Canadian Politics Today

I'm about to say something that I hope doesn't come off as lecturing, or telling Canadians what to do with their own government. I'm just throwing an idea out for your consideration, take it or leave it.

If I understand correctly the Queen may be the head of state in theory, but in reality the duties of the Crown in Canada are exercised by the governor-general. The "recommendation" of the GG is made by the prime minister, so the actual day to day head of state is therefore an appointee of the head of government. This is actually a no-no in parliamentary democracy, where the head of state is supposed to be apolitical and detached from the government of the day.

An elected, independent president--chosen by the People directly (as in Ireland), or by an electoral college (as in Germany) or by the Parliament as a whole (as in Barbados)--would have a better standing as the last line of defense again an abusive government. Don't forget what happened to Sir John Kerr in Australia, in 1975. After his intervention in the constitutional crisis, he received death threats, resigned before his term was up, and spent most of the rest of his life outside of Australia. Thus, governors general of Australia since then, and in the future, will be afraid to intervene like that, because of what happened to GG Kerr. If Kerr had been chosen by the People of Australia in a special election, he might have stood a better chance of getting away with firing the Gough Whitlam government because he'd have had the popular authority to make such a rare and critical intervention.

Is a GG of Canada really a constitutional protection in the slightest way? IMO, the British monarch is fine---in Britain itself. But in the Commonwealth Realms outside of the UK, she's entirely symbolic, since the real head of state is the GG and he or she is in fact picked by prime ministerial fiat, not by royal primogeniture. She's on the money and the stamps, in Commonwealth realms, but (again, IMO) it doesn't go much further than that. What was intended as a "constitutional fire extinguisher" is in fact completely powerless to stop the excesses and abuses of the in situ government since they lack the popular support and moral authority necessary for such rare interventions, being little more than yet another prime ministerial appointee.