I was waiting for the first post-O'Leary withdrawal polling to come out to complete my ballot. Seems like we now have that data although it'll be spelled out more clearly tomorrow.
Bernier is the clear front-runner. Scheer is the stopper candidate. O'Toole is who I'm backing to win because others like Chong or Raitt don't seem to have a chance... BUT they're easy to vote for because they'll likely have dropped from the race BEFORE O'Toole does given his status.
So my completed ballot will be...
1) Erin O'Toole
2) Lisa Raitt
3) Andrew Saxton
4) Michael Chong
5) Andrew Scheer
The vote for Scheer at the bottom of our ballots is important because it will count against Bernier and Leitch should everyone else drop off and the ballot won't be completely spoiled. Unless, of course, you're fine with Bernier winning. I'm not because it forces me to vote Trudeau in 2019 and I can't hold him accountable for squat should I choose to do so. But others might be fine with that end result should you consider Bernier an auto-win for the Liberals and you're happy with that.
I might even throw Bernier down there in 6th on the off-chance that Leitch's pull is stronger than we all realize as it would at least weigh my ballot in his favor over her should the race be narrowed down to those two individuals.
I think including both O'Toole and Scheer is the safe thing to do. I think it's significantly more likely that it comes down to Bernier versus one of them than we get a final of Bernier vs. Leitch. I know you can't look at it totally logically, but Leitch's probable down-ballot support would come from the people who vote for Brad Trost, Pierre Lemieux, and Steven Blaney -- all total non-contenders. I think she'll get a bit of a post-O'Leary bump, but that's not going to be enough to make her a viable contender. She'll have a decent showing on the first ballot (I'll guess a very close third place, with around 18-20%), but her room for growth is pretty limited, even assuming that many of her voters are too shy to admit to pollsters that they support her.
Of course, if you're rooting for chaos (rather than rooting for an Official Opposition that isn't run by crazy people), Bernier vs. Leitch would be pretty interesting. Most of caucus support has gone to O'Toole and Scheer, and a lot of those MPs and Senators have made it clear they wouldn't support either Bernier and Leitch. The small CPC Quebec caucus have pointedly refused to endorse Bernier, and I think all the other leadership candidates have insulted Leitch. If it's Bernier or Leitch, I could imagine the CPC -- at least in Parliament -- splitting,
Democratic Representative Caucus-style. From a partisan Liberal point of view, that would be amazing to see, but as someone who wants our democracy to continue to function, I'd hope that it doesn't.
You're just doing 5?
Right now I have Chong, O'Toole, and Raitt. I don't know who Saxton or Scheer are, but I could rank them 4-5 since I don't really know any of them other than Obhrai for being a bit of a goofball. And Bernier I suppose. lol
Scheer is basically a blander version of Stephen Harper, while, as UberTag explained, Saxton is the most generic businessman Conservative imaginable. He's a former MP, and he has no chance of winning.
And Obhrai is a goofball, but he's got better policy ideas than most of the other candidates. Plus, throwing him a vote is implicitly sticking it to the racist wing of the CPC.