The Rhinos are Back!

And now, there's a new "neo Rhino" party too.

Via the Globe and Mail: (h/t penlan)

Their reappearance aims to revive a party that helped enliven politics from 1963 to 1988 with an absurdist take on Canadian affairs. The party says it picked a rhino as its mascot since, like politicians, the animal is thick-skinned, slow-moving and dim-witted. Among its planks was flattening the Rockies, banning guns and butter since both killed, and improving higher education by building taller schools.

Behind their latest antics, however, they say they're drawing attention to some serious issues. Mr. Salmi says the $1,000 deposit required by the federal Elections Act is a deterrent for lower-income Canadians, and violates the Charter.

"It's a de facto economic means test that discriminates against the poor," said Mr. Salmi, a Montreal resident who has sought office on nine previous occasions, several of them in British Columbia. (Mr. Salmi has legally changed his name to Sa Tan, so his challenge in Federal Court reads Sa Tan against Her Majesty The Queen.)

The Rhinoceros Party last ran in a general federal election in 1988, fielding 74 candidates. None was elected, and the nascent groups say they're intent on matching that abysmal performance.
[...]

What they've promised

A dam on the St. Lawrence to make Montreal the Venice of North America;

A tax on milk to finance the appointment of Rhino followers to a new Ontario senate;

A 400-kilometre fishing limit to be drawn offshore in watercolour, to make sure the fish could see it and stay inside the Canadian boundary;

A Guaranteed Annual Orgasm through a network of regulated brothels;

To repeal the law of gravity (promised by Rhinos in 1984);

A proposal for free trade with the United States: "Trade Frank Zappa for Pierre Berton, Kermit the Frog for Lorne Greene, and we were prepared to put Anne Murray on the bargaining table."

See wiki for more.

The Rhino Party also declared that, should they somehow actually win an election, they would immediately dissolve and force a second election.

Michel Rivard once went on TV (during free air time given to political parties) and stated: "I have but two things to say to you: Celery and Sidewalk. Thank you, good night."

A British Columbia splinter group proposed running a professional dominatrix for the position of party whip, renaming "British Columbia" to "La La Land", moving the provincial capital, and merging with the Progressive Conservative Party so as "not to split the silly vote."

I don't know about you but I know who I'm voting for now when the next election rolls around.