Monday, May 24, 2004
Welcome to the Jungle
Well, if the number of signs up in St. Albert urging me to vote for Moe Saeed of "Team Martin" are any indication, Paul Martin today asked Adrienne Clarkson to dissolve Parliament, and the Governor General complied. I imagine that many of you, especially those of you with smaller brains, have been on tenterhooks (whatever the hell those are) awaiting my penetrating insight into this.
Well, I'm not going to tell you for whom you should vote (LENGTHY PARANTHETICAL DEVICE - actually, I will: vote for whichever candidate you think will do the best job of representing your viewpoint as an MP - you have no real power to hold party leaders to account, so don't vote on the basis of which of them you like best. The MP is your representative, and she/he is the one who decides how to vote, so it's on the basis of who would make the best MP that you should decide how to vote. Granted, if you're really naive, you might pull a Mustafa and vote for the Conservative candidate after he/she lies to you about her/his willingness to defy party discipline, but in a representative democracy voting for your preferred representative remains the only tenable fashion in which to proceed), but I am prepared to provide something far less useful: random punditry and observations on the parties' positions going into the campaign.
We shall use, as our source material, the Canwest Global News poll released May 20 (probably available at the University Bookstore for $155). This poll, you will recall from class, places the Liberals at 39% national support, the Conservatives at 31%, the New Democrats at 17%, the Bloc at 11%, and Other (which we can probably assume is mostly the Green Party, though the poll didn't separate Greens out) at 2%. If these are the numbers that come in on the 28, we can expect a Liberal minority (barring some very strange regional voting patterns).
For reference purposes, before we really get into this analysis, here are the poll's regional breakdowns:
British Columbia
Conservatives: 40%
Liberals: 32%
New Democrats: 26%
Other: 3%
Alberta
Conservatives: 57%
Liberals: 27%
New Democrats: 14%
Other: 2%
Saskatchewan/Manitoba
Liberals: 35%
New Democrats: 32%
Conservatives: 27%
Other: 7%
Ontario
Liberals: 42%
Conservatives: 39%
New Democrats: 18%
Other: 2%
Québec
Bloc Québecois: 43%
Liberals: 40%
New Democrats: 9%
Conservatives: 7%
Other: 1%
Atlantic Canada
Liberals: 50%
Conservatives: 26%
New Democrats: 20%
Other: 4%
And now, finally, my observations:
1. The poll indicates that the Liberals would fare best in an election in which the main issue was keeping Québec in confederation, drawing 48% of the vote nationally. Unfortunately for the Liberals, the Québec question will be a total non-issue this election, even (especially?) in Québec.
2. The Conservatives will fare best in an election in which scandal and waste are the main issues, drawing 37% of the vote nationally (as opposed to 30% for the Liberals). This is, obviously, why the Conservatives are trying to focus on ad-gate.
3. The New Democrats will fare best in an election in which Health Care and Education are the main issues, in which they'd win 24% of the vote. Accordingly, they are trying to focus on these things.
4. 32% of decided voters said they'd vote Liberal if "getting a change after three Liberal governments in a row" was the election's sole issue. Uh. . . what?
5. Have you noticed that the Conservatives aren't talking much about gay marriage anymore? Here's why: in an election in which gay marriage was the sole issue, 38% would vote Liberal, 31% would vote Conservative, and 21% would vote New Democrat. However, in Alberta 60% would vote Conservative. These statistics mean that while gay marriage is a vote getter for the Conservatives in Alberta, it's a vote loser in the rest of the country combined. The Conservatives aren't about to bring an issue to the forefront that could help them win all of two additional seats while jeopardizing gains in the rest of the country.
6. More bad news for the Conservatives: on the issue of protecting Canadians against terrorism, a favourite theme of the Bush-friendly Blues, the Liberals are beating them 44% to 31%. The Conservatives need to downplay terrorism issues, which runs opposite to their current practise.
7. Traditionally, governing parties are vulnerable during economic downturns, and what the country is going through now is closer to qualifying than anything else during the last decade. Unfortunately for the Conservatives, the Liberals are beating them on this one too by 43% to 31%. If the economy becomes the issue, just like if national security becomes the issue, the Liberals *gain* votes, while the Conservatives remain stagnant.
8. The Conservatives should be fighting this election by focussing on how a decade of Liberal government has resulted in complacency, scandal, and waste - these are the only issues on which they outpoll the Liberals. In other words, the Conservatives need to shy away from all policy issues - conservatism continues to be unfavoured by Canadians.
9. The Liberals, paradoxically, need to convince Canadians that the Conservatives have a chance of winning. Only 29% of Canadians want to see Stephen Harper as Prime Minister, and, as mentioned above, Canadians by and large dislike the Conservatives' approach to policy issues. If Canadians think the Conservatives could actually win, they are likely to flock to the Liberals. If Canadians consider a Liberal victory assured, they are more likely to vote Conservative in order to punish those aspects of the Liberals they dislike, or to bring in a minority government.
10. The New Democrats are the party that has the most to gain from focussing on policy issues. On the gay marriage front, for example, the poll shows that Canadians are likely to abandon the Liberals (whose support shrinks from 39% to 38%) in favour of the New Democrats (whose support increases from 17% to 21%, largely as a result of anti-Liberals outside of Alberta who see no reason that gays shouldn't be allowed to marry). Results are similar on social programs. The New Democrats also have much to gain by jumping on the Conservative bandwagon in attacking the Liberals apparent tiredness.
11. The New Democrats must convince Canadians that a Liberal victory is guaranteed. As soon as left-leaning Canadians think that Stephen Harper might become Prime Minister, a large number of them will foresake the NDs for the Liberals, in order to prevent this from happenning.
12. The re-elections of Anne McLellan and David Kilgour seem almost assured, as almost as many Edmontonians favour the Liberals (40%) as the Conservatives (42%). A victory for Debbie Carlson in Edmonton-Strathcona would also be possible were it not for the local strength of New Democratic candidate Malcolm Azania.
13. Historically, no government has managed to take office without carrying at least one of Ontario or Québec. The Conservatives remain a non-entity in Québec - actually polling *lower* there than the Progressive Conservatives did last election, I might add - and are behind the Liberals in Ontario. There is thus no way that they will form a government.
14. No Liberal government has ever managed a majority without winning at least significant minority of Québec seats (before the Bloc, no Liberal government ever managed a majority without winning a massive majority of Québec seats). The Liberals' gains in Atlantic Canada (at the expense of both the Conservatives and the New Democrats) are unlikely to be enough to offset their losses in Ontario (to both the Conservatives and the New Democrats). Therefore, the Liberals will need to do well in Québec to retain their majority.
15. My preliminary seat predictions, to be revised during the campaign:
Liberal: 152
Conservative: 77
Bloc Québecois: 52
New Democrat: 26
Green: 1
This will allow the Liberals to remain in power by alternately veering to the left and gaining New Democrat/Bloc/Green support and by pandering to Québec nationalists (which Martin has already shown a distressing willingness to do).
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Well, if the number of signs up in St. Albert urging me to vote for Moe Saeed of "Team Martin" are any indication, Paul Martin today asked Adrienne Clarkson to dissolve Parliament, and the Governor General complied. I imagine that many of you, especially those of you with smaller brains, have been on tenterhooks (whatever the hell those are) awaiting my penetrating insight into this.
Well, I'm not going to tell you for whom you should vote (LENGTHY PARANTHETICAL DEVICE - actually, I will: vote for whichever candidate you think will do the best job of representing your viewpoint as an MP - you have no real power to hold party leaders to account, so don't vote on the basis of which of them you like best. The MP is your representative, and she/he is the one who decides how to vote, so it's on the basis of who would make the best MP that you should decide how to vote. Granted, if you're really naive, you might pull a Mustafa and vote for the Conservative candidate after he/she lies to you about her/his willingness to defy party discipline, but in a representative democracy voting for your preferred representative remains the only tenable fashion in which to proceed), but I am prepared to provide something far less useful: random punditry and observations on the parties' positions going into the campaign.
We shall use, as our source material, the Canwest Global News poll released May 20 (probably available at the University Bookstore for $155). This poll, you will recall from class, places the Liberals at 39% national support, the Conservatives at 31%, the New Democrats at 17%, the Bloc at 11%, and Other (which we can probably assume is mostly the Green Party, though the poll didn't separate Greens out) at 2%. If these are the numbers that come in on the 28, we can expect a Liberal minority (barring some very strange regional voting patterns).
For reference purposes, before we really get into this analysis, here are the poll's regional breakdowns:
British Columbia
Conservatives: 40%
Liberals: 32%
New Democrats: 26%
Other: 3%
Alberta
Conservatives: 57%
Liberals: 27%
New Democrats: 14%
Other: 2%
Saskatchewan/Manitoba
Liberals: 35%
New Democrats: 32%
Conservatives: 27%
Other: 7%
Ontario
Liberals: 42%
Conservatives: 39%
New Democrats: 18%
Other: 2%
Québec
Bloc Québecois: 43%
Liberals: 40%
New Democrats: 9%
Conservatives: 7%
Other: 1%
Atlantic Canada
Liberals: 50%
Conservatives: 26%
New Democrats: 20%
Other: 4%
And now, finally, my observations:
1. The poll indicates that the Liberals would fare best in an election in which the main issue was keeping Québec in confederation, drawing 48% of the vote nationally. Unfortunately for the Liberals, the Québec question will be a total non-issue this election, even (especially?) in Québec.
2. The Conservatives will fare best in an election in which scandal and waste are the main issues, drawing 37% of the vote nationally (as opposed to 30% for the Liberals). This is, obviously, why the Conservatives are trying to focus on ad-gate.
3. The New Democrats will fare best in an election in which Health Care and Education are the main issues, in which they'd win 24% of the vote. Accordingly, they are trying to focus on these things.
4. 32% of decided voters said they'd vote Liberal if "getting a change after three Liberal governments in a row" was the election's sole issue. Uh. . . what?
5. Have you noticed that the Conservatives aren't talking much about gay marriage anymore? Here's why: in an election in which gay marriage was the sole issue, 38% would vote Liberal, 31% would vote Conservative, and 21% would vote New Democrat. However, in Alberta 60% would vote Conservative. These statistics mean that while gay marriage is a vote getter for the Conservatives in Alberta, it's a vote loser in the rest of the country combined. The Conservatives aren't about to bring an issue to the forefront that could help them win all of two additional seats while jeopardizing gains in the rest of the country.
6. More bad news for the Conservatives: on the issue of protecting Canadians against terrorism, a favourite theme of the Bush-friendly Blues, the Liberals are beating them 44% to 31%. The Conservatives need to downplay terrorism issues, which runs opposite to their current practise.
7. Traditionally, governing parties are vulnerable during economic downturns, and what the country is going through now is closer to qualifying than anything else during the last decade. Unfortunately for the Conservatives, the Liberals are beating them on this one too by 43% to 31%. If the economy becomes the issue, just like if national security becomes the issue, the Liberals *gain* votes, while the Conservatives remain stagnant.
8. The Conservatives should be fighting this election by focussing on how a decade of Liberal government has resulted in complacency, scandal, and waste - these are the only issues on which they outpoll the Liberals. In other words, the Conservatives need to shy away from all policy issues - conservatism continues to be unfavoured by Canadians.
9. The Liberals, paradoxically, need to convince Canadians that the Conservatives have a chance of winning. Only 29% of Canadians want to see Stephen Harper as Prime Minister, and, as mentioned above, Canadians by and large dislike the Conservatives' approach to policy issues. If Canadians think the Conservatives could actually win, they are likely to flock to the Liberals. If Canadians consider a Liberal victory assured, they are more likely to vote Conservative in order to punish those aspects of the Liberals they dislike, or to bring in a minority government.
10. The New Democrats are the party that has the most to gain from focussing on policy issues. On the gay marriage front, for example, the poll shows that Canadians are likely to abandon the Liberals (whose support shrinks from 39% to 38%) in favour of the New Democrats (whose support increases from 17% to 21%, largely as a result of anti-Liberals outside of Alberta who see no reason that gays shouldn't be allowed to marry). Results are similar on social programs. The New Democrats also have much to gain by jumping on the Conservative bandwagon in attacking the Liberals apparent tiredness.
11. The New Democrats must convince Canadians that a Liberal victory is guaranteed. As soon as left-leaning Canadians think that Stephen Harper might become Prime Minister, a large number of them will foresake the NDs for the Liberals, in order to prevent this from happenning.
12. The re-elections of Anne McLellan and David Kilgour seem almost assured, as almost as many Edmontonians favour the Liberals (40%) as the Conservatives (42%). A victory for Debbie Carlson in Edmonton-Strathcona would also be possible were it not for the local strength of New Democratic candidate Malcolm Azania.
13. Historically, no government has managed to take office without carrying at least one of Ontario or Québec. The Conservatives remain a non-entity in Québec - actually polling *lower* there than the Progressive Conservatives did last election, I might add - and are behind the Liberals in Ontario. There is thus no way that they will form a government.
14. No Liberal government has ever managed a majority without winning at least significant minority of Québec seats (before the Bloc, no Liberal government ever managed a majority without winning a massive majority of Québec seats). The Liberals' gains in Atlantic Canada (at the expense of both the Conservatives and the New Democrats) are unlikely to be enough to offset their losses in Ontario (to both the Conservatives and the New Democrats). Therefore, the Liberals will need to do well in Québec to retain their majority.
15. My preliminary seat predictions, to be revised during the campaign:
Liberal: 152
Conservative: 77
Bloc Québecois: 52
New Democrat: 26
Green: 1
This will allow the Liberals to remain in power by alternately veering to the left and gaining New Democrat/Bloc/Green support and by pandering to Québec nationalists (which Martin has already shown a distressing willingness to do).
