Ontario undergrad tuition fees, analyzed

D - the devil is in the details.

If gov't funding was basically frozen for 3 years, and tuitions were hiked in reaction, then where does that leave the Ontario Liberals with their promise of a tuition grant?

Certainly, Ontarians seem to pay more than the rest of Canada.

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http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/abysmal-youth-vote-prompts-call-for-a-remedial-strategy/article2248509/?utm_medium=Feeds%3A%20RSS%2FAtom&utm_source=Politics&utm_content=2248509

But the voter participation rate of people between the ages of 18 and 24 rose from 37.4 per cent in 2008 to an only slightly less abysmal 38.8 per cent in 2011. Among Canadians between the ages of 24 and 34, it actually dropped from 47.9 per cent to 45.1 per cent.

D - the very young adult vote spike can be attributed to the awareness-raising of the leadnow.ca group.

Leadnow.ca is an independent advocacy organization that brings generations of Canadians together to achieve progress through democracy.

We're working together to build a stronger democracy that protects our environment, creates economic opportunity while increasing equality, and guarantees that everyone receives the care they need.

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D - the Federal Liberals have been decimated. Whether they can reinvent themselves remains to be seen. But what is clear is they've lost their core supporters. So what to do?

Well, the voters are old and white. The disengaged are more young and multicultural.

There are sufficient young adults disengaged from the political process to form the basis for a reinvented Federal Liberal Party.

There is still some discussion about merging the centre and left into one super-party, much like the Conservatives and Reforms did to the left. Honestly, the sheer grassroots fund-raising of the new Conservative Party is such that we won't see any other party win a federal election for a very long time.

The Federal Liberals have been in an intellectual coma for at least 2 terms. Paralyzed by the fear of right-wing attack ads, they became petrified at the idea of introducing new platform planks. So they went obsolete. The # of times I saw how to hit the Conservatives on some terrible policy or person in charge, and watched the Liberals do nothing, well I cannot count it on my fingers. The Liberals don't deserve to be even the opposition- they have not been a functioning party for quite some time.

The youth vote would lead to uncharted territory for federal politics. There has always been a right leaning tendency in ageing and well-established voters. But this trend has never been quite so clearcut before. For the Liberals to adopt policies with intergenerational sustainability in mind would essentially create a age-based generation us-and-them dynamic in federal politics.