[Brandon716]

Yea, Dion should go into the summer and trigger an election on immigration. It would generate enthusiasm among urban liberal voters who have lots of immigration ties, and its best to risk an election now than to waste precious time on a carbon tax and green proposals when the base would pay more attention to current conservative scandal and immigration.

June 16th sounds like a great date for the Liberals to run a competent campaign and win back either a minority or even a surprise majority.

 

[Observer Walt]

Dion just can't seem to buy a break. You have to feel sorry for him. Just when the polls show him on a small upswing (a couple of points, but I'm sure he'll take what he can get), the RCMP go and arrest another person in Montreal regarding the sponsorship scandal.

As for Quebec, it's my understanding that Dion is deeply disrespected there. The Bloc is losing some support, but off Montreal Island it will go to the Conservatives, not the Liberals.

I'll repeat what I have been saying for some time ... no election until fall 2008 at the earliest, and more likely 2009. None of the parties has anything much to gain from an election right now.

 

[Brandon716]

The RCMP has been playing politics ever since they released an investigation into the Liberal party before the last election in 2006, so yes I do feel sorry for Dion.

Remember the RCMP bringing out Ralph Goodale and some other prominent Liberals out just before the 2006 election with the income trust "scandal" that never went anywhere?

No wrongdoing was ever really found, they just released an investigation quite publicly days before a federal election.

Apparently the RCMP loves playing politics.

The income trust affair was the singular reason the Paul Martin government lost, not sponsorship. Canadians were polling as if they were willing to give the Liberlas another minority government before the RCMP got involved and "investigated" something that went nowhere and was quickly dropped after the election.


Well, it was that, and the Liberals ran a relatively bad campaign. What was Paul Martin doing focusing on the notwithstanding clause in the debates of the last election?

Dion should tighten down his federalist words for the sake of Quebec, and forge forward with all the latest Conservative scandal and fight into a June election. He'd be surprised how well the results will be in his favor if he does so. Canadians aren't going to vote Liberal for a well meaning, well positioned argument on a carbon tax. They have to think there's a reason to vote against the Conservatives and the left has to build a consensus. The Liberals have to take back seats from the NDP and the Conservatives, and gain just a few in Quebec. A green carbon tax issue isn't going to build that consensus, even though the policy is well intentioned.

 

[Payback]

What's the likelihood of the NDP becoming the lead opposition party ahead of the Liberals? For all the mudkraking against Harper they can't seem to find one damning thing his administration's done SINCE elected into office- only dredge up some scandal from 17 years ago and an alledged bribing for good life insurance. Seriously are these grounds to call an election on? I'd like to know what the Conservatives have astronomically done wrong since Jan '06?

 

[afransen]

What's the likelihood of the NDP becoming the lead opposition party ahead of the Liberals? For all the mudkraking against Harper they can't seem to find one damning thing his administration's done SINCE elected into office- only dredge up some scandal from 17 years ago and an alledged bribing for good life insurance. Seriously are these grounds to call an election on? I'd like to know what the Conservatives have astronomically done wrong since Jan '06?

The circumvented Canadian election laws by overspending in the last election. They offered a dying man a million dollars for his vote in Parliament. He has operated a government of secrecy, duplicity, and dishonesty despite promising an era of accountability and honesty in government. That is, he lied. Blatantly.

 

[unimaginative2]

What's the likelihood of the NDP becoming the lead opposition party ahead of the Liberals?

Haha. Uh, zero.
Well, I guess the Liberals could spontaneously decide not to run any candidates.

 

[Brandon716]

Haha. Uh, zero.
Well, I guess the Liberals could spontaneously decide not to run any candidates.

No no... A Liberal majority government with an official NDP opposition, now that's a healthy Canada!

 

[Observer Walt]

No no... A Liberal majority government with an official NDP opposition, now that's a healthy Canada!

I'm not sure if it's a "healthy Canada" (very much open to debate), but it's quite unlikely. Where do you foresee all those NDP seats coming from? For that matter, where do you foresee all those Liberal seats coming from?

The NDP have probably gone about as high as they are going to go. For all of Jack Layton's talk, I can't really believe he is that eager for an election. He's not sitting in a bad position, at present. The Liberals have a huge amount of fence-mending to do, particularly in Quebec where we keep hearing that their "on the ground" organization is almost non-existent outside of Montreal and suburbs. The Conservatives seem to be pretty much holding their existing support, but they don't exactly seem to be finding much growth.

Other people on this forum follow these things more closely than I do, and are better at "calling" seats. Having said that, I see, if an election were held now: little or no change in Atlantic provinces, perhaps 3 - 5 seats going from the Bloc to the Liberals in Montreal and perhaps 3 - 5 seats from the Bloc to the Conservatives in the Quebec City area and more rural parts of Quebec; and very little change in Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, or Alberta.

The big battleground might be B.C., the only province where all three parties have realistic chances to win in many of the seats. Bottom line: a little shuffling back and forth but an overall end result not much different from what we have now.

 

[allabootmatt]

The continuing failure of the NDP to re-invent itself is one of the puzzling things about Canadian politics. I guess the Liberals cover a lot of the territory which would be claimed by some of the possible role models (New Labour and the German SPD, for ex) but surely there's a route to greater power for the Dippers, given that on any number of issues Canadians' values tend to line up with their positions, or so it seems.

 

[Brandon716]

I'm not sure if it's a "healthy Canada" (very much open to debate), but it's quite unlikely. Where do you foresee all those NDP seats coming from? For that matter, where do you foresee all those Liberal seats coming from?

It was all in good humor, I know there won't be a Liberal majority with an NDP opposition goverment.

 

[unimaginative2]

I think a minority is definitely the most likely outcome here, with a majority on either side being highly unlikely but conceivable. If Dion and the Bloc both run an abysmal campaign, Harper would have a chance. He'd have to make major gains in Quebec, defend his gains in Ontario, and win additional seats here too. That's a pretty tall order, especially when considering his lack of policies to attract urban and suburban Ontario voters.

Interestingly enough, the most recent polls show the Liberals at 50%, which is about what they were at during the Chretien years when they won every seat. Most of those votes are coming from the NDP, which couuld swing a huge number of ridings away from the Conservatives through reduced vote splitting. I don't think 90s-style sweeps are in the cards, mind you, but the Liberals could make significant gains. Right now, the Liberals and Tories are more-or-less tied in the polls, in the low 30s. Unfortunately for the Tories, their declines have been disproportionately in Ontario. They're retaining their supermajorities in Alberta, but many seats over here could be at risk. Their rise in Quebec also seems to be stalled.

If you plug the most recent couple polls (Nanos, Harris/Decima) into the Election Forecaster, you get some pretty interesting results. Major gains for the Liberals in B.C. and Ontario, minor gains for the Tories and Liberals in Quebec, and minor gains for the Tories on the Praries (there's not much more for them to gain!). It projects, from the raw numbers, a total wipeout for the NDP in Ontario, but that's certainly not going to happen. That may be even worse news for the Tories: contrary to the NDP's rationalizations behind disappointing results in the 2004 election, people in Downtown Toronto ridings are smart enough to know they don't have to vote strategically since the Tories have no chance. That means that most of the NDP voters in Downtown Toronto and the other NDP seats will remain NDP, while a lot of NDP voters in no-hope suburban, rural, and mid-sized city seats are swinging to the Liberals in order to defeat Harper.

 

[Brandon716]

Wow, those are the only hard evidence national polls with regional details I've seen for some time.

50% in Ontario and 51% in Atlantic Canada is good enough to call an election, when your base is that strongly behind you its something you should go with.

 

[King of Kensington]

I think there was a temporary blip with the Lukiwski comments and the Tories getting flak in the press. This Environics poll shows things back to business as usual (I wouldn't really put much stock in regional breakdowns, save Ontario, due to small sample sizes and CROP polls - with samples of 1,000 voters - are the best for Quebec). But Dion's very low personal popularity presents a problem for the Libs, and this may explain Dion's unwillingness to take on the Tories. The Liberal "brand" is much stronger than the Liberal Party led by Stephane Dion. While being the Prime Minister naturally makes one seem more prime ministerial, Dion's 13% is very, very bad and in an actual campaign the party could be in big trouble.

http://erg.environics.net/media_room/default.asp?aID=672

I'm wary though of these Green numbers. A lot of vote-parking there. Much of that 12% is open for grabs from the Libs and NDP, I don't Harper would get much of the Green leaners. I also think May's chances of winning Central Nova are pretty slim.

 

[unimaginative2]

I don't think polls would say anything about the chances of Elizabeth May winning in her riding. Considering that she's the leader of the party and there's no Liberal candidate, her support will likely have little or no relationship to the Green vote across the region. Many Liberal voters in that riding would likely identify themselves as Liberal in a poll, but would vote Green at election time.

Note that the NDP's decline in Atlantic Canada is outside the margin of error.

 

[Brandon716]

Here's for some humor, it would be a great real Conservative ad.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dI4anDo967A