Canada 2011 Official Thread

[Lief 🗽]

Probably an idiotic question, but why are the NDP surging? And what's all this about the Bloc being left with a single-digit seat count...?

Presumably the same reason third parties are doing well around the world: people are tired of the endless back and forths between two corrupt, nearly identical, neoliberal parties.

Hmm... UK 1983, anyone?

The NDP have been around for decades.

Their support is also much more concentrated in specific ridings, rather than spread evenly-ish across the country.

[You kip if you want to...]

Hmm... UK 1983, anyone?

The NDP have been around for decades.

Not to mention that the SDP/Liberals had momentum until about a year out from the election (Falklands). Their fortunes had been falling as the election approached. The NDP could realistically come first if things keep up, the Alliance didn't have that possibility less than a week from election '83.

If anything, UK 2010 would be a better comparison... and even then, it's dodgy.

[Verily]

Hmm... UK 1983, anyone?

The NDP have been around for decades.

So had the Liberals.

But it just looks so familiar though.  A first term Tory government calls an election not long after a huge economic recession, and since the 'red' opposition party shows no hope (especially under an unpopular leader), the 'yellow' third party surges ahead instead.

Whether they end up with the same disappointment as the Alliance did remains to be seen.

Very different in many ways. The Alliance actually did not "surge ahead" during the 1983 campaign. In fact, they had reached as high as 50% in the polls as early as 1981. They declined over the course of the campaign (and had been since the beginning of the Falklands War), and by election night were about tied with Labour in the polls, which was more or less borne out in reality.

As for seats, the Alliance suffered the problem of no concentration of votes. The NDP, not being a centrist party, does not have such a problem.

Not saying the NDP won't come up way short. However, if they do it will be due to the polls severely overestimating their support, not because of FPTP or declining poll numbers.

UK 2010 is a better comparison, but again the impact of FPTP on the Lib Dems and NDP is very, very different in practice.

[Insula Dei]

Also, this is the same nation that gave the world the 1993 election.

[Хahar 🤔]

And what's all this about the Bloc being left with a single-digit seat count...?

Presumably it's the same sort of idiocy as explained here:

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[You kip if you want to...]

Also, this is the same nation that gave the world the 1993 election.

Yeah, I don't know too much about Canadian politics, but I notice their elections can generate massive swings which wouldn't happen in other Westminster systems.

[Joe Republic]

Fair enough, guys.  I saw a comparison in it, but I guess you can find those anywhere in anything.

(Odd to see Refudiate respond to something I'd posted for once though, albeit indirectly.)

[Linus Van Pelt]

Also, this is the same nation that gave the world the 1993 election.

Yeah, I don't know too much about Canadian politics, but I notice their elections can generate massive swings which wouldn't happen in other Westminster systems.

Ultimately, this comes down to the bilingual/binational nature of the country. Canada is basically the only country where you have not just regions with different preferences within the same space of political options, but regions with two fundamentally different axes along which politics is organized - roughly, left-right in the English provinces and federalist-sovereigntist in Quebec - which don't match up with one another. This makes the party system very unstable, because it's so difficult to stake a coherent and popular position on both the left-right spectrum and the federalist-sovereigntist one - the PC's huge victory in 1984, their subsequent disintegration and the Liberals' return were ultimately about this, and this election appears to be no exception.

[Foucaulf]

Also, this is the same nation that gave the world the 1993 election.

Yeah, I don't know too much about Canadian politics, but I notice their elections can generate massive swings which wouldn't happen in other Westminster systems.

A more apt comparison would be your coupon election.

Echoing the previous post, federal politics is always marked by regionalism. Take the Conservatives and the Liberals - as "neoliberal" as both may be, few Albertans vote for the Liberals because they still remember the National Energy Program, a federal takeover of the province's oil. There comes a point where it's easier to create a party that especially caters to regional interests, which splits the left-right vote on the federal level. When this split happens in swing ridings and swing provinces - Ontario, maybe BC - the unified alternative wins.

Quebec always has favourite-son syndrome, and the province is united by a theme of Anglo-French conflict. When a party establishes its position regarding that theme, the whole province swings. PM Laurier established this for the Liberals in 1896, and that kept Quebec a Liberal fortress for 60 years. Then Diefenbaker linked up with Quebec's Duplessis, and swept it in 1958. The Quiet Revolution revived the Liberal vote, and it apexed with Trudeau. Quebec's inertia prevents it from swinging too often, but once every decade...

Alberta is similar, except the huge swings happen on the provincial level, then reflected federally. See the Liberal -> United Farmers -> Social Credit -> Conservative transition.

[Teddy (IDS Legislator)]

These projections, especially ones from Grénier, basically get destroyed in the current post (linked earlier in this thread I believe) from Alice Funke at the Pundits Guide, who is a way better and more numerate commentator.

It was a few pages back, so in case anyone missed it: http://www.punditsguide.ca/2011/04/rubber-hits-the-road-for-parties-and-seat-projectors/

And, in case anyone missed it, one of the only ones with experience is... ME! http://www.ridingbyriding.ca/

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Very different in many ways. The Alliance actually did not "surge ahead" during the 1983 campaign. In fact, they had reached as high as 50% in the polls as early as 1981. They declined over the course of the campaign (and had been since the beginning of the Falklands War), and by election night were about tied with Labour in the polls, which was more or less borne out in reality.

No, there was a big Alliance surge in the first half of the campaign which faded away to an extent, though they still underperformed when the votes were counted. IIRC different companies showed different details; I don't have the figures in front of me at the moment. This was separate from the main Alliance poll surge, the bizarre thing that was taken out by the Falklands. There was a similar pattern in the 1974 election, although the Liberals never rose into second. 1987 was unusual in that 'the surge' (ahem) happened before the campaign started.

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There is that, but there's also the fact that the LibDems (and their predecessors) were/are/etc an absolute shambles from an organisational point of view (no serious national organisation since the 1920s, no serious regional organisations ever, total inability to cope with sudden poll movement during elections, etc). The NDP has issues with that (especially in Quebec) but they pale into insignificance in comparison.

Of course we know from local elections in places with a heavy use of postal votes that the LibDem poll surge in 2010 was mostly artificial. The big question is whether the same is true of the NDP in this election.

[Phony Moderate]

Another good example of an artifical poll bounce was the Conservatives' in late 2000, during the petrol protests.

[Hatman 🍁]

NDP with a big lead in Hull-Aylmer (swing from 2008):

NDP : 42% (+22)
Lib : 29% (-8)
Bloc : 13% (-9)
CPC : 11% (-4)
Green : 2% (-3)

link

Interesting. I guess that means Pontiac is in play. When I was at the rally on Monday, I was introduce to the mayor of Cantley (a town in Pontiac riding), and seemed a little surprised at the thought of the riding going NDP. He mentioned all the Anglo farmers would never do such a thing.

[Hatman 🍁]

Also, it's too bad Pierre Ducasse didn't run again. He has played a big role in making the NDP focus on Quebec. I bet he's kicking himself now. I know he's still working hard for us, as I saw him at the rally.

[Holmes]

Ignatieff has seemed to underperform his Liberal predecessors and has never touched 50%, but I don't see any reason why he would be in trouble... Ford seems to have won his riding though, fwiw. I'm not in Toronto anymore so I can't go check things out myself.

Teddy, you really seem to think Duceppe will be unseated? I'd eat my hat... well, maybe something more edible but comparable due to how things have been heading in the past couple of days.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Ignatieff has seemed to underperform his Liberal predecessors and has never touched 50%, but I don't see any reason why he would be in trouble... Ford seems to have won his riding though, fwiw. I'm not in Toronto anymore so I can't go check things out myself.

He actually had a swing in his favour in 2008, but a lot of that was due to the underperformance that resulted from his controversial selection in 2006. There would need to be a real Liberal disaster in the GTA for him to fall, I think; although with recent polls, who knows. Long, long ago the NDP did well in Lakeshore, actually winning it once federally when Lewis was leader and repeatedly provincially before the Rae Days. But Toronto isn't Vancouver so that's just a meaningless piece of trivia.

[Hash]

The NDP guy in Pontiac was a Communist candidate in 1997. Ironically, if he won, that could technically make him the second communist elected (the other being Fred Rose for the LPP in Cartier in the 40s). Haha.

Quebec always has favourite-son syndrome, and the province is united by a theme of Anglo-French conflict. When a party establishes its position regarding that theme, the whole province swings. PM Laurier established this for the Liberals in 1896, and that kept Quebec a Liberal fortress for 60 years. Then Diefenbaker linked up with Quebec's Duplessis, and swept it in 1958. The Quiet Revolution revived the Liberal vote, and it apexed with Trudeau. Quebec's inertia prevents it from swinging too often, but once every decade...

Quebec's Liberal fortress days lasted from 1917 to 1984 with the major exception of 1958 (though the Tories did well in 1930). The Tories were actually relatively strong albeit not dominant in the Laurier era and did well in Quebec in the 1911 election (but didn't win the province). Their weakness started in 1887 with the Louis Riel hanging, destroyed by conscription in 1917 and never strong aside from 1958 until Mulroney's ability to link up with moderate-nationalist sentiment in 1984 and 1988.  

[Linus Van Pelt]

The NDP guy in Pontiac was a Communist candidate in 1997. Ironically, if he won, that could technically make him the second communist elected (the other being Fred Rose for the LPP in Cartier in the 40s). Haha. 

Surely Dorise Nielsen would qualify before this dude.

I think Etobicoke-Lakeshore would probably be about the fourth or fifth pickup in the city, after (in no particular order) Don Valley West, Eglinton-Lawrence and York Centre. It's more Eastern European than it was in the old NDP days, which is usually pretty good for the Liberals, but the old white immigrant communities in Toronto are decreasingly voting en bloc as they get more suburban and prosperous (see: Vaughan). Plus it has the Kingsway which is probably the wealthiest and most WASP neighbourhood of the city outside the region from Rosedale up to Lawrence Park.

[Hatman 🍁]

I wonder if the NDP will make some strange pickups in Toronto like Lakeshore- seats they've won a long time ago but where they've not had a shot recently. Etobicoke North, and Scarborough SW are some possibilities. Howabout York West?

[Holmes]

I live in York West during the school year... Liberals will win with 50%+.

[Verily]

The NDP guy in Pontiac was a Communist candidate in 1997. Ironically, if he won, that could technically make him the second communist elected (the other being Fred Rose for the LPP in Cartier in the 40s). Haha.

Pretty sure Duceppe was once a Communist as well. There probably have been others, too.

[Verily]

EKOS:

CON: 34.0 (+0.1)
NDP: 28.1 (+0.2)
LIB: 22.9 (-1.1)
BQ: 6.6 (+0.6)
GRN: 6.5 (-0.3)

Been a while since the Bloc saw a + next to their national figures. That said, they're still more than 10 points down on the NDP in Quebec (37.2-27.0).

[Holmes]

Are Liberals really considering Bob Rae to replace Ignatieff? They've already shot both their feet, what's left...

[Foucaulf]

I - and likely the majority of the electorate - completely forgot about newspaper endorsements!

http://tgam.ca/CN2h

The Globe and Mail endorses the Conservatives. Too bad their endorsement reads like it was written right after the debate.

Endorsements like this display how politically invariant the Canadian media is. In the next day or two one will see a great majority of newspapers support the Conservatives, citing both "at least Harper hasn't screwed up yet" and "Better the devil we know". The two left-wing newspapers of note, The Toronto Star and Le Devoir have been solid supporters of the Liberals and the Bloc, and will keep the line this election.

The question is how many newspapers will endorse the NDP - virtually none like last election, or will one mainstream paper support them? The next question obviously becomes: "Would anyone care?"

[Lincoln Republican]

I can see how a badly divided left would benefit the Conservatives.

Are the Liberals and Bloc getting ready to hit the panic button?

I repeat.