PLCY 110 Lecture 16: October 27, 2016: Reading Notes

The 2016 presidential election at times felt like a mockery of democracy, where the internal problems and manipulation of both the Republican and Democrat Parties led to the nomination of two vastly disliked candidates. This in turn made the election in which we are supposed to be excited to vote for the better candidate into an election where many were forced to pick between the lesser of two evils without truly supporting them. With the Democratic Party greatly underestimating the dislike for Hillary Clinton and the silent majority becoming a huge of part of this election, Donald Trump ultimately got enough electoral votes to secure the presidency.

With the inauguration of Donald trump as the 45^th president of the United States, many issues have arisen; while some are content with him as our president there is a large majority of people who oppose him. Among the issues surrounding his presidency are issues that will drastically affect the young generation, issues of human rights, climate change, threat of war, and growing prejudice. I believe because of the uncertainty behind his presidency and just from his first week office, one of the most prominent issues we will face will be as a result of the 2016 presidential election. Already a Muslim ban for some countries have spark nation-wide outrage, and due to some of his executive actions many countries have been forced to react to them. Fear is growing and people are more divided.

whats your opinion about this topic, do you agree ?

Discuss the following:

Climate change policy in Ontario

• New provincial government ends carbon pricing policy

• New plan to reduce emissions out for public consultation

• Min. of Environment ruled out carbon pricing (towards the end of article)

• Province believes it is not an effective way to change behavior:

“We are out talking to people about the approach we're going to take… That approach won't include a carbon price. But we do, for example, plan, as we said during the election, to have an emissions-reductions fund to fight climate change.”

“We are focusing on the polluters, in terms of people producing the most emissions, not on individual families and people.”

• Besides carbon pricing (either through tax or cap-and-trade), what other options does the province have?

• In light of the above quotes, how might these policies perform?