Conservative Party of Canada Leadership Race Megathread-May 27th 2017

[136or142]

Bernier without a doubt. Only Scheer of the serious candidates could really compete, especially since most of them are unilingual and therefore eliminated by default. (As I've said before, unilingualism is a red line for me)

What about Blaney as his support for the charter of values and identity politics seems to be more in line with Conservatives in Quebec?

[136or142]

Nelson Wiseman's entire column strikes me as fighting old battles between Quebec and English Canada (or English Speaking Canada.)  As one of the replies there points out, Canada is now much more like other countries with ideological divisions based on urban/rural divides and the like, including, increasingly in Quebec itself.

I read the comments section and someone is refuting the author's statement calling Raitt the establishment candidate claiming it is Scheer. From the Wikipedia CPC leadership page Scheer has 20 Mps supporting him, O'Toole 14 and Raitt only 3.

That was me.

[136or142]

Much of the Conservative base is composed of anti-French bigots who hate bilingualism and are convinced that Quebec gets too much of everything. What happens if the CPC picked Bernier as leader who has a heavy Quebec accent...

I don't know about people who would actually join the Conservative Party, but polls every four years show that even half of Conservative Party supporters would vote for the Democratic candidate for President over the Republican candidate.

I think the view expressed here in the original post is too dismissive of Conservatives.

[136or142]

Anti-elitist Kellie Leitch is an insufferable asshole. She also breakfasted with O'Leary yesterday.

She's clearly getting increasingly desperate now that she knows her 'anti elite' shtick is going to be upended by Kevin O'Leary who is far more than she is of a genuine outsider.  This is similar to what happened to Ted Cruz when Donald Trump got in the race, except Cruz at least ended up in second place whereas I think Kellie Leitch's support will collapse to near zero, which is what she deserves to get.

[136or142]

Is O'Leary "anti-elite" though? Is he going to want to drain the swamp in Ottawa? I can't see it. The comparisons with Trump end at being a wealthy, self absorbed blowhard reality TV star.

The similarity is that both of them lie to their idiot supporters that they are 'anti-elite' when, in reality, they both want to drain the government swamp so that they can then sell it and make millions for themselves.

[136or142]

I was thinking about this the other day:

1.Rick Peterson - Mark Everson
2.Andrew Saxton - George Pataki
3.Bradley Trost - Mike Huckabee
4.Deepak Obhrai - Lindsey Graham
5.Andrew Scheer - Marco Rubio
6.Lisa Raitt - George Pataki
7.Michael Chong - John Kasich
8.Pierre Lemieux - Rick Santorum
9.Chris Alexander - Chris Christie (if not for their major setback, would have been a serious contender)
10.Erin O'Toole - Jeb Bush
11.Kellie Leitch - Ted Cruz
12.Kevin O'Leary - Donald Trump
13.Steven Blaney - ?
14.Maxime Bernier - Rand Paul

Those are the Republicans I think they most closely resemble, not that I necessarily expect similar results.

[136or142]

Certainly a bit soon, but after the Republican lookalike challenge, I challenge you to all predict the balloting.

Of course, I expect some of the 14 candidates to drop out, which is one reason why I wrote this is 'too soon.'

I did this province by province and these are my total results based on the 338 riding point system.  I have my province by province 'working papers' but I'll leave that out as it would make this post too cumbersome.

1st Ballot
1.Andrew Scheer 24.3%
2.Kevin O'Leary 19.2
3.Maxime Bernier 15.9
4.Michael Chong 8.8
5.Steven Blaney 5.8
6.Erin O'Toole 5.1
7.Lisa Raitt 5.0
8.Chris Alexander 4.0
9.Pierre Lemieux 3.4
10.Bradley Trost 2.9
11.Kellie Leitch 2.8
12.Deepak Obhrai 1.8
13.Andrew Saxton 0.8
14.Rick Peterson 0.3

This isn't a delegated convention and I guess this works by having the 2nd ballot choices for the lowest candidate redistributed, but if this were a delegated convention all but Scheer, O'Leary, Bernier, Chong and Lemieux drop out.  Lemieux remains as the representative of the social conservative wing.

Rick Peterson endorses Maxime Bernier.  Andrew Saxton and Lisa Raitt endorse Michael Chong.  Kellie Leitch releases her delegates not able to get along with anybody and her supporters split between Kevin O'Leary and Pierre Lemieux.  Brad Trost endorses Pierre Lemiex.  Chris Alexander endorses Andrew Scheer as the establishment choice but his delegates split between Scheer, O'Leary and Lemieux, Erin O'Toole endorses Andrew Scheer and Steven Blaney releases his delegates.  (I know there are no delegates)

2nd Ballot
1.Andrew Scheer 34.1%
2.Kevin O'Leary 23.3
3.Maxime Bernier 18.2
4.Michael Chong 16.6
5.Pierre Lemieux 7.9

Pierre Lemieux endorses Andrew Scheer and Michael Chong releases his delegates who split mostly between Scheer and Bernier.

3rd Ballot
1.Andrew Scheer 44.2%
2.Maxime Bernier 28.6
3.Kevin O'Leary 27.2

Kevin O'Leary quits politics.

4th ballot
1.Andrew Scheer 56.8%
2.Maxime Bernier 43.2

[136or142]

Ivison: O'Leary is the prohibitive favourite, with Bernier, Leitch and Alexander (!) polling strongly.

If I'm not mistaken, these polls are based on self identified Conservative Party supporters.  The people who will actually vote though are just the actual Conservative Party members.

I could be wrong, but I think that fundraising is a better indicator of the campaigns that are successfully selling new memberships (and appealing to long time members) than polls of all Conservative Party supporters.

On that score, I believe Andrew Scheer is either in first or second after Maxime Bernier.

[136or142]

I have to change my convention balloting result predictions for three candidates based on the French Language debate.

Tristin Hopper reported prior to what I'd previously read, that Erin O'Toole does, in fact, speak decent French (he learned it while serving in the Canadian Forces) but has a heavy English accent.  However, his main rival in the 'establishment lane' (for those who watched CNN during the U.S Primaries, the pundits there tried to put the candidates into different lanes for their "path to the nomination") Andrew Scheer does not speak French anywhere near as well as we'd previously been led to believe.  According to Hopper, Scheer is only able to speak using simple French sentences. 

I had previously mentioned that I thought Chris Alexander would have been a serious contender if he didn't have a major setback, like Chris Christie and Bridgegate. With Chris Alexander I was referring to him losing his seat in the 2015 election.  However, with the overall weakness of this slate of candidates, and despite Alexander's several high profile missteps, I think he could yet emerge as a frontrunner.

[136or142]

The major problem I see with Chris Alexander is that, unlike a politician who wants to be all things for all people, he see to want to be all things for nobody.

On the one hand, he has likely turned off a lot of immigrant voters with his 'barbaric cultural practices' hotline, on the other hand, he is running his campaign as an establishment economic conservative who wants to boost the number of immigrants to Canada to 400,000 a year.

I suspect this won't even appeal to most immigrants.  Whenever we get the cliched interview with a 'visible minority' voter about 'their' issues in the election on television, the reply I always see is "Well, yeah, I'm concerned about family reunification, but, other than that, I have the same concerns as every other Canadian."

So, I think the vast majority of immigrants who are citizens of Canada who live in Greater Vancouver, Edmonton, Calgary and Greater Toronto will have the exact same reaction I and most people in Greater Vancouver have to this idea, "400,000 immigrants a year?  Are you crazy?  Housing prices are already insane and traffic is already beyond gridlocked at rush hour times, and infrastructure is already heavily lagging."

Maybe in the areas with a fair number of immigrants already but where the increase in the number of immigrants doesn't seem to be so large this will be more popular.  So, Winnipeg and maybe Montreal (maybe Ottawa?).  Halifax and the rest of Nova Scotia wants more immigrants, which makes sense to me.

[136or142]

The main issue with immigration to the outlying areas isnt raw numbers, it's retention. Nova Scotia gets a decent portion of immigrants, but they disproportionately leave after the minimum period required, or once they get their citizenship.

Yes, I read about that recently.  The Nova Scotia government says the problem is with the federal government rules.

[136or142]

Kevin O'Leary was on the Jon McComb show on CKNW today.
http://www.cknw.com/2017/02/08/270897/

If the interview can't be heard there, if you go to 'On Demand' and then 'Audio Vault' the interview aired at 7:30 AM.

I don't support O'Leary but I don't dislike him as much as I used to.  Aside from his bombast and condescension, he's not a deranged psychopath like President Trump.  His policies are also in the mainstream.  I don't know if he's moderated his policies since he entered the race.

His focus is on competitive tax rates and trade missions and he says he would focus foreign policy on international trade.  He sounds like...Jean Chretien.

I rarely ever listen to Jon McComb, as when I'm awake at that hour I prefer to listen to Rick Cluff on the Early Edition on the CBC.  When I do listen to McComb though, or hear ads for his program on CKNW, he comes across as the fairly typical sanctimonious radio talk show host, one day complaining that government isn't doing enough to solve some problem and the next day complaining that taxes are too high.

However, he is also an experienced interviewer.  I think both sides come across.  On a couple of occasions, McComb challenges O'Leary and makes O'Leary back off somewhat from his initial claim.   A couple of other times though towards the end of the interview  McComb asks 'questions' in the form of at least 45 second long editorials.  O'Leary, in my opinion rightly so, gets tired of waiting for McComb to be quiet and starts responding while McComb is still talking.

O'Leary, as he often does, says that he has the ability to bring about '3% growth' because he is a businessman.  He gives an example of some company that contacted him wanting to move to Canada and bring 500 jobs, but says they have been stymied by provincial and municipal legislation.  
This focus on bringing jobs to Canada one foreign investment at a time reminds me of another 'blue Liberal' leader, that of Frank McKenna.  

I suggest to O'Leary if he is really interested in being a political leader that he take the advice of McKenna, an experienced politician.  When McKenna was asked if he had any interest in the Federal Liberal leadership, he said that his style was too hands on to work for Canada and only worked for a small province like New Brunswick, and, I believe he also said, that his approach to attracting foreign investment, the same as O'Leary's, wouldn't have any appreciable benefit for Canada's overall population.

O'Leary often seems more interested going after Kathleen Wynne, whose government is a disaster.  I suggest if he wants a political career that he should run in Ontario and bolster the Progressive Conservative Party there, then, should they win government, ask to be named the Economic Development minister.

[136or142]

I don't get all the hysteria about O'Leary in some quarters...once you get beyond his bombastic and obnoxious personality - he sounds like a Paul Martin Liberal...pro-business and trade and liberal on social issues (though actually Paul martin was kinda socially conservative back when he was Finance minister).

I don't like O'Leary - but its not like i like ANY of the people running to lead the Tories - at least he doesnt seem to want to pick at any scabs on xenophobia and identity issues.

With his sole focus on economics I find him to be more like John Manley.

[136or142]

I don't like O'Leary - but its not like i like ANY of the people running to lead the Tories

Even Mike Chong?

I personally like Michael Chong, Lisa Raitt, Maxime Bernier and Andrew Saxton.  Deepak Obhrai seems to be a decent enough person, but I have no idea why he's running.

[136or142]

I don't like O'Leary - but its not like i like ANY of the people running to lead the Tories

Even Mike Chong?

I personally like Michael Chong, Lisa Raitt, Maxime Bernier and Andrew Saxton.  Deepak Obhrai seems to be a decent enough person, but I have no idea why he's running.

One of my friends went to the debate in Halifax. Apparently more people were trying to meet Obhrai than a lot of more popular candidates, because he's kind of funny. My friend speculates its mainly an ego stroke.

Yes, I was going to write 'a likable enough person' but people might have thought I was being sarcastic due to Obama's comment to Hillary Clinton in 2008 of something like 'you're plenty likable."

[136or142]

Yeah, Deepak seems to be a genuinely nice person, and is quite humourous. His candidacy is bizarre, but I guess he thought it was 'his turn' because he is the longest serving Tory MP.

Tied with the longest actually.  As Yoda said "No, there is another."  Gerry Ritz was also elected in 1997.

[136or142]

I share Glavin and Coyne's concerns here on the Islamophobia motion and certain winds blowing through the party generally.

Here is one thing i don't understand...Conservatives were falling all over each other to support laws and resolutions that specifically combated anti-semitism, but now the same people complain about a resolution targeting Islamophobia...what's the deal is it Jews = Good and Muslims = bad?

Yes, it seems the generally conservative Canadian media has some kind of mass amnesia on the Conservative Party's anti BDS motion of only one year ago.

The Conservatives who oppose this measure over concerns over 'free speech' who supported their party's motion make no sense.

For those here who don't remember:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/conservative-motion-bds-macdonald-1.3454497


ANALYSIS
Liberals denounce and agree with Tory motion condemning Israel boycotters
All parties agree BDS tactics against Israel bad policy, but that's about all they agree on

[136or142]

Lisa Raitt says half of the candidates should drop out and that maybe she's one of those who should.

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2017/03/01/lisa-raitt-conservative-leadership-race-2017-debate_n_15079642.html

[136or142]

Unless candidates need to make another payment, if you don't mind maybe getting not much votes, why not stay in the race. The reason is to stop other people from winning, maybe she would support O'Toole or Scheer.

Read this in the National Post:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I've read Bernier is sometimes refered to as the Albertan from Quebec. No wonder they like him, he sounds like a Reform candidate.

I think most of Lisa Raitt's support base (such as it is) would go to Michael Chong.

The reason for candidates to drop out is that their being so many candidates in the race has possibly prevented more serious ideas from being debated due to the lack of time in the debates themselves and the prevented the more serious candidates from breaking through through and this has made it that only the sensationalist candidates like Kevin O'Leary and Kellie Leitch have broken through at all.

This is most clearly observed with Andrew Scheer changing from trying to become something of a serious consensus candidate at the beginning of the race to engaging in the usual anti carbon tax nonsense and adopting other B.S populist memes.

It's the old concept of 'too many cooks spoil the broth.'

I think there is clearly a genuine problem with this leadership race but whether too many candidates being in the race is the reason for it,  I don't know.  That aside, there is no question many of the candidates running are fringe candidates at best.

[136or142]

The thing about have a 14 person preferential ballot system like the Tories have is that it creates this crazy "randomness"...there will be a cluster of candidates in the middle each with 7 or 8% of the vote and who ends up leapfrogging ahead and collecting preferences could depend on who people choose to rank 6th instead of 7th and I wonder if a lot of CPC members might have one or two favourites and one or two people they definitely want to rank dead last and everyone else might just get numbered at random.

I'm not so sure that Raitt's voters would go to Chong. First of all I suspect that she would get far more support than him in the first place. Chong is very well-liked...by Liberals, Greens and New Democrats...his policies are totally out of step with his own party. He is the Canadians equivalent of Arlen Specter running for the GOP nomination in 2008 as a pro-choice socially Liberal Republican (he got 1% some early primaries and then dropped out). If Raitt dropped out I suspect her support would be dispersed among all the other candiadtes who are NOT Kevin O'Leary or Kellie Leitch 

Minor correction, Arlen Specter ran for President in 1996.

[136or142]

Raitt is a moderate Conservative; that's fine, and moderate Conservatives are necessary to have in the coalition if we want to have a party that can govern Canada, and they need to feel welcome. Raitt wouldn't be at the top of my preferences, but she wouldn't be at the bottom, either, and I wouldn't be particularly disappointed if Raitt won. By contrast, from what I've seen in the debates, Chong seems like a CINO who holds down a very safe Conservative seat (which came within 3 points of reelecting a PC incumbent in 1993!), and while there may be a spot for him on the fringe of the party, he definitely shouldn't become leader. I'd still rank him ahead of the cuckoo birds like Leitch/Blaney/Lemieux, but still.

A few could be switched around, but I'm solidifying something like this as my list (in a race where I can't vote )

1)   Deepak Obhrai
2)   Rick Peterson
3)   Maxime Bernier
4)   Erin O’Toole
5)   Andrew Saxton
6)   Andrew Scheer
7)   Lisa Raitt
8 )   Chris Alexander
9)   Kevin O’Leary
10)   Michael Chong
11)   Steven Blaney
12)   Pierre Lemieux
13)   Brad Trost
14)   Kellie Leitch

EDIT: fixed formatting

Michael Chong would dispute that he isn't a conservative.  He argues, and I think with some merit, that his views are traditionally conservative, but don't fit into modern conservatism, which he would argue isn't conservative at all, but is simply radical.

[136or142]

Deltell endorses O'Toole.

Is this due to the increasing realization that Andrew Scheer can't actually hold a conversation in French?

I think I've written here that if this were 'normal' times Erin O'Toole would win the leadership because he's the closest to ticking all the boxes.  However, despite that, he clearly doesn't seem to have caught on among Conservative Party members.

Boxes he ticks:
1.Can converse in both official languages.

2.Holds a seat in Parliament unlike Chris Alexander.

3.Is consistent unlike Alexander who can be either a Dr Jeckyl or a Mister Hyde.

4.Isn't a dogmatic ideologue unlike Maxime Bernier who would potentially alienate millions of Canadians with his hard line style (I personally agree with a lot of Bernier's economic views, but he is also too dogmatic for me.)

5.Doesn't really have a strong ideology or even all that many policy views, but, with what he does say, he comes across as a pleasant version of Stephen Harper.

6.Has cabinet experience, but wasn't either an M.P or a cabinet minister long enough that he could be tainted by his association with the Stephen Harper government in 2019.

Condolences to Andrew Scheer on the passing of his mother.

[136or142]

Radio-Canada is reporting on Quebec farmers becoming party members to save supply management in reaction to Bernier's policy. Scheer and Blaney have attended dairy farmers meetings.

Seems to be in the regions of Quebec City, Chaudière-Applaches, Estrie, and Montérégie. Estimation from various camps is over 2.000 farmers will have joined.

http://ici.radio-canada.ca/nouvelle/1020973/la-mobilisation-des-agriculteurs-quebecois-coutera-t-elle-la-victoire-a-maxime-bernier

The party has 5,500 members in the province. And from the Montreal Gazette

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I'm cautious on the influence of people who are not interested in a party who join to vote against someone. Maybe they are very motivated. Something to watch for when analyzing the results by riding. They should vote for someone unexpected, say Trost, so their vote is noticeable and stand out. I had heard the farmers union in Chaudière-Appalaches was trying to campaign against Bernier but it would be more effective if they are spread out in regions with low membership.
  

Shows the length a monopoly cartel will go to to maintain it's privilege.  These dairy farmers are a  dead weight loss.

[136or142]

Radio-Canada is reporting on Quebec farmers becoming party members to save supply management in reaction to Bernier's policy. Scheer and Blaney have attended dairy farmers meetings.

Seems to be in the regions of Quebec City, Chaudière-Applaches, Estrie, and Montérégie. Estimation from various camps is over 2.000 farmers will have joined.

http://ici.radio-canada.ca/nouvelle/1020973/la-mobilisation-des-agriculteurs-quebecois-coutera-t-elle-la-victoire-a-maxime-bernier

The party has 5,500 members in the province. And from the Montreal Gazette

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I'm cautious on the influence of people who are not interested in a party who join to vote against someone. Maybe they are very motivated. Something to watch for when analyzing the results by riding. They should vote for someone unexpected, say Trost, so their vote is noticeable and stand out. I had heard the farmers union in Chaudière-Appalaches was trying to campaign against Bernier but it would be more effective if they are spread out in regions with low membership.
  

Shows the length a monopoly cartel will go to to maintain it's privilege.  These dairy farmers are a  dead weight loss.

Well, they are right. Australia broke that system and now milk is 30 to 50 cents more expensive.

Since deregulation in 2000, milk prices in Australia have risen considerably less than the increase in the CPI up to May of 2015.  


http://www.farminstitute.org.au/ag-forum/australian-consumers-facing-increasing-food-prices

[136or142]

I still think if Trudeau was truly Machiavellian, he'd go ahead with electoral reform and introduce proportional representation. That would encourage the break-up of the CPC into different factions and make the Liberals, who have been a big-tent party their entire existence, at least the senior party in any governing coalition (they could always throw their junior partner under the bus like what Cameron and Merkel did).

I get the logic, but I can't really see any major party getting behind a system that virtually eliminates majority governments. Besides, even though the Liberals aren't as faction ridden as the Tories have been lately, they'd still be vulnerable to the logic of proportional representation. To use the 90's as an example, I have a hard time imagining Sheila Copps and John Manley sharing a party under PR.

In Australia, which has a PR system in its Senate through STV, the Australian Labor Party has formal right wing and left wing factions.  Under a PR system,  I could see the Liberal Party having the same type of thing.