Forget the Coyneses and the Wellses and the rest of the preening political pundocracy. I’m going to nominate Skippy’s “last letter home” as the best thing you’ll read all week.
If the NDP displaces the Liberals as the Official Opposition, or even comes close to it, the Liberals are effectively finished. If Ignatieff winds up losing seats, especially in Toronto, he’ll be beheaded by his own party on election night next Monday, which leaves the Grits leaderless and in the throes of a leadership campaign.
Assuming that there even is a Conservative minority (which is getting harder to do every day,) defeating them on a confidence motion would require the Governor General to decide whether to invite a coalition or an accord to assume government or to hold yet another election. That would require some kind of assurance that said coalition could hold for at least two years. I don’t know how a leaderless Liberal Party can make such an assurance to David Johnston.
There are also large swaths of the Liberal Party that want nothing to do with the NDP, and that segment of the party can be expected to run for the leadership. Or there might be sufficient opposition in caucus to defeat the idea outright.
Barring a coalition or an accord, another election would utterly break a bankrupt Liberal Party and English Canada would be divided up between the NDP and the Tories, almost certainly resulting in a massive Conservative majority.
After spending weeks asking the question, no one has been able to tell me why Jack Layton would even want to get into bed with the Grits. As I’ve explained before, it isn’t in his strategic interest. Harper’s fear-mongering about a coalition is adorable, but it assumes that Layton is stupid enough to still be afraid of the Liberals at this point. He pretty clearly isn’t, and seems to know that if he just waits a few months, the Grits will collapse all on their own, leaving him as the only credible alternative to the Tories.
Regardless of Monday’s outcome, the Liberals won’t be able to raise money (which is already a giant problem for them) or recruit halfway serious candidates (which they haven’t focused all that much energy on anyway.) By Tuesday morning, anyone with any brains will see the future of the left in this country, and it isn’t going to include the Liberals.
But read the whole thing. (h/t Lord of the Fleas)
Has anyone considered the possibility that if such a coalition is announced with the NDP in the drivers seat in a significant way, that some Liberals might cross to the Conservative side?
Yeah, lots of people have considered that. I’ll bet Jack Layton’s among them.
Wish I could get to the rally in Kingston in order to ask the PM how his bright boys let this one slip thru their fingers.
I sent two donations from my widows’ mite and it would have been better spent buying a few bottles of Baileys. I’ll be going thru them quickly until the final count is in, I can see.
But, there will be one bright light in this whole mess and that is if Alicia Gordon, the PC candidate, is elected in red Kingston. I live in a true blue area next door but am cheering her on.
Thanks, I needed that.. sharp article that doesn’t need a laugh track.
His thesis ignores the fact that this is Jack’s only real chance of ever being PM. There is no way he could do it legitimately through an election. No way it would ever happen even with no Liberal party. So what better way to end a political career before you go meet your maker? Make no mistake Layton will go for a coalition if it means he becomes PM. He means what he says.
@ james:
Jack’s best bet is to make a coalition with the Liberals. Some of us remember Ontario under the NDP, and the best way to completely steal the legitimacy of the Liberal party is to prove them obsolete by simply quasi-absorbing them.
@ Kate: hopefully Harper is thinking about it too. The Liberal party could end up being the equivalent of a carcass on the plains of Africa if the Cons and NDP try and devour it.
“By Tuesday morning, anyone with any brains will see the future of the left in this country, and it isn’t going to include the Liberals.”
BINGO!!
And it may even be the death of the Dippers, as we’ve known them. Look for a divorce from organized labour and a re-alignment with kooky causes, such as the Greens. In other words, a losing strategy.
Don’t forget either that Bob Rae and Dosanj are in the Liberal party behind the scenes ready to get the coalition deal done. No the fix is in here. Stephen Harper is not making this crap up guys. Jack Layton started the campaign saying he was running for PM and I take him at his word.
“By Tuesday morning, anyone with any brains will see the future of the left in this country, and it isn’t going to include the Liberals.”
While I’m happy to see the Libs get their comuppance, some day, sooner or later, the Cons will be defeated. What then? NDP in power nationally? That prospect is appalling! While I hope the Libs get spanked I also think I’d like to see enough of a resurgance to knock the NDP back into their rightful 3rd place by next election.
The decision to jettison the LPC (or at least the current leader) was made last week.
When Peter Mansbridge starts questioning the Liberal leader in the heat of an election battle in the same manner he usually reserves for Reformers and Conservatives, you know the order has been given to pull the plug. Mansbridge did it last week with the coalition question.
When the Mansbridge focuses on things he would normally studiously ignore, you know someone gave an order somewhere.
He did it with Martin in 06 as well – and poor Paulie didn’t see it coming.
I agree with James.
Skippy wrote:
“…the merger idea was framed under the almost unbelievably arrogant Grit premise that the NDP would renounce all of their principles just to join a Liberal Party that was incapable of winning an election on their own…”
What principles is he referring to? At the time that the merger idea was floated, and promoted, the NDP was also incapable of winning an election on their own. The very impetus for the merger talks stemmed entirely from the – realistic and calculated – notion that a merged left would have a better chance of winning an election in Canada than either the NDP or the Liberals would on their own.
To make assumptions about the primacy of party loyalty, and to assume that those on the left somehow value their party banner more than they do their big-government anti-conservatism is to make a mistake, IMO. *If* Layton were to find himself in a position where he could become Prime Minister via the support of the BQ and perhaps a few Liberal MPs, would he turn it down, and leave power in the hands of the Conservatives because of some deep-rooted deference to NDP party principles?
I don’t think so. Skippy says he will vote for the NDP, at the precise time when the NDP are at an historic high in the polls, in order to punish the Liberals. This sort of strategic thinking, writ large, could end up being an historic mistake. No one should ever underestimate the ability of big-government, bureaucrat-oriented forces on the left to pool their collective resources post-election.
If you’re not a leftist, don’t vote for the NDP. The left in this country are a *lot* more mercenary than they are principled; the parties of big government and top-down rule have a mutual, undeniable vested interest in kneecapping government-reducing conservatism, and no one should ever lose sight of this fact.
If you’re a conservative, vote Conservative.
Let’s not outwit ourselves here.
The NDP is never going to form the government, unless they shed a whole lot of their long standing, traditional postures, such as being the party of labour unions.
When the Libs die, all the remaining parties will have to reinvent themselves. Traditional liberal territory will be carved up and repackaged and redistributed and marketed under new brands and labels.
The Harperites haven’t been much more than old style Liberals, so they are going to have to do better, as will the Dippers. Don’t count the Bloc out, either. In fact, that will be the next battle – ROC and Quebec separatists and the Dippers could very well die in that battle, seeing as how the only thing that distinguishes them from the Bloc is the separatist plank. Both parties have survived on the twin mantras of victimology and entitlements.
This sudden media erection for Layton is only that, it is soft on arrival folks. Late Monday night when the media viagra wears off, Lenin/Layton will be no further up the path to 24 Sussex than he was before. The usual slut walk the MSM does with the lieberals has been aborted to run to jig with Jack, it is a Robert Fife wet dream to see Harper working at Mcdonalds and his ilk will concoct any story to slag a good man Harper, shows the depth and intellect of our news repeaters in this country.
I truly beleive that the reason for the Oda scandal and this subsequent election was to hold the CPC to a minority and then have the opposition defeat and replace that minority without the bother of being elected.
And there would be no mechanism to remove the coalition once it appointed itself to power (you don’t see the media discussing this very much do you?)
That is what was sold to Iggy and the Libs. Lets all just go through the motions, we’ll get the same outcome – CPC minority, Libs in opposition and NDPand Bloc bringing up the rear – and then we install ourselves in government.
All of the opposition parties come out as big winners – keys to the treasury and all that.
But what Iggy did not count on is that the other parties had absolutely nothing to lose.
To finish 3rd and 4th again was precisely what was expected of them.
The BQ is a joke federal party, and the NDP only has a shred more credibility in that they are not dedicated to the breakup of the country.
No one – certainly not the media – expected anything other than status quo after this election – at which point Iggy would be installed as leader with the backing of the NDP and BQ
But what now seems clear in hindsight is that the Libs – who were stagnating in the polls prior to their forcing this election (another damning indictment of their real goal -coalition) had the most to lose and were perhaps suckered by the NDP. Maybe the Bloc too.
The NDP is a fourth place party. Are they going to fall from that perch below the Greens? Long long odds on that I’d say. virtually zero. So the only place for them to go is sideways or up.
The Bloc is locked into Quebec. The best they can do is go sideways ( they dont expect to lose support).
The Libs have been bleeding seats since the intercenine battle between Chretien and Martin, with the trend over the last 3 elections most definitily being down.
And with Iggy as leader (even with full support of the media) the Libs have consistentley trailed the CPC by at least 10 points.
Does the smart money behind the LPC authorize the takedown of the Harper government and the blowing of 20 Million to fight an election without a guaranteed outcome? I don’t think so. (and that causes me to worry about our current GG)
And that is what they thought they would get. But they never ever considered that they would be fighting the NDP. But Jack did.
The Libs had the most to lose in this because they were the only Party that could realistically lose in this, and the NDP were the only ones who could realistically gain.
If the status quo were to be the result after this election and the NDP again finishes fourth, Layton and the NPD gain power via a coalition with absolutley no downside.
But the Liberals must absolutley count on a status quo result with them finishing second to retain and regain power.
But whereas the NDP is already in the gutter, and can’t really fall any lower, the Libs very much can, and it will be Layton and the NDP who will do all they can to pick the Lib carcass clean if they do fall. And it is looking very much like the LPC has fallen and will not get up.
The Libs got sold on the idea that their only way back to power was getting in front of Jacks coalition gambit, but apparently did not realize that Jack would win no matter what the outcome, while they only would win if they could hold second place.
Just shows how desperate the LPC has become to fall prey to such a one sided hustle.
“They’re fighting for their lives in 416 itself now. Reasonable people fully expect the Grits to lose both Dryden’s York Centre seat and the neighboring riding of Eglinton-Lawrence. This is the political equivalent of the final defense of Berlin from marauding Soviet troops in April of 1945 and I now expect it to end about the same way. Once those ridings fall, all that’s left is the Hitler’s bunker of downtown Toronto, and the NDP Power Twins, Jack Layton and Olivia Chow, already hold two of those seats. Not only do the Grits have to worry about a Tory incursion into the north west of 416, the NDP could very well retake Parkdale-High Park. If that happens, Iggy’s own riding of Etobicoke-Lakeshore could be at risk. I’m actually shocked that the Ford brothers haven’t been working their backyard hard for Harper. That could start a pincer movement that could drive the federal Liberals directly into Lake Ontario in the very near future.”
Signed “SkippyStalin”
Fairly lurid writing, the demise of the Liberal party is awaited with baited breath…as Iggy realizes belatedly he is out of ammunition.
PMSH is on the game as he warns:
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20110427/harper-asks-for-votes-in-campaign-110427/20110427?s_name=election2011
Harper says NDP-led coalition would be ‘disastrous’
So now it all comes down to your ground game…
Cheers
Hans-Christian Georg Rupprecht, Commander in Chief
1st Saint Nicolaas Army
Army Group “True North”
// But read the whole thing //
OK. Just before your quote starts —
// as I’ve mentioned before, Harper’s record is the Liberal record. Dion and Ignatieff kept the Conservative minority afloat several hundred times in the last five years. It appears that the voters concluded that if they absolutely must unify around an opposition party, it may as well be one that actually opposed something from time to time, which is how the NDP surge was born. //
And an earlier post —
God, the Conservatives are dumb
This might be the strangest Canadian election that I’ve ever seen. Stephen Harper’s Conservative Party is running an almost blindingly shitty, strategy-free campaign …
I’ve seen this movie before…
“Globe & Mail endorses Stephen Harper and Conservative Party:
Harper “has built the Conservatives into arguably the only truly
national party, and during his five years in office has
demonstrated strength of character, resolve and a desire to reform.
Canadians take Mr. Harper’s successful stewardship
of the economy for granted, which is high praise.””
http://www.newswatchcanada.ca/
“The Globe’s election endorsement: Facing up to our challenges”
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/editorials/the-globes-election-endorsement-facing-up-to-our-challenges/article2001610/
Comments: 1,081
all this anti-coalition talk is interesting.
what I glean is conservatives are dead set against a scenario whereby the partie(s) garnering the majority of votes winds up ruling the country.
what is so ghastly bad about coalition governance? it happens all the time around the world. google it. or take a look at this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coalition_government#Coalition_governments_worldwide
oh the humanity !!! I actually used wiki for a reference !!!
no, the fact is with the present winner-take-all approach they demand, conservatives expose themselves as obsessed with power, the very same accusation you throw at liberals. guess what, we’re both right on that count !!!
we need MORE coalitions not fewer. it’s the ONLY way within the present election-parliamentary structure in Canada to get meaningful representation for the most voters. you right wingers simply have to accept the fact you can’t always have it all your way all the time.
p.s. ‘ward’ at 3:13, learn to spell.
Da Citoyen Kyoto Dionky Plan & It’s George’s Fault.
…-
“Dion’s wife goes rogue?
Stephen Wicary
Posted on Saturday, November 21, 2009”
“Mr. Ignatieff’s leadership is openly questioned, as is his decision to shun the coalition deal struck by Mr. Dion, NDP Leader Jack Layton and Bloc Leader Gilles Duceppe.
“The time for choices is now,” the message says.”
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-notebook/dions-wife-goes-rogue/article1372858/
…-
“Combative Ignatieff says Tories can ‘go to hell”
“On the issue of Iraq, Ignatieff said the thing he has learned in dealing with the United States “is you don’t believe what the American tells you.”
“You go into a room with the Americans, they have their sources of information and you had better be damn sure you have your own. You better be darn sure you don’t let yourself be persuaded by bad evidence.””
http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/politics/article/981662–combative-ignatieff-says-tories-can-go-to-hell?bn=1
Harper’s record. He has finished Gilles Deciet, he has demolished the Liberal Party, they are on life support. The game is not over yet. If you look at all of the polls numbers for undecided voters it is around 14%. Pretty significant this late in the game. When the dust settles, all that will be left is Harper and Jack Layton and his A*s Bandits.
Nanos last polls show 15% Undecided Nationally. 20% Undecided in Quebec and Atlantic Canada 13% Undecided in Ontario and about the same in BC. It is still a crap shoot. Jack doesn’t have it in the sack yet. Whoever gets out the vote will win. Usually this late the Undecided’s are less than 10%. The Prairies are at 8% Undecided. Harper has gutshot Count Ignatieff with a 12Ga. He just has to wait for the LPC to pack out his carcass and their own. Did anyone see the Bitter Old Thief Cretin, trying to take credit for Harpers Handiwork, even tho the old Thief has been gone for about 7/8 years. Harper has done it all with a minority all the while forcing the Liberals to eat a plate of Hot Steaming Cat Sh*t for the last 5 years, by forcing the Liberals to support him in crucial votes almost 300 times. Jack’s erection will be so soft on May 2 he will have to use his thumb.
Thanks for the ilnk, Kate.
I don’t suppose that many of the folks areound here read me all that often, bu the decline and fall of the Liberal Party is something I’ve been hypothisizing about in public for over two years. This is pretty much much how I predicted that it would happen, but it’s much sooner than I thought likely.
As for Harper, I’d like to make a single point as to why I wouldn’t support him under any circumstances: his fiscal policy has been to the left of Barack Obama’s, so why not have a coalition, although I think one is unlikely?
Look, the Tories have spent more money in a shorter time frame than even Trudeau did and got less for it. And please don’t attribute that to the minority situation. Harper could have been defeated on principle and taken his case to the people anytime he wanted. Does anyone think that there were ever circumstances under which, say Stephane Dion was going to beat him?
No, he blew roughly $200 billion trying to buy a majority and abandoned any and all conservative principles trying to do it. Sure, the Grits and the Dippers are going to tax and spend, but I don’t see that as being any different than borrowing and spending.
Thanks for the ilnk, Kate.
I don’t suppose that many of the folks areound here read me all that often, bu the decline and fall of the Liberal Party is something I’ve been hypothisizing about in public for over two years. This is pretty much much how I predicted that it would happen, but it’s much sooner than I thought likely.
As for Harper, I’d like to make a single point as to why I wouldn’t support him under any circumstances: his fiscal policy has been to the left of Barack Obama’s, so why not have a coalition, although I think one is unlikely?
Look, the Tories have spent more money in a shorter time frame than even Trudeau did and got less for it. And please don’t attribute that to the minority situation. Harper could have been defeated on principle and taken his case to the people anytime he wanted. Does anyone think that there were ever circumstances under which, say Stephane Dion was going to beat him?
No, he blew roughly $200 billion trying to buy a majority and abandoned any and all conservative principles trying to do it. Sure, the Grits and the Dippers are going to tax and spend, but I don’t see that as being any different than borrowing and spending.
Jack Layton said he was running to be PM last election too, it’s like a broken record.
If I were Jack I wouldn’t get too cocky, Quebec voters are fickle, they can turn on a dime, their game is to play the ROC like a fiddle.
We need a Conservative majority without Quebec factoring in. It’s hard to fathom how the Atlantic provinces can care about the economy and jobs and vote NDP.
Dear Skippy. Comparing Harper on spending to the Liberals is a joke. Trudeau took Canada from a 25M dollar debt to 200B in debt before he leaft office. The PC’s and Chretien finished it off. Canada’s Total Public Debt is around 3Trillion dollars, all accumulated by Liberals and Liberal Lite PC Governments before the birth of the Conservative Party. Chretien stole 54B from the E/I Fund to pay down his Debt, and sold off all of Canada’s 700 Metric Tonnes of Gold Reserves for 150-200/oz. And that money still has not shown up on the Government of Canada’s books. Maybe it funded the 9B in Tax Dollars that Martin and the Liberals put into the Liberal Trust Funds to employ Liberals. He also left office with Canada 80B further in debt than when he came in, Liberal Fiscal Prudence is a myth unsubstantiated by facts. Harper is head and shoulders over the Liberals when it comes to cost cutting and spending control. The deficit he ran up was with the Liberal and NDP Gangsters gun to his head. And you know that is a fact.
“we need MORE coalitions not fewer. it’s the ONLY way within the present election-parliamentary structure in Canada to get meaningful representation for the most voters. you right wingers simply have to accept the fact you can’t always have it all your way all the time”
So..here’s my answer to that – what is “unacceptable” that the losers get together to form a Coalition AFTER the election – all the while saying – no coalition.
AND the government does not include the party that got the most votes.
That is what is wrong with THIS coaltion. It has nothing to do with “getting what we want” – it has everything to do with fooling the voters.
If you guys are so gung ho for a Coaltion – how come you just don’t form one – run as a Coalition and let the country decide?
Want to know what I think – because if you did that – EC would’t give you as much money because you aren’t running TWO candidates (3 if you are in Quebec) ( 4 if you count the greens) in every riding. Plus there is that $1.95 per vote – the three amigos get more if they pool their money after than if they run one candidate in each riding
So lets call this election what it is – a money making scheme for the three – or four – opposition parties. And with a media chanting – Coalitions are Good – they have brainwashed a good number of left wing supporters to really believe this is about democracy – when it is really all about money and power.
Right Alberta Girl @ 7:38 AM. in a democracy the losers don’t become winners AFTER the electorate has voted. A coalition formed that doesn’t include any members from the party that got the most votes is not how democracy works.
England has a coalition but the media forget to inform it’s comprised of the winning party and a losing party. It’s already showing problems.
well alberta girl, the problem is we’re presently hobbled by the fact it would be oh most unacceptable to be up front about a coalition.
the mere musing and eluding and mentioning-in-passing is the best we get. until some form of proportionate representation is the norm we the Canadian people have to settle for ‘majority’ governments based on less than 40% popular vote.
hint: Greens garnered a million votes last election and landed exactly zero seats in parliament. there is something distinctly UNdemocratic about that.
and as far as ‘money and power’, well dearie, it’s ALL about money and power in public life, business, entertainment industry, keeping up with the jones, et friggin cetera.
face it, unlike the tweedledee tweedledum americans, we Canadians have a long history of a multitude of viable parties running for election. we dont need their deplorable method of magnifying the discrepancy via the electoral college system for instance or the very similar results of winner-take-all that we do have.
now go do your homework like I told you and find out about how coalitions are formed elsewhere in the world and how many developed western countries have proportionate voting.
That’s what I don’t understand about the media’s love-affair with coalitions. They are only too happy to show how they happen in Europe all the time, so ‘what’s the big deal?’
Umm, have they LOOKED at Europe lately??? It’s a disaster!
Ping…what Luke said.
Grow up and quit listening to your Facebook friends.
And ping…we Canadians have a “history” of allowing the party who got the most votes to take power and not have to worry about the losers attempting to take over.
You can’t pick and choose your “histories” sweetie.
My God this is bad. The only way that these numbers make sense is if the NDP are getting the UNDECIDED vote, as there is no way in hell Conservatives are changing their vote to the NDP.
Harper, you guys better start campaigning again or we are going to be in a recession again in about 5 days.
Four days left to campaign. If I’m running strategy for the Cons I go hard on the scary idea of having the big labour unions running the country because they will have a heavy influence on a Layton-led coalition.
Just look at the influence labour unions have on Democrats in the US and the mess they are in.
I’m thinking (hoping) that should the Dippers and Lieberals try to form a coalition government Harper would go into recruite mode to convince certain Liberal MP’s to cross the floor.
There’s another problem with an NDP led coalition that hasn’t been mentioned – the lack of NDP MP’s with experience governing. Iggy may claim he’d work with a PM Layton, but how many long time Liberal MP’s, including former cabinet ministers are willing to take a back seat to people who ran with no expectation of actually getting elected?
Is it too early to start a “Draft Warren Kinsella for LPC Leader” campaign?
After all, they deserve each other sooooooooooooooooo much.
I disagree that Harper has run a bad campaign. The media have portrayed him as running a bad campaign and they have defined his campaign through their “gotcha questions” instead of focusing on what his policies and annoucements were. On the other hand, look at the free ride they gave Iggy and they basically ignored Jack, until they realized that Iggy was falling and Jack was going to be their guy.
This is how Nenshi got elected in Calgary, how Obama got elected in the States and how Jack may be elected in Canada – this is a campaign driven by the media’s hate for Harper and how many “likes” you can get on Facebook!
RFB,
“A gun to his head?” Are you friggin’ kidding me?
Are you seriously suggesting that Stephane Dion was such a clear and present danger to the Harper government that it forced the spending of $13 billion surplus – which Steve was quite proud of and talked about frequently before the End of the World in September of ’08 – and more than a hundred billion in stimulus spending when the coalition debacle had him at 50% approval?
Are the NDP and Liberals now forcing Harper to promise hundreds of billions more in new spending and social engineering tax credits in his platform that he has no way of paying for? If so, how?
No, I decidedly do not know that is a fact. All of the available evidence indicates to me that he’s holding a pork barrel auction with the treasury to secure himself a majority, despite his celebrated inability to cleanly beat someone as helpless as Dion.
He’s studied the history of the Liberal Party and appropriated its tactics to get himself elected. From using the tax code to engage in social engineering to allowing Jason Kenney to ward heel his way through the swamp of identity politics.
Uh…skippy…Dion was long gone (shoved out by the coronation of Iggy) by the time the stimulus was put in place.
If I remember Iggy was the one who demanded “report cards” from Harper.
The Coaltion were the ones who were demanding “spend more” and “you haven’t spent enough”.
It was the stimulus plan put in place by Harper that in part, weathered the recession as the best in the G8 if not the G20.
so don’t pick and choose your historical points to make sense of this mess we now find ourselves in.
This election was about wresting power away from Harper – they couldn’t do it on the economic front, so they came up with some hare brained contempt charge so they would have a reason – trusting that Canadians would agree with them.
Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on your viewpoint, Canadians are going to voice their opinions on Monday.
In my view, the media have done a great disservice to the Canadian people by allowing their hatred of Harper to overshadow balanced and fair reporting of the issues. so much so that they have built up (first Iggy) and now Jack to be something this country could tolerate – without giving the country the results of their choice.
The saying – “you get the government you deserve” is more apropro than ever these days.
Take a look at the nanos polls this am and you will a different and more dark story possibly developing. I emphaisize possibly because the pollsters in this country as shockingly weak.:
The support for the ND is DOWN in western Canada is DOWN and CPC is up. The Ontario polling doesnt indicate if the ND swoon is uniform across the province. I doubt it is. I bet that in rural Ontario it is a similar phenom to that in western canada.
Thus what we may be seeing is the last stand of the OLD canada – the socialist leaning, entitlement loving Canada that MIcheal Bliss wrote about. The Canada that largely lives east of bloor and yonge. Seat additions to western Canada and rural Ontario (proposed, but that would likely be reversed by a coalition) would make this their last chance to stop or delay a more conservative future.
What it also does is make it possible for an extremely divisive and destructive coalition led by the ND with its key support being BQ NOT lpc. That means Carbon taxes, higher corporate taxes, more entitlements, more equalization to que, easier EI rules (read more transfers to que) etc etc.
If the CPC is not in a majority situation by tuesday, this confederation will be far more in jeopardy than it has been in more than a generation.
The blog post assumes that the GG wont give the Coalition a chance to rule unless it can guarantee two years of stability. That is simply incorrect. Given the choice between an election and an organized coalition – read: a written agreement the GG will choose the latter regardless of any timeline caveats. And there is no doubt both the BQ and the LPC will sign on as neither will be in any position to fight an election.
That said, it seems more likely that we will indeed see a majority CPC mandate on Monday. The ND support is very soft – organizationally they are weak in 90% of the ridings. They are taking most of their new support from the lpc and BQ which means that the CPC is going to come up the middle in a lot of ridings. And the fear of PMJL will bring even more CPC voters to the polls.
As an aside / evidence of a mounting pushback, the globe and mail of all papers endorsed the CPC today. What’s next? Torstar saying PMSH is the best leader for the country?
Skippy please. The coalition almost worked last time ok. If Harper didn’t embark on the spendathon there would have been an election or a coalition. We would have lost either way. Canadians wanted the spendathon. They believe in “stimulus” even though it doesn’t work. So hey you could say democracy worked.
And to ping the coalition lover no one here is saying there is anything wrong with a coalition in terms of it’s legality. We just don’t want one. You know because we kind of want a conservative government.
Skippy’s post was entertaining. But it was this kind of thinking that gave Bob Rae a vctory in the early 90’s. Then he proceeded to ruin Ontario, just like Layton will do to the ROC. And you know what, you could never find anyone to admit they voted for Rae.
Skippy’s post was entertaining. But it was this kind of thinking that gave Bob Rae a vctory in the early 90’s.
Yep. It’s beyond stupid.
Alberta Girl,
Dion was gone in January and the stimulus budget was presented in March. And Flaherty promised it during the Liberal coup and prorogation.
Yes, Iggy demanded the retarded “report cards,” but did nothing to follow up on them because he lacked the balls to force an election that he might very well have won.
As to the stimulus itself, I very much doubt that you’d so stridently defend the Obama one, a third of which was tax cuts.
More importantly, we “weathered the recession as the best in the G8 if not the G20” for the simple reason that said recession was the result of a banking failure and credit breakdown that simply didn’t occur here. Our banks were fine and loans continued as they always had.
As to “picking and choosing historical points,” most of the folks here are rather pointed in ignoring Harper’s pre-crash spending spree, all of which was in his 2005 and ’08 platforms, and his laughable assertion in mid October of 2008 – a month after the End of the World began – that he would “never” engage in deficit spending.
“This election was about wresting power away from Harper” might be the funniest thing I’ve read all week. Firstly, all elections are about beating the incumbent. And wasn’t the 2005 election precipitated by a confidence vote?
Look, I get that your favorite colour is blue and that’s fine, I suppose. But you’re hardly making a case that Harper isn’t as statist or wasteful as any other recent prime minister.
There’s speculation on twitter that nanos numbers will show the NDP in the lead soon. I tend to agree. You guys don’t get it. The only way to stop this crap is to work for your local candidate. Yeah if you’re in Alberta you’re safe. Elsewhere not so much.
I must agree with Skippy, RFB.
Harper is _anything_ but a conservative. He may be the best of a bad lot but a rotten apple with only a little bit of rot is still useless.
He may not have accumulated as much debt in real equivalent dollars adjusted through the BS-o-meter divided by ‘it doesnt matter’ and laundered through ‘who the heck cares’ but what really matters is that he grew the civil service some 15% before the recession and as Skippy said, blew the wad when he really didn’t have to.
I hate to say they told us so, but the left told us so, Conservatives always seem to spend to the limit and over.
Well Skippy – I would have liked to see just how his spending would have been had he not had to “work with parliament” given his minority status.
Will we ever get to find out?? Depends on this vote I guess.
And you have your thoughts on the reason for this election; I am entitled to mine – and “wresting power” is how I woudl describe it. So you may not agree with it, but when the opposition demands that Harper “work with parliament” then bring down the government BEFORE they even look at a budget that included things they asked for; says to me that this election is not about good government, but about power.
BTW Skippy – Dion was gone in December – they didn’t wait a week after his disasterous “three amigos” photo to force him out and cornate Ignatieff.
What everyone is missing here is that Jack morchestrated this quite a while ago. He was the point man on the last coalition, remember! It is no coincidence that Rae and Dosanjh are now in the Liberal cabinet. Also when Ignatief is handed his walking papers the Liberal base in Quebec will demand that Justin be installed. So if Harper doesn’t get a majority we’ll see a coalition, a resurgence of Liberalism in Quebec and we’ll never be able to afford the payments demanded by the extortionists.
You go ahead and vote for Layton and his bimbos Skippy, so you can be assured of a few years of entertainment.
But I’m not in it for the laugh.
Guys like you piss me off.