Wednesday, December 19, 2007

Mulroney Comes Through (For Liberals)!

CTV has a "statistical tie" between the two major parties, with the Libs actually up a couple:

OTTAWA -- A new poll suggests Stephen Harper's Conservatives have lost their big lead over the Liberals, plunging six percentage points in popular support in just one week.

The Canadian Press Harris-Decima survey puts the Tories at 30 per cent support, in a statistical tie with the Liberals, who are up four points to 32 per cent.

The Bali disaster and the Chalk River isotope disaster are also cited in the Tory plunge.

Can we call the Harper government "embattled" now? I wanna call them "embattled".

And, by the way, can we all agree now that Dion's going to Bali and looking reasonable, while John Baird was out back somewhere catching a few zzzs during negotiations, turned out to be a net positive?

Here is a link to a more detailed breakdown of the results. As Kingston notes in the comments, the results from Atlantic Canada, or their interpretation by The Star, seem a bit odd.

37 comments:

Jay said...

I guess we can also dispense with the notion of Harper being a strong leader and using that to win.

Now they have nothing to go on. They don't even have the strength of its elected members, they've been muzzled and useless for 2 years.

I hear knives sharpening.

Jeff said...

oh yeah..they're embattled.

Anonymous said...

might have something to do with over sampling in Toronto, the last LPC bastion in the land

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyZcwnO794k&eurl

we all love Toronto, we do, we really do.

Anonymous said...

actually...nothing to do w over sampling in TO.
Conservs dropped in EVERY single region across the country.
Merry Christmas Steve!

Anonymous said...

Pretty devious, trying to tie Harper somehow with Mulroney. For something Brian did 15 years ago.

burlivespipe said...

Take Alberta out of the equation, and the CONs are kissing 25 percent at most.
I hear the knives emerging from their sheath, too.

Reality Bites said...

"Let's pretend they only polled in Toronto" - the favourite excuse of Conservative trolls.

Unlike online "polls" with a self-selected sample, reputable pollsters use a balanced sample. They do occasionally do things like oversample in Quebec, to ensure they get a large enough sample to measure BQ support accurately, but in the final results it's still weighted by Quebec's share of the population.

bigcitylib said...

B-pipe,

Where did you find the Prov breakdowns? The stories I've seen just give a real basic overview.

Reality Bites said...

I haven't seen any regional breakdown. I was giving an example of where oversampling can be legitimately used in order to obtain a fair sample, and how it isn't used to distort the results, but to make them more accurate.

Just using it as an illustration of the absurdity of pretending there is oversampling in Toronto. Ignorant people assume that others are like them and think "Well gee, everyone I know in Bumfuck, Arkansas thinks like I do. So what if Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver have 3-bazillion times the population?"

Anonymous said...

"I hear knives sharpening."

LOL. Let's not get ahead of ourselves. The Conservatives aren't going to throw Harper under the bus over one lousy poll. They've kept him threw much worse.

Jay said...

"Pretty devious, trying to tie Harper somehow with Mulroney. For something Brian did 15 years ago."

It's just as devious as linking Dion to adscam which occured alomost 12 years ago. Those involved in it were not meentoring Dion still like Mulroney was to Harper.

Oh, btw, those charged in Adscam were all Conservatives, one of which is now a separatist. There is something really corrupt about Conservative politicians IMHO.

Then they blame others for their own shadiness.

Jay said...

From CTV who are using the same CP news:

"Support for the Tories dropped across all regions and demographic groups."

Reality Bites said...

oops, thought you were talking to me!

BLP is likely right. Based on Alberta's share of the population, in order for the Cons to be at 30% nationally it would take 25% support in the rest of Canada and 73% in Alberta.

However, since they only got 65% in the last election, that level would make for 26% outside Alberta. A more likely 60% level in Alberta would make for 27% outside.

Conversely, for the Liberals to be at 32% nationally with their 15% Alberta support from the last election, would have them at 34% outside Alberta. If they've risen to 20% in Alberta, they're only at 33% outside.

Regardless, the Cons have a guaranteed bloc of 28 Alberta seats

Anonymous said...

Hmm, so even with Mulroneygate and all the hoo-ha at Bali, the best the Liberals can do is tie with Harper? I don't think I'd break out the champaign quite yet.

Anonymous said...

"...The Conservatives aren't going to throw Harper under the bus over one lousy poll. They've kept him threw much worse."

I'd say Anon at 3:15 PM made a Freudian "threw".

Reality Bites said...

Gee, even with a tired, 13-year-old government and a scandal the best Harper could do was a minority, a mere couple of percentage points outside a statistical tie?

Jay said...

More breakdowns from thestar.ca

" In Ontario, the Liberals scored 41 per cent support, widening their lead over the Tories who stood at 31 per cent.

In Quebec, the Bloc Quebecois remained in the lead with 40 per cent, but the Liberals had moved up to second place with 23 per cent followed by the Tories at 17 per cent – an 11-point drop.

Tory popularity slid dramatically even in the party's traditional strongholds and among groups usually most supportive.

In Alberta, for instance, Tory support plummeted almost 20 points to 45 per cent. In British Columbia, support dropped 17 points to 31 per cent.

In Atlantic Canada, where the Conservatives had been leading for most of the year, the Liberals edged ahead with 36 per cent to the Tories' 33 per cent.

Among male voters, Tory support dropped to 32 per cent from 40 per cent. And among rural voters, the Tories sank eight points to 35 per cent."

Looks pretty significant to me. Right across the board, regionally and demographically.

Burton, Formerly Kingston said...

Jay, After reading your post, I am totally confused now on how too take the results of this poll, I had no problem with the results until I read your post which has a huge error from the polling company and or the reporting news agency.

"In Atlantic Canada, where the Conservatives had been leading for most of the year, the Liberals edged ahead with 36 per cent to the Tories' 33 per cent".

Every poll since the March budget has shown the CPC behind the LPC in Atlantic Canada in all four provinces, hmmm, maybe I will doubt the veracity of this poll now if the polling company cannot even look at their previous data and that of other polling companies and interpret it correctly. For example the same polling company reported its three week average for AC as 39% LPC , 26 % CPC on Oct 29, the numbers were 38-30 LPC on the 13th of Nov by the same company and again on the 18 of Sept 50-18 LPC in Atlantic Canada. If anything from the most rescent numbers the CPC gained on the LPC in AC

Anonymous said...

Larry, you just got owned!

Reality Bites said...

Election wise, I can't find a time when Conservative (Reform) support in Alberta was so low since the 1960s.

I'd love to know what the Alberta Liberal/NDP/Green results are.

Anonymous said...

Then can we please,please,please have an election??? The CPC has tried to trigger an election but the liberals have been no-shows when it mattered most.

Anonymous said...

Not the stale old Mul-ruin-ey side show... no that did not move the numbers

Bali and Chalk river (very current Tory messes) are waking up the somnolent Canadian populace.

About time ;-)

Reality Bites said...

It is only in a party's interest to trigger an election when they are hopeful of making gains.

Since all three opposition parties will have to be on board, we'll need to see the Cons drop a bit further. The NDP isn't too interested in getting a Liberal minority or majority. They (unlike most of their supporters) would rather see the Cons in power, in hopes they can supplant the Liberals.

Gayle said...

"The NDP isn't too interested in getting a Liberal minority or majority. They (unlike most of their supporters) would rather see the Cons in power, in hopes they can supplant the Liberals."

Except Layton has been running aroudn telling anyone who will listen that he thinks the conservatives have to go and that the liberals should stop propping them up. How does he justify supporting the conservatives now?

That said, since I do not think propping up the conservatives recently will hurt the liberals in the long run, the same probably applies to the NDP - if they can get past being complete hypocrites.

Anonymous said...

If the Liberals can get past being complete hypocrites I'm sure the NDP can, too. But we all know the NDP is not going to be the party that keeps Harper in power.

Jay said...

Kingston,
Interesting. One would hope the firm looks at their own data. Maybe Canadian Press made an error.

I'd be interested in seeing the other firms results when they come out.

Anonymous said...

Bring on an election I say.

How do you spell electoral disaster?

D-I-O-N.

'nough said.

The Cons will eat him alive.

Gayle said...

"But we all know the NDP is not going to be the party that keeps Harper in power."

Well they put him there...

Anonymous said...

Bring on an election I say.

How do you spell electoral disaster?

D-I-O-N.

'nough said.

The Cons will eat him alive.

Unknown said...

I doubt it's the Mulroney thing that's responsible for this poll. The whole Bali fiasco had to be more damaging. Even hard-core conservatives must be embarrassed by the Harperettes transparent dishonesty and bad faith weaseling on climate change.
But, if anyone knows what's behind this poll it's the Harpercrites themselves, with their unprecedented, taxpayer-funded, socialist polling program.

Anonymous said...

Hehe,

One poll,

and they're declaring victory.

I.

Love.

It.

Please god, let the Liberals rely on this and believe that Dion can win an election.

We'll see how the polls compare to votes (like in the Quebec by elections where the lib vote was overestimated by about 20 points).

In the meantime write to your local Lib MP and encourage them to force an election.

Anonymous said...

I say we start a blog storm to encourage Dion to take down the government!!

This poll is huge.

I've heard some say that conservatives tradditionally underpoll at Christmas by significant margins and that's the only explanation for a nearly statistically impossible six point drop in a few days is due to this.

But we all know that's hogwash. Dion is getting traction with the voters, and they're really starting to respect him. Likewise the voters are realizing Harper's hidden agenda is coming to light....all this week!

Write your MP, lets get on with the election!!!

Burton, Formerly Kingston said...

excited liberal, calm down friend, one poll does not an election make. Lets see what happens in the new year, as a center of the road voter, i do hope that LPC has more then the hidden agenda, scarey Harper to go into this election with. If the LPC has any brains at all they will wait out the possible inquiry and hope against hope that some mud sticks to the CPC. I personally do not think the Bali story has legs and will be quickly forgotten. Chalk River might be worth checking into but again that is just political crap now that all parties supported the emergency legislation, that the public less us political junkies will not care about. The great hope of the LPC is to hope some mud from KHS and Brian sticks. I do not know if it is wise to allow the CPC to get to a budget though, for two reasons, one, the LPC cannot run again tax cuts, and two, most of the LPC assumed and proposed policies i.e Daycare, bring back the K Accord, the new poverty plan, and Kyoto and the Son of Kyoto are going to cost a lot of money and I personally believe that the next budget you going to see a lot more of that tax room given back to the taxpayers not to mention an expected slight down turn in the economy. This will make the LPC policy platform extremely costly and un-doable when the bean counters start breaking out the adding machines during the elections. Just my thoughts. Feel free to abuse them.

Anonymous said...

One poll and Jay wets his pants, let's see 1,2,3,4...5 posts. Look at the conclusion he draws with one (Decima) poll.

Would that be the same Jay who's running around the blogosphere saying that the world is coming to an end because of global warming caused by Canada's emissions?

Well at least he's consistent, in jumping to conclusions I mean.

"Looks pretty significant to me." says Jay. Go get some sleep or go watch Al Gore's propaganda piece but for the sake of your waning credibility keep your "scientific" analysis to yourself.

Anonymous said...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LNqlGlzNVEE&eurl

he means Jay.

Reality Bites said...

"Except Layton has been running aroudn telling anyone who will listen that he thinks the conservatives have to go and that the liberals should stop propping them up."

Isn't it amazing? Sometimes Layton says that. Other times it's Duceppe, and still others it's Dion.

Somehow it always seems not to be all three at the same time. ;)

The NDP has not been polling well and has little to gain from an election at this time. They have little to campaign on - no record of accomplishments extracted from the ruling party and no chance of forming the government.

The NDP has nicely demonstrated that the only valuable role they can serve is as an influence on a Liberal minority government or a source of ideas for a Liberal majority. With Harper in power, they're absolutely useless.

Jay said...

Desperation troll/biff

Itts not a big deal so why are you making such a fuss about it. Its just interesting as the cons have been trending downward since March. Like I said above, it'll be interesting to see what other polls got to say.

Your making it look as though it something to worry about.

Slack off on the sugar dude.