Canadian by-elections, 2015

[Boston Bread]

Suzanne Shawbonquit may be the new frontrunner for the NDP nomination.
https://twitter.com/SShawbonquit/status/547459875002122246
Paul Loewenburg who ran in 2011 and narrowly failed to be nominated in 2014 not only dropped out of the provincial scene to run federally, but endorsed Shawbonquit.
http://www.thesudburystar.com/2015/01/04/loewenberg-backing-shawbonquit-in-ndp-race
Interestingly if Shawbonquit wins the general the ONDP caucus will be 9 men to 12 women.

[Boston Bread]

Sudbury is provincial (MPP Cimino resigned), the federal seat for Sudbury is open too but its election will coincide with the federal election.

[Boston Bread]

How racist are people in Sudbury? First Nations candidates often face voter discrimination. One of the reasons the NDP was unable to win Kenora in the last couple of federal elections despite winning it provincially.

Kenora might have also voted based on the gun registry. Anyways the discrimination question isn't a question I can answer but I would hope it isn't an issue.

[Boston Bread]

Shawbonquit has taken the nomination.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/suzanne-shawbonquit-will-run-for-sudbury-new-democrats-1.2897108

[Boston Bread]

Note that the olp did better in 2014 than in 2011 popular vote wise in the north, the swing against them in Sudbury was outmatched by positive swings in Thunder Bay. I doubt orientation hurt them. Sudbury is less frontierish than Kenora so I feel racism wouldn't hurt the NDP as much as in Kenora, if racism played a role there.

[Boston Bread]

I'm curious as to why Simcoe of all places had such a large swing to the liberals. My former Barrie MPP Jackson lost re-election, a happy day that was.

[Boston Bread]

A more interesting swing map in my mind is the 2007-2014 liberal swing map, which really demonstrates their decline in rural areas and their ever-increasing strength in Toronto.
I made this map some months ago, the technology isn't impressive but it shows it:
grey=swing of less than 1%
red=liberal swing, 5% increments
blue=liberal decrease, 5% increments


Edit: Whoops, I'm new to the image system here

[Boston Bread]

Thibeault explains his switch:
http://www.northernlife.ca/mobile/displayarticle.aspx?id=90650

[Boston Bread]

Sudbury by-election happens today. Hoping for an NDP win of course.

[Boston Bread]

Time to place my bets:

Shawbonquit 37%
Thibeault 35%
Olivier 14%
Peroni 8%
Green person 5%
Other 1%

Ultimately just enough Olivier voters cross over to save Shawbonquit from losing.

[Boston Bread]

It seems to be ending up close to my predictions. A win for ethics in politics, I'd say.

[Boston Bread]

10/238: 146 Thibault, 113 Shawbonquit. Really wish we had poll maps like the US, would make guesstimates easier.

Really? You could actually know what's going on in Sudbury with a map? I'm impressed.

Just juxtapose the results with
http://www.election-atlas.ca/ont/107/88.php?e=2014
and you can see how things are shaping up early on.

[Boston Bread]

The gap is closing now, Shawbonquit ahead by 2.2 points right now.

[Boston Bread]

People are tweeting that the Liberals are ahead

Do they know something we don't? Paikin is tweeting that the NDP leads.

[Boston Bread]

They could be right. The NDP lead is still shrinking on Elections ON.

[Boston Bread]

Wow that was a turn for the worse.

[Boston Bread]

Shawbonquit has conceded. There's always 2018.

I take back what I said about a win for ethics in politics

[Boston Bread]

Also the Sudbury Star endorsed Thibeault after endorsing NDP in 2014 because of the prospect of having a member of the government in power. In 2014 a minority was expected so an NDP MPP would have leverage in that situation.

PCs probably suffered from bad turnout, like the NDP did in Whitby-Oshawa. If you don't think your party has a chance you're more likely to not vote.

[Boston Bread]

Is there a good chance of a new NDP leader before 2018 now? I think it would be good for the party.

[Boston Bread]

From a few thousand miles away this is pure bad politics by the ONDP. They had everything in their favour (bar the unnecessary resignation) and blew it. FFS, don't blame the electors or the OLP (get in by the way!) think why they failed so badly.

I'm still quite surprised why Horwath didn't quit (or wasn't forced to) after the provincial election campaign disaster.

To say everything was in their favour is wrong. As was previously mentioned Liberals are guaranteed to be the governing party for 3+ years so some are wishing that a favourable vote will get Sudbury funding for local things. Also polls showed Olivier took more from the NDP than the Liberals, so his candidacy might have hurt the NDP. The NDP have lost their momentum since the last provincial election, so a by-election in a non-safe NDP seat was always going to be competitive.

[Boston Bread]

I'm not going into how racism played into the by-election, but it's a fact that racism against aboriginals is a more deep-rooted problem than homophobia in Canada today.

[Boston Bread]

Where's the evidence that the comparatively poor Liberal performance in SW Ontario last year had anything to do with Wynne's sexuality? Or are we just listing off stereotypes and confusing them with reality?

The liberal decline has more to do with the decline of manufacturing since 2003. This accounted for the large swing to the NDP, especially in urban areas. The rural swings to PC are not out of place with what happened in other rural parts of southern Ontario. The vast majority of rural formerly liberal voters who would refuse to vote for an LGBT leader jumped ship in 2011, a campaign where the tory campaign which featured social conservatism and where a general backlash against the Liberals outside the GTA took place. I see no evidence that Wynne's sexuality had a significant electoral impact. The focus was on jobs and the economy, which played against Liberals more so in the SW than any other part of the province.
I know the tri-cities area where I live is a major exception to the economic downturn in the SW, so it's not surprising the region had one of the largest liberal swings. And the tri-cities area have a lot of mennonites and German-Canadians, not the most socially liberal group.

[Boston Bread]

In 2014, those liberal losses in SW were virtually all to the NDP (only riding where Tories did better than 2011 was BGOS). Don't these so-cons know the NDP is equally pro-LGBT? I'd like an explanation on why the NDP is now all of a sudden the vehicle for a so-con backlash against Wynne. A reason other than the economy, which I outlined in my previous post.

[Boston Bread]

My dad at one point liked Putin because of Russia's tough stance on teh gay and has only ever voted Liberal. Being homophobic doesn't mean they refuse to vote for a party with an LGBT leader.

It's arguable how much of the liberal decline in areas where they did decline in 2014 was due to homophobia manifesting at the ballot box, but generally these areas have been trending away from the liberals for quite some time (moreso at the federal level). Even immigrant-heavy places in the GTA. Not that long ago the NDP was non-existent in places like Scarborough Rouge-River and the Liberals would get two-thirds of the vote. 2011 was where the NDP and Conservatives really started breaking through in immigrant-heavy Liberal strongholds.

[Boston Bread]

Remind me how well the ONDP were doing amongst such voters ten years ago.

Let's be reminded that the NDP won more 416 seats in 2003 than in 2014, including a 27 point NDP win in Beaches and a 16 point win in Trin-Spa.