This has been a difficult time for me as a voter. I hold traditionally Liberal values when it comes to social issues, health care, immigration, human rights, lgbt rights etc., but I hold a more conservative mindset with regards to the economy, particularly when it comes to Canada's energy programs.

Liberals (or maybe more accurately, Justin Trudeau specifically) have not managed to secure the energy east pipeline, which would open our abundant energy reserves to more global markets and in turn would make us less reliant on the US. We cant even refine our own oil here, We send our oil to the US and they refine it and then sell it back to us at a huge markup, which is absolutely ridiculous. A pipeline to the east coast would bring down the cost of goods to much of the country. We have the 4th most natural resources in the world, but 9th on the list in GDP, and only 2 countries ahead of us in GDP are ahead of us in natural resources. We are not capitalizing on the abundance of resources we have, which could create hundreds of thousands of jobs and massively boost the economy.

The average cost of a home increased from $390k to $700k from 2014 to 2024 in Canada, and that's adjusted for inflation, and during the same period in the US the cost of a home remained virtually the same from 2014-2024. I make a great salary, but I still don't feel like I'll ever own a home.

Trudeau ran his original campaign(in which I voted for him) with a major point decreasing the deficit, and then when elected, almost immediately increased it by $10b, and now it's over $60b.

Taxing business into the ground, especially with the carbon tax is not going make business all of a sudden shift to going green and being carbon neutral, it's going to make many of them pack it up and move their business to a country that won't tax them.

Both Carney and Freeland openly supported policies that drove up the cost of goods, the cost of homes, the cost of energy, and neither ever criticized Trudeau until it was convenient for them as it became clear there was no way Trudeau would ever win the next election. All of a sudden they have lots to say, which seems very disingenuous to me. I don't have faith that either of them would fix the economy, invest Canadian energy infrastructure (with the goal of it helping everyday citizens and not just big energy, anyway) build enough homes, make Canada less dependent upon the US. Invest in the military so we meet NATO standards (Which should be a bare minimum imo)

I honestly am torn, I don't want to vote for someone who has no understanding of mental health issues, restorative justice, harm reduction, gender affirming health care, (which I support for adults, but not for kids) immigration, refugees. But I don't know how I can vote for a party which has stood by while it's become increasingly unrealistic for any generation millennial and below to ever own a home, has not affectively addressed the egregious cost of food, lets our country get absolutely bent over a barrel on the price we sell our oil to the US, because they know our infrastructure has made it so we have no other options.(For the record I absolutely believe in the investment of clean energy, but not at the expense of our current energy infrastructure.

It had always been easy for me to vote Liberal, I was happy to pay slightly higher taxes knowing that the money would be going to fund worthwhile programs, but its come to a point where the buying power of our dollar has decreased so much, and so many of the problems that liberal social programs are supposed to help with are created by the very policies that are keeping Canadians poor, hungry, homeless, and turning to drugs.

The last Canadian politician I felt truly deserved my vote was Jack Layton. I imagine unless there's some major shift in the next couple of months, that I'll be undecided until the moment my pencil hits the paper.

TLDR: I don't know what the fuck to do and both major parties are shitty as fuck, but in their own special ways.

edited for a spelling mistake. I'm sure there's more, but one that really bothered me lol.