37 Months In Ottawa

for whom the international tolls (the broad view).

2011-09-14T18:34:00.004-04:00

as our friend writes in the hill times today, there's a clear sense in which brian topp is the clear front-runner to succeed jack layton as head of the new democratic party of canada. let's very briefly recount topp's positional advantages at this point, in schematic terms:

1) strong connections among media types, skill at earning media - we saw this in the days following jack's death, when he surfaced as a contender out of nowhere, but also in his skillful domination of several news cycles during the early part of the week;
2) strong connections among new democratic types across the country, a lot of friends in the party and in labor, a lot of folks who see their values reflected in him, a lot of favors owed him. probably the country's pre-eminent backroom ndper, almost noone in the party today could touch the guy on these, and of those few who could, one of them, broadbent, is behind him;
3) a seamless campaign launch and intelligent campaign plan. it seems clear that he'll be doing laps: first, broadbent/boivin/team jack, next demonstrate support among electeds across the country, the higher profile the better, next, attempt to parlay that success into endorsements from labor and activist groups, finally and throughout, work on mps.

there's an implicit and probably winning strategy here on wooing the membership. first, he'll play the air game, to raise profile, raise funds, and position himself as a clear front-runner. the best way for topp to win is to be the non-mulcair, the party man to the politician, as it were.

next, but not long behind, he'll move to the ground game. topp's approach to memberships will almost certainly occur in three distinct ways: in recent leadership contest provinces like bc, sask and manitoba, he'll try to capitalize on links to former leadership camps, talking to their organizers and team members, getting their lists, trying to get endorsements, etc. here he has a commanding advantage over the other potential candidates. in provinces like ontario, alberta and the maritimes, he'll likely look to the unions as well as various ndp provincial elements and locals. topp is likely to be stronger with the older line types, and certainly he'll be the first to contact them. finally, in quebec, he'll do what he can to organize, likely out of ottawa and in conjunction with whatever caucus and q-section organizational support he can peel off mulcair (my guess: not much).

to these ends and with them in mind, his message is already clear: 1) on quebec, he says he's the architect and from the province; 2) on the backroom to frontroom, he's the architect of campaigns and governments; 3) on ndp values, he's old-line and jack's heir, but also savvy and pragmatic. these are appeals that ought to work well enough for him to capitalize well on his advantages.

onto the places where he could falter. basically, if adrian dix had run for ndp leader in 2010/2011 without ever having stood for election, there's no question he'd have fared poorly. topp is in the same position. topp's lack of fire, gravitas, charisma and parliamentary experience can't but be seen as strongly negative to most dippers, used to layton.

quebec remains a problem. on the one hand, the caucus is likely to come out strongly for mulcair, reshifting the narrative in a way that will affect the thinking of everyone from bc unionists to halifax enviros. it's very possible that a movement for mulcair develops out of itself, as it becomes clear that he's the best candidate to take the boots to harper and deliver a progressive government in ottawa. moreover, quebec membership numbers are so low, and support for a mulcair ndp so potentially high that with a powerful campaign, mulcair could potentially win the leadership by winning quebec and suffering close-ish losses in every other province.

a component that remains unclear at this point is the extent of mulcair's support outside of quebec. if mulcair could match topp outside of quebec, and blow him away inside of quebec, then topp will have to out-organize the quebecer in the field, potentially difficult if the media is going against him and he's forced to mount a campaign from the union left.

moreover, a core element of topp's strategy requires that he roll out the sort of campaign and support that make it clear that his is a team to join. however, precisely this element may well have the effect of chasing other candidates from the race, and catalyzing the leadership contest into a choice between mulcair and topp. and this is not necessarily to topp's advantage. the support that will go mulcair will likely go mulcair on the first ballot, and non-mulcair candidates' partisans' second ballot support will likely fall disproportionately to non-mulcair candidates. if topp pushes potential allies out of the race at the start, he cedes allies in membership sales that could lead to second ballot support.

so all told, we have a real front-runner in topp, a beatable front-runner, but one who a betting man would not be wise to bet against.

The shot heard around the hourly CBC news updates.

2011-03-22T17:08:00.000-04:00

Instinctually, I feel that there won't be an election. But my instincts are terrible, and word has just come down that Jack Layton won't be supporting the budget.

What Now? Election time?

The Wager

2010-12-06T18:17:00.000-05:00

12 months ago to the day I bet a lobbyist 20$ that Stephen Harper would have a Majority government by this new year's eve. It was a bad bet, I admit, One should never bet on the occurrence of one event leaving all other events to one's counterparty. I had been drinking. But a Bet's a Bet here at this low-rated Canadian politics blog.

Essentially what I had thought made sense at the time: Ignatieff had just faced a personal trough of popularity, Harper had a pile of money and could afford to fire little anti-cyclical attack ads at Team Iggy. Add to that the fact that there had been an election every two years since 2004: I thought we were due.

In any case I was wrong. Here we are in the waning days of 2010, no election in sight. The funny thing is how little has changed, when one thinks of the position of the polls then and now. Surprisingly little movement, despite all the crazy shit that has happened.

But at the same time the oppositions has been steadily worn down. Liberal fundraising is still low-ish, Conservative fundraising is still high-ish. Micheal is still hella-unpopular, Jack is dying, Gilles is old and has already, to my knowledge, told everyone he was going to step down in 2010. Everyone is tired except Harper. So it's coming, that election, everyone expects it in the spring.

But what of my 20$? It will go, like all good things, to the lobbyists. And they will use it to tip the coat check girl at Hy's Steakhouse. And she will give it to me, for undisclosed, unsavory reasons. The Life-cycle of Ottawa is complete.

a lonely raft adrift at sea.

2010-06-11T13:39:00.006-04:00

it's charming how those in the legacy media most vigorously counseling canadians against the legitimacy, workability and propriety of an ndp/lpc coalition are doing so using direct-from-the-message-box cpc partisan language. truly charmed, i am. as we all know by now, it would be far, far too much to expect measured, relevant political analyses from our legacy media. and surely, deception, partisan subterfuge and a basic disrespect for canadians' intelligence has always figured large in the political punditry thrust upon us by the same. nonetheless, though deplorably consistent, what we're seeing here still irritates: harnessing the canwest legacy media monopolies for naked promotion of a pro-cpc take on the coalition isn't a new low, but it's still pretty low. the cpc in its current iteration will never achieve 50% of the vote, their shot at a majority depends very basically upon the smp system and the rewards accrued in a favorable distribution of support. similarly, the most powerful argument on the liberal side against joining a coalition is their belief that they may, themselves, one day again benefit from an smp bonus. these positions are both deeply cynical, and it ought to be the first thing a journalist with any respect for his profession would point out to a public that may still believe that these groups operate on principle. alas, in the roc, the moral contortionists instead concoct convoluted rear-garde arguments defending tory/future liberal power, or at the very least, the sick man status quo: because the system has always operated to narrow the parameters of power shift, it is radical and unseemly to suggest that it be otherwise. the thrust is so obvious that it's almost certain that canadians, long spoon-fed their pablum of simplistic causal lines and slogans, are sure never even to consider it.

really, and if there are those who still do not understand the quebec intellectual class' four square support of separatism, consider this a first lesson.

I

2010-05-21T16:31:00.000-04:00

Douglas Bell has a short piece on the declining popularity (huh? what?) of Ignatieff titled "Ig descendant". Has anyone noticed that his name is getting steadily shorter? First it was the correct anglo 'Ignatieff', then detractors and wags used the more slavic 'Ignatiev'. Then we have the ubiquitous 'Iggy', used by both the lovers and haters alike. Then there was Igg used as a shorthand for a shorthand on this very blog.

Now Bell, pushing the boundaries of the Canadian Political Injoke, has taken it a step further. One wonders if the name will continue to shorten untill one day there is no name. Simply an empty space standing across from a confused PM, and in front of a Liberal Party drifting in the wind left by his passing.

The Return of Domestic Terrorism

2010-05-20T11:22:00.000-04:00

This has made shockingly little impact on the people of Ottawa. Despite the fact that it happened in one of the most thoroughly walkable neighbourhoods. About five blocks from my apartment actually.

It's actually pretty surprising to see this happen, although when you think of the huge number of these soft targets available for anyone who wants to make a political statement, you could see how it could start happening a whole lot more. But why the Glebe? The RBC actually has a much more important branch in centretown. Probably has to do with the relative lack of security cameras in the Glebe. but all that is about to change.

How does this all this play out? Well, it's probably some 21 year old Emily Carr Institute student from a liberal-held riding in Vancouver who will be caught and tried under laws that were crafted to prosecute international terrorists who actually want to kill people and behead them on TV. All the same I think we can assume that they'll screw up the investigation so that his (or her!) four year trial will easily cover the period of incarceration that he will be sentenced to.

Should be interesting.

words that build and destroy.

2010-04-29T01:42:00.002-04:00

rahim jaffer, long a side joke among those who follow politics closely (this is james moore five years early), is now a national joke. but whereas only a few days ago it seemed that his issues were to remain such, the worm has turned, ever so deliciously, in precisely the direction we had all hoped and suspected it might and must. yes, dear readers, full scale government corruption! savor this, knowing that the absurd prairie-dancing opposition can no more convert it to capital than our (yes, the phrase is deeply ironic) parliament's hapless speaker can abrogate the concentric swirl of power to the pmo.

The NCC has got to go.

2010-04-28T09:12:00.000-04:00

I was going to write a sarcastic post, something along the lines of "oh yeah this would be a REAL great idea..." But I'm fairly sure that irony is easily misread by the people of Ottawa. I will therefore go on the record saying that Making a 20 metre tall statue of the stanley cup using public money and public space a stupid idea. There are no, I repeat, no redeeming qualities to this proposal.

There was no joy in mudville.

2010-04-25T13:51:00.000-04:00

Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright;

The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light,

And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout;

But there is no joy in Mudville — mighty Casey has struck out.

Beautiful Day today in our nation's Capital. The sun is shining, the birds (actually!) are singing. The bureaucrats are making love. The waitresses are serving overpriced food and drink. The conservative minded people are developing bad policy ideas. You can still see the flags and assorted Senators shwag is the windows of people who forgot to get off the bandwagon last night. Throughout the city though, there is a palpable feeling not of loss but the sense of emptyness that comes from a long expected tragedy, like the family of a man who died after a long terminal illness.

Up Next: Montreal's defeat at the hands of Washington!

these canards (connards?).

2010-04-11T14:39:00.005-04:00

it would be nice if this sort of mendacity weren't so common, but alas, it is. it really does bear repeating: 1) it would be disastrous if quebec left canada; 2) the government doesn't give quebec special treatment. the article that this guy should have written deploys that survey data in some outline of how the government might better inform canadians, that they would hold accurate views.

Spiking the Ball.

2010-03-26T10:20:00.000-04:00

A fun little chart from the Ministry of Finance showing how awesome we are and how utterly embarassing the United States can be.

all around the mulberry bush.

2010-03-22T14:38:00.000-04:00

the only question is which is the monkey and which the weasel. i mean, seriously, what a bunch of nothing.

The Nexus of Ironic Humour and Transit

2010-03-19T13:14:00.000-04:00

As a fan of irony and public transit, I can't help but posting this gem. Some right-wing taxpayer's association wanted to put up bus ads decrying the incomes of OC Transpo employees.

The text:

OC Transpo average wage (salary, wage, overtime, employer benefits, contributions & allowances): up 80 per cent in six years to $74,748. Fed up with rising taxes and bus fares? Join us...

I think the math might be a little off, as this would mean that salary including benefits and overtime were a bit over $40,000 in 2006. that would actually be pretty low for a unionized public sector employee, considering that they've monetized the benefits (this might put the average gross income somewhere in the neighbourhood of 30K).

That said, I'd be happy to join them if they were interested in reducing transit fares by increasing taxes or consolidating services with the STO.

vers les demains qui chantent.

2010-03-15T16:24:00.004-04:00

so the pq brass orchestrated the expulsion of the spq-libre members this weekend. whilst i utterly detest the group for their strident anti-canada positions, i think this is the sort of thing that we'll all probably regret. on the one hand, these folks are probably less harmful within the party, rather than without it. on the other hand, one worries about any political system in which unions and working people generally do not possess a strong, institutionalized voice within at least one party. from my experience, paring away the left-wing voices tends never to increase the quality of legislation that a given system can produce.

so what's going on here? well, first and most basically, a move like this signals that marois is in a strong position, able to pull off a coup that boisclair could only have dreamed of. but this is the sort of strength that comes from weakness, wherein the pq caucus, leadership and core membership seem to be hoping (against hope?) that marois can right the ship, and marois has been granted the power to silence her interparty critics. it's muscle-flexing in the viper den.

expelling the spq-libre also signals that the pq is fully committed to reclaiming the rural and suburban francophone vote lost to the adq by co-opting a portion of that party's right-wing populist message. in other times (and at the federal level), the separatist party has reclaimed turf from such parties (the cpc, the creditistes) by re-iterating and re-focusing upon the sovereignty/quebec first message. the thin salience that message holds at the moment is obviously driving the pq rightward, but the spq-libre expulsions really do signal that the party's top level strategists want to re-align the party in a more permanent way - i.e. they view the current weakness of the pq qua party as structural, and they view the current dynamic as potentially long-term.

finally, booting the spq-libre will provide an interesting test for the robustness of the pq's progressive core, and present an interesting challenge to quebec solidaire. in removing these critics, team marois seems to have decided that the risk of losing another montreal seat (or two) to quebec solidaire is worth removing this particular party unity thorn, and the potential rewards of reclaiming a dozen heartland seats from the liberals and adq down the road. a side gamble is that the unions (their money and their side campaigns) stick with the pq, and one imagines some phone calls have been made to attempt to limit the fallout. the pq must be calculating that, during an election campaign in which the contest for the reins of government is a two horse race, most progressives will come home to the pq. the challenge for quebec solidaire is nothing less that to make inflict massive casualties upon team marois by mounting some sort of 'principled left' campaign.

all of this is apart from the fact of having booted 400 hardcore, battle-tested parti members. these folks could stay in the fold (it has been made clear that they are welcome to re-join the party as regular member), go with qs, start new projects - but everyone knows they're not going to be quiet.

the question.

2010-03-10T16:55:00.000-05:00

this is the one i was wondering about. the "canadian nationalist" self-identification isn't necessarily inconsistent with some sort of sovereignty-association, but within the context, boy, the olympics really didn't do much for the old separatism. on the one hand, quebecois generally seem to want to see themselves in the whole narrative, as a part of it. and, indeed, quebec athletes form the core of it. on the other hand, and more generally, the olympics presented quebecois with a couple pretty solid questions: does this speak to you? are you a part of this? it's a clivage as manichaean as these sorts of things get. and as chantal points out, you have 2/3 of people reporting that yes, this does feel like it means, like it connects to something strong enough to feel like belonging. it won't last, but it could well prove to be something that we look back to as a contributing factor when explaining a third referendum loss or a sustained period of pq opposition. and at any rate, it'll be interesting to see the extent to which a generation-defining moment like that gold medal hockey victory translate among quebecois to long-term affection for canada.

So much for getting tough on crime...

2010-03-09T16:02:00.001-05:00

Rahim Jaffer got a slap on the wrist for getting drunk and high then driving at almost double the speed limit. The interesting thing is the whitewash job (pun intended) on the matter of the cocaine found in his car. There's barely a reference to it in the Globe or (was there ever any doubt?) in the National Post, and now they have put there the modifier "alleged" in front of "cocaine possession," where there was none in previous articles.

(Sorry, "Alleged"? Did the police just not find any coke in his car? Did they just make that up? Did they lose it? Was it just a baggy of crushed up rocket candies?)

Does this not smack of corruption? isn't anyone concerned? The husband of a cabinet minister and a friend of the prime minister just sees his problems evaporate. For those of you reading this who are unconcerned, I invite you to imagine what would happen to you if you were caught doing the same thing.

To have and have not

2010-02-25T14:43:00.001-05:00

Flipping through the T-Star this morning I find this: the Star is telling us that the system of equalization is 'broken' and that it should be scrapped or reformed. Based on what? A report from a think tank. Sounds reasonable. But wait! Is it a conservative think tank based in the prairies? yeah, yeah it is.

Here's the publication. Its conclusions are more or less recycled from a collection of rants from my grandfather with numbers and graphs and stuff. It's partisan, it has a point of view, it's dishonest.

Let's look into a few of the claims made by this article in the summary:

1) "The levels of government service in the traditional "have" provinces like Ontario (also Alberta and British Columbia) are "significantly below" those enjoyed by residents of most of the so-called poor provinces that receive equalization payments from Ottawa." The bullet points used to prove this are that there are more doctors and more nurses per capita in some, not all, of the "Have Not provinces" than the Have provinces. The Have Nots are also winning in terms of long term care beds.

2) Quebec spends more (per capita) on social services than Ontario, BC and Alberta. (What?)

3) Five Have Not provinces have more public servants (per capita) than the two Have provinces and Ontario.

These claims are used to tell us that "The real have-nots in Confederation are those provinces that have, through their federal tax dollars, historically contributed massive amounts to equalization." The T-Star copies this verbatim from the FCPP Website.

Let us leave aside the fact that Ontario is now a have not province, and that, historically, different areas of the country paid more into the confederation depending on how their economy was performing relative to the others. Let us look at the "findings" listed above.

1) The decision to hire doctors and nurses and to install beds is decided at the provincial level, not at the federal level. The funding that comes from equalization may have an impact but what will probably have more of an impact is the larger pool of funding from provincial taxes, royalties as well as provincial level decisions about the allocation of resources to doctors, nurses and hospital beds.

Also you might want to consider the fact that the Haves and Ontario have younger populations and require less health care and long term care facilities. Jesus, don't you guys do research? Their report also contains a section on "Percentage of residents spending more than 1% of income on prescription drugs" which also confirms their hypothesis. Ever heard of a confounding variable?

2) Quebec spends more or social services than BC, Ontario and Alberta. Wow. That's brilliant. True genius, FCPP. That is a wonder of think tankery.

First of all, they have higher taxes, business, personal and consumption in Quebec. They have more social programs and more social services (duh...) and thus spend more. That increased taxation and spending far outstrips the 8 billion or so they receive.

Second of all, why did we suddenly stop talking about all of the other 'have not' provinces to focus on Quebec? Is it because they actually spend less per capita on social services? Oh it is (chart 14 on page 26 clearly shows that AB and BC lead the pack in social service spending)? Well, maybe we shouldn't be using cherry picked data then.

3) Ok, this is true (based on whatever unnamed metric they are using); there are more federal employees per capita in the Have Not provinces. Except for one thing. Alberta, the highest payer in the confederation, sits astride Quebec, the highest receiver in the confederation, in terms of provincial employees (as 3rd and 4th lowest, respectively). (See Page 29) If there's no clear difference between the two furthest points myabe then this would mean that there may be other factors at work here? This would seem to say that there is no correlation at all.

Their conclusion is that transfers from the haves "subsidize levels of government services that are higher than what they receive," ie, the Haves have lower levels of service provision due to the resources taken away from them in the equalization arrangement. This is patently false as the provincial governments get to determine their own level of public spending in these areas. If the provinces wanted to increase the number of doctors say, they could easily, it just means either borrowing (most provinces run deficits) or moving resources from elsewhere.

My conclusion is that they're taking government failures in Alberta and BC (lack of provision of public services) and blame the federal government for taxing the very high resource wealth generated by those provinces. They use not a small amount of Quebec bashing to do it. I won't say that their conclusions are wrong - they're probably wrong - but that's not the point. The point is that this agency, the Frontier Centre for Public Policy does shoddy research that shouldn't be taken seriously.

New health care debate on the horizon.

2010-02-02T12:40:00.000-05:00

Danny Willimas goes to the US for heart surgery.

Yeah, this is one of those stories that is, essentially, meaningless from a policy perspective. One person getting an operation in the states because they are unable to get it in St. John's, a city of roughy 100,000 people didn't have the specific services required to deal with his health problem. This is going to touch off a forgotten national debate about privatizing services in the health sector.

What you will see: Emotional arguments based on anecdotal evidence, possibly calling people who disagree with you 'Nazis' or 'communists.' Possibly some non-sensical statements couched in ideological language about how this "proves" that we need to dismantle our current healthcare system.

What you won't see: a look at exactly what procedure needed to be done and why it wasn't available to Premier Williams.

Martin: "Supreme Ruler of Canada may have too much power"

2010-01-28T13:55:00.002-05:00

Lawrence Martin has a must-read column. His point it that Iggy should, before pointing fingers, remember that the Liberals let the system of government get as dysfunctional as it is. Like the Republicans complaining about big government and massive budget deficits in the US, the Liberals complaining about Harper ruling like a king ring a little hollow, to say the least.

The expansion of prime ministerial power began under Pierre Trudeau before being expanded under Brian Mulroney and then Jean Chrétien. So when Michael Ignatieff's Liberals start attacking the democratic deficit, they need be conscious of their own history...

But [Ignatieff] has been here to observe what has happened under the Conservatives. They campaigned heavily against Liberal abuse of power and promised a new era of accountability. And the Accountability Act did, in fact, contain many fine reforms. But as Duff Conacher of Democracy Watch (who advised the Conservatives on the legislation) will tell you, a goodly number of the proposed reforms never made it to the table, and others that were enacted have since been violated in spirit.

Martin goes on to vaguely blame Harper. While not being a fan, I think blaming the current PM or even his predecessors is wrong. As they say, when a rabbit gets into your garden and eats your vegetables, you don't blame the rabbit.

Canada, as a post-colonial government without a significant period of anti-colonial housecleaning, has kept government institutions that are designed more or less to be easily controlled from the top. Remember? The reason why we have those ridiculous anachronisms, the Governor General and the Senate (and the weird ceremonial mace, and the bizarre old person on the money for that matter), is because this country was supposed to be controlled by another. While our ideas about governance have changed over the last 140 years, the institutions haven't.

The structure of the Canadian parliament makes it easy for the PM and his O(ffice) to use the power of government against his opponents. Harper is using this power to cripple the opposition and not making the necessary changes, but guess what? Ignatieff and Layton wouldn't do it any different. They have their goals and those goals would be greatly eased by the powers of the PM over parliament.

What's the solution? Forgive me for being cliché, but it's all about the citizen activism. We have to make it unpalatable for the political leadership to continue to act this way. We have to give incentives to backbenchers willing to risk the PM's scorn, and have to be willing to protest abuses of power, no matter who is in power.

Cuts in the Liberal advertising budget

2010-01-27T15:58:00.001-05:00

I like this photo now on display at the Liberal.ca.

First off, I like it because it's an ad for an event that the Libs are holding in Montreal, but where the kids in the photo are all pretty clearly from McMaster U (What's the same number of letters and starts with an M?). Second, have you ever seen kids more clearly dissapointed at not being anywhere but there? It looks like Iggy is lecturing them on better oral hygeine habits, or possibly telling them that he's not angry, he's just dissappointed with them.

Like you think of the thousands of photos that didn't make the cut for promotional stuff and this is what they get?

It's Raining Money.

2010-01-27T12:03:00.000-05:00

David Akin Reports:

Conservative MPs, though, were unusually active Monday as well doing what government MPs do well: Hand out money. On Monday, government MPs issued 44 press releases announcing a combined total of $48 million in federal funding.

Find that blog post here. It has a great breakdown of into whose hands the money flows (spoiler alert: it's Conservative held ridings).

More interesting than the naked partisanship and electoral bribery are the numbers themselves. Exactly half (22) of those announcements are for $5000 or thereabouts, which is to say that they aren't really much more significant than the announcement itself. Most of them have something to do with housing, workshops for housing, housing guides, housing survey, housing strategy workshop, etc. What's this all about? What kind of halfwit backbencher do you have to be to get to dole out 5k at a photo op in Meaford, ON or West Kelowna, BC? Exactly half of these payments were money designated for the sole purpose of distraction.

The PMO, I assume, is trying to counterspin the whole "MPs giving themselves a vacation" line that the opposition is trying (ineffectively, in my mind) to paint on the proroguation issue. They want to show that their MPs are out there, helping their consituents, doling out public funds, doing something. It's a lame point of attack and it's a lame riposte.

Another bizarre point is how Halifax based most of the funding was. 14.8 million out of the 48 million. I don't have a good conspiracy theory, but it's worth mentioning.

On Political Theatre

2010-01-27T11:51:00.002-05:00

I've been thinking about political theatre as performance art. Rush Limbaugh as a performance artist, for instance. We lack that up in the canuckistan: too much of our political theatre is consequential, too much of it rooted in real strategy. It makes one miss Brian Mulroney (the self-described "big brassy guy") and Pierre Trudeau. The country is poorer for never having these two face off in an election campaign, though I suppose one could dig up the hansard on the very few commons exchanges pre-Turner. That said, Jack Layton still gets it - yet another reason to support the guy.

These guys were diametrically opposed in aims, but both had enough respect for the theatrical institution that they never brought their true plans public. You can see in Mulroney's disdain for Turner; a disdain for the ernest technocrat that the Liberal leader represented/embodied. It was the reason that Trudeau smiled and laughed whenever Joe Clark spoke: Trudeau understood that Clark had a thin sense of theatre and that he'd de-elect himself if given the stage. Clark's later realization and rehabilitation came far too late to score him anything more than leadership of a moribund party and a better pension.

Entarté!

2010-01-26T12:30:00.000-05:00

So, We all heard about the Minister for Fisheries and Oceans getting pied by a PETA protester. As a big fan of pastries, physical humour and political theatre, I sincerely hope that the pieing makes a comeback. As a hat tip to the idiocy of our era, a Liberal MP is suggesting that the pie'er should be prosecuted as a terrorist.

Considering the terrorist threat from anarchist bakers, I figured that this would be a good time for a pie retrospective:

Jean Chretien Pied, here's the news report
Stephane Dion Pied
Ralph Klein (ff to 1:14 for the money shot) Pied. That really looked like it hurt. Really if you plan on doing this, you should have a soft touch, these are old people.
Jean Charest Pied
Montreal Mayor Tremblay Pied.
And just for fun Bill Gates Pied.

There are more available on this seminal wikipedia page: List of people who have been pied.
Those of you sympathizing with the terrorists can check the website: http://www.entartistes.ca/

Numbers

2010-01-26T00:00:00.000-05:00

Well since we've been gone, the numbers have changed.

http://threehundredeight.blogspot.com/2009/02/opinion-polling-trends.html

Harpers dropped far from majority territory, but the cracks in the analysis are showing. It's unlikely, some are saying, that the diminished poll numbers will translate into diminished votes. Take the Olympics in the news, then the budget, the the confidence vote, then a 40 day election cycle. Harper could club a baby seal right now (and likely will) and the electorate will have forgotten it by the time they come to the ballot box.

In sum, this is, for the Rassemblement des Forces Anti-Harperistes, good news in the vein of "your t-cell count is higher than last month" or "The Russians are retreating from Ukraine, Fuhrer." Good news, certainly, but not the kind of thing that will stop Iggy's nightmares about being cast adrift on an iceberg by a rudderless Liberal party.

What about our Lacrosse matches?

2010-01-25T15:28:00.001-05:00

Conservative Pundit Kelly McParland compares the attendance at a hockey game to the protests against the proroguation. The Point? Protests against the government don't matter because they are lower (Though actually higher by his math) than the maximum capacity of the Air Canada Centre where the Maple Leaves play.

This seems a little unfair as the Leafs are a large, historic Canadian institution, with a fan base that loves them fanatically no matter how badly they do, has generally bad management and overpaid stars that punch below their weight. That and the fact that, while they are beloved by their fans, they are largely hated everywhere else in the country. I really don't see the comparison to the Liberals.

That said, McParland's comparison is a silly, insulting and demonstrates a lack of awareness of the situation. I was at the protest on parliament hill, and there wasn't one Liberal poster, or a large Liberal party presence at all. If I had had to guess I would have said it was an NDP affair. If he had gone he would know that. Whatever, it's not like he's a journalist or anything.

We're Back!

2010-01-25T14:18:00.000-05:00

Since we haven't published so many big changes have happened. Other than the greenpeace scaling the walls of West Block I can't really remember any of them.

When the inmates run the asylum.

2009-11-03T19:20:00.000-05:00

Okay, first off, was not this piece of shit propaganda mill supposed to close? I mean, you lose that much money over that many years basically disseminating lies, disinformation, and half-formed opinions that are mostly antithetical to serious and measured deliberation, with no serious business plan that sees the joke getting funny, and you get bailed out by some right-wing yahoo who wants to see it going? It really is like that joke about the guy who sold the Brooklyn bridge.

That said, then theres the anti-gun registry nonsense. In sum this is completely wrong and this Martin guy (who is to journalism as Raffi is to Beethoven) would be howling for torture and the death penalty for anyone caught with a gun were he exposed to any form of gun violence. Perfectly frankly: is there anything theat these fuckhead conservatives do that is not ordered on the basest self-interest? Like did any of them go to school to learn anything other than how to fuck people over (Harper and his joke MA from the U of Calgary being the paradigmatic example). How is it that people so unserious, so ignorant and corrupt, so truly odious - how is it that they receive even a modicum of serious attention? Inquiring minds want to know, but do indeed fear the truth, lest if prove so unpalatable as to disillusion.

2009-10-30T14:25:00.000-04:00

Apologies to the three or four people who connect to this Blog, our writers are out doing other things for the moment, and/or lamenting the complete absence of actual events to discuss. For myself, I have contracted the swine flu, and should be back up to speed soon.

I leave you for the moment with this poem and this Kandinsky to contemplate instead of incisive, clever and occasionally insulting commentary of canadian politics.

They are hostile nations

by Margaret Atwood

In view of the fading animals

the proliferation of sewers and fears

the sea clogging, the air

nearing extinction.

we should be kind, we should

take warning, we should forgive each other

Instead we are opposite, we

touch as though attacking,

the gifts we bring

even in good faith maybe

warp in our hands to

implements, to manoeuvres

Put down the target of me

you guard inside your binoculars,

in turn I will surrender

this aerial photograph

(your vulnerable

sections marked in red)

I have found so useful

See, we are alone in

the dormant field, the snow

that cannot be eaten or captured

iii

Here there are no armies

here there is no money

It is cold and getting colder,

We need each others’

breathing, warmth, surviving
is the only war

we can afford, stay

walking with me, there is almost

time / if we can only

make it as far as

the (possibly) last summer

Yglesias on food and drink in Ottawa.

2009-10-23T01:15:00.001-04:00

Yglesias, as usual, cuts to a matter very close to my heart: high drink prices. He's pointing to a national survey (American, of course) that plots food a drink prices. In Oklahoma, an average beer was $3.22, in DC it's $4.13. Boo hoo.

It’s common for friends of mine to go visit Philadelphia and then come back outraged by how expensive everything is in DC. This is, however, largely a case of the wages of high wages. Mean annual earnings in the DC metro area are $57,080 a year, way above the national average of $42,270. Philly, by contrast, is close to average at $46,410 while Oklahoma City is well below average at $36,880. The ones who really seem to be losing out on this deal are the New Yorkers, whose beer costs slightly more than DC’s despite somewhat lower wages. What I’d really like to see is the full dataset from Intellaprice, then you could make a “price of beer vs average wages” scatterplot.

The problem he's established is high wages. I figured this out pretty much as soon as I arrived in Ottawa where people seem to think 20$ for a pitcher, tax and tip, is normal and acceptable.

First off, no, it's outrageous. That beer costs probably less than two dollars to produce and ship.

Second, Matt's missing the point, which you only get if you live right in Centretown: too many people are not paying for their own drinks. Too many people with expense accounts, too many people trying to impress other people, too many people using business lunch tax exemptions. They don't pay for their own drinks, they don't care what it costs. It drives up the prices for those of us who have to pay for our own Ceasars at Social.

the other thing is that people in Ottawa also have bad taste, but I'll save that for another post.

Cyber-warfare in Hochelaga

2009-10-21T13:01:00.002-04:00

An interesting little tidbit from The Pundit's Guide. I missed this one.

The NDP candidate in Hochelaga, Jean-Claude Rocheleau is tweeting quite a bit, and doing so exclusively in french. He does not appear to have many followers. But sometime around 10 days ago, a Twitter account entitled "JeanClaudeNDP" invited a lot of people to follow him/her/it, including yours truly and quite a few others. It invited its followers to complete a short survey, saying that the NDP needed their help. Needless to say, the link to this "survey" likely contained a virus, and the account has been tweeting spam ever since. Most of its followers have since vanished, but I'm sure I wasn't the only one to think I had a story that the NDP by-election candidate had been infected by a virus. Mr. Rocheleau's true Twitter account is "jcrocheleau"

"JeanClaudeNDP" here and "jcrocheleau" here.

There are two explanations: first that it was just some hacker who wanted to spread a virus, or it could have been a malicious (and lame) attempt to hurt Rocheleau's online organizing. Whatever the answer (I don't have the resourses or the desire to investigate), it does open up a new frontier in the annoy-your-opponent's-supporters division of dirty election tricks - right up there with the automated dialers claiming to be a candidate and them giving misleading information or lying about their platform.

Blogger says...

2009-10-21T00:12:00.000-04:00

Nixtuff has a decent and convincing election projection.

Baird on Gatineau park

2009-10-21T00:02:00.001-04:00

I think this might mean that John Baird is unclear as to what a 'park' is.

Quoth John Baird: "Protecting the park is a very important thing, but protecting people's rights is equally important, you know?" Their rights to develop condos?

Ottawa music podcast

2009-10-20T23:50:00.000-04:00

I can't figure out what the hell these guys are on about, but they're music, they're local and the NDP's foreign affairs critic has a cameo.

Politicians fall victim to the lobbying efforts of Big Pork

2009-10-19T22:57:00.003-04:00

I really love pork, and can't wait until my career gets to the level where I actually get invites to the Canadian Pork Council's shindigs.

This story is funny for a couple of reasons. First, the Conservatives are conspicuous by their absence. Hmm, how odd. Second, it's obviously a way of shoring up support for an industry which has been hit hard by a ridiculous overreaction to the 'Swine Flu'. Third, those photos are terrible. With the exception of Terrence Young, who looks like he's just about to punch someone out, the photographer has managed to make them all look a little, I don't know, undead, and the food look disgusting.

Conservative Blogger Stephen Taylor: I agree with the BC NDP, and the federal Liberals.

2009-10-19T22:30:00.000-04:00

I have to politely disagree with my newly bipartisan colleague (and the BCNDP and LPC), while it will suck to have to pay an extra 5 or 7% on many goods and services, the HST is a good idea. It reduces a level of bureaucracy, makes tax collection more efficient - thus realizing cost savings through efficiency - all while eliminating tax loopholes that were probably installed to protect certain private interests who had a seat at the bargaining table when the provincial tax was crafted.

The tax that will be added is a consumption tax that will reduce spending on consumption goods and may therefore marginally increase family savings. Always a good thing.

The HST removes taxation power from more parochial provincial governments while allowing those same governments to close their budget gaps, thus reducing the need for government borrowing, thus reducing the need for future tax increases to service debt.

Long live the HST!

McGuinty on Publicly-funded Advertising

2009-10-19T22:03:00.001-04:00

McGuinty was doing pretty good, what with his attacks on the Conservative patronage appointments and the giant cheques and all, but then he has to go and shoot himself in the foot with this little interview.

Basically, he's talking about "10 percenters", flyers that can be distributed, at taxpayer expense, to any riding in the country by any sitting MP. They're essentially a form of state-subsidized advertising. They can be sent to any riding, with the return address of the sitting MP. They need to be at least 50% (or something) different at each mailing, and can be sent to a maximum of 10% of a riding - which, in Ontario, is anywhere between 6 and 16 thousand households at a batch.

Sayeth David McGuinty: "That is a flagrant abuse of taxpayers' money. If you're using public resources to further the cause of your own party in held or unheld ridings, it's against the rules. And if it's not against the rules, it's against common sense."

This is true, except that I got one of those mailings about two weeks ago talking smack about Stephen Harper from... Martha Hall Findlay, MP for Willowdale, probably green-lit by the Ottawa Centre Liberal organization. Point is, David, before you go firing off on the CBC, you should look at what your party's doing in your back yard.

Micheal Coren: Idiot or Literary Prostitute?

2009-10-19T00:32:00.002-04:00

Social conservative Michael Coren has written a poorly researched article on why there's no such thing as global warming. I admit I didn't really know who Coren was and so I thought that it might have been someone legitimate. How wrong I was. Just for the exercize, I'm going to go over the fallacies and half truths that it takes to write an idiotic, regressive column for the Sun Media corporation.

Coren starts by reminding us that "every left-of-centre journalist in the country has managed to become an instant expert on the arcane subjects of global warming and the science of climate change." Coren, himself, has a degree in "politics" with no training in the sciences whatsoever. Judging from his columns he really hasn't read that much about it either. I assume this is an attempt at irony, an inside joke maybe.

Next line: "Imagine, for example, if some average Canadian hack who had never studied the Middle East suddenly announced that he was an authority on Israel-Palestine, knew which side was right and knew how to solve all of the associated problems." Imagine! That never happens, though.

Back to the point, there are "an increasing number of peer-reviewed and intensely credible scientific minds who believe conventional thinking on global warming is nonsense." Oh, there are? Because I had heard that there weren't. But who? Coren has named "Lord Christopher Monckton, former science adviser to British prime minister Margaret Thatcher and a world-renowned scholar."

As I am, an expert in Middle Eastern affairs (I really am), I dusted off my research skills to find out who Lord Monckton is. So first off his full name is Christopher Walter Monckton, 3rd Viscount Monckton of Brenchley, he claims, occasionally, to be a peer of the House of Lords but is not. Guess what? He has no scientific training. He has a diploma in Journalism, an extensive background in conservative punditry, an impressive record of electoral failures, but no actual training in climate science.

Coren describes him as "A man of compelling wit and eloquence, he has defeated so many environmental activists -- he calls them "bedwetters" -- that few of them will now debate him." Bedwetters. How eloquent. Tell me Coren, isn't it more likely that they refuse to debate them because instead of using rational argument he uses insults usually reserved for those in the 3rd grade?

"According to Monckton," continues Coren "there are more than 700 major scientists who steadfastly refute the notion that the climate is changing to any worrying degree, that global warming is a reality and that the planet is in danger." Oh yes? Name one with an actual degree relevant to this topic. Of course there really aren't that many. That's why you need some crackpot aristocrat with no real education to make this stuff up.

In the next section we get into the nitty-gritty. The hard science, so to speak. Coren tells us that "in a series of articles he appears to show that Earth's sensitivity to increased atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide is minimal."

I did a little checking and found the article. It's published in a publication called the Quarterly Economic Bulletin. I don't know much about this publication, but I can tell you for sure that it is, in fact, an economics journal, and not in any way related to any of the sciences related to climate change nor is it peer reviewed by any actual scientist. Which shouldn't be surprising as Monckton has no training in the sciences. Here's the link to his article, published in late 2006.

But here we have the big argument: "Take the example of the medieval warm period," Coren says Monckton says, "The bedwetters tell us that this was brief and irrelevant. Yet if we look at history we see it wasn't brief and is certainly relevant. Climate does change but it's minor and it has little if anything to do with man's intervention."

Well three things about that, 1) no one says that, 2) the Medieval warm period happened gradually not in a period of a quarter century, as with the recent spike in global temperatures (see the chart) and 3) I really don't know how you can believe that removing most of the earth's forests and destroying the ecosystems of the ocean, both of which are responsible for removing the CO2 from the air, and pumping hundreds of times the natural amount of CO2 into the air when we know that CO2 has an effect on global temperatures, could have no effect on global temperatures.

Monckton/Coren cites DDT "the pesticide used to kill mosquitoes that carried malaria," as evidence that concern for the environment is all about being cool, and has nothing to do with the mountains of peer reviewed research, or the scientific consensus around the issue. "Jackie Kennedy read a book saying it was harmful, got her husband the president to bring pressure to have it banned and in 40 years 40 million people, mainly children, died. Now we've come to our senses and re-introduced it but only after the fashionable left did their damage."

Actually, DDT was banned because it was a highly toxic chemical that was being used indiscriminately in nature and in agriculture. It's actually really bad for you. It's banned in most western countries. You can still use it in North Korea, India and other countries with severly lacking health and safety regulations but not many countries allow for general use. It's being used only as a last resort. Another thing? There are lots of ways to kill mosquitos.

"Global warming is similar.' this damned fool informs us, "It makes no sense, is bad science and policies to deal with it will cause terrible problems." Yes, it would be terrible if we used public transportation, invested in alternative energy and polluted less. What a terrible future we have in store.

"People are being indoctrinated and critics are intimidated into silence," Monckton/Coren concludes. Do you suppose he includes things like "shut up you idiot, your points are inane, and you haven't done any research" as intimidating someone into silence. If so, I could see how that is true. Don't worry though, I'm sure you'll find some supportive members of the Coal, Oil and Gas industry to hear your complaints.

In sum, there's no Climate Change because some aristocrat who no one actually wants to talk to managed to get a paper published in a third rate Economics journal and because Jacqueline Kennedy-Onassis convinced her husband to ban DDT, she's responsible for more deaths than Hitler, and now we risk making the same mistake again so we had better do nothing at all.

Is Michael Coren dumb or is he just well paid to make bad arguments? You decide.

International Successes as Domestic Failures

2009-10-18T18:41:00.002-04:00

I'm taking advantage of this beautiful day to sit in a darkened room reading Peter Newman's excellent Bio of John Deifenbaker. I read something interesting early on in the book.

A part of the Liberal party's decline in the late fifties and Diefenbaker's rise to power in 1957, according to Newman, was the actions of the Canadian government, and specifically Foreign Affairs Minister Lester Pearson in the Suez crisis of 1956.

A further decline in the administration's popularity occurred as the result of the Suez crisis... Lester Pearson's vigourous action at the United Nations, which culminated in the establishment of the United Nations Emergency Force in the Middle East, brought Canada down on the same side as Russia and the United States - against Israeli "aggression" and the Anglo-French "intervention."
The Conservatives attacked the Grits for deserting the British and becoming chore-boys for Washington, and Pearson's reply didn't help the situation very much: "If it's bad to be a chore-boy for the United States, it's equally bad to be a colonial chore-boy running around shouting 'Ready, aye, ready!'"

Newman goes on to describe that Prime Minister St. Laurent, when pressed on the issue of giving UN representation to smaller countries in this matter over the "vital interests of the great powers," gave a stunningly progressive response, saying that they should be given a voice by virtue of their common humainty and that the era of colonialism was over. Deif replied that this type of thinking would give hope to the communists.

What blows my mind is that this incident was domestically unpopular for the Liberals. We had always learned in social studies that Pearson's actions at the UN were widely praised, and that we were on the vanguard of history at that point, crafting the UNEF (which actually succeeded, for a time, in reducing hostilities in the Middle East) and the leading the creation of the Blue Helmets. What they never told us was that people were scandalized at St. Laurent's unprecedented breach with the United Kingdom and at the new relationship with the Americans. They turfed out the Liberals (knocking out half of the cabinet) and gave the reins to Deif.

That said, the Liberal government fell for a number of other reasons, none of them unfamiliar to someone who has been following Canadian politics for the last six years. The Liberals under St. Laurent had become distant, arrogant and mildly corrupt; they were replaced by a Conservative Minorty government with a Western leader supported by two minor parties who had made gains at the Liberal's expense. It strikes the modern reader how Canadian society has changed but how little it's politics have.

The Rexxie? The Fournie?

2009-10-18T17:55:00.001-04:00

Some Blog posts write themselves.

The Royal Canadian Mint has issued a 4$ coin (why four? Is Team Harper moving us away from our traditional relaince on the number 5?) with a Tyrannosaurus skeleton on it. Available now for the low low price of just Over 40$.

Are we really running our of cute animals to put on our currency?

Secret Liberal Weapon in Ottawa Centre

2009-10-16T20:06:00.002-04:00

You know, I don't mind Scott Bradley. I may not vote for him but I think he's an okay guy. Tell me though Scott, what does this mean?

I Leaf Scott? Like "make like a tree and leaf"? You couldn't have thought of anything better? And could you remind your volunteers to close their mouths during photo sessions? and look a little bit more like they're not completely high? I really hope you resolve these problems before the beginning of campaign season.

All the same, if you send me one of those T-shirts I will probably wear it to squash.

The Ekos Poll, revealed

2009-10-15T21:02:00.000-04:00

Surely by now you've heard the EKOS poll that says that Conservative support is sticking at majority levels and Liberal support is sticking at Stephane Dion levels. If not, read here. Also, there's more analysis by Katy O'Malley and by 308.

But what did those guys miss? Let's compare the latest data with the election numbers from last year in the two most important areas, Quebec and Ontario

First thing, we have to say that the big news here is the significant Conservative gains in Ontario. No surprise there. This will help them to knock off a few marginal ridings and to push in on the edges of the 416 area code in Toronto. It won't however, change much in the three Ontario non-Conservative ridings that we follow here, those three ridings would require a greater swing to move them.

Conservative gains in Ontario seem to have been made not at the expense of the Liberals, but more at the expense of the NDP, defying the traditional right-left political spectrum. This might bode ill for those newly elected NDPers in the north.

The big weird news out of Quebec is that the Greens seem, out of nowhere, to have tripled it's support, now standing at more than 10%. This is probably wrong, as the Green party has never broken 5% in Quebec, and likely to fold during a campaign - the Greens simply don't have the ability to collect all their votes like the other parties. The big loser here is the NDP (only their change is out of the MOE), leading us to speculate that Francoise Boivin's campaign in Gatineau and Mulcair's seat in Outremont may be in real trouble.

So, this is bad news for the Libs, but even worse for the NDP.

Ottawa West-Nepean: Local press polite, respectful

2009-10-15T20:59:00.000-04:00

YourBarrhaven.com gets the lowdown on the perpetual third candidate in OWN.

It's hard not to love Marlene Rivier, a social democratic grandmother who's been pushing the boulder up the hill for what will soon be five elections in a riding that it so opposed to community spirit that it would actually willingly elect a throwback from the Mike Harris cabinet to represent them federally. Needless to say, she stands no chance, the NDP is just not that strong in this riding.

Nat Post says something constructive.

2009-10-15T20:44:00.001-04:00

Every backbencher in the Tory caucus needs to read this Don Martin piece in the National Post.

The Point: Yes, the liberals used every dirty trick in the book to bribe just enough ridings to win, but that doesn't mean that the conservatives have to steal from their playbook. Every time the opposition points out that a cabinet minister drunkenly slammed his car into a schoolbus, the minister comes out to remind us that Jean Chretien once lit a group of nuns on fire.

Like seriously, Conservatives, shut the hell up and stop diverting public funds to get yourselves reelected..

The Urban Toronto Advantage

2009-10-15T00:04:00.000-04:00

Wowee, Hat tip Kady O'Malley. I kind of wish this was a slightly better story: Stephen "call-me-Stephen-Harper" Harper likes an awesome indie rock band. Like him, they're from Toronto.

Because I know he loves this blog, I'll post one of my favourite tracks.

it bares repeating

2009-10-14T23:40:00.000-04:00

Mr. David McGuinty (Ottawa South, Lib.):

Mr. Speaker, in 2006, all parties agreed to the creation of a public appointments commission to set standards for and oversee federal appointments. Four years later, there is no commission, no commissioner and more than $1 million wasted on a phantom office.

Over 3,000 appointments were made without scrutiny. In the last six weeks alone, 37 Conservative insiders, donors, bagmen, candidates and campaign workers have received lucrative government jobs.
How many more rewards does the Prime Minister intend to hand out to his Conservative flock?

Mr. Andrew Saxton (Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board, CPC):

Mr. Speaker, this is the government that tried to bring in a public appointments commissioner but the Liberal Party shot it down. We are committed to accountability and transparency and we will continue to be committed to that.

Mr. David McGuinty (Ottawa South, Lib.):

Mr. Speaker, only the government would expect a crony to stamp out cronyism. How ridiculous.

The Conservatives' constant cronyism is insulting to those who believed them when they promised to put an end to partisan appointments.
The Prime Minister promised a commission “to ensure that the selection of individuals is based on merit and is done in an open and transparent way”.
Four years later, there is still nothing, except for the appointment of 37 Conservative faithful.
How many Conservative cronies will get one of these rewards?

Mr. Andrew Saxton (Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board, CPC):

Mr. Speaker, this government is committed to accountability and transparency and we will continue to be committed to that.

Why can we all get along?

2009-10-14T22:51:00.000-04:00

If my instincts were better, I would have trusted them to see this coming, but iggy's softened his tone. (that was fast.) Basically, Ignatieff has just made the calculations that he'd get his clock cleaned if he had an election, then lose his job and then be taking orders from his old Trinity College chum Bob Rae. No, Iggy doesn't like the prospect.

The tragedy of this is that the humbling of Ignatieff (and of Layton and Duceppe for their roles in propping up a government that they disagree with) in the latest salvo of partisan brinksmanship won't change a thing. The four parties in parliament haven't yet learned the lesson that history has been trying to teach them for the last five years: that they should be trying their best to produce good policy that actually makes things better. What they have been doing is near-constant opinion polling to determine the best date for an election, and then organizing their policy proposals so as to create a string pseudo-events around which to build their 'narrative' to edge themselves slightly higher in those opinion polls.

This is all fine and good for the young Machiavellis in their offices in downtown Ottawa, but seriously, were does it get us?

In my mind, the solution to this lies in the Liberal party, and it always has. While nothing quite terrifies me like the prospect of a Conservative-Liberal unity government, I can't see a better solution than one in which the Liberal party begins to actively work with the government to produce better legislation and provide better appointments, improve our institutions and our legislative decisionmaking. The NDP, as the European-style social democratic party that it is, cannot and should not be expected to provide this role, nor should the separatist Bloc. The fact is that there's legislation that needs to be passed and there's a workable parliament. The Liberals need to be at the table because they want to be, not (as were with Dion) because they have to be.

The point is that they should just stop it with the confidence votes, debate until there is good legislation on the floor then vote it up or down. Fuck it; let Harper be the damned PM for a while. Take the fingers off the triggers and get your work done.

Diverse.

2009-10-13T14:17:00.009-04:00

We discover today, to the surprise 0f very few, that the government is awarding too many sole-sourced contracts. In all fairness to Darth Harper and his Storm Troopers, this could be a result of anything from path-dependency at the bureaucratic level or with whatever procurement services contracts the government uses, bureaucratic incompetence, government policy, ministerial interference, and plain old contract rigging through the time-honored insertion of obscure provisions and specifications into the tender requests. One hopes that it is an issue being investigated by some intrepid team at some or other publication, but one fears that those resources are being devoted instead to Garth Turner, idle gossip, and the like.

We also learn today that stimulus spending is very unevenly distributed in Nova Scotia, a situation the reporting team seems to be suggesting owes to minority parties (particularly in Dartmouth) not having representation at the table and, thus, seems to put a common sense spin on outrageous spending priorities (when the countryside gets more infrastructure money that they cities, this is when you know that something isn't right).

Finally, we read that once again, Canada's environmental stance has produced a walkout at an international climate convention, this time in Thailand. Inexplicably, the Star is the only one getting this so far, which makes it difficult to gauge whether or not the Canadian delegation was truly offending the 77 countries, or whether Canada was simply used as a proxy for the U.S. by these folks. Regardless, this will be a nice arrow in the quiver of one of the opposition parties during the election (my guess is that Gilles Duceppe wields it most effectively).

Willful ignorance.

2009-10-09T16:15:00.005-04:00

It really shocks, the disgraceful capacity of the national media and the moronic pundit class focus on trivial issues at the expense of truly scandalous revelations. Here, we have a systematic, concerted effort by the party in power to employ the tools and resources of government for political gain. Yet, we read and hear about Michael Ignatieff this and that, and Harper's obviously bullshit "no taxes, no service cuts" budget stabilization plan. Seriously, fuck them.

Those poor, poor bankers...

2009-10-09T14:44:00.000-04:00

I'm not sure who I hate more in this story: a scattered group of right-wing pseudo-professionals who are happy to drive up prices for average people, or the small Cabal of banking executives who have been running the country's financial services like a military junta for decades. Tough call, but interesting little window on how policy is made.

Twitter feed

2009-10-08T18:59:00.000-04:00

MP Royal Galipeau tweets:

Today, for the third time in three weeks, I voted against an election. 63 Liberals voted for an election. 14 Liberals, incl. Ignatieff, were AWOL

Actually, it's pretty courageous to be voting against the government, basically putting your carreer in the hands of the BQ and NDP, when you're doing so badly in the polls.

Iggy's Inferno.

2009-10-08T15:59:00.001-04:00

I'm absolutely stupefied by these Ekos numbers.

Conservatives: 39.7 (+3.7)

Liberals: 25.7 (-4.0)

NDP: 15.2 (+1.3)

Green: 9.7 (-0.8)

Bloc Quebecois: 9.7%

This means that Iggy has made himself and his party less popular than Stephane Dion (At 26% or so). Everyone always talks about how living in Ottawa is like living in a bubble, and I'd expect that this is true, because I have no idea how people's opinions could have changed so radically in the last three weeks. Three weeks ago the Libs and the Cons were polling even, two and a half weeks ago the liberals were going to call an election and annihilate the NDP caucus and knock off a few Conservatives straggling into Lib territory. Now Harper has his majority. What the hell happened?

Damn Right!

2009-10-07T16:32:00.000-04:00

For once, the NatPost says something that actually makes sense..

Meet the renegades! Part 2

2009-10-07T16:21:00.000-04:00

Just for fun let's take a look at a few Canada's previous defectors so that we can judge hat makes a good Floor-crosser. This list is not comprehensive, just a few of the big ones in the last decade.

The last was Wajid Khan, a Liberal who defected to the Conservatives after interim Liberal leader Bill Graham foolishly allowed him to become an advisor to the PM on Middle Eastern affairs. Khan died a lonely political death in the 2008 election as he was turfed out by the rampantly Liberal denizens of Mississauga. He's not coming back either; the Conservative nomination for Miss-Streetsville went to neophyte Sue McFadden.
Before that we had David Emerson, another red to blue turncoat. He elected as a centrist Liberal in a left wing riding. After his defection he was an inner cabionet member and one of the few in the conservative members to have any damned class at all. Coming into the election in 2008, he saw the writing on the wall and decided to "spend more time with his family" a phrase usually reserved for politicians who are under indictment (but may have actually been true - Harper would have moved him to a winnable riding)
And then there was the luminous Belinda Stronach, who ditched not just her party but her boyfriend at the time. She moved from the Conservates to the Liberals to become an inner cabinet member of Team Paul Martin, following them into the political wilderness. Unlike the two turncoats mentioned above, Belinda actually managed to flip a Blue Riding to red based on her personal popularity in the riding, though it was in fact a fairly close race befoe
Reform/Alliance MP Keith Martin (who actually snaked his riding from Former Premier of BC Dave Barrett) refused to take part the merger with the Progressive Conservative Party and moved over to the Liberals. He didn't exactly cross the floor as he spend the remainder of his term as an indpendant before taking the Liberal nomination in 2004. His riding has none of the normal demographics a liberal riding in BC, so he must've been a pretty popular candidate to move it into the liberal fold, though he will likely be unseated next election.
Conversely Scott Brison was a member of the PC caucus who refused to join the Canadian Alliance and made the jump to the Liberals following Paul Martin's coup in 2003. Like Martin, his personal popularity carried him as he crossed the aisle, and he still wins with a significant margin as a conservative.
On the same day, Bloc MP Robert Lanctot bailed to the Liberals; he marched his was into obscurity in the 2004 election.

So the Liberals seem to be doing a bit better (so far) than the Conservatives, but this will probably shift as the balance in parliament continues to shift. More importantly, we can't make any assumptions about the nature. They could be politically shrewd, like Stronach, rely on their own personal popularity, like Brison, or be quite foolish like Khan, it's all about political calculation or miscalculation.

The recent rumours of defection from the Liberal Camp revolve around a Liberal-party-as-sinking-ship narrative. The Conservatives are trying to create the impression that there are people out there who want to keep their positions and who (like Stronach and Brison) would have immediate promotions and raises. This could include anyone who is basically Conservative in some domain (fiscally or socially), from parts of the country where the conservatives are weak (David Emerson was brought on to provide representation for cities), or those who carry some person weight in the riding or are from ridings that are more inclined to vote based on the person running rather than the party, like in the maritimes.

But, of course, calculations have never stopped anyone from misreading the situation. Ask Wajid Khan. In this case though, to look at the Liberal leadership floundering for what seems like the sixth straight year, it may not be a miscalculation at all. One or two more bad news cycles may start turning those rumours into actions.

Meet the Renegades!

2009-10-06T23:56:00.000-04:00

I'm with Greg Fergus on this one, Iggy's not dead, he's just sleeping with his eyes open.

Just for fun though, let us assume that there was some validity to the rumours that the Conservatives spread that there's a defector (or three!) waiting to cross the floor. Who would that person be?

Some guy on Rabble.ca has made a pretty convincing list, and since I don't want to go through the trouble of doing it myself, I'll link to Scott Piatkowski's post. Many of the things he predicts are pretty outrageous - like that Joe Volpe or Maurizio Bevilacqua would cross the floor - but he presents a list of dissenters and vulnerable riding candidates that could potentially be brought into the conservative fold. We here at Ottawa37 have whittled it down to four candidates that we will be analysing over the next day or so in the hopes that we will get the bragging rights associated with predicitng the defection of the newest conservative members.

Dispatch from the Hill.

2009-10-05T19:33:00.003-04:00

Sheila Copps' latest dispatch from the Hill Times is a really damned good read for anyone who likes the themes we touch on in this blog. Besides the overall thrust of supporting Ignatieff's original, now abandoned, idea to get rid of the position of "Quebec Lieutenant," it has a few little tidbits of Liberal gossip that I didn't catch.

Georges Lafontaine, the guy who came third in Pontiac was Coderre's Man. Really? What was he thinking? that Race was sewn up months ago. Copps accuses him of bending the rules to allow Lafontaine's nomination. This turned out to be dumb for two reasons.
NDP candidate Francoise Boivin (a former liberal MP) was pushed out to make way for 'Star' candidate. I always thought that she'd left of her own accord.

We should take this with a grain of salt: smearing La Traitre Coderre, making him seem disloyal, unethical and incompetent would be the approriate thing to do at this point, and Copps does this well. Still, it's a good article.

Space, Symbolism and the Colour Blue

2009-10-05T14:16:00.006-04:00

Katy O'Malley shows us that the conservatives can't quite get past partisanship. They want to recognize that this is the anniversary of the first Canadian in space but they also want to keep it out of the public consciousness that that person is Industry Critic Marc Garneau, member of the Liberal Party of Canada. They can't get past the symbolism of recognizing a member of their most powerful opposition.

I was wonder if this bizarre, post-modern emphasis that the Conservatives have put on the symbolism of governance - the change of all government websites to the colour blue, for example - would continue after they gain a majority government? Will they continue it but with a freer hand? I just had this wierd thought this morning as I sleepily drove between the NAC and the war memorial, What if they changed the flag, adding blue to it, bringing back the print that Deifenbaker denounced as Pearson's Pennant?

Not that I give a damn, mind you.

Michael Ignatieff, I miss you already (for all that you were, and all that you weren't).

2009-10-05T02:50:00.014-04:00

There's an inevitable mourning of ends of eras; it's schlocky and silly, but there isn't a way around it. Big changes force one to take stock of things - and indeed, approaching 30 years old, I find that I do so with a disappointing regularity, I mourn my time as a student, I mourn the great nights I spent with my friends, I mourn the places I have and haven't visited. But I couldn't imagine a way to mourning Michael Ignatieff. Jack Layton, Stephane Dion, these are principled men, men to mourn; the Igg, he is not. Nonetheless, with the end of the Igg comes the end of an era in which I have been deeply invested. In our lifetime, the LPC is unlikely ever again to select an academic as their candidate for the purple, and certainly never to do so twice in such absurdly quick succession. There is a depressing consistency to Canadian politics, a smallness, a sense in which even the weightiest decisions lack gravity. Say what you will about the Igg: he is indeed an interloper, he's only thinly Canadian, he really doesn't have a clue about what it means to raise a family in this country, or to lose a job in this country, or to be deeply invested (heart and soul) in this country. But he represents the very best intellectual tradition that we have- the cosmopolitan intellectual at the intersection of the public and the academic. And losing him (and Dion) really is losing something very very important to what it means to be Canadian. There are a thousand ways that Stephen Harper is wrong for Canada, and his elimination of precisely this sort of candidate for the purple is maybe, maybe the most egregious.

But...

2009-10-03T17:57:00.001-04:00

What kind of man is Harper, anyway?

Harper's Index.

2009-10-03T17:53:00.003-04:00

I just read historian Michael Bliss' account of the current state of affairs in Canadian politics. In short, he's saying that The PM has found the "tipping point" that it will take to get his majority. The Conservatives have moved towards a pragmatic/governance-based agenda and stand united; the Liberals are in disarray and have more or less failed to produce any serious defining policy. This is, for once, penetrating the Canadian psyche and translating into a more or less common belief that the Liberals would be spanked if the election were held tomorrow.

His point is this: Harper can continue to run the show like he has a majority because he can assume that he can turn any election ito a majority.

There are two problems with this: first, here's some actual quantitative data that tells us that, yes, the Cons are doing well, but no, they are not doing well enough to take a majority. Even at 37% support (Chretien levels), the distribution of support for the Conservative Party is such that it will not give Harper a majority.

More below the jump

The second is that there may be an election sooner than we think. I think Chantal Hebert is right. The NDP might not be terribly happy with its new position as the mostly silent partner in what looks like a conversative majority government. Iggy says he has no confidence in Harper, he's painted himself into a corner. Will Layton or Duceppe want to step into the role so recently vacated by the Liberal leadership? Probably not.

So what do we have? Winter election. If Iggy can put sutures on the hemorrhaging Liberal support and maintain it at Stephane Dion levels then we can expect another close minority, with some minor changes.

There are only three ways that Harper will get his majority. First is a major blunder by the Liberal party during the election. It's happened before, may happen again. But it would have to be pretty serious. Second is a large scale defection of the Liberal, Bloc or NDP (it's happened before) right wing. Third and most likely is the coming addition of seats to parliament, a redistribution that will favour cities and favour the west. It's unclear how the Libs are going to deal with this issue but it's big. It will reduce, clearly reduce, the power of Quebec in confederation and shift the focus of national elections.

The first two are unlikely, the third is inevitable. We have a long road to walk, Canadians, but the period of turbulent Canadian politics is not over.

Touching the bottom.

2009-10-02T20:59:00.005-04:00

Anyone else notice the little war going on between that idiot Bourque and the Newswatch guy? Yes, they actually appear to be dueling over the origins of the use of the moronic term "Iffy" to describe Liberal leader (for now) Michael Ignatieff. Long story short, Bourque has been claiming all week to have coined the term, and now the Newswatch dude has repliqued with some links demonstrating earlier use. At first, I was outraged and vaguely nauseated by the baseness of the exchange and my having been unwilling witness to it, but meta debates don't get more mindlessly stupid than this, so I've decided to enjoy the spectacle of it.

UPDATE: And now Bourque has removed the banner claiming to have first used the term "Iffy".

Seats to watch: Western Canada

2009-10-02T17:58:00.003-04:00

To finish up my four part series, I am going to look at the seats to watch in the West. However, with the NDP propping up the government recently, we may not even be heading to the polls until at least the spring.

Palliser, Saskatchewan
One thing I contunally tell people about Saskatchewan is how gerrymandered the districts are. Both Saskatoon and Regina are divided four ways creating 8 ridings dominated by the rural surroundings. This has meant that the Conservatives have been able to win 7 of the 8 seats, many of which by close margins. One riding that is usually close is Palliser, one of the more urban ridings. It includes the southwest corner of Regina plus the city of Moose Jaw. In 2008, the Regina part of this riding voted NDP (by a thin margin) while the rural parts plus Moose Jaw voted Conservative. The NDP under Jack Layton has been unable to make significant inroads in Saskatchewan, a province the party used to dominate. I don't think that will change this time, at least not in Palliser which has been trending Conservative recently.

Prediction: Safe Conservative

Saskatoon-Rosetown-Biggar, Saskatchewan

SRB is another one of those gerrymandered ridings. It includes the southwestern corner of Saskatoon plus the surrounding rural areas. Last election, the NDP pinned all of their hopes here in their attempt to win a seat in the province, and came very close to doing so, coming within a few hundred votes. They did this with the help of a collapsed Liberal vote- the Liberal candidate placed fourth. It is hard to believe the Liberals will fall any further here to help the NDP pick this up, and with the NDP lower in the polls, it's hard to see this being picked up this time.

Prediction: Lean Conservative

Edmonton-Strathcona, Alberta

This was the only seat a non-Conservative has won in Alberta since 2004. Linda Duncan picked this off for the NDP who coincidentally hasn't won a seat in Alberta since the 1980s. She picked this up with the help of a collapsed Liberal vote which strategically voted to get her elected. This may not happen again however, and Duncan is in serious danger of losing this seat, a district she won by just 363 votes.

Prediction: Toss up

More Below the Jump

Surrey North, British Columbia

Here is a traditional NDP seat that the party did not win in the last election. The NDP held it briefly from 2006 to 2008, but former MP Penny Priddy won it in a landslide. The area is very strong for the NDP provincially. So when 2008 came around, what happened? The Tories ran Dona Cadman, wife of the late Chuck Cadman who held this seat before Priddy did. The NDP thought she was invincible, backed off and ran a relative no name to the seat. Despite this, my prediction for the seat was that it was so NDP, they would still win it, despite most people's disagreements. Well those people were right, however I felt justified in my prediction as the NDP came within 1100 votes of winning it. Cadman's popularity here is waining, so the NDP may be able to pick this seat up despite its faltering numbers, in a seat that seems to have bucked national trends last election.

Prediction: Toss up

Burnaby-Douglas, British Columbia

Burnaby-Douglas has voted NDP for decades. It is one of only two ridings the NDP won in 1993 and still holds today. However, in recent elections, the NDP has been holding on here by the skin of their teeth. MP Bill Siksay should be nicknamed "landslide Siksay" because he has won his last three elections by a combined total of about 3000 votes. In 2004 and 2006, his closest rival was Bill Cunningham of the Liberals. Cunningham ran again in 2008 but slipped to third, letting his Conservative opponent rise to second. Will anti-NDP forces coallese behind the Tories? Will it be a 3-way race once again? Will a divided opposition let Siksay win another election? It's too soon to tell, so I'm not calling this yet.

Prediction: Toss up

New Westminister-Coquitlam, British Columbia

NWC is currently a vacant seat, so we may see a by-election here before a general. It was held by the NDP's Dawn Black from 2006 to 2009 when she ran for the BC NDP in the last provincial election. This is a tight NDP-Conservative seat that Black only won by 1500 votes. Her 3000 vote victory over the incumbent MP in 2006 was more impressive. It may be that this riding is swinging back to the Conservatives. Again, it's too early to call this.

Prediction: Toss up

North Vancouver, British Columbia

North Vancouver is a riding that has experienced quite a significant demographic change in the early part of the decade, allowing the riding to trend towards the Liberals despite the national trend. Former Liberal MP Don Bell picked this up from the Tories in 2004 and won again in 2006 with a larger margin. His vote slipped in 2008, allowing the Tories to pick the seat back up, but it is unknown whether they can keep it.

Prediction: Toss up

Vancouver Kingsway, British Columbia

Kingsway is a traditional NDP seat that the party lost during the 1990s, and only recently regained it in 2008. Some peg this victory on the coattails of the David Emerson affair. Emerson was elected in 2006 as a Liberal, but quickly crossed the aisle to the Tories so he could continue serving in cabinet. This angered local voters who gave the Conservatives a third place finish here in 2006. Emerson did not run for re-election. NDP MP Don Davies won here in 2008 by just under 3000 votes as a result. It will be much closer next time, but I think he will probably hold on.

Prediction: Lean NDP

Vancouver South, British Columbia

In 2008, we all thought this would be a cakewalk for Liberal MP Ujjal Dosanjh. Dosanjh had won his two previous elections here in landslides. However, 2008 would be much different. His vote collapsed, allowing the Tories to come within 20 votes of winning here. If demographics had a part in this, it may make it difficult for him to keep this seat. However, I think much of the collapse had to do with the party collapsing as a whole, and I think next election he may pick up some NDP votes to ensure a victory.

Prediction: Lean Liberal

Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca, British Columbia

What was once an NDP target seat, is now a Liberal-Conservative toss up. The Conservatives came from third place to nearly knocking off incumbent Keith Martin here, losing by just 68 votes. Martin however, is a popular MP who was once the Canadian Alliance and Reform MP for the district. He should hold on to this district.

Prediction: Safe Liberal

Saanich-Gulf Islands, British Columbia

This riding I believe has the highest median age in the country. It was also once the Green's best riding in the country. And this is where Elizabeth May, leader of the Green Party will be running this time. She has proven time and time again that she is an excellent candidate at losing elections. She really thinks she has picked the best riding for which she can win. The Greens got 17% of the vote here in 2004, but have been hovering around the 10% mark ever since. The only Green part of this riding are the Gulf Islands, which actually make up a small part of the population. The mainland is full of seniors, most of whom vote Conservative. Many paint this riding as a tragic example of a splintered left, unable to knock of an unpopular incumbent. Well, Conservative MP Gary Lunn was able to get 43% of the vote here last time, about 2500 votes ahead of the Liberals. This was with a collapsed Green vote and a collapsed NDP vote, after their candidate had to pull out. I predict May will get about 27% of the vote here, but that won't be enough to win. Winning the seat with about 33% of the vote will be Mr. Lunn. So close, yet so far for May.

Prediction: Safe Conservative

Vancouver Island North, British Columbia

This seat was won by the NDP in 2006, but a collapsed right wing Liberal vote led the Conservatives picking this back. Tory MP John Duncan has faced off against former NDP Catherine Bell in the last 3 elections, all of which were fairly close. However, 2009/10 will be the most lobsided I think, as Duncan will win once again. Most of the Liberal vote will come back, and it will come from the NDP.

Prediction: Safe Conservative

Nunavut, Nunavut

Nunavut is always pretty tough to call. The voters there are not partisan, the vote for the candidate they like best. They vote for their local candidate. In the 2008 election, this meant the Liberals winning Baffin Island, the Tories winning the mainland and the NDP winning the remaining islands. Anyways, with the Tories poised to win once again, and the local MP being a cabinet minister- the first Inuit cabinet minister, I think it's a safe bet that this riding will go Conservative once again.

Prediction: Safe Conservative

Poilievre: "More Pork for my Constituents!"

2009-10-01T12:02:00.006-04:00

More proof that Pierre Poilievre doesn't have any goddamn sense of the common good: This from Nepean This Week

Conservative MP Pierre Poilievre has leapt to defend federal spending in his riding after the Liberal Party released a report claiming there has been too many grants in Nepean-Carleton.

“If the Liberal Party thinks we are getting too much, which one would they take away?” Poilievre asks. “I represent one of the fastest growing communities in Ontario.”

The report mentions Nepean-Carleton for receiving $30,421,998 in grants, while having a relatively low unemployment rate of 5.3 per cent. The Liberal report says the average for Ontario ridings was $10,738,229 and places Nepean-Carleton sixth in grants of 106 ridings.

I have two thoughts on this issue.

More below the fold

First, it that it's almost insulting to think of how easily and glibly these people talk around their petty acts of corruption. Three times the average of the province? The national average is somewhere around $6 million, which means that Poilievre's riding received five times the national average. All this while having an unemployment rate three points less than the national average!

Hey! You! Stimulus money is supposed to put people back to work!

Obviously, It's a little more complex than one guy just funnelling money into his own riding but really, this is pretty egregious; even if it's not outright corruption, it is a complete waste of resources to funnel stimulus money into an area that doesn't need it. This money would be better served in areas that are actually in need of 1) jobs and 2) infrastructure.Weren't these guys complaining about exactly this sort of thing before they were in power?

But here's the twist, they don't need to funnel money into that riding to win it. The Liberal party has pretty much abandoned it in favour of other, more winnable, ridings. There's absolutly no strategic need in Nepean-Carleton. It's been a blowout before and will be a blowout in the future.

So why then?

Newsflash: incumbent politicians may use their positions to keep power.

2009-09-30T13:40:00.003-04:00

The controversy that should be being kicked up around the fact that 1) most of the stimulus spending hasn't hit the ground yet and 2) most of that spending is going into conservative districts is missing a little meat to the bones of the story. You'll forgive a little skepticism, but coming from a small town which went NDP during the Mulroney years and then Conservative during the Chretien years (and remains so), I've gotten the sense that this has been going on for quite some time. My hometown never got any real pork until very recently.

I think that this may be why people aren't whispering of revolution and holding 'tea parties' in response to the Liberals'/Gerard Kennedy's latest discovery - that the incumbent government of Canada uses public money to shore up support in key ridings - is because, deep down, they already knew this. A few examples:

More below the fold:

Did you know we had a department of Western Economic Diversification? A whole department deticated to making sure that Alberta has something to do once its oil runs out. And this thing chugged along, spending taxpayer money as the manufacturing base of our country was annihilated in southern Ontario and Quebec (ie. Lib and NDP ridings).
Remember that rapid transit project to Peterborough, a city of 80k? Then Harper's Infrastructure minister flipped out at David Miller, the mayor of Toronto for using infrastructure money on mass transit in urban Toronto?
Do you ever wonder why you send you tax forms to Shawinigan? (If you live in Montreal or Ottawa) Do they have some special knowledge of Canadian tax law or something? Could you even find 'Shawinigan' on a map? Hey, what Craphole, middle-of- nowhere town was Jean Chretien from?

The list goes on. I'm sure if Deifenbaker had had another term he would have put an extra bunker in his hometown of Prince Albert. This is the thing: the Liberals were every bit as involved in this during their tenure as Canada's natural governing party. It's something that is done by those in power to stay in power.

Which isn't to say that we should not get angry or cynical and certainly not complacent. The idea that we should let politicians spend taxpayer money on pet projects in winaable ridings is disgusting, and I look forward to reading Kennedy's report on where the stimulus projects are being funded.

Oh, in other news a conservative candidate just got fired for pointing out that there was, in fact, an elephant in the room.

Municipal elections on the rock

2009-09-30T09:35:00.003-04:00

Municipal elections are often considered boring, even though local issues are probably those that affect us the most. They are for the most part non partisan, and for a partisan like me, it actually makes voting fun, because I have to research the candidates. And so, I will be reporting on some municipal elections from time to time, across Canada.

The first province to go to the polls this fall was Newfoundland and Labrador which went to the polls last night.

There were interesting races, including three incumbent mayors who were turfed in Newfoundlands largest communities. And those were all close elections too. In Corner Brook, Neville Greeley beat mayor Charles Pender by 125 votes. In Paradise, Kurtis Coombs beat mayor Ralph Wiseman by just three votes! And in Portugal Cove-St. Philip's, Bill Fagan beat mayor Norm Collins by just ten votes. In addition, another close election ocurred in Clarneville where mayor mayor Fred Best hung on to the skin of his teeth by defeating Lisa Browne by just 67 votes.

Of course, the real story was in St. John's. Mayor Dennis O'Keefe was re-elected with 57% of the vote. He first became mayor last year when former controversial mayor Andy Wells resigned. Former acting mayor and PC MLA Shannie Duff was elected as Deputy Mayor with 54% of the vote. On St. John's city council, only one incumbent was shown the door, as Art Puddister lost in his attempt at re-election in Ward 1 to Danny Breen. St. John's council also welcomed newcomers Bruce Tilley and Sheilagh O'Leary who were elected to vacant seats.

And just when you thought no one voted in municipal elections, at least two municipalities reported over 90% turnout. In Long Harbour & Mount Arlington Heights, 249 of 266 eligible voters voted (94%) while in Point Lance 90 of 98 people voted (90%). And one last interesting story, in Bay L'Argent, voters elected an all female council! Should make things interesting there.

Other provinces an territories to go to the polls later this fall will be the Yukon (Oct. 15), Saskatchewan (Oct. 28) and Quebec (Nov. 1)

Outremont denouemont.

2009-09-28T08:20:00.006-04:00

FOUTH UPDATE: The Igg does damage control:

"The Liberal party is headed from Toronto," Duceppe said Tuesday. "And the Conservative party — they are from Calgary."

Ignatieff, for his part, used his allotted three questions in the Commons to accuse the Conservatives of neglecting Quebec when it came to infrastructure funding.

"Quebec's unemployment rate is higher than the national average, yet Quebecers are receiving the lowest per capita infrastructure funding in all of Canada. How does the prime minister explain this? How does he explain his own numbers?" Ignatieff said.

After question period, Ignatieff headed for Laval, Que., where he was to headline a Liberal fundraising event that was, ironically, organized by Coderre. The Montreal MP and his allies have withdrawn from that fundraiser, which is closed to the media.

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THIRD UPDATE: ENTIRE QUEBEC LIBERAL FRONT OFFICE RESIGNS! Wow. It just keeps coming. But will Coderre have caucus support?

Also, the Igg is to eliminate the Quebec lieutenant position. This is the sort of idea that looks great when you hold very few seats, but that looks very bad if you plan to hold a lot seats.

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SECOND UPDATE: CODERRE STEPS DOWN AS QUEBEC LIEUTENANT!!!! Wow. He doesn't mince words either, it's an open rift.

"Coderre said he still has "confidence" in Ignatieff, but he suggested the Liberal leader make changes to his inner circle of advisers."

This speaks louder than anything:

"Ignatieff's office was completely unaware of Coderre's plans and said the Liberal leader had not been in contact with his lieutenant over the weekend. However, Ignatieff had left three voice mails on Coderre's cellphone and two emails this morning, all of which had gone unanswered."

Wow.

Questions: Does the Igg try bring Coderre around or does he try to kill him off? Who will replace Coderre as Quebec chief? Does Coderre have any caucus support?

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UPDATE! CAUCHON GETS OUTREMONT AFTER ALL!

Wow. Let's wait a few days and see how this shakes out.

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So it happened! After an unbelievable number of process stories in the national and Montreal media, and some hilariously vitriolic postings on a number of Liberal partisan blogs, the Igg has gone and handed Cauchon Jeanne-Le Ber! Wow! Dancing with both the one what brought you, and dancing with the schoolyard rival that the one what brought you pointedly suggested you not dance with.

So many questions arise! For one, how to gauge the meaning of it all? We know that the Igg didn't particularly want Cauchon in there, so after all the calls and assessments, did Team Igg decide that it was a matter of staunching some serious bleeding or merely a matter of removing an annoying distraction? Are the Quebec activists truly irritated with how their province is being run, or is it a gang of cranks and malcontents?

How does Justin Trudeau figure into all of this (if at all)? First, we had Hebert throwing his name out as leadership material and now we have some purported close allies of his making trouble for Coderre in the media. Why are people trying to throw up this particular smokescreen and how will the media continue to play it up?

How will Bob Rae's name figure? He (sort of) came out for Cauchon this week, and despite the glee the national press corps would take in his ritual dismemberment were he ever to become Liberal leader, representing the only serious pole of interparty opposition to the Igg (which does include Cauchon), their interests temporarily align with his.

And sticking with the media, what will come of the truly unprecedented turn by La Presse against Denis Coderre? Will the man continue to come under fire? Is he safe in his position? I bet yes, but some folks will likely be rooting very secretly for another Mulcair victory, so as to hasten whatever judgment awaits him before St Peter of the LPC hivemind. And what of Coderre's yet unnamed Jeanne-Le Ber candidate? What will she have to say? Friends, only time, leaks, and Chantal Hebert will tell.

Oh, and this ought very likely to spell the end of the political career of one Thierry St-Cyr. In the end, it's hard to deny that Cauchon comes out better running in Jeanne-Le Ber, though I suppose it's much less of a prestige riding.

Hull-Aylmer: Party like it's 1993

2009-09-24T23:40:00.002-04:00

...the title is a reference to Liberal strength... jeez.

Continuing our coverage of Liberal strongholds, we come, inevitably, to Hull-Aylmer. This is the western part of the Gatineau MegaCity, home to the older generation of Civil servants who moved there, paying heavier taxes in exchage for cheaper rents.

Hull has a glorious history, being one to the oldest white colonies in the Outaouais/Ottawa region. It served as a prison camp/gulag for interned Italian and German POWs as well as, horrifically, Canadian refuseniks following the Conscription Crisis of 1944. Its place in history was largely settled when a far-sighted government relocated 4000 inhabitants at its core and annihilated one of its oldest quartiers to create North America's second largest office building. Its sister arrondissment Aylmer is a rapidly developing set of bedroom communities built along the skeleton infrastructure of the old villages that are quietly being envelopped.

Hull-Aylmer itself is majority Francophone, with important Anglo and Allophone populations (15.6% and 12% respectively). It's one of the more immigrant friendly ridings in Quebec, but not the most, and has a visible minority population of about 10%. This is one of the more educated ridings in the country but not the most, and one of the higher income ridings, but not near the highest. It is both very Quebec and very Ontario. It is the only Quebec riding outside of the Montreal-Laval-Rive Sud area to vote Liberal.

It's a stronghold. It has voted Liberal at every election. The riding's brief flirtation with political diversity came in 1990 when Gilles Rocheleau left the Liberals after the Meech Lake implosion to help found the Bloc. The 1993 election would be his Waterloo, as he was tossed out by some of the most federalist of Quebecois. Though the Bloc remains the most potent competition in the riding but support for separatisme is low: the riding voted Non by about 75%.

The riding is currently held by Marcel Proulx, an early Ignatieff supporter, but who acted as Dion's deputy in Quebec. Guess what? No word on a competitior, it is just Marcel, and with Election-Scare-2009 (that weird non-event that no one is talking about anymore? with the election that was supposed to happen but then didn't? remember that?) that means that this riding is ultimately non-competitive. No one cares. Zzzzzzz.

Political Profile of Montreal Island

2009-09-24T21:10:00.012-04:00

Hola, everybody. I'm a new contributor to this blog and this is my first post. My passion happens to be politics, elections and political geography. I'm a member of the Liberal Party, and I maintain a 'famous' blog on world elections.

I'll start with a political profile of the constituencies of Montreal Island, to follow up the work done on Ottawa by Earl.

LaSalle-Émard: Paul Martin's old seat includes the old working-class areas of LaSalle and Ville-Émard, which are now lower-income to lower middle-class suburban areas west of downtown. The Liberals are strong in LaSalle, which is more Anglophone, while the Bloc is strong in the old working-class French areas of Ville-Émard, in the east of the riding.

Jeanne-LeBer: The south Montreal riding is a marginal one, although it is largely Francophone (65%). The area includes the solidly Bloc city of Verdun, a working-class and largely low-income area, but an old English area. The Liberals are strong on the upscale Nun's Island, which has lots of affluent condominiums on the St. Lawrence. It also polls well in the more English and/or affluent areas east of the riding.

More Below

Lac-Saint-Louis: Montreal's wealthiest and most Anglophone constituency is a federalist and a Liberal stronghold. It includes the affluent communities of Senneville, Baie-d'Urfe, Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue, Kirkland and so forth. The Liberals used to win over 70%, but they're now kept under 50% mainly due to a rising Conservative and NDP vote.

Westmount-Ville Marie: The constituency includes the very affluent and old English neighborhood of Westmount, but also the affluent areas of downtown Montreal, and part of NdG. Westmount is still solidly Liberal, though the Conservatives do well there. The NDP polls best in NdG, which is kind of a Glebe-like area and is attractive to young professionals.

Outremont: Every Dipper's favourite Quebecois riding is a diverse, well-educated, and artsy area. The NDP's support base is Mile-End, a very artsy area of the Plateau Mont-Royal; and the Liberal's best areas are slightly less affluent immigrant areas such as Parc-Extension and Côte-des-Neiges. They also do well in the riding's most affluent areas on the slopes of Mont-Royal.

Mont Royal: Mont Royal is kind of like Quebec's Thornhill in that it is plurality Jewish, since it includes Montreal's large Jewish community in Côte-Saint-Luc as well as the very wealthy areas of Hampstead and Mount Royal. It also includes part of the diverse and less affluent Côte-des-Neiges. Pierre Trudeau's seat, it was one of the safest seats for the Liberal Party in all of Canada and its current MP, Irwin Cotler, won over 90% of the vote in a 1999 by-election. However, the Tories have made significant gains, mostly in Hampstead and, in 2008, Côte-Saint-Luc, though Quebec Jews swung much less to the Conservatives than those in Ontario did. The Liberal majority of 75% in the 2000 redistributed results is now a mere 28%.

Ahuntsic: Ahuntsic is a swing riding which is very polarized between an historically Francophone middle-class Ahuntsic and English Montreal, which is now Immigrant Montreal south of Saint-Laurent Boulevard, the historical separation. Today, it's basically the Franco areas for the Bloc and the immigrant/less Franco areas for the Liberals.

Papineau: Papineau, Justin's seat, is another polarized area which runs right down the middle of the old linguistic line. Today, the immigrant areas of Saint-Michel and Parc-Extension are solidly Liberal, the latter very muchso, while the central area, working-class Francophone Villeray is solidly Bloc.

Pierrefonds-Dollard: Pierrefonds-Dollard is similar to Lac-Saint-Louis, although it is more ethnically diverse and more Francophone than Lac-Saint-Louis. Predictably Liberal, though the Bloc has some support on the French-speaking (although affluent) and more rural Ile-Bizard. The Conservatives won a few polls in what I would assume to be Jewish areas.

Saint-Laurent-Cartierville: Stephane Dion's constituency is Montreal's most ethinically diverse, with around 41% of inhabitants being visible minorities, mostly Arab or black. The area is also rather poor and working-class. I'm not certain, but I believe the old riding of Cartier, which elected Canada's only Communist MP, is now in this riding.

NDG-Lachine: This riding is a largely federalist and Liberal riding including Dorval, Montreal-West and Lachine. The Bloc's support is concentrated in Lachine, a francophone working-class area while the Liberals dominate the very Anglo MoWest.

Rosemont-La-Petite-Patrie: This solid Bloc riding includes all the French areas of the old working-class area of Rosemont, which has been gentrifying in recent years and becoming more yuppie (explaining a high NDP vote and, in 2006, a good Green vote) like the Plateau is in general. The Liberals only won a few polls on the other side of the old linguistic line.

Laurier-Sainte-Marie: This is Montreal's most socially liberal and hippie area, and they've even elected a Trotskyst! Duceppe's riding includes the provincial constituency of Mercier, represented by Amir Khadir (QS's sole MNA), the gay area, and parts of the Plateau. It's also an old working-class area. The Liberals and NDP win some polls on the western fringes of the riding, near Outremont or the city core. Both parties also poll well-ish in the area comprising Mercier.

Hochelaga: Hochelaga is one of the country's poorest riding, and the area, unlike Laurier-Sainte-Marie, is still a largely working-class area with the Bloc playing the role of a social democratic party. The name "Hochelaga-Maisonneuve" is still an infamous name in French Quebec referring the French 'ghetto' of the city. The Liberals have some support in the more Italian areas near Saint-Léonard.

Saint-Léonard-Saint-Michel: Saint-Léonard is a heavily Italian, and, more recently, immigrant (largely Arab or black) neighborhood of the island, and both demographics are heavily Liberal, making the riding one of the party's safest seats outside the West Island. Massimo Pacetti won all but one poll in 2008.

Bourassa: Bourassa (Coderre's seat) covers most of Montréal-Nord, which has a rather infamous name in Québec due to its high crime rate and low income. It's colloquially known as Montréal-Noir (it has a high immigrant, mostly black - West Indian - population). It also includes Italian and/or Haitian areas in Rivière-des-Prairies. The riding is only growing more and more federalist with the influx of immigrants. While the riding elected a Bloquiste in 1993, I think such things are impossible now.

Honoré-Mercier: Honoré-Mercier is the most marginal of the three Liberal seats on the Island that aren't on the West Island or that general vicinity. The riding's Liberal lean comes mostly from Rivière-des-Prairies, which is, as described above, multi-cultural. Anjou, which is more tossup, leans Bloc though there are Liberal pockets in areas of the town with more immigrants.

La Pointe-de-l'Île: La Pointe-de-l'Île covers the very Francophone and very nationalist areas on the St. Lawrence coast of the island. It includes very working-class areas in Mercier-Est (part of the Hochelaga area), the old petroleum refineries in Montréal-Est, and the suburb of Pointe-aux-Trembles. Notably, the riding is one the three in which the Bloc won over 60% of the vote in 2006 and it was the party's best riding in 2008.

I won't cover Laval for now, but I hope to post more information on Laval, the North and South shores in coming days or weeks.

More of the same in Ottawa South

2009-09-23T15:12:00.010-04:00

I've been asked nicely to write an entry on my home riding, Ottawa South. Well, I don't call it home anymore, but I did live in the "O-So" for most of my life before moving away from home to live in Ottawa Centre. My parents still live in Ottawa South, and I have friends there still, which means I still travel there often. Plus, I'm still active politically there.

Thus, there is no riding I know better than Ottawa South, especially having worked three campaigns there so far. It's a suburban riding, mostly built up during the post-war period, but it's close enough to the central city to eschew the common characteristics of suburban ridings, and as suburban ridings go, it is on the older side.

The riding was created in 1987, and has elected a Liberal in every election since, although it should be noted, had it been around for the 1984 election, it would have voted Conservative. The riding was held by John Manley from 1988 to 2004. During this time he served in a number of high profile cabinet portfolios, and ran for the leadership of the Party briefly before dropping out. He didn't run for re-election in 2004, when he was replaced by David McGuinty, brother of Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty, who represents this riding provincially.

The 1984 election saw what is now Ottawa South go for the Tories. They won 46% of the vote to the Liberals 37%. Since then, the Liberals have always been on top. They maxed out their support in the 1993 election, when John Manley took nearly two thirds of all votes. In every election he ran, John Manley won a majority of the support of Ottawa South voters. David McGuinty has been less popular, ranging in the 40% range. His best performance was in the 2008 election, where he nearly won a majority, despite lower Liberal fortunes in the rest of the country. This truly is a safe Liberal seat.

More below the fold

The Tories did come within 7 points of winning this seat in 2006, when they ran whistleblower Alan Cutler. The Tories were up nationally, Dalton McGuinty was at the height of his unpopularity, and the NDP ran a competent candidate who took support from the Liberal base. However, they were still unable to wrench this seat from the Liberals.

Speaking of the NDP, they have never been able to get more than 14% of the vote here, unless we count the 1984 transposition of votes, where they got 17%. During the low years of the 1990s, the NDP ran in the single digits, and with McGuinty more popular now, they run the risk of doing this again. In the last election, they ran under 10%. The Greens have recently targetted this riding, and have been nipping at the heels of the NDP, but have yet been unable to surpass them.

The riding has the highest Arab population in Ontario, second in Canada. Many of the parties have attempted to appeal to this demographic by running Arabs in the past, to no avail. Much of the Arab population is Lebanese. The Tories ran Elie Salibi in 2008, and the NDP ran Henri Sader in 2006. Monia Mazigh (who generated a lot of press, being Maher Arar's wife) also ran here in 2004. The riding was one of the most populous in the country when it was created, but has since shrunk slightly. It was once a growing riding, with new subdivisions in the south, but these have stopped.

The riding is a natural riding, in that it has natural borders, in the sense that they make sense. It basically includes all the urban area between Highway 417 at the Rideau River. Its mostly older suburbs as mentioned, which the Liberals have been able to do well in. The Tories have pockets around the riding, that they do better or worse in depending on a number of external factors. They almost always do well south of Hunt Club, however, an area I predict will be lobbed off come next redistribution.

And so what do we expect come the next election? Well, the Tories seem to have dropped the ball here, figuring they are best to focus their efforts elsewhere. This is my prediction anyways, as the Tories have yet to nominate a candidate. David McGuinty will of course run again. The NDP will be running Hijal De Sarkar once again, unless someone else steps forward. The Green Party has once again nominated Qais Ghanem, who gave the Greens their best showing ever in Ottawa South. So, once again more of the same! Except for the Tories, who have a new candidate every election.

By-election round up

2009-09-22T17:25:00.003-04:00

Last night wrapped up this fall's provincial provincial by-elections across the Canada. There were two in Saskatchewan and one in Quebec.

Let's start in Quebec. The by-election was held in Rousseau, a rural/exurban riding northeast of Montreal. It has voted for the PQ steadily since 1994, and went overwhelmingly in favour of the "Oui" side in the referendum. So, it was no surprise that this riding went for the PQ again last night. The Liberals did increase their vote by over 8 points, as the ADQ vote (once a close second place finisher in the 2007 race) collapsed in this riding to a measly 5%. The PQ vote held steady.

Saskatchewan had two by-elections. One was in Regina Douglas Park, a safe NDP seat on the south side of Regina, while the other was in Saskatoon Riversdale, another safe NDP seat in southwest Saskatoon.

Regina Douglas Park was vacated allowing the newly elected NDP leader Dwain Lingenfelter a seat in the Assembly. He held the seat, but lost a couple points from the NDP result last election. The Liberal's didn't run here, and appears most of their vote went to the governing Saskatchewan Party which gained 10 points here.

Saskatoon Riversdale was vacated by outgoing NDP leader and former Premier Lorne Calvert. The by-election here also saw the NDP vote drop marginally, while the Saskatchewan Party gained substantially. Once again, they gained 10 points, mostly from the Liberals whose vote collapsed here, despite having actually run a candidate.

What conclusions can be drawn from last night? Well, another boring batch of by-elections for sure, BUT it looks like the ADQ is pretty much dead in Quebec. They'll be lucky to even win a seat next time, I reckon. And the Liberals are pretty much dead in Saskatchewan, if we haven't yet had a funeral for them.

Actually, he was a leader.

2009-09-22T13:11:00.003-04:00

Conservative President Nicolas Sarkozy-Bruni of France has introduced a Carbon Tax that would involve reducing personal and business taxes through tax credits and retrieving the revenue by taxing carbon emmissions. I seem to remember that there was some guy who was tarred and feathered by our government and then by his own party for suggesting that we do the same thing. I can't remember his name, as I am Canadian and have an incredibly short political memory.

New topic of conversation: How long before the PMO congratulates Sarko on his bold and innovative policy initiatives?

Spies like us

2009-09-22T12:15:00.002-04:00

Just an interesting little news item. There's a new book out about how Canada has become a haven for international spies, due to lax enforcement and availability of resources. it accuses foreign governments of wide scale industrial espionage as well as "infiltrating ethnic communities, suppressing criticism of homeland governments, recruiting industrial spies, stoking political violence among the diaspora and operating front companies and political lobbies aimed at manipulating government policies."

I kinda knew this already, but it's nice that there's at least some acknowledgement in the media that this may be a problem. I remember the Chinese students at university being afraid to talk to the Falun Gong people becasue they thought that they were being watched. Though, I think it's probably making a little too much out of the Soviet/Russian and Chinese spies and not enough about the American, European and Israeli spies who are almost assuredly working here as well, but with zero monitoring and wider deeper networks, and are also, you know, a bit of a problem. This isn't to say that the Russian and Chinese governments aren't 1) spying on us and 2) terrible, but just to say that our allies are doing the same thing and we should be worried about that as well.

Quebec Liberals return to form.

2009-09-22T02:39:00.011-04:00

New developments in Outremont! Following on last week's reports of strife in the lovely Montreal ridings nomination process, we learn that not only is Cauchon's scalp again resting on Coderre's mantle (oh and we knew that was coming), but the CBC has Liberal sources claiming that Coderre has made moves to oust several long-standing Montreal area MPs! According to Ms Erickson:

"The sources said former party leader Stéphane Dion, along with Bernard Patry, Raymonde Folco, and Lise Zarac, have all been asked to step aside."

The article continued to make it clear that at least two of these MPs have been cleared by the leader to continue on, after voicing loyalty/begging to be allowed to stay.

Two things. First, it seems reasonably clear that everyone got/will get the message here. MPs are on a tight leash, rivals will be dispatched, and the Igg (if sometimes by proxy) is in charge. Despite whatever "divided Liberals" stories pop up, noone in the caucus is likely to display displeasure, let alone dissension. This is what Dion should have done.

Second, Coderre is making a Chretien-like play for chiefdom. He's cracking heads left and right, winning the interparty battles, setting himself up for the big show whenever the Igg cracks, and loving it. Like Chretien, he'll be very dangerous during any future nomination contest precisely because incidents like these make people very afraid to cross him.

Some preferred outcome by the by.

2009-09-21T12:11:00.001-04:00

Buried in the latest EKOS gloom is a nice table illustrating the relative stability of result preferences with a lot of good takeaway.

First, we have the perversity of that the fact of a plurality of respondents signal a preference for a Liberal government in a poll in which the CPC leads the LPC by 6 points. Next, there's the fact that the two major parties have essentially equivalent bases of support (with around 1/4 of voting Canadians in each camp). Also, according to these results, the CPC ought theoretically to have a more difficult route to a majority government, as other parties' partisans seem to prefer the LPC over the CPC nearly 2-1, a bit of data that could tempt Team Red toward the strategic voting line. There's the impressive stability since July - the incremental CPC gains by this metric belie the greater gains the poll reports in vote intentions. Then there's the fact that a majority of respondents prefers a majority government, a bit of data that will feature prominently in the CPC campaign ("without a Harper majority, we'll have a coalition and continued instability"). Finally and more generally, there's the fact that with so few Canadians satisfied with the minority governments of the past years, the campaign could turn very quickly against the NDP and/or the BQ, as voters narrow their options with a mind to avoiding a quick return to the polls.

The Senate as self actualization.

2009-09-19T14:21:00.000-04:00

Perhaps only an illiterate could so elegantly describe the outrage and absurdity of the continued existence of the Canadian Senate. Can't read or write? No interest in politics? No experience whatever in the public policy domain? The Canadian Senate is just the place for you! The great accomplishment that we might fold into that great national narrative as the essence of equity achieved: in this country, even an illiterate can become a senator! And by the stroke of a pen, no less!

Indeed, given the confused role of the senate in the Canadian legislative and political process, does not economy call it only reasonable that another function be found? Could this new role not be seen as the natural adaptation of the Senate organism to an environment in which it is largely useless? Why not make the senate a site of vicarious achievement, that the masses might look upon it with fondness, affection even, rather than scorn?

Given Canadians' notorious complacency (noticed anything strange about those coins in your pocket lately? maybe, the picture of that weird queen of another country?) and that post Meech and Charlottetown, the political class is reluctant to press too strongly for large, visible institutional changes, aside from those associated with deficit reduction, it all lies in the hands (and pen) of the Imperator. That he may calm our fears and fulfill our wishes.

Boring by-election in St. Paul's

2009-09-18T17:54:00.003-04:00

After an exciting and surprising provincial by-election in Alberta, I was hoping the residents of St. Paul's would deliver an equally exciting by-election last night. They did not. What with the recent scandal involving outgoing MPP Michael Bryant running over a cyclist, I was sure this would damage the Liberals at least a little bit. Plus, there was the whole issue of the Harmonized Sales Tax (HST) that both the Tories and the NDP were running against. However, in the end neither opposition party made any significant inroads in this Toronto riding.

The results of last night's by-election were almost exactly the same. And oddly for a by-election, all three major parties increased their share of the vote, albeit very marginally in all three cases. This hurt the Greens, which lost nearly 3 points, which is significant I suppose if you only got 8% of the vote last time.

Yawn. Well, there are some more provincial by-elections to look forward to next week in Saskatchewan and Quebec. I'll keep y'all updated.

The Siege of Ottawa-Orleans

2009-09-18T13:40:00.007-04:00

Orléans si est tout la frontière
Et tout le port du remenant,
Où le François chascun espère
-Mystère du Siege D’Orléans.

The town on Ottawa’s eastern frontier is named for a city that staged possibly one of the most significant battles of European history. Orleans was the lynchpin of the French defences against the English invasion that was the Hundred Years’ War. Historians speculate that if it had fallen or surrendered that England would have become the dominant force within France and that France itself would have “become a second Ireland” to quote Creasy.

Equally dramatic, (not really) is this bellwether riding at the end of the 95. It represents not only the Conservatives inroads with the Francophone community (and where they might go in the next election) but also the suburbanites that the Liberals desperately need to win back if they are going to take back power. If the Liberals can win here on a solid national campaign, then it means that they’ve made a strong bid with Ontario suburbanites and federalist francophones. If the Conservatives can hammer down this one, it means that the Liberals will lose those same groups and the Cons can fight on other fronts, and push farther into rural and suburban Quebec.

More after the jump.

This place looks like a tiny version of the 905 belt that the conservatives have managed to gain control of over the last three elections. You have big houses, above average earnings, higher than average debt loads, bigger cars. This riding, incidentally, has one of the highest rates of home ownership in the country, and conversely, one of the lowest rental rates. These are the people who, foolishly, kept Harris in power. This cuts in Harper's favour. What cuts against them is that the riding is 30% francophone and that many are civil servants. Details here.

Ottawa Orleans is a two way contest, with the NDP barely cracking double digits in 2008 (like the 905), which means that one teams looss in the other's gain. Royal Galipeau is the sitting Conservative MP fighting against the Liberals David Bertschi, an insurance litigator. More about these two later; for now let's take a look at the numbers.

Galipeau took this one from a one term Liberal MP with one of the slimmest margins in the country in 2006, winning by about 1200 votes, slightly less than 2% of the total vote. In 2008, he expanded that lead to about 3800 votes, more than 6% over Liberal Marc Godbout (turnout stayed roughly the same). Right now, Orleans Online is calling a 10 point lead for the Cons. I'd find that hard to believe, but if it were true then, the Libs would need to swing 5% of the vote in this riding to get it back. This could happen: nationwide polls are putting the Ignatieff Liberals between 33% and 30%, which gives them an increase of between 3.75 and 6.75% of their national average. This could all change depending on the national press for the Liberals and local work on Bertschi’s part, but at this point it’s not looking too good for the besieging armies of Team Red.

The past couple weeks.

2009-09-17T16:24:00.010-04:00

Shocking though it may seem, Captain Hook actually produces some reasonable analysis. But he's not all of the way there, so I'll just go ahead and give him a hand.

If we were to sketch a narrative of the past several weeks, it would go something like this. Michael Ignatieff and his team decided (likely sometime this spring) that assuming the numbers held, Team Red would cease supporting the government for the September session. With the final summer polls rolling in, and some uniformly good numbers for the LPC, the Sudbury retreat basically evolved into a rollout - good money numbers were leaked, advanced campaign readiness information was leaked, the leader outlined his broad campaign themes in a campaign-style speech. The idea was to make it clear to the press and the other parliamentary actors that the LPC was ready to go.

More after the Jump

There was a lot of sound strategic behind it all. First, and as we're seeing now, these moves had the effect of forcing the two other opposition parties to move to election preparation or to recalibrate their parliamentary positions to something more favorable to Team Red. Either the three opposition parties would vote down the government as one, neutralizing the "unnecessary election" meme vis-a-vis the opposition parties, or one/both of the opposition parties would cede their 'Iggy-supported-Harper' ground, neutralizing in these contests the "real opposition" meme and lending support to the LPC claim of the Igg as the voice of the opposition. Second, moving to full-on election-mode outside of the campaign period obviously lets the LPC spend money it otherwise could not spend on the critical task of defining the new leader and his team, and injects urgency into fundraising appeals. Finally, moving to election mode, especially so far out of the campaign period and in conjunction with the 'introduction to Iggy' air campaign, has the effect of amplifying media attention of the LPC leader. We're talking about a lot of earned media, and the LPC team seems to be very confident that once presented with the choice between the two leaders, the Igg will win out.

Despite the cleverness of said manoeuvres, however, the LPC failed to anticipate both the effectiveness of the CPC counter-attack (the programs rollouts, threats and other tactical victories) in driving the media narrative, and the high degree of media hostility to another election generally. Really, I've been puzzled by the polls these past few days, but I think there are probably two things behind the LPC's precipitous drop in support. One is obvious, that the media treatment of the election gambit is driving down the Igg's numbers. Another is that the summer polling was too friendly to the LPC, and that with people paying close attention, Harper is the most popular leader.

At any rate, the most troubling issue for the LPC is that their Igg rollout has been hijacked by the 'unnecessary election' meme. It's very hard to poll for that sort of thing beforehand, and it's even harder for folks in charge to consider that their campaign strategy could so thoroughly step on their leadership messaging. Still, however, one would imagine that it was evitable. Moreover, if the NDP and BQ succeed in the 'common sense' and 'important work still to be done' framing of their support of the government, then the LPC has ceded control of election timing for no discernible advantage to a gang that has proven time and again that they know how to capitalize. At this point, Team Red's high command ought to take a few deep breaths.

Rahim Jaffer, about to be airbrushed out of many photos.

2009-09-17T10:26:00.004-04:00

Rahim Jaffer was nailed for cocaine possession, and really it couldn't have happened to a nicer guy; he isn't a bad guy and wasn't a terrible MP. I'm pretty disappointed about this. Really, I can think of members of the conservative caucus who 1) I would much prefer to see this happen to 2) do more coke than Mr. Jaffer. Though it's nice that this will give a little boost to Alberta's experimentation with political diversity.

The Edmonton Journal provides us with this radio ad he ran against the NDP's Linda Duncan when it looked like he was about to be dislodged from his riding in Edmonton Strathcona:

"Jack Layton and the Ottawa NDP have publicly supported the legalization of marijuana. In fact when asked about marijuana Jack Layton called it a wonderful substance which Canadians should be free to smoke at home or in a cafe. Edmontonians understand how difficult it is to make sure our children make the right choices especially on serious issues like drug use. The Conservative Party supports drug free schools and getting tough with drug dealers who sell illegal drugs to children. Don't let our schools go up in smoke..on October 14th vote Conservative. Authorized by the official agent for Rahim Jaffer.".

To his credit, it is hard to make children make the right choices. (reminder: this is when they were calling them the Ottawa NDP, in a bid to remind people that things associated with Ottawa are bad )

Forgive me for being preachy, but when stuff like this happens, it reminds me of the occasional hypocricy of the conservative movement. I picture poor Larry Craig, who wasn't just a gay Republican but actively crusaded against gay people and fought against equal rights issues as they pertained to homosexuality. After getting caught soliciting gay sex in a men's bathroom, he was forced into early retirement. The ridiculousness of this aside, when you're uncovered as the hypocrite you are, you either have to have a high profile religious experience or accept political obscurity. I think Rahim will have to settle for the latter.

The big show.

2009-09-16T20:49:00.010-04:00

So the big Mulroney shindig is supposed to mend some of the recent fissures in the CPC team in the Belle Province. Could be. But the motivation signalled in this article isn't getting to the guts of it. The article mentions the Mulroney Quebec machine, but that's not at all what this is about. Basically, everyone knows that the Mulroney operation was smashed to bits years ago as the province settled into a decade long LPC-BQ duopoly, and that the only folks who stayed around weren't leaving the Conservative fold anytime soon. Nor is this smoothing of ruffled feathers specifically about keeping the Red Tory or Quebec factions happy. It never hurts to do outreach, but these folks are four-square with the Prime Minister as long as he's Prime Minister. No, the real motivation behind all this is money. You see, the old timers in Quebec, the guys who remember the great wins of the 1980s, the old school Tories, they're precisely the sort who're none too pleased at Harper's treatment of the Big Brassy Guy. Mulroney was their man, some of them made their first million under his watch, married off their daughters at weddings with his cabinet ministers on hand, flirted with Mila at parties; they shot pheasant in the Gatineau knowing that their guy was running the big show. This Mulroney party deal is an exercise in ring-kissing of the folks in Westmount and Outremont and Saint Lambert who're cutting the cheques, and everyone knows it.

Wild Upset in Alberta, Continued.

2009-09-16T16:11:00.003-04:00

This Alberta by-election result is actually really damned interesting. Thanks, Andrew.

Normally they tell us not to get to too excited by by-elections, as they are usually just protest votes against the sitting government and they tend to have given disproportionate weight to the hardcore activists because of lower voter turnout. You might get somewhere between 50-70% of the level of turnout for a general election, because only the local media is paying attention and noting is really happening once you leave the riding. Often the result is turned over on the general election.

Funny thing about this by-election is that the turnout was almost statistically the same, with turnout at 41.4% in the general election and 40.5% in the by-election - though the number of voters did decrease by about 13%. This means that we can assume that those were (roughly) the same voters who had voted in March of 2008. Let's see where they went:

Interestingly, the percentage of Liberal voters stayed roughly the same, with NDP efforts collapsing in the riding and the Green Party not contesting. In 2008, we have about 58.7% of the electorate choosing right-wing parties; in 2009 that number comes up to 63.8% (with the sad, shattered remnants of the Socreds). This is a big, big movement for the Wildrose Alliance, because it seems to me that either they brought those Green and NDP voters with them or the Liberals absorbed them and the WA peeled off some Liberal supporters.

But that's not the big news, the big news is that half of the PC's support switched from Coke to Pepsi. Now one might be tempted to look at this and say that this is the beginning of a multi-party future for Alberta. I'm going to suggest something a little more radical.

Preston Manning wrote a piece in the Globe a few years ago about Alberta's political history. That history is one of long periods of one-party rule that are followed by the swift destruction of that party and it's replacement by another long period of one-party rule. The Liberals ran the province from 1905-21. They were wiped out by the United Farmers who ran majority governments from 1921-35. The UFA was destroyed by the Social Credit Party who ran until defeated by the Progressive Conservatives in 1971. There has never been a minority government and in each case the incumbent party quickly became irrelevant. What Manning was saying was that he thought that Alberta was waiting for its next big party to wipe out the PC. At the time, people said he was crazy, it looks like history may just prove him right.

The evolving Iggy narrative.

2009-09-16T12:07:00.008-04:00

It's a fairly well-established fact that the National Post represents something like the final triumph of venal passion over intelligence and good taste, but this turn deserves special scorn. Seriously, what the fuck is this moron on about?

"Mr. Ignatieff seems to have a view of Canadians as a nation of well-meaning dunderheads with few of his international sensibilities, who can be wowed by a visiting professor waving a passport filled with exotic stamps. Throw a little ancient history at them, mention some far-off countries, and they'll give you their votes like they did for Trudeau. So deaf is he to his own pomposity he has the conceit to boast of his plans for delivering a "big Canada," which only makes sense if you believe the current rendition of the country is small and unimportant."

No.

The Igg (of whom I am no fan) is actually doing three very interesting things with his "Big Canada" campaign: 1) he's explicitly contrasting his 'ideas' brand of campaign and government with the obfuscationary and reactionary styles of Darth Harper and his gang; 2) he's speaking explicitly to the specifically Canadian quality and experience of multi-cultural nationalism; and most importantly 3) he's laying out a broad, post-national, post-Chicago School, 21st century vision for Canadians to consider when they go into the ballot booth. That is, he's most of the way to explicitly stating what Obama said implicitly over his long campaign for the imperial purple. Now, you can critique that and analyze that and mark its hypocrisy or whatever, but grotesque partisan misrepresentation - in an organ that makes (deeply untrue) claims at offering serious analysis - has to stop. We can and should demand better, folks.

Wild upset in Alberta

2009-09-15T17:21:00.003-04:00

As a Canadian political geek, I'll follow any type of election in Canada, and so I made a note to follow one provincial by-election in Alberta last night. The riding? Calgary-Glenmore. You can't get more Tory provincially then suburban Calgary. It's not rural enough to vote for fringe right wing parties, and it's not urban enough to vote Liberal or NDP. Well, at least until last night.

Calgary-Glenmore is located in the heart of Prime Minister Harper's federal riding of Calgary Southwest. It has voted for the provincial Conservatives in every election since 1969. When MLA Ron Stevens resigned in May, a by-election was later called to fill it.

Albertans are widely discontent over the performance of Premier Ed Stelmach. With the new and improved right wing party, "Wildrose Alliance" increasing in popularity, this by-election show down would be the brewing of the perfect storm in this suburban riding. The Wildrose Alliance, in the midst of a leadership race as rebranded itself as a party of not only rural conservatives, but also the party of urban conservatives.

Interim leader Paul Hinman was the candidate for the Alliance. The Liberals ran Avalon Roberts, a health care advocate. The Tories ran city councillor Diane Colley-Urquhart. With the Tories as unpopular and out of touch with Calgarians as they are, the Conservative vote collapsed, putting Colley-Urquhart into third place. Red tories voted Liberal, and the blue Tories voted for the Alliance. At the end of the day, Hinman won by less than 300 votes. Thus begins a new era of Alberta politics. Maybe we'll see a competitive election next time?

We are all anti-socialists now.

2009-09-14T23:18:00.000-04:00

I really don't get how hating the socialists is getting so much play these days. As we know from the 'coverage' of the health care 'debate' in the states, it's become a label that you Americans apply to people they don't like when they do things that will undercut either their company's bottom line or the campaign contributions that keep them elected. Fine. That's America. They believe many crazy things there.
But this is Kanada. We have socialized medicine. We sided with the terrorists by not joining the invasion of Iraq. Now you have our national leaders yelling "Socialist!" across the room like they were Joseph McCarthy's parrots for performing actions (ie. making concessions, forming coalitions or propping up the government) that in a normal parliamentary democracy are considered commonplace except in extreme cases. How is this getting so much media attention? Why are people taking it seriously?

Now, a little music!

Liberal Nominations

2009-09-14T11:33:00.001-04:00

The major Liberal nominations are in:

Ottawa Centre: Scott Bradley, the local candidate who lost last round against Penny Collenette, beat out Collenette's successor Janet Yale. Mr. Bradley's been on the campaign trail for about a year now and may be able to roll that momentum over into a powerful campaign against Paul Dewar.

Ottawa-Orleans: Lawyer David Bertschi took this one, in what we're told was a very competitive race. This race might be serious as Royal Galipeau has been a relatively underperforming MP, and he could easily be knocked off if the Liberal tide comes back in in eastern Ontario.

Nepean-Carleton: Like a lamb to slaughter, Ryan Keon, has been put up against a the incomprehensively successful Pierre Poilievre. This guy is accomplished, reasonably successful and well connected (His father is a Mulroney-era Conservative Senator), and likely to come in a very distant second at around 30% of the vote.

Gatineau: Party hack and lobbyist Steve MacKinnon takes the nomination.

Pontiac: Local candidate Cindy Duncan McMillian kept control of the riding association and kept the nomination. She'll run against Minister Cannon. I really don't know what she'll do differently this time, so I assume that much of the hopes for the Libs in Pontiac in the 41st election is based on the conservatives waning support in Quebec and (hoped-for) popularity of Micheal Ignatieff. On the plus side, I do believe that she's the only candidate to have Campaign slogans written in Pumpkin, which is - like myself - both avant-garde and traditional.

Add these to David Pratt, Mauril Belanger and David McGuinty, and you have almost a full roster of Liberal candidates, minus Carleton-Mississippi Mills.

On a different note, I've been struggling over the local/parachutist dichotomy I've been seeing in alot of these nomination events, especially winnable ridings like Gatineau, Pontiac and O-Orleans. Ultimately, the party will let the riding association determine their own candidates in order to avoid a revolt or the bad press that comes with it, but of course the national office wants to put their people in winnable ridings. I've been trying to figure out who supports who, but haven't really made much headway.

Carleton-Mississipi Mills: Uninteresting.

2009-09-13T16:23:00.001-04:00

Unless Gordon O'Connor is accused and convicted of murder in the next couple of weeks, this one is doing conservative. He's a good guy, an actual member of the community (rare in these parts) and this is a genuinely conservative riding, as Andrew put it, one of only two ridings to vote Alliance in 2000.

But here we are, the parties need candidates and the West Carleton This Week has the low down. To Quote the Liberal Scarf: "NDP candidate Paul Arbour is taking a pass, Jake Cole is thinking about running again, and Liberal Justin MacKinnon has yet to decide."

No real contest here though.

Gatineau: Le Bon, Le Bad et le Separatiste.

2009-09-13T15:55:00.003-04:00

By far the most interesting race in Ottawa (a political snoozefest, usually) is Gatineau. It is, famously, a long-time Liberal stronghold that came unglued only in 1984 (with the Mulroney landslide) and recently with the loss of the riding to the BQ’s Richard Nadeau, a Hawkesbury native.

M. Nadeau knocked out Rookie MP Francoise Boivin, Labour lawyer and early Ignatieff supporter, who subsequently left to run with the NDP. The result in 2008 was one of the closest 3-way races in the country, with Nadeau squeaking past the second place NDP and Liberals. While the NDP’s numbers (and election spending) has been rising in Quebec, they did extraordinarily well in this riding. I think that a lot of this can be attributed to Mrs. Boivin’s personal popularity and campaign style. The conventional wisdom is that if she had stayed with the Libs that she would have trounced the Bloc in Gatineau.

But this is all just speculation; the real question is what do we have now, on the ground? Well, Nadeau and Boivin are back for more in the 41st election and the Liberals have just elected Steve MacKinnon. Read his biography: He’s Iggy’s man in the riding. A PEI native, MacKinnon worked in Frank McKenna’s government in New Brunswick, became the Liberal Party’s National Director, then ran Iggy’s (failed) leadership campaign and now was parachuted into what they expect will be a winnable riding, first as riding president then as candidate.

How will he do? Not sure… This riding is a solid toss-up. Hopefully, Boivin and MacKinnon will beat Nadeau, and then ride off in different directions, splitting the ridiculous MP pension.

Canadians don't like voting? cont'd

2009-09-11T09:18:00.002-04:00

...
Exactly.
...

Canadians don't like voting?

2009-09-09T21:03:00.002-04:00

I'd like to go on record as saying that I am Canadian and I want an election. This is not to say my political convictions have changed, or that I'll be voting differently (they haven't and I won't). I just like voting and I won't punish any party that makes me do it.

I like voting. I vote for everything I can. I vote federal, provincial and municipal. I voted for student's councils and for whatever professional association I'm a part of. I vote in those stupid Globe online polls. Why do I do it? Because, 1) we live in a democracy that more or less limits our political voice to voting and 2) it's really not that hard. You go to an elementary school within a couple of blocks of your house, chat with some pensioners, show them a peice of mail you got, indicate which political candidate you support, then go home. It's (far) easier than mowing the lawn. Who cares?

The political class in this country seems to think that voting is a chore, somewhere in the vein of cleaning the toilet. That people lothe it and would prefer to keep it reduced to every four or five years. We have Ed Stelmach saying that he thinks that it would hurt the economic recovery, could distract us from Climate change talks (!?!) and also that "people just don't want to go to the polls." We have my old boss Monte Solberg saying "it is our duty as citizens to vigorously participate in an election," but that to "force it upon us every year really is a cruel indignity." Even Jeff Simpson, the greatest mind that Canada has ever produced tells us that "Canadians should end this string of minority governments."

I disagree. I'd love to see more elections, and I like minority governments. The problem here is that the Canadian political elite still hasn't figured out how to make it work. But it hasn't been a disaster, it hasn't even been particularily bad. Here we've had a minority government since 2004 (5 years!) and the country is still producing lumber and oil for export, we're still pretty high on the HDI and our terrible talent-based-reality-tv is still on the air. Things are fine. Let's keep voting.

It's all down to the campaign.

2009-09-06T13:09:00.002-04:00

Yesterday's huge (1772 respondents!) EKOS poll brings some good news for both major political formations, and provides the definitive post-summer wrap-up.

First off, the CPC is looking much better in Atlantic Canada than they have in any other recent poll, and the party's Quebec share continues to increase, albeit incrementally. On the other hand, the Liberals have to love the Ontario score and the 5th consecutive poll to put them at or over 30% in Quebec. Indeed, more than anything else, the banal takeaway from this poll is that the two key areas continue to be Canada's two largest provinces. In Ontario in 2006, the CPC won 40 seats with 35.1% of the vote compared with the LPC's 54 seats and 39.9% of the vote and these numbers would suggest a similar result. Quebec has already received some treatment, but again, the resilience of Liberal support since the Igg succeeded Dion is striking (as is the CPC's gradual recovers).

I'm going to build some models for the provinces over the next days, to better get us to translating these percentages to seat estimations, but just generally, these EKOS numbers on election day should mean something like:

Ontario: CPC loses 12-15 seats; LPC gains 13-18 seats.
Quebec: CPC loses 2 seats; LPC wins 3-8 seats.
The rest: CPC loses 6-10 seats; LPC wins 6-15 seats.

So running these numbers, the Liberals would enter the 41st Parliament with somewhere at or near 100 seats, the approximate size of the Party's 39th Parliamentary caucus. Considering what's in store, Team Red is starting at a decided disadvantage: the LPC leadership must be very, very confident in their leader and message - they expect the Igg to carry them to victory via the campaign.

Seats to watch: Ontario

2009-09-05T12:29:00.003-04:00

"Vote rich Ontario", as its called is full of seats to watch, so brace yourself as I go through this list.

Kenora

Its strange in the sea of Orange that was Northern Ontario in 2008, that a seat the NDP holds provincially bucked the trend by electing a Conservative in an area that hasn't done so since 1917.
The NDP in fact, was a fairly distant third. The Tories have no business holding this riding. The Liberals need to make up a 2,000 vote defecit that is not impossible.
Projection: Toss up

Thunder Bay-Rainy River

John Rafferty finally won this for the NDP on his third try. All his defeats were close, but his victory in 2008 was somewhat comfortable. He should be able to keep it, but a rising red tide may sink this boat.
Projection: lean NDP

Thunder Bay-Superior North
This district is a mirror district to Thunder Bay-Rainy River. NDP MP Bruce Hyer finally won this on his third try, after a couple of close contests. His margin of victory was similar to Rafferty's.
Projection: lean NDP

Algoma-Manitoulin-Kapuskasing
Third time was the charm as well for NDP MP Carol Hughes when she finally won in 2008. She won it with a larger swing in the vote than her colleagues in Thunder Bay, giving her a more comfortable victory. However, the area has less of an NDP friendly history.
Projection: lean NDP

Nickel Belt
Claude Gravelle took three times to win this as well. This seat has been NDP provincially since forever. Federally, it was an NDP-Liberal swing seat during the 60s, 70s and 80s before Liberal MP Ray Bonin came around. This should be a pretty safe NDP seat, and I think this will become more evident in the future.
Projection: Strong NDP

Sault Ste. Marie
The Soo is an interesting area. Despite holding the seat since 2004, NDP MP Tony Martin has been unable to increase his margin here like his colleague Charlie Angus in Timmins. The 2004 and 2006 races featured a close race with the Liberals, while the 2008 race was a close race with the Tories. I'm thinking in 2009 the anti-NDP vote will be split to the point that Martin can march to a fourth victory.
Projection: lean NDP

Sudbury
In the history of this riding, Sudbury has voted NDP a total of twice. Their second victory came as a huge suprise to everyone. Not sure if MP Glenn Thibault can win again here. The Liberals suffered a large depression here, and unlike the other pickups for the NDP, Thibault has had no experience in earlier elections.
Projection: Toss up

Glengarry-Prescott-Russell
Before voting Conservative in 2006, this was a pretty safe Liberal seat. Now the Tories have won it, and their showing here in 2008 was pretty impressive. The Liberals can't rely on the Francophone support any more. This riding is behaving much like Anglo-Eastern Ontario these days.
Projection: Safe Conservative

Ottawa-Orleans
Ottawa-Orleans was the closest race in Ottawa in the 2008 election, and so it wont take much for the Liberals to gain it back.
Projection: Toss up

Ottawa West-Nepean
MP John Baird is once again facing a matchup with former Liberal MP (Nepean-Carleton) David Pratt. It should be closer, but I'd give Baird the edge at this point.
Projection: lean Conservative

Kitchener Centre
This was a surprise pick up for the Tories who lost by over 5000 votes in 2006. The 2008 race was very close, making this a tough call.
Projection: Toss up

Kitchener-Waterloo
The Liberals won this seat by over 12,000 votes in 2006. The Tories surprised many by overcoming this to pick it up. This seat is held by the Tories provincially by popular incumbent Elizabeth Witmer, probably on her popularity alone. I don't know how popular MP Peter Baird is, though. He won this seat by just 17 votes in 2008.
Projection: Toss up

London West
The 2006 race here was fairly close, and so was the 2008 race. London has usually been a Liberal city, and so I can definitely see it going Liberal again after the Tories picked up with a small swing. It will be a very close race though!
Projection: Toss up

London-Fanshawe
Before the NDP had a surge in the polls in 2008, I though MP Irene Mathyssen was very vulnerable. However, she has proven herself to be a very popular MP and won in 2008 with a fairly comfortable margin.
Projection: Strong NDP

Welland
This seat is held by the NDP provincially, but that doesn't make it an "NDP seat". In fact, MP Malcolm Allen is the first Dipper to ever win a federal seat in the Niagara region after the NDP came close here in 2004 and 2006. The 2008 election was a very close race seeing the Liberal MP fall to third place. Anything can happen here.
Projection: Toss up

Oak Ridges-Markham
I thought the inner-905 region was a Liberal fortress, but in 2008 the Tories made a few inroads , and this York Region suburban district was one of them. The 2008 race was very close, and I'm not sure if this is area is trending Liberal or Conservative.
Projection: Toss up

Thornhill
Thornhill is the only riding in Ontario with a Jewish plurality. To know how this seat will go, we need to know how the Jews will vote. And they went Conservative in 2008. Thornhill also suprised many when it voted Conservative provincially in 2007, bucking the provincial trend. MP Peter Kent won with a comfortable margin here in 2008, and I expect him to hold on to it again.
Projection: Strong Conservative

Ajax-Pickering
The Tories have made marginal gains in this riding in recent elections, but I don't think they will pick it up when the Liberals have rebounded in the polls.
Projection: Strong Liberal

Oshawa
The NDP has tried, and tried and tried to get this back provincially and federally and have failed to do so continuously. If it didn't happen in 2008, a particularly strong year for the NDP in Ontario, it wont happen in 2009.
Projection: Strong Conservative

Brampton-Springdale
Once a rising star in the Liberal ranks, MP Ruby Dhalla has been hurt bad by "Nannygate". She won this seat by just 700 votes in 2008. I think her constituents will give her the boot in 2009.
Projection: lean Conservative

Brampton West
If the Liberals were able to hold on to this seat in 2008, I think they can again. However, the 2008 election was a very close race.
Projection: lean Liberal

Mississauga-Erindale
This was once a safe Liberal seat, but the Tories have been picking at it until they finally picked it up in 2008. It was so close though, that it is likely that this will swing back to the Liberals.
Projection: Toss up

Mississauga South
Much like the rest of the Peel region, Mississauga South, which is arguably the most conservative riding in the region, has been trending Liberal. The Tories were a stronghold in the region in until the 1990s, when constant Conservative victories turned into constant Liberal victories.
Projection: Strong Liberal

Trinity-Spadina
Toronto is an incredibly incumbent friendly area. It took MP Oliva Chow a few tries before winning here in 2006, despite the riding being a sefe NDP seat provincially. And now, people continue to underestimate Olivia Chow's abilities to keep this safe NDP district.
Projection: Strong NDP

Quebec campaign supplemental.

2009-09-04T12:54:00.003-04:00

Quebec seems to have locked itself into a holding pattern along the lines we described last week. We have two new polls this week, and neither suggests any movement, one way or the other, aside from a slight recovery for the CPC.

Angus Reid's 25-26 August poll, Quebec regional numbers:

33.0 % BQ
33.0 % LPC
16.0 % CPC
12.0 % NDP

EKOS' 27 August-2 September poll, Quebec regional numbers:

32.3 % BQ
30.9 % LPC
19.4 % CPC
9.8 % NDP

Leger's 31 August-2 September Quebec poll:

35.0 % BQ
30.0 % LPC
16.0 % CPC
16.0 % NDP

The CROP's 24-25 August Quebec poll:

30.0 % BQ
30.0 % LPC
17.0 % CPC
18.0 % NDP

Four poll average:

32.6 % BQ
31.0 % LPC
17.1% CPC
14.0 % NDP

Assuming a normal distribution, running any of these sets of numbers gets us mostly to the same result: three more sure seats for Team Red, four fewer for Team Blue, and highly competitive LPC/BQ contests in five more ridings. Again, not a bad hand for the Igg and his crew to hold going into a fall election.

On Jasmine MacDonell

2009-09-04T09:46:00.000-04:00

So the 26 year old party hack who had to resign for leaving a totally unimportant taped conversation with a junior cabinet minister has been hired for a vaguely worded job with the Mayors office. This sort of reminds me of how Monica Lewinsky started hanging out with Tom Green in the late-90s

Seats to watch: Quebec

2009-09-04T00:07:00.003-04:00

Quebec is always a battle ground province, and many ridings can be very hard to predict. There will definitely be some surprises here. In many seats, it will depend on which party federalists back and how well federalists are able to galvanize behind that candidate.

Abitibi-Baie-James-Nunavik-Eeyou
Separatists are a minority here, and MP Yvon Levesque has relied on federalist vote splitting to march to victory in three straight elections. The Conservatives came in second here last time, and I think this riding will be in transition when it comes to which federalist party to support.
Projection: Strong Bloc Quebecois

Roberval-Lac-Saint-Jean
The Tories took this seat from the Bloc in a by-election in 2007 with an impressive landslide victory. However, in the 2008 election they barely held on to this seat. It will remain a toss up until I can tell what kind of direction Quebec will be going into. The Tories need to hold their own to keep this.
Projection: Toss up

Beauport-Limoilou
Federalist support was able to galvanize effectively behind the Tories here in 2006, and they have been able to keep this suburban Quebec City seat by the skin of their teeth ever since. We'll have to see how the Tories and the Bloc are doing in Quebec before we can a call.
Projection: Toss up

Portneuf-Jacques-Cartier
Ooh, I get to make my first party switch, and so early too... This seat is held by one of only two Independents in the house, Andre Arthur, who picked it up in 2006. He barely defeated the Bloc candidate in the 2008 race. The Conservatives did not run here in 2008. I expect that if they do, they will take enough support from Arthur to give this to the Bloc.
Projection: Lean Bloc Quebecois

Haute-Gaspesie-La Mitis-Matane
I'm willing to make another daring call. This one is for the Liberals. Haute-Gaspesie is traditional Bloc territory. However, in the last election, the Liberal candidate, former MNA Nancy Charest made this a very close race. She certainly surprised me, even though I had heard that an upset was in the making. She must be rather popular, but I don't know much about her other than when was elected as an MNA, it was a very close race, and she was defeated in the following election. This area has also not voted Liberal since 1980! (although the 2000 election was very close). Nancy Charest will be running again, and therefore I think she will be able to pull it off.
Projection: Lean Liberal

Brome-Missisquoi
Brome-Missisquoi is a fairly federalist riding in the Eastern Townships. The federalist vote was split somewhat in the 2008 election, but former MP Denis Paradis made it a close race for the Liberals. He will be the candidate this time, and I expect him to reclaim his seat.
Projection: Lean Liberal

Brossard-La Prairie
This south shore riding was won by the Liberals in an election so close, the Bloc thought they won based on election day votes. The Liberals won this despite a fairly decent number of votes for the Conservative candidate. I think there's no doubt the Liberals will be able to hold on to this seat.
Projection: Safe Liberal

Gatineau
Gatineau was a real 4-way race last time. Well, the Tories weren't really in it, but they did get respectable numbers. This race all depends on whether or not former Liberal MP Francoise Boivin runs again for the NDP. I think a lot of people in Gatineau voted Liberal last time thinking she didn't have a chance, yet she came a close second to the Bloc. The Liberals had a very good showing too, barely trailing their former MP. If Boivin runs again, I think enough Liberals will jump on board her bandwaggon and give her a slim victory. Gatineau has no business having a seperatist MP.
Projection: Toss up

Pontiac
Pontiac is probably the best bellwhether in Canada, now that Sarnia-Lambton looks like it will vote Conservative. Pontiac, as mentioned countless times in this blog has voted for the winner in every election since 1980. I expect it will do the same this time.
Projection: Toss up

Ahuntsic
Ahuntsic, which sits on the Federalist-Separatist divide in Montreal, has seen three straight battles between Bloc MP Maria Mourani and former Liberal MP Eleni Bakopanos. All three elections were decided by a combined total by less than 5%. This will again be a true tossup, since the federalist vote seems to have mostly backed Bakopanos. The Tory and NDP voters here seem to be content in not voting for her, knowing perfectly well how close each race would be by now. This race will all depend on BQ and Liberal fortunes during the campaign in Quebec.
Projection: Toss up

Jeanne-Le Ber
This riding has also seen three straight close elections, and will probably vote for whoever Ahuntsic does. Tories and Dippers seem content on voting for their parties as well, meaning the Liberals are going to have to rely on their fortunes in Quebec to swing this as well.
Projection: Toss up

Outremont
Thomas Mulcair is the face of the NDP in Quebec. Sure, he lost a chunk of his support gained in the by-election, but that is to be expected for the NDP. And, in actual fact he gained 3,000 new voters while losing 8 points. The Liberals will be targetting this, but Jack Layton is just as popular as Ignatieff in Quebec, which means he probably is the most popular federal leader in Montreal at the moment. There's no way Mulcair loses.
Projection: Safe NDP

Things won't fall apart; the center will probably hold.

2009-09-03T23:58:00.001-04:00

Punditsguide.ca saves me the trouble of writing my own copy on the Matter of the Ottawa Centre nominations:

"the contested Liberal nomination in this riding is now scheduled for September 9. Running are Scott Bradley and Janet Yale. The riding is currently represented by two-term NDP M.P. Paul Dewar, who is expected to be renominated by acclamation on Monday, September 28. Green Party 2008 candidate Jen Hunter was renominated in the spring, and there is at least one declared candidate for the Conservative nomination, Bruce Kyereh-Addo."

My two cents: Bradley or Yale would have to be fairly solid candidates to knock out Dewar. That said, Penny Collenette, the previous Liberal contender wasn't a very solid candidate, and so we could see this race becoming very competitive if the Liberals run a good campaign and really attack the NDP. However, we should remember that Bradley got beaten by Collenette, and Dewar beat Collenette, so it stands to reason that Dewar could take care of business if Bradley gets the nomination.

Bonus third cent: Surfing the campaign website, I caught a glimpse of a photo of Yale and Collenette together leading me to believe that this is the candidate that Collenette's supporters would be working for/going to working for. Yale also has a pile of photos of her with big time Libs, Justin Trudeau and Chretien and the like - Bradley's photos are of him doing stuff with real people. Is Yale the national party's candidate fighting the home grown candidate? I look forward to seeing how this dichotomy plays out.

The LPC's Quebec targets.

2009-09-03T14:50:00.001-04:00

Castonguay posts an interesting article today in the Devoir, broadly sketching the LPC's Quebec strategy according to no less than Iggy Quebec lieutenant, Denis Coderre.

First off, we get eight targeted ridings:

-Ahuntsic (0.3 point deficit in 2008)
-Jeanne-Le Ber (2.5 point deficit in 2008)
-Brome-Missisquoi (2.5 point deficit in 2008)
-Haute-Gaspésie-La Mitis-Matane-Matapédia (2.5 point deficit in 2008)
-Gatineau (4 point deficit in 2008)
-Outremont (6 point deficit in 2008)
-Pontiac (8.5 point deficit in 2008)
-Compton-Stanstead (19 point deficit in 2008)

The article also mentions that dependant on the unfolding of the campaign, the party has identified four supplemental ridings for potential late campaign attention:

-Saint-Lambert (9 point deficit in 2008)
-Shefford (22 point deficit in 2008)
-Saint-Bruno-Saint-Hubert (22.5 point deficit in 2008)
-Abitibi-Témiscamingue (27 point deficit in 2008)

Also worth noting is that the LPC already has six organizers on the ground, touring the ridings, working with riding associations in targeted and secondary ridings.

Coderre also says the party will be going with three distinct campaigns - a Montreal campaign, a Quebec region campaign, and a regions campaign - with various regionally-relevant themes. But given the targeted ridings, this is only half the story - the targets imply a much more precise campaign character.

Basically: aside from the Outremont riding, the LPC is going full bore against the BQ. This presents two highly likely implications:

1. To prime folks for the the Liberal message, the LPC will likely run hard against Harper, but tangentially, piggy-backing BQ attacks.
2. The Liberals will make the sale in the three regions running contrast ads against the BQ. Coderre could well have been honest about the contours of these running along a tri-regional declension.

And of course, the standard national campaign Igg-puffing will likely figure as well. It's game on, folks.

Ottawa West-Nepean, Battle of

2009-09-03T14:37:00.001-04:00

Le Droit is calling it “La bataille des ministres,” I’m calling it “the Slug Fest in Ottawa-West.” Baird vs Pratt, the Rematch, is set for the next federal election.

Maybe the Liberals know something I don’t know. Former National Defence minister David Pratt was re-nominated as the candidate for OWN by the second place Liberals in what I’m sure was an uncontested nomination. Why would they put a solid front bencher in a losing riding?. It could be political miscalculation, or it could be that they really think that their party’s changing image will cause about 5000 people to change their minds – if the polls are to be believed this could be true. It could also be that they want to knock out one of Harper’s most public (and most belligerent) ministers and they stand the best chance of in this riding (where Baird’s support has plateau-ed) with this candidate.

OWN is, I’m sure you all know, the fiefdom of Minister-of-all-Trades John Baird and so this little contest promises to be a fairly free spending little race. The NDP aren’t really a factor here, never having gotten above 10,000 votes, and not likely to break through here anytime soon while these two lumbering dinosaurs slam each other into buildings and breathe fire on each other. This should be a hell of a good campaign, with both Pratt and Baird being top notch campaigners, and with both parties ready to load up a dump truck with money and empty it out in Ottawa West.

Seats to watch: Atlantic Canada

2009-09-02T19:04:00.001-04:00

Well, it looks like we're in for another election season. It wouldn't be fall in Ottawa without an election, considering we'd have to go back to 2005 before we had a fall without an election (or 2004 if you want to get technical, as much of the 2006 campaign was in the late fall of 2005).

Michael Ignatieff said yesterday he doesn't plan on supporting this government, so it looks like we'll be heading to the polls in late October or early November.

I've been scanning my two favourite prediction sites electionprediction.org and democraticspace.com looking for their take on the upcoming election. Both sites are really in their infancy for this campaign season, but we can take a look at some of the early seats to watch. For the sake of making this post as short as possible, I'm going to list seats that both sites agree are tossups.

St. John's South-Mount Pearl, Newfoundland and Labrador
This seat was really close last time between the NDP and the Liberals. However, the NDP will have to run Ryan Cleary again to have any shot at this seat. I can't see a seat in Newfoundland going NDP without some sort of cult of personality behind the candidate, like we saw in Jack Harris. In 2008, they wanted to kick out the Tories on the rock, and they did that here by picking a Liberal. There won't be as much of a need to vote NDP next time.
Projection: lean Liberal

Egmont, Prince Edward Island
This race was a real suprise for me last time, as no seat in PEI has voted Conservative since the 1980s, but they really wanted a cabinet minister. I think this seat will go the way the government goes. If it looks like the Liberals will win, Egmont will vote Liberal. Tory MP Gail Shea has been booted by the locals before, afterall, in the last provincial election.
Projection: Toss up

South Shore-St. Margaret's, Nova Scotia
I really thought the Tories would lose this one last time, as polls seemed to suggest their popularity was lagging in Atlantic Canada, but perhaps not, as they held onto this one. MP Gerald Keddy is a Red Tory, and seems to be rather popular. NDP hopeful Gordon Earle has been working this seat quite hard, and will be aided by the fact his party now forms government in Nova Scotia.
Projection: Toss up

West Nova, Nova Scotia
West Nova is the traditional Liberal area of Nova Scotia (provincially, anyways), but the Tories took this in the 2008 election. We have seen two straight close matchups in this seat, and it looks like it will depend on the winds in the air. Tory MP Gordon Kerr and former Liberal MP Robert Thibault look poised for a third straight close matchup (their combined margin of victories of the last two elections being about 4%)
Projection: Toss up

Fredericton, New Brunswick
This seat seemed to surprise me in the last election. It took a large swing to the Conservatives after the incumbent Liberal MP Andy Scott chose not to run again. It seems incumbency plays a large factor in this riding, and MP Keith Ashfield won this by 11 points last time. Also, before Scott, this riding had a long history of voting Conservative.
Projection: lean Conservative

Miramichi, New Brunswick
It seems rural New Brunswick is going back to its Tory roots, although Miramichi has more Liberal roots than anything. However, even fracophone rural areas in Canada are starting to like the Tories. Longtime Liberal MP Charles Hubbard lost this in 2008. Unless he runs again, this seat will probably stay in Conservative hands.
Projection: lean Conservative

Moncton-Riverview-Dieppe, New Brunswick
The Tories put up a fight here last time, coming within 1500 votes of Liberal MP and former Moncton mayor Brian Murphy. I don't expect him to lose this seat unless the Liberals fail in even further in the Maritimes, which will be pretty hard to do.
Projection: safe Liberal

Saint John, New Brunswick
This was only one of two seats the Progressive Conservatives were able to win in the 1993 election, however they ended up losing in 2004 when Elsie Wayne resigned. They got it back again in 2008 in a very close race decided by 500 votes. This makes this riding the main one to watch in New Brunswick
Projection: Toss up

At the close of the summer: Maritime edition.

2009-09-02T12:57:00.000-04:00

Let's take a look in a general way at Atlantic Canada by looking over the Angus Reid solutions poll that closed out the summer (EKOS's 27 August poll has too small a sample size to be useful).

Angus Reid's 25-26 August poll put voting intention in the region at:

LPC 39
NDP 33
CPC 20
Other 04

Contrast with Atlantic Canada 2008 results:

LPC = 375,632 = 35%
NDP = 279,565 = 26%
CPC = 318,069 = 29.6%
Other = 99,677 = 9.3%

Assuming an even distribution, if the ARS snapshot the election day result, there are five ridings in the region that would swing to the party that took second place in 2008:

Egmont (CPC held, LPC deficit 0.1%)
South Shore-St Margaret's (CPC held, NDP deficit 2.5%)
Saint John's South-Mount Pearl (LPC held, NDP deficit 3%)
West Nova (CPC held, LPC deficit 4%)
Miramichi (CPC held, LPC deficit 5%)

There are also two more ridings that, depending on region and personal affection, could also move to the 2008 second place party:

Fredrikton (CPC held, LPC deficit 11%)
Dartmouth-Cole Harbour (LPC held, NDP deficit 8%)

The net movement here is:

LPC + 2-3
NDP + 2-3
CPC - 4-5

The bottom line is that even if, as we saw with the final EKOS tracking numbers (that's 3-day rolling average - i.e. good poll) in 2008, the CPC gets an election day boost, it's hard to see how the party is looking forward to the Atlantic campaign. Despite the relatively small numbers of seats we're talking about here, the opposition parties' campaign teams have to be feeling bullish right about now.

The NDP's Quebec moves.

2009-09-01T16:34:00.001-04:00

Following a summer that saw the Montreal media hail the pro-French language measure adopted at the Halifax convention, a substantial Igg slow fade, Darryl Dexter win the Nova Scotia election and Layton's successful Belle Province summer tour, it has to be nice for the boys (and girls!) in orange to cap it off with news that Doer's nomination to Washington has been very well received by the Quebec political and media elite. Limonade out of lemons, as it were.

Things are looking up and up and up. According to the August CROP poll, the NDP has now surpassed the CPC in vote intention, and hold a robust (for a 3rd party) 18% support.

Contrast with the May 2009 CROP poll, which put the NDP equal to the 12% support it scored in the 2008 election (which, incidentally, was a dramatic increase over the 2006 score of 7.49%).

If this level/arc of support holds (and despite my near constant cynicism about NDP prospects, I believe that this one actually will) and barring some embarrassing candidate issues or irresistible LPC candidates, the NDP will win the two Quebec ridings it seriously contested last time around: Outremont and Gatineau. But whence, thither?

This summer, Layton specifically mentioned Brome-Missisquoi and Hull, and the NDP seriously challenged Jeanne-Le Ber and Westmount-Ville Marie last time around, but wins here would require implausible shifts in vote intention. Laurier-Sainte Marie should flip to the NDP whenever Duceppe retires (I'm half-convinced that he's staying on, partly to ensure a BQ retention of the seat he's held for nearly two decades).

Which brings us to the point of this post: if immediate term prospects aren't so great, why is Team Orange spending so much time and so many resources in Quebec? Well, I think there are three reasons:

1. Relatively small investments reap large rewards. The NDP pays the most per vote and per seat of any party with parliamentary representation, and Quebec provides a better return on investment ratio, both on cost of seats and on cost of votes.

2. The CPC breakthrough in 2006 and the Mulcair breakthrough in 2007 demonstrated that the political winds can shift very quickly in Quebec. With how good the NDP investment value is in the province, it's relatively cheap to position itself to capitalize on any such potential shifts.

3. The NDP is in the curious position of introducing itself to an electorate that, on demographics alone, ought to be very open to the party's message. If you're a political strategist, this is an opportunity like no other, and you're happy to suffer the sunken costs in exchange for lower operating costs down the line (i.e. selling message salience is cheaper when the path is unfettered).

The NDP is looking at Quebec as a major growth region, and leadership is willing to take its time. As an aside, I also believe that the federal party's reluctance to see a Quebec provincial party owes at least partly to the desire for strict message control.

High speed rail and public spending.

2009-08-31T14:04:00.001-04:00

The Quebec-Windsor high speed rail corridor has been kicking around for years, and when it became clear that the federal government was willing to consider massive infrastructure spending in response to the recent economic morass, the governments of Quebec and Ontario ordered up a new feasibility study and began talking the project up. It is, on its merits, a very very good idea. So why does Adams from EKOS says believe that that the Liberals could lose any votes on this one? (And why, incidentally, run a pollster lede, without providing any polling data?)

The answer lies in a broader question: what constitutes 'good' spending? There's a very good argument to be made that people's relative-income effects and materialistic bias cause a bias towards private consumption in government spending - effectively, the government has an interest in bribing constituents and loves to do so with tax cuts, rebates, subsidies, and little gifts. As well it should, it's a democracy, right? Incidentally, Akin gives us a great run-down of how the government has been doing it over the past several months, and it gives us some good insight into what this $40 billion deficit is 'stimulating'. Returning to Adams of EKOS, the point is that with finite resources, the structural imperative of democratic governance rewards governments that build lots of swimming pools in the hinterlands over those that build 21st century infrastructure. High-speed rail could prove to be wildly popular, but it's certainly not the most cost-effective way of bribing the electorate.

Here, by the way, is something else that differentiates Dion and the Igg. Both had grand visions for the country, however, the Igg seems to have a better sense of the necessity to couch said visions in an equally grand narrative. A keen student of states and state-building, the Igg has taken history's lesson that it is easier to sell a massive spending project within the context of a narrative than it is to sell a massive, de-contextualized spending project.