Angus Reid, a well-respected pollster and sociologist, when asked this week what he thought the top election issue in B.C. was, said “trust.”
Who do you trust, who can you trust, what promises made will be kept, and why do candidates deserve your trust? All good questions, and all for the most part involve very personal judgments.
As a media source, we provide as many news stories, candidate question-and-answers and opinion pieces as we can produce and fit in during a pretty short campaign.
It’s never as much as we’d like to publish or put on our website, but we think it offers readers a solid local starting point. (If you’ve missed any of our candidate questionnaires, riding profiles and special reports, go to www.burnabynow.com and click on our Election 2017 tab.)
And if you’re looking for our endorsement of candidates or a party, you won’t find it anywhere. We don’t endorse candidates as other newspapers do or have done. We think it’s a bit arrogant to assume we either know what’s best for you or have some special, superior knowledge that gives us that right.
We simply trust in our readers to try to make sense of it all, take time to consider what kind of a province they want to live in and vote for the candidate or party that best reflects their vision.
What one voter may believe is a key issue may be something another voter doesn’t give a hoot about. Some people vote the party, others vote the candidate. Some, unfortunately, don’t even bother to vote. To those folks we say, as we always do: don’t whine and complain later if you can’t be bothered to get out once every four years and mark a ballot.
This is an important election. They all are. Whatever the pollsters may try to tell you, the results are not a foregone conclusion.
By all accounts, this election could go almost any way in at least a couple of Burnaby ridings. This may be one of those elections where a very small number of votes will determine the winner – or loser. Your vote counts.
So whether you are determining who to vote for based on trust or what party’s policy is dear to you, exercise your democratic right. And, at the very least, trust your own thinking.
At least then you only have yourself to blame if you’ve picked the wrong candidate.
