I want Ignatieff's head. I've head back from saying exactly what I thought until tonight, but I was at a number of rallies, and the biggest problem was that he couldn't sell himself to a crowd of partisans. The problems in his 2006 leadership run -- his lack of energy during speeches, his touchiness during debates -- were never fixed.
Well, he didn't win his seat.
And Jack's rise... well, apparently, the candidate who doesn't speak french won in her riding.... And good luck trying to work for the average Canadian when you're facing a majority government with that crew.
Oh well, we won't have another federal election until 2015. There's time to rebuild the party.
When Harper wages his full scale assault on everything they cherish they can go cry to Jack because he can't stop any of it.
What the NDP elected in Quebec is laughable and Layton many a lot of promises to Quebec that he can't fulfill.
Jack Layton and the NDP wear this Harper majority and I hope they wear it proudly because after four years of Harper the Federal NDP name will be crap as it should be.
I am very concerned about the amount of damage Harper will inflict on Canada in the next 4 years.
Hopefully, he'll keep to the platform he ran on. It sucked, but it wasn't too radical.
Biggest losers in this election -- environment, status of women, immigration (they cut before, and they will cut again).... We will get prisons we don't need, and out of control jets.
Yes, Sharron, there is time to rebuild.
If the Liberals can look like a government in waiting, if they can find the right leader.... we can come back. At this point we don't have any choice. Sorry, but Ignatieff didn't have the fire in the belly to lead this party. We raised $4 million in one month, had more people volunteer than ever. What let us down was the leadership.
Who's bright idea was to run an infomercial on a Sunday afternoon? You're not going to catch undecided, just the converted. The money would have been better spent on commercials during prime time and the news -- because that's how most people get their information on elections. (Informal poll of my friends).
The last week there should have been major changes in his schedule. Yeah, try and win swing ridings... he should have been trying to keep the seats we had. Did he have any idea what the polls were like.
What the NDP elected in Quebec is laughable and Layton many a lot of promises to Quebec that he can't fulfill.
Question period's going to be interesting. I can see a number of them being eaten alive by Conservatives. I also predict a spate of by-elections after some of these candidates decide to pull out. I'm sorry, but when an NDP candidate declares that she's "procrastination incarnate" on facebook or decides that she'd rather go on vacation than campaign... it goesn't bode well for their future in politics.
Re laughing at Lizzie, with her in the debates next time the GP total likely will go up 2-3%, which will make life even tougher for the NDP and Libs. On the plus side, the Cons look to have hit a hard ceiling at ~40%.
As a distant observer, this looks to me like a shotgun marriage in the making.
If you're talking NDP-Liberal, one of the problems in the eventual marriage is the way the two parties will resolve their positions towards Quebec. The NDP have the Sherbroke Declaration (no Clarity Act, asymmetrical federalism), while the Liberals have the bedrock established by Trudeau. They're two different approaches.
If I hear one more person blaming the Tory majority on the NDP, I'm going to scream. Face it, the Liberals blew it big time. The Tories made all their gains taking 905 seats by taking votes from the Liberals in seats where the NDP was never a factor.
More people voted for Harper in Ontario this time (45 percent) than last time (39 percent), not because the Liberal-NDP vote was 'split'. It's as simple as that.
If I hear one more person blaming the Tory majority on the NDP, I'm going to scream.
Sorry, the attack ads after the debates on Ignatieff's voting record after the debates.... The flyers that were passed along across the country including Newfoundland on this. When we needed all guns blazing at Harper, the focus was on Ignatieff. Ignatieff should have fought back a hell of a lot harder than he did, but let's be honest... Layton was running for leader of the opposition as much as anything else. Fine, he'd got it. But we've got a Conservative majority facing us.
The Tories made all their gains taking 905 seats by taking votes from the Liberals in seats where the NDP was never a factor.
The NDP took votes away as well.
Check out Missisauga-Brampton South.
Eve Adams (Con): 23,547 Navdeep Bains (Lib): 18,562 Jim Glaven(NDP): 9,417.
Here are the results from 2008: Navdeep Bains (Lib): 27,409 Arnjeet Sangha (Con): 15,556 Nirvan Balkisoon (NDP): 5,514
Voted obvious got lost to both the Conservatives and the NDP.
So Jack was running for leader of the opposition. What was Iggy running for? Because the only job he had a reasonable shot at was JUNIOR partner in an NDP-Liberal coalition and I sure didn't see him running for that. Instead I saw someone who rejected co-operation with the NDP at every opportunity.
Talking about a merger now is pointless. Frankly, the Liberal party has nothing the NDP wants or needs. It's not like Reform needing the much smaller PC party because the Reform brand was toxic in much of the country.
Yes, a lot of the NDP caucus are hugely inexperienced. If they were forming the government that would be a problem. But they're not. Most of them aren't going to get to speak in Question Period. They'll have time to grow into their roles. And I doubt there's much arrogance among them. They weren't opportunists - they were people who allowed their name to go on a ballot for something they believed in, with no hope of it paying off.
Call me crazy, but I think we could and have had much worse motivations among a group of MPs.
So Jack was running for leader of the opposition. What was Iggy running for?
Hopefully, both of them were running to replace Harper. Well, they both got what they wanted.
They weren't opportunists - they were people who allowed their name to go on a ballot for something they believed in, with no hope of it paying off.
And sometimes putting one's name on the ballot was the extent of what they wanted to do.
From the article:
"“She’s actually in Las Vegas,” says her boss, Rod Castro. When first asked about Ms. Brosseau’s candidacy, Mr. Castro told The Globe and Mail that there must be a mistake. But after looking her up online, he confirmed the candidate and his colleague are one and the same.
“This is all news to me,” he said, noting that she has never mentioned politics in the more than two years they have worked together as the bar’s only two full-time staff members. " ***
"Two candidates running for office are Charmaine Borg in Terrebonne-Blainville and Matthew Dubé in Chambly-Borduas. The two are co-presidents of the McGill NDP club. Mr. Dubé’s posts on Twitter are largely devoted to hockey, comic books and computer games, with the occasional forward of tweets by NDP Leader Jack Layton.
"Another, Sana Hassainia, who is running for the NDP in Verchères-Les Patriotes, makes no mention on her Twitter page of her NDP connections, except when asked by others to confirm that she is in fact the NDP candidate. "
Hey, guess what, these four apparently won their seats.
Hmm... well if the NDP is running separatists that makes them like every other federalist party in Quebec.
I don't have a twitter page, but if I did, it would convey very little about my fitness (or lack thereof) to hold office. I take more interest in the fact that they were the co-presidents of the McGill NDP club than that they have other hobbies.
Me, I'm pretty happy that chances are they aren't disgusting homophobic bigots like Joe Volpe, Paul Szabo and Dan MacTeague who disgraced the Liberal party just by being allowed to be members.
A non-compete agreement might do the job as well. But if no accomodation is made and Harper doesn't screw up, beating the Cons in the next election seems problematic. It'll be good for the GP, though.
I don't have a twitter page, but if I did, it would convey very little about my fitness (or lack thereof) to hold office. I take more interest in the fact that they were the co-presidents of the McGill NDP club than that they have other hobbies.
I could care less about their hobbies. The extent of their campaigning was pushing twitter from Jack Layton.
A local paper tried to get in touch with Charmaine Borg, and they couldn't. Was she busy, or was the party running interference so that she couldn't talk to them. Funny thing is that according to the McGill paper, one of these McGill students posted on Facebook that she was told by the NDP not to speak to the media in the weekend before the election.
There is something deeply cynical about this. They don't want the people to know anything about the MPs they're going to send to Parliament.
Me, I'm pretty happy that chances are they aren't disgusting homophobic bigots like Joe Volpe, Paul Szabo and Dan MacTeague who disgraced the Liberal party just by being allowed to be members.
Yeah, well, we don't know what their stand is on any issue because they didn't say anything during the campaign. They could be angels. They could be devils. They could all be anglophones. We don't know. The NDP didn't want us to.
One funny thing about Borg. It wasn't that hard to get in touch with her before. Here's an article about her work on Mulclairs riding.
One thing to note -- at McGill, the main language on campus is English. Is it possible that the students they don't want to speak to the media don't happen to speak any French? Enquiring minds want to know. :P
Well, well. Interesting evening indeed. So who's in the batter's box after Michael's dismal strikeout?
ReplyDeleteI want Ignatieff's head. I've head back from saying exactly what I thought until tonight, but I was at a number of rallies, and the biggest problem was that he couldn't sell himself to a crowd of partisans. The problems in his 2006 leadership run -- his lack of energy during speeches, his touchiness during debates -- were never fixed.
ReplyDeleteWell, he didn't win his seat.
And Jack's rise... well, apparently, the candidate who doesn't speak french won in her riding.... And good luck trying to work for the average Canadian when you're facing a majority government with that crew.
Oh well, we won't have another federal election until 2015. There's time to rebuild the party.
I am very concerned about the amount of damage Harper will inflict on Canada in the next 4 years.
ReplyDeleteYes, Sharron, there is time to rebuild.
Well I hope the NDP is happy with Jack now.
ReplyDeleteWhen Harper wages his full scale assault on everything they cherish they can go cry to Jack because he can't stop any of it.
What the NDP elected in Quebec is laughable and Layton many a lot of promises to Quebec that he can't fulfill.
Jack Layton and the NDP wear this Harper majority and I hope they wear it proudly because after four years of Harper the Federal NDP name will be crap as it should be.
I am very concerned about the amount of damage Harper will inflict on Canada in the next 4 years.
ReplyDeleteHopefully, he'll keep to the platform he ran on. It sucked, but it wasn't too radical.
Biggest losers in this election -- environment, status of women, immigration (they cut before, and they will cut again).... We will get prisons we don't need, and out of control jets.
Yes, Sharron, there is time to rebuild.
If the Liberals can look like a government in waiting, if they can find the right leader.... we can come back. At this point we don't have any choice. Sorry, but Ignatieff didn't have the fire in the belly to lead this party. We raised $4 million in one month, had more people volunteer than ever. What let us down was the leadership.
Who's bright idea was to run an infomercial on a Sunday afternoon? You're not going to catch undecided, just the converted. The money would have been better spent on commercials during prime time and the news -- because that's how most people get their information on elections. (Informal poll of my friends).
The last week there should have been major changes in his schedule. Yeah, try and win swing ridings... he should have been trying to keep the seats we had. Did he have any idea what the polls were like.
What the NDP elected in Quebec is laughable and Layton many a lot of promises to Quebec that he can't fulfill.
Question period's going to be interesting. I can see a number of them being eaten alive by Conservatives. I also predict a spate of by-elections after some of these candidates decide to pull out. I'm sorry, but when an NDP candidate declares that she's "procrastination incarnate" on facebook or decides that she'd rather go on vacation than campaign... it goesn't bode well for their future in politics.
Such a wonderful day for Canada.
ReplyDeleteA truly wonderful, transformative day.
And the icing on the cake . . . we'll have Lizzie May in Ottawa to laugh at on a regular basis.
As a distant observer, this looks to me like a shotgun marriage in the making.
ReplyDeleteRe laughing at Lizzie, with her in the debates next time the GP total likely will go up 2-3%, which will make life even tougher for the NDP and Libs. On the plus side, the Cons look to have hit a hard ceiling at ~40%.
ReplyDeleteOn the plus side, the Cons look to have hit a hard ceiling at ~40%.
ReplyDeleteIn 2008, they ended up with a higher total the polls predicted. I had a feeling that this would happen again this time....
I can hear Fred's laughter already:
ReplyDelete"She says we come frome apes! Ahahahaha!"
As a distant observer, this looks to me like a shotgun marriage in the making.
ReplyDeleteIf you're talking NDP-Liberal, one of the problems in the eventual marriage is the way the two parties will resolve their positions towards Quebec. The NDP have the Sherbroke Declaration (no Clarity Act, asymmetrical federalism), while the Liberals have the bedrock established by Trudeau. They're two different approaches.
If I hear one more person blaming the Tory majority on the NDP, I'm going to scream. Face it, the Liberals blew it big time. The Tories made all their gains taking 905 seats by taking votes from the Liberals in seats where the NDP was never a factor.
ReplyDeleteMore people voted for Harper in Ontario this time (45 percent) than last time (39 percent), not because the Liberal-NDP vote was 'split'. It's as simple as that.
If I hear one more person blaming the Tory majority on the NDP, I'm going to scream.
ReplyDeleteSorry, the attack ads after the debates on Ignatieff's voting record after the debates.... The flyers that were passed along across the country including Newfoundland on this. When we needed all guns blazing at Harper, the focus was on Ignatieff. Ignatieff should have fought back a hell of a lot harder than he did, but let's be honest... Layton was running for leader of the opposition as much as anything else. Fine, he'd got it. But we've got a Conservative majority facing us.
The Tories made all their gains taking 905 seats by taking votes from the Liberals in seats where the NDP was never a factor.
The NDP took votes away as well.
Check out Missisauga-Brampton South.
Eve Adams (Con): 23,547
Navdeep Bains (Lib): 18,562
Jim Glaven(NDP): 9,417.
Here are the results from 2008:
Navdeep Bains (Lib): 27,409
Arnjeet Sangha (Con): 15,556
Nirvan Balkisoon (NDP): 5,514
Voted obvious got lost to both the Conservatives and the NDP.
So Jack was running for leader of the opposition. What was Iggy running for? Because the only job he had a reasonable shot at was JUNIOR partner in an NDP-Liberal coalition and I sure didn't see him running for that. Instead I saw someone who rejected co-operation with the NDP at every opportunity.
ReplyDeleteTalking about a merger now is pointless. Frankly, the Liberal party has nothing the NDP wants or needs. It's not like Reform needing the much smaller PC party because the Reform brand was toxic in much of the country.
Yes, a lot of the NDP caucus are hugely inexperienced. If they were forming the government that would be a problem. But they're not. Most of them aren't going to get to speak in Question Period. They'll have time to grow into their roles. And I doubt there's much arrogance among them. They weren't opportunists - they were people who allowed their name to go on a ballot for something they believed in, with no hope of it paying off.
Call me crazy, but I think we could and have had much worse motivations among a group of MPs.
So Jack was running for leader of the opposition. What was Iggy running for?
ReplyDeleteHopefully, both of them were running to replace Harper. Well, they both got what they wanted.
They weren't opportunists - they were people who allowed their name to go on a ballot for something they believed in, with no hope of it paying off.
And sometimes putting one's name on the ballot was the extent of what they wanted to do.
From the article:
"“She’s actually in Las Vegas,” says her boss, Rod Castro. When first asked about Ms. Brosseau’s candidacy, Mr. Castro told The Globe and Mail that there must be a mistake. But after looking her up online, he confirmed the candidate and his colleague are one and the same.
“This is all news to me,” he said, noting that she has never mentioned politics in the more than two years they have worked together as the bar’s only two full-time staff members. "
***
"Two candidates running for office are Charmaine Borg in Terrebonne-Blainville and Matthew Dubé in Chambly-Borduas. The two are co-presidents of the McGill NDP club. Mr. Dubé’s posts on Twitter are largely devoted to hockey, comic books and computer games, with the occasional forward of tweets by NDP Leader Jack Layton.
"Another, Sana Hassainia, who is running for the NDP in Verchères-Les Patriotes, makes no mention on her Twitter page of her NDP connections, except when asked by others to confirm that she is in fact the NDP candidate. "
Hey, guess what, these four apparently won their seats.
Hey, so did the separatist Alexandre Boulerice.
ReplyDeleteThis should be an interesting caucus.
Hmm... well if the NDP is running separatists that makes them like every other federalist party in Quebec.
ReplyDeleteI don't have a twitter page, but if I did, it would convey very little about my fitness (or lack thereof) to hold office. I take more interest in the fact that they were the co-presidents of the McGill NDP club than that they have other hobbies.
Me, I'm pretty happy that chances are they aren't disgusting homophobic bigots like Joe Volpe, Paul Szabo and Dan MacTeague who disgraced the Liberal party just by being allowed to be members.
A non-compete agreement might do the job as well. But if no accomodation is made and Harper doesn't screw up, beating the Cons in the next election seems problematic. It'll be good for the GP, though.
ReplyDeleteI don't have a twitter page, but if I did, it would convey very little about my fitness (or lack thereof) to hold office. I take more interest in the fact that they were the co-presidents of the McGill NDP club than that they have other hobbies.
ReplyDeleteI could care less about their hobbies. The extent of their campaigning was pushing twitter from Jack Layton.
A local paper tried to get in touch with Charmaine Borg, and they couldn't. Was she busy, or was the party running interference so that she couldn't talk to them. Funny thing is that according to the McGill paper, one of these McGill students posted on Facebook that she was told by the NDP not to speak to the media in the weekend before the election.
There is something deeply cynical about this. They don't want the people to know anything about the MPs they're going to send to Parliament.
Me, I'm pretty happy that chances are they aren't disgusting homophobic bigots like Joe Volpe, Paul Szabo and Dan MacTeague who disgraced the Liberal party just by being allowed to be members.
Yeah, well, we don't know what their stand is on any issue because they didn't say anything during the campaign. They could be angels. They could be devils. They could all be anglophones. We don't know. The NDP didn't want us to.
One funny thing about Borg. It wasn't that hard to get in touch with her before. Here's an article about her work on Mulclairs riding.
ReplyDeleteOne thing to note -- at McGill, the main language on campus is English. Is it possible that the students they don't want to speak to the media don't happen to speak any French? Enquiring minds want to know. :P