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[maharg]

NM

 

[diaspora]

The 50-64 demo's voter intention skews ridiculously liberal. Comparing to the university demographic's voter intention, the 50-64 group votes more liberal, about the same for the NDP, and slightly lower for tory. Honestly I find that really interesting. College students seem to have a heavier conservative lean.

 

[maharg]

18-34 includes quite a bit more than college students. And it almost certainly includes quite a few people directly affected by the oil downturn, particularly in the prairies (the 'youngest' provinces).

 

[diaspora]

18-34 includes quite a bit more than college students. And it almost certainly includes quite a few people directly affected by the oil downturn, particularly in the prairies (the 'youngest' provinces).

I'm looking at the University and college age brackets too. Where they've both got a heavier conservative lean.

 

[maharg]

Ah, I see. Took me a while to find the link to the whole thing.

Those are, afaik, university and college *educated*, not people currently attending those levels. I think that lean has actually been a pretty common thing historically, actually. See for example this one during the election where CPC support was higher in that demo: http://www.ekospolitics.com/index.p...ves-now-find-themselves-in-a-statistical-tie/ and before the election as well: http://www.ekospolitics.com/index.php/2015/05/a-new-normal/

So what seems to have actually happened there is that NDP support cratering has driven the Liberals up to competitive with the CPC among college educated people.

 

[potatohead]

That must just be eating conservatives from the inside out.

FOX is literally afraid of him, too scared to report on him because he is too pretty and a Liberal in name and in policy.

 

[diaspora]

Possibly, I don't see anything clarifying either way though.

 

[maharg]

About whether it's an age demographic? At least one of the previous Ekos polls I linked explicitly says "College Educated", and Frank Graves has talked about that demo in those terms ("X educated") on his twitter. My afaik is hedging a bit, but only a very small bit.

 

[diaspora]

Fair enough. Though the heavy Liberal/Tory ratio in the 50-64 bracket could probably be attributed to most of those voters being fans of his during his father's political domination period.

 

[Sean C]

Abacus released their CPC leadership polling, and wow at those Kevin O'Leary numbers:

Maxime Bernier's net numbers being the worst of the lot kind of surprise me. Sure, he had that embarrassment that got him knocked from cabinet some years ago, but I'd be surprised if most voters remember that.

Those BC numbers for the Liberals are crazy high, and really bad for the NDP, considering BC was actually the major bright spot for them last election (they gained seats overall).

 

[Stumpokapow]

One does wonder if there's value in asking self-identified NDP supporters what would make them more or less likely to vote Conservative given that the baseline is that they are 0% likely to vote Conservative.

 

[matthewwhatever]

Ah, I see. Took me a while to find the link to the whole thing.

Those are, afaik, university and college *educated*, not people currently attending those levels. I think that lean has actually been a pretty common thing historically, actually. See for example this one during the election where CPC support was higher in that demo: http://www.ekospolitics.com/index.p...ves-now-find-themselves-in-a-statistical-tie/ and before the election as well: http://www.ekospolitics.com/index.php/2015/05/a-new-normal/

So what seems to have actually happened there is that NDP support cratering has driven the Liberals up to competitive with the CPC among college educated people.

About whether it's an age demographic? At least one of the previous Ekos polls I linked explicitly says "College Educated", and Frank Graves has talked about that demo in those terms ("X educated") on his twitter. My afaik is hedging a bit, but only a very small bit.

I'm almost certain you're right that it's highest level of education achieved, not people currently. There'd be no reason to break it down into age groups, and then get so specific for 18-22-year-olds. And thinking even further, they wouldn't even be polling high school students. So...yeah, it has to be education completed, not what they're currently doing.

I'm not sure how historically common it is for them to do so poorly amongst the young and the university-educated. That May 2015 poll you posted has them doing best with those groups, and even at other times when they were in third place -- i.e. October 2013 -- their support in the young/University-educated demographics still outpaced what they were getting from everywhere else.

The counterpoint to that would be, say, December 2010, when they were only a few points higher than they are now, at 14%: their numbers were just as in the tank with those demographics as they were with everyone else. All of which is to say, I guess, that if you're doing bad everywhere, there's not a lot in the way of silver linings. (Also, that poll is crazy: the Greens were cleaning up with the under-25 set!)

One does wonder if there's value in asking self-identified NDP supporters what would make them more or less likely to vote Conservative given that the baseline is that they are 0% likely to vote Conservative.

I don't think there's 0% overlap between potential CPC voters and potential NDP voters. It's obviously not a huge number, but our ideological/party alignments aren't quite as set in stone as you're suggesting. The Reform Party was built in part on the back of the NDP back in the early '90s -- just look at how many NDP ridings went Reform in the 1993 election. Or, more recently, look at last year's Alberta election -- while there were all kinds of factors at play there (immigration, PC/Wildrose vote-splitting, the Alberta Liberals tanking, etc.), they wouldn't have won a majority without some help from Conservative voters changing their habits. I think we're getting a little more rigid than we use to be, but -- especially if we move to ranked ballots -- there's value in seeing party preferences.

Maxime Bernier's net numbers being the worst of the lot kind of surprise me. Sure, he had that embarrassment that got him knocked from cabinet some years ago, but I'd be surprised if most voters remember that.

It's all kind of baffling. Kellie Leitch turning off more voters than Kevin O'Leary? Jason Kenney being less of a turn-off than anyone not named Peter Mackay? Michael Chong -- beloved by the media for his relative centrism and his interest in reducing the power of the PMO -- with a -8? Like you said, it's a long ways out, so a lot of it's name recognition at this point, but...I don't know. It's weird.

 

[maharg]

There are absolutely NDP/Reform+CPC switchers. Not as many as there used to be, and fewer at the federal level than provincial, but they definitely exist. People are far too quick to discount populism as an independent axis in Canadian politics.

 

[TheRealTalker]

So the Saudis just announced that they are planning a 2 trillion dollar post oil megafund and also selling shares of Aramco

staring in 2018 or even earlier

I mean if that doesn't ring any bells for oilsand obsessed Albertans Idk man

 

[Sean C]

There are absolutely NDP/Reform+CPC switchers. Not as many as there used to be, and fewer at the federal level than provincial, but they definitely exist. People are far too quick to discount populism as an independent axis in Canadian politics.

Under Layton and Mulcair the NDP fairly pronouncedly moved away from the earlier Douglas-style populism (though in truth, changes in ideology were already making that much less fertile terrain) toward a more urbanite leftism. The main exceptions tend to be in areas of the rural west (and now Quebec) where the NDP were long the main alternative to the Tories rather than the Liberals.

 

[gutter_trash]

Bernier's numbers don't suprise me, he is too Libertarian for the liking of the Reform Party overlords in the CPC

 

[Sean C]

The federal election was months ago, but I was looking over the riding results tonight to analyze the parties strongest areas. For the Liberals and Tories, I picked the ridings where they got over 60% of the vote. In the Tories' case, these are particularly significant since 2015 was a bad year for them.

Liberal ridings >60%
1. Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL (Judy Foote, 81.8%)
2. Cape Breton—Canso, NS (Rodger Cuzner, 74.39%)
3. Long Range Mountains, NL (Gudie Hutchings, 73.85%)
4. Sydney—Victoria, NS (Mark Eyking, 73.24%)
5. Labrador, NL (Yvonne Jones, 71.75%)
6. Kings—Hants, NS (Scott Brison, 70.74%)
7. Beausejour, NB (Dominic LeBlanc, 69.09%)
8. Winnipeg North, MB (Kevin Lamoureux, 68.9%)
9. Halifax West, NS (Geoff Regan, 68.65%)
10. Humber River—Black Creek (Judy Sgro, 66.91%)
11. Cardigan, PEI (Lawrence MacAulay, 65.03%)
12. Saint-Leonard—Saint-Michel, QC (Nicola Di Iorio, 64.73%)
13. Lac-Saint-Louis, QC (Francis Scarpaleggia, 64.14%)
14. Cumberland—Colchester, NS (Bill Casey, 63.73%)
15. West Nova, NS (Colin Fraser, 62.99%)
16. Etobicoke North, ON (Kirsty Duncan, 62.41%)
17. Malpeque, PEI (Wayne Easter, 62.08%)
18. Saint-Laurent, QC (Stephane Dion, 61.75%)
19. Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON (Gary Anandasangaree, 60.24%)
20. Ottawa South, ON (David McGuinty, 60.06%)
21. Scarborough—Guildwood, ON (John McKay, 60.04%)

Conservative ridings >60%
1. Battle River—Crowfoot, AB (Kevin Sorenson, 80.91%)
2. Bow River, AB (Martin Shields, 77.42%)
3. Foothills, AB (John Barlow, 75.7%)
4. Red Deer—Mountain View, AB (Earl Dreeshen, 74.33%)
5. Grande Prairie—Mackenzie, AB (Chris Warkentin, 72.91%)
6. Lakeland, AB (Shannon Stubbs, 72.81%)
7. Yellowhead, AB (Jim Eglinski, 72.25%)
8. Red Deer—Lacombe, AB (Blaine Calkins, 70.71%)
9. Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB (Rona Ambrose, 70.23%)
10. Souris—Moose Mountain, SK (Robert G. Kitchen, 70.14%)
11. Peace River—Westlock, AB (Arnold Viersen, 69.35%)
12. Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK (David Anderson, 69.19%)
13. Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB (Jim Hillyer, 68.8%)
14. Calgary Midnapore, AB (Jason Kenney, 66.73%)
15. Calgary Shepard, AB (Tom Kmiec, 65.87%)
16. Edmonton—Wetaskiwin, AB (Mike Lake, 65.77%)
17. Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK (Kelly Block, 64.72%)
18. Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB (Garnett Genius, 63.94%)
19. Calgary Heritage, AB (Stephen Harper, 63.77%)
20. Banff—Airdrie, AB (Blake Richards, 63.37%)
21. Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK (Gerry Ritz, 61.01%)
22. Portage—Lisgar, MB (Candice Bergen, 60.84%)
23. Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB (David Yurdiga, 60.56%)
24. Calgary Signal Hill, AB (Ron Liepert, 60.55%)
25. Calgary Roky Ridge, AB (Pat Kelly, 60.4%)
26. Calgary Nose Hill, AB (Michelle Rempel, 60.04%)

For the NDP and the Bloc, I lowered the bar to ridings where they got above 40%, since they're smaller parties.

NDP ridings >40%
1. Windsor West, ON (Brian Masse, 51.35%)
2. Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC (Nathan Cullen, 51.08%)
3. Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC (Alexandre Boulerice, 49.15%)
4. Hamilton Centre, ON (David Christopherson, 45.56%)
5. Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB (Niki Ashton, 45.04%)
6. Outremont, QC (Thomas Mulcair, 44.11%)
7. Edmonton Strathcona, AB (Linda Duncan, 43.96%)
8. Windsor—Tecumseh, ON (Cheryl Hardcastle, 43.52%)
9. Rimouski-Neigette—Temiscouata—Les Basques, QC (Guy Caron, 43.11%)
10. Timmins—James Bay, ON (Charlie Angus, 42.86%)
11. Berthier—Maskinonge, QC (Ruth Ellen Brosseau, 42.17%)
12. Abitibi—Temisamingue, QC (Christine Moore, 41.5%)
13. Essex, ON (Tracey Ramsey, 41.42%)

Bloc Quebecois >40%
1. Manicouagan, QC (Marilene Gill, 41.25%)

And finally, going over the Quebec results, some of which were astonishingly small winning percentage, led to my compiling a list of all the ridings where the winner got less than 35% of the vote.

Winner <35%:
1. Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Vercheres, QC – Xavier Barsalou-Duval (BQ), 28.64%
2. Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC – Brigitte Sansoucy (NDP), 28.65%
3. Quebec, QC – Jean-Yves Duclos (LPC), 28.9%
4. Montmagny—L’Islet—Kamouraska—Riviere-du-Loup, QC – Bernard Genereux (CPC), 28.99%
5. Jonquiere, QC – Karine Trudel (NDP), 29.19%
6. Salaberry—Suroit, QC – Anne Minh-Thu Quach (NDP), 30.43%
7. Drummond, QC – Francois Choquette (NDP), 30.46%
8. Beauport—Limoilou, QC – Alupa Clarke (CPC), 30.58%
9. Hochelaga, QC – Marjolaine Boutin-Sweet (NDP), 30.89%
10. Beloeil—Chambly, QC – Matthew Dube (NDP), 31.07%
11. Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC – Denis Lemieux (LPC), 31.09%
12. Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC – Pierre Nantel (NDP), 31.22%
13. Mirabel, QC – Simon Marcil (BQ), 31.49%
14. Richmond—Arthabaska, QC – Alain Rayes (CPC), 31.57%
15. Trois-Rivieres, QC – Robert Aubin (NDP), 31.83%
16. Riviere-du-Nord, QC – Rheal Fortin (BQ), 32.05%
17. Therese-De-Blainville, QC – Ramez Ayoub (LPC), 32.5%
18. Laurentides—Labelle, QC – David Graham (LPC), 32.1%
19. Riviere-des-Mille-Iles, QC – Linda Lapointe (LPC), 32.37%
20. Montarville, QC – Michel Picard (LPC), 32.54%
21. Terrebonne, QC – Michel Boudrias (BQ), 33.01%
22. Saint-Jean, QC – Jean Rioux (LPC), 33.16%
23. Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC – Sheila Malcolmson (NDP), 33.2%
24. Lac-Saint-Jean – Denis LeBel (CPC), 33.27%
25. Joliette, QC – Gabriel Ste-Marie (BQ), 33.3%
26. Beauport—Cote-de-Beaupre—Ile d’Orleans—Charlevoix, QC – Sylvie Boucher (CPC), 33.5%
27. La Pointe-de-L’Ile, QC – Mario Beaulieu (BQ), 33.58%
28. Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC – Dan Ruimy (LPC), 33.89%
29. Elmwood—Transcona, MB – Daniel Blaikie (NDP), 34.14%
30. Desnethe—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK – Georgina Jolibois (NDP), 34.15%
31. Repentigny, QC – Monique Pauze (BQ), 34.68%
32. Louis-Hebert, QC – Joel Lightbound (LPC), 34.85%

7 of the 10 Bloc MPs are on this list.

 

[Tapejara]

Bell/CRTC shenanigans:

I just got this e-mail from my ISP:

Dear Tapejara,

My name is Matt Stein, and I'm the CEO of Distributel. I’m sending a note to all Distributel customers today about our company's support of fair competitive practices for telecommunications services in Canada. Without competitive providers for telecommunications, you would not have the choice of services that you enjoy today from Distributel.

After nearly 3 years of review and debate, the CRTC (Canada's federal regulator of telecom services) has ruled in favour of open competition for telecommunications, which would ensure affordable access to new technologies for Canadian consumers, such as fibre-to-the-home. This CRTC decision is now being challenged by Bell Canada. We agree with the CRTC's decision and feel that it is in the best interest of you, the consumer. We ask you to consider sharing your voice if you think Bell's appeal is as wrong as we do.

If you want to read about the details of this issue and add your opinion, OpenMedia has an independent consumer advocacy campaign that you can find at: https://act.openmedia.org/emergency. OpenMedia is not tied in any way to Distributel, but we support their actions, as they put a lot of effort into lobbying on behalf of consumers to keep telecom services competitive.

Distributel will always work to provide our customers with the best value for service in the marketplace, at prices that make sense, and we will fight for your access to the most progressive Internet services.

Over 66,000 Canadians have already voiced their opinion on this issue, so if you join in now you could really make a difference.

Thank you for your consideration,
Matt Stein, CEO
Distributel

Source: To learn more see this piece in Globe & Mail written by William Sandiford chair of the board and president of Canadian Network Operators Consortium

They cite this article from the Globe & Mail, which is from October 2015. The latest information I could find on this was from a Huff Post op-ed written back in February.

Due to articles on the ruling and appeal dating back to just after the election, I'm not sure what the status is of Bell's appeal; but I assume something must have happened to prompt Distributel to alert its customers about it.

 

[Walpurgis]

Bell/CRTC shenanigans:

I just got this e-mail from my ISP:



They cite this article from the Globe & Mail, which is from October 2015. The latest information I could find on this was from a Huff Post op-ed written back in February.

Due to articles on the ruling and appeal dating back to just after the election, I'm not sure what the status is of Bell's appeal; but I assume something must have happened to prompt Distributel to alert its customers about it.

I don't think the current CRTC would ever rule in favour of Bell. One of the guys there is pretty vocal about how much he hates them. I wonder if this would make any perceptible difference though.

 

[matthewwhatever]

Justin Ling at Vice likes Thomas Mulcair even less than I do, apparently:

Thomas Mulcair did not snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

Thomas Mulcair grabbed defeat, wretched it from the bloodied teeth of electoral success, planted that defeat in the cold hard ground, and grew a 10-foot-tall loser tree, lousy with loser fruit. Mulcair and his inner circle harvested that loser fruit to make organic cold-press loser juice. His strategists took the bows from the tree and made loser wreaths. His defenders sat in the tree's cool loser shade and played loser songs on their loser guitars.

And now, Mulcair is readying an axe to chop down his loser tree so he can mill the wood, varnish it, and make a loser house of it.

(B)reak the system. Oust Mulcair. Install a human being. Solve for X, where X is the value of diverse public dialog multiplied by the will for genuine ideological engagement on a level that resonates and speaks to people. Remove Y from the equation, where Y is the value of who-is-electable.

I'm really curious to see how the vote turns out this weekend. One of my co-workers is going to the NDP convention as an observer, and she said that it looks like they're trying to game the vote -- it won't open until very late in the schedule, and then they've got the vote results scheduled for 10 minutes before the convention officially closes.

I'm also wondering which way the NDP goes more broadly. Between last October's loss at the federal level, last night's drubbing at the hands of the Saskatchewan Party (where they went from being 19 points back at the beginning of the campaign to nearly 30 points back last night), and their impending doom in the Manitoba election, their brand isn't doing so well. I have no idea how they renew themselves, but there's clearly work to be done.

 

[gabbo]

Justin Ling at Vice likes Thomas Mulcair even less than I do, apparently:




I'm really curious to see how the vote turns out this weekend. One of my co-workers is going to the NDP convention as an observer, and she said that it looks like they're trying to game the vote -- it won't open until very late in the schedule, and then they've got the vote results scheduled for 10 minutes before the convention officially closes.

I'm also wondering which way the NDP goes more broadly. Between last October's loss at the federal level, last night's drubbing at the hands of the Saskatchewan Party (where they went from being 19 points back at the beginning of the campaign to nearly 30 points back last night), and their impending doom in the Manitoba election, their brand isn't doing so well. I have no idea how they renew themselves, but there's clearly work to be done.

Am I alone in thinking Rebecca Blaikie might need to go from the top spot?

 

[maharg]

They have a while to wait before Notley is done with Alberta.

 

[diaspora]

Justin Ling at Vice likes Thomas Mulcair even less than I do, apparently:




I'm really curious to see how the vote turns out this weekend. One of my co-workers is going to the NDP convention as an observer, and she said that it looks like they're trying to game the vote -- it won't open until very late in the schedule, and then they've got the vote results scheduled for 10 minutes before the convention officially closes.

I'm also wondering which way the NDP goes more broadly. Between last October's loss at the federal level, last night's drubbing at the hands of the Saskatchewan Party (where they went from being 19 points back at the beginning of the campaign to nearly 30 points back last night), and their impending doom in the Manitoba election, their brand isn't doing so well. I have no idea how they renew themselves, but there's clearly work to be done.

Ling openly supported Topp iirc.

 

[gutter_trash]

Ling openly supported Topp iirc.

so Ling openly supported a real Social-Democrat instead of a chameleon.

Mulcair is not bright attacking Donald Trump. Trump is the best chance Democrats have at winning the White House.

Spoiler

Hillary 2016!!!

Who cares right? Nobody is listening to Tom anyway

--
http://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/p...me-bernier-tentera-de-devenir-chef-du-pcc.php
Max is the first CPC member to kick off his bid for leadership, he's going to go fishing for the required amount of signatures across 10 provinces then send a $25000 check to the party.

Feel the Bern

 

[hydragonwarrior]

FOX is literally afraid of him, too scared to report on him because he is too pretty and a Liberal in name and in policy.

Not to mention he's pretty sharp. He'droast them in an interview.

 

[Sean C]

http://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/p...me-bernier-tentera-de-devenir-chef-du-pcc.php
Max is the first CPC member to kick off his bid for leadership, he's going to go fishing for the required amount of signatures across 10 provinces then send a $25000 check to the party.

Feel the Bern

Bernier was a rising star until the Couillard scandal derailed his career; he spent the latter half of the Harper government as a junior minister, semi-redeemed. In terms of the way ahead, the Couillard thing has a certain tabloid quality that might make for a few embarrassing moments, but it's probably not a dealbreaker for the party or public opinion.

He's also signed off on a lot of very libertarian-ish policy proposals in the past which wouldn't play all that well in a general election, but I expect if he's running for the leadership he's prepared to water that down.

 

[Pedrito]

There's no way western conservatives would support a party leader from Québec, even one who would probably agree with them about cutting transfer payments to the province.

Hopefully, now that he'll be in the public eye, we'll get many quotes like the one about China the other day. Which makes me think, if he wins the leadership race, now the LPC will have its own out-of-context China quote to use in facebook memes.

 

[matthewwhatever]

As I've said before, I think Bernier has a better shot than a lot of people expect. Judging from his elections returns, he's better at raising money than most other potential CPC leadership candidates outside of Jason Kenney, and he starts the race with a huge advantage in Quebec (it may officially be one-member, one-vote, but the votes are still allocated by points on a riding-by-riding basis). His reputation as a flake hurts him for sure, but I'm not going to write him off just yet.

Am I alone in thinking Rebecca Blaikie might need to go from the top spot?

I'm pretty sure she's not running again, so she's gone regardless.

They have a while to wait before Notley is done with Alberta.

She has up to five years, right -- until May 2020? I feel like she should embrace the fact she has so much time left and be as bold as possible. The odds of the NDP winning in 4 years seem pretty long right now -- and will get even longer if Wildrose and the PCs unite -- so why not embrace the fact they have a huge majority and (for the moment) a divided opposition, and try to remake Alberta politics? Things are already looking dire for the economy, so it's not like they have a whole lot to lose.

 

[gabbo]

There's no way western conservatives would support a party leader from Québec, even one who would probably agree with them about cutting transfer payments to the province.

Hopefully, now that he'll be in the public eye, we'll get many quotes like the one about China the other day. Which makes me think, if he wins the leadership race, now the LPC will have its own out-of-context China quote to use in facebook memes.

They put themselves into a mess of a hole for a guy from Toronto who used to be a Liberal.

 

[Pedrito]

I think most people think Harper is from Calgary.

Maybe I'm wrong about Bernier getting no traction out west, but I'm talking about the base who thinks the East, and Québec especially, has been sucking Canada dry for decades and that westerners have been working oh so hard to keep it afloat. The people who go on and on about the "Laurentian elite" (though Bernier is more Appalachian...).

 

[maharg]

She has up to five years, right -- until May 2020? I feel like she should embrace the fact she has so much time left and be as bold as possible. The odds of the NDP winning in 4 years seem pretty long right now -- and will get even longer if Wildrose and the PCs unite -- so why not embrace the fact they have a huge majority and (for the moment) a divided opposition, and try to remake Alberta politics? Things are already looking dire for the economy, so it's not like they have a whole lot to lose.

We have a fixed election law (that Prentice ignored), so the next election should theoretically be between March and May 2019.

A few thoughts on this:
- I have pretty strong doubts the PC and Wildrose will unite in that time, personally. There's a lot of animosity between them that probably isn't very visible if you're not paying attention to the province. It's not far off from the tea party split in the Republicans, really, except there's no firmly established two party system to glue them together whether they like it or not.
- The PCs are also looking surprisingly more lively than I expected at this point, to be honest. And the Liberals are pretty much silent, so in spite of national popularity I don't see them eating into the NDP vote any time soon.
- The NDP is down in polls, but frankly, not nearly as much as I'd expect at the bottom (maybe) of an oil recession in a hostile province.
- Political pluralism suppressed by forty years of one-party rule will probably take more than 4 years to clean up.

I think most people think Harper is from Calgary.

Maybe I'm wrong about Bernier getting no traction out west, but I'm talking about the base who thinks the East, and Québec especially, has been sucking Canada dry for decades and that westerners have been working oh so hard to keep it afloat. The people who go on and on about the "Laurentian elite" (though Bernier is more Appalachian...).

You know, I believe I've said that I don't think anyone from east of Ontario could do well as CPC leader but... the CPC could really lose quite a lot of votes out west and still pull off a pretty impressive base (at least so long as we have FPTP or switch to single-member ranked ballots). Gains in Quebec could easily be worth that, if they'd come.

If we actually go to a proportional system, though, it'd probably be bad.

Incidentally, I thought about going to the NDP Convention as an observer since it's in my city, but holy shit is it expensive if you're not a member (which is understandable, but wow).

 

[jstripes]

Justin Ling at Vice likes Thomas Mulcair even less than I do, apparently:

I think he's trying to imply something in those first three paragraphs, but I can't quite put my finger on it.

 

[Walpurgis]

Mulcair's campaign and messaging was hugely disappointing to us NDP supporters but that isn't why he lost. He lost because of the niqab. I don't know they could defend themselves in Quebec from that.

 

[Stumpokapow]

del mastro lost his appeal &#127881;&#127881;&#127881;&#127881;&#127881;

 

[Simon Belmont]

del mastro lost his appeal &#127881;&#127881;&#127881;&#127881;&#127881;

If this doesn't sum up the Tories ten years in office, I don't know what does:

Del Mastro — former prime minister Stephen Harper's one-time point man on defending the Tories against allegations of electoral fraud — was convicted of three electoral offences: overspending, failing to report a contribution he made to his campaign, and filing a false report.

 

[Complex Shadow]

If this doesn't sum up the Tories ten years in office, I don't know what does:

Lol that quote could be the subtitle for the conservatives.

 

[Sean C]

Fittingly enough, the Liberal who won Del Mastro's seat in the last election is now the Minister for Democratic Institutions.

 

[mo60]

I'm not to worried about the Alberta NDP. As long as they don't make any huge mistakes in the next four years or so I think they will be able to stay in government in the next election. I can see the Alberta PC unless they collapse revive a bit to make it harder for the wildrose to keep their official opposition status.

In other news the Manitoba Liberal's campaign is turning into an absolute disaster. A former Manitoba Liberal leadership hopeful commented on all the problems plaguing the Manitoba Liberal's campaign right now
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/manitoba-election-bob-axworthy-liberals-1.3522034

 

[Walpurgis]

I'm not to worried about the Alberta NDP. As long as they don't make any huge mistakes in the next four years or so I think they will be able to stay in government in the next election. I can see the Alberta PC unless they collapse revive a bit to make it harder for the wildrose to keep their official opposition status.

In other news the Manitoba Liberal's campaign is turning into an absolute disaster. A former Manitoba Liberal leadership hopeful commented on all the problems plaguing the Manitoba Liberal's campaign right now
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/manitoba-election-bob-axworthy-liberals-1.3522034

It's become a regular thing now. I wake up nearly every morning to another screw up by the Manitoba Liberals. The misogynist, the woman beater, the guy that said he'd close down hospitals if elected and later back pedalled claiming that he said it for PR, the conspiracy theories/persecution complex about the media from Rana Bokhari, her bad attitude, etc. It sucks because I wanted a strong alternative to the NDP and that's what a lot of others wanted as well.

 

[matthewwhatever]

This story by John Ivison is insane on so many levels. Brad Wall as the only person who can save the country from prolonged Liberal rule (with the bonus quote that "He just needs to learn enough phonetic French to get him through two debates")? Peter Mackay as "the telegenic scion of a political dynasty that many true-blue Conservatives consider an abomination"? Jason Kenney needing to be persuaded to run? Stephen Harper being the CPC's last, best hope at rebuilding the party and getting over the...uh, Harper years? It's just non-stop crazy from beginning to end.

Mulcair's campaign and messaging was hugely disappointing to us NDP supporters but that isn't why he lost. He lost because of the niqab. I don't know they could defend themselves in Quebec from that.

Nonsense. Trudeau was, if anything, even more forceful in his denunciations of the CPC's race-baiting, but it didn't hurt the Liberal fortunes much in the province. And I don't see how their stance on that one issue in one province led to them getting wiped out in Atlantic Canada or Toronto. Saying "The NDP lost because it took a principled stand" may help NDPers feel better about their loss, but it doesn't hold up to critical thinking/reality.

A few thoughts on this:
- I have pretty strong doubts the PC and Wildrose will unite in that time, personally. There's a lot of animosity between them that probably isn't very visible if you're not paying attention to the province. It's not far off from the tea party split in the Republicans, really, except there's no firmly established two party system to glue them together whether they like it or not.
- The PCs are also looking surprisingly more lively than I expected at this point, to be honest. And the Liberals are pretty much silent, so in spite of national popularity I don't see them eating into the NDP vote any time soon.
- The NDP is down in polls, but frankly, not nearly as much as I'd expect at the bottom (maybe) of an oil recession in a hostile province.
- Political pluralism suppressed by forty years of one-party rule will probably take more than 4 years to clean up.

I saw that the PCs just won a by-election there thanks to a four-way split (less than 28% of the vote!), and that the Wildrose candidate tried going negative on the PC candidate with flyers painting him as a Liberal. I'm kind of surprised that the Alberta PCs still have so much life -- I'd have thought that the last two elections killed them off, with their base abandoning them in the Redford election, and then the Redford supporters leaving them last year. I know that they got more votes than Wildrose last election, and I know that Brian Jean has the charisma of a damp towel, but still: with so few seats, I would've guessed that most of those voters would've abandoned them by now.

(Sort of related side note: I just had to write an academic paper for a Master's Program I applied to at Carleton, and I spent half of it writing about last year's Alberta election, comparing it to the 1985 Ontario election where the PC dynasty was taken down. I'm really interested to see if the Alberta PCs can avoid the same fate as the Ontario Tories post-1985.)

 

[Simon Belmont]

Are you at BPAPM at Carlton?

 

[firehawk12]

So now that Saskatchewan is basically the new Conservative stronghold (at least provincially), what are the chances the Brad Wall gets tapped to lead the CPC?

 

[matthewwhatever]

Are you at BPAPM at Carlton?

I just got accepted to the MPM program! Going back to school in the fall after thirteen years.

So now that Saskatchewan is basically the new Conservative stronghold (at least provincially), what are the chances the Brad Wall gets tapped to lead the CPC?

There are definitely people who want it -- see that Ivison column I linked to a few posts up; anecdotally, one of my co-workers, a hardcore CPC supporter, got starry-eyed at the idea -- but those people are either overlooking or minimizing the fact that he doesn't speech French, and that his appeal is pretty limited to the prairies right now.

 

[firehawk12]

There are definitely people who want it -- see that Ivison column I linked to a few posts up; anecdotally, one of my co-workers, a hardcore CPC supporter, got starry-eyed at the idea -- but those people are either overlooking or minimizing the fact that he doesn't speech French, and that his appeal is pretty limited to the prairies right now.

Hey, that worked for Stephen Harper!

 

[Simon Belmont]

I just got accepted to the MPM program! Going back to school in the fall after thirteen years.

Nice! My wife went there for BPAPM as a springboard to law school. The folks she went to school with pretty much all became staffers, so if you're looking to get into policy that's a great place to to.

 

[pr0cs]

I'm not to worried about the Alberta NDP. As long as they don't make any huge mistakes in the next four years or so I think they will be able to stay in government in the next election.

I think you're mistaken, especially given how the NDP continue to do as little as possible to try and improve the situation in this province.

 

[Walpurgis]

Rebecca Blaikie said that the NDP dropped 20 points over night in Quebec after the niqab. I figured that it lead to a domino effect across the rest of the country making the Liberals the only option to oust the CPC. The Liberals were stronger on the niqab than the NDP but didn't appear to suffer from that in Quebec. I'm not sure why this is though.

 

[Walpurgis]

I don't know anything about Saskatchewan. How is Brad Wall and the province under him? It seems that he's very popular so he must be doing something right.

 

[Tiktaalik]

Nonsense. Trudeau was, if anything, even more forceful in his denunciations of the CPC's race-baiting, but it didn't hurt the Liberal fortunes much in the province. And I don't see how their stance on that one issue in one province led to them getting wiped out in Atlantic Canada or Toronto. Saying "The NDP lost because it took a principled stand" may help NDPers feel better about their loss, but it doesn't hold up to critical thinking/reality.

I agree. In contrast to Trudeau's language, Mulcair's approach to the niquab issue was weak and watered down. He seemed flat footed when the issue arose in the campaign and it's frankly embarrassing that the NDP waffled and were more vague about their stance than Trudeau. The way the NDP handled the issue felt incredibly off brand.

"Off brand" would be a good way to describe Peggy Nash's complaints of the NDP campaign too. She doesn't sound like a Mulcair fan at all.

My prediction is that he's gone. Either he'll get sub 80% and quit, or he'll get 70+% and stay on, but most of that vote was a unity facade and he gets pushed out before the next election anyway.

 

[Simon Belmont]

Rebecca Blaikie said that the NDP dropped 20 points over night in Quebec after the niqab. I figured that it lead to a domino effect across the rest of the country making the Liberals the only option to oust the CPC. The Liberals were stronger on the niqab than the NDP but didn't appear to suffer from that in Quebec. I'm not sure why this is though.

The Niquab thing also happened alongside the debates where Trudeau was killing it. I don't know that you can point to a specific thing that killed the NDP last election other than they just weren't the change people were looking for.