Yesterday, while working to make the world a better place for Canadian small businessmen, I managed to catch part of a presentation by Ipsos Senior Vice President John Wright. A couple of highlights:
1) He's predicting at least two consecutively Harper majorities, due to the "chaos" on the political Left which will take "years" to sort out. He talked mostly about how the NDP MPs from Quebec had no real connection to the federal party's ideology, and how it would all end badly. Which might be prescient, or a statement of the obvious. But either way there is also some simple math involved: the distance between 34 LPoC seats and 155 will be difficult to cross in a single election.
2) Regarding the upcoming election in Ontario, Mr. Wright figured that Ms. Horwath would wheel out Jack Layton but it might not help much (memories of Bob Rae); that Tim Hudak (if I remember this correctly) was saving up his dough for after the upcoming PCPO convention and that the Ontario Tory ad blasts would not start until then; and that a "Bill Davis-style" minority gov. for either Hudak or McGuinty was a distinct possibility.
So there you have it.
PS. Won't be around much today either.
There may be a poor connection with the people who elected the NDP MPs, but as people who volunteered to run in a no-hope riding for the NDP, they probably strongly believe in the NDP. Besides, there wheren't that many policy disagreements between the NDP and Bloc, anyway.
ReplyDeleteJack Layton doesn't have any more of a connection with Bob Rae then Horwath herself. I don't see how that would be a problem.
Besides, Bob Rae can't be that bad if he survived while so many other Liberals in safer ridings fell.
Toronto Centre is the most heavily gay and lesbian riding in the country and the Conservatives run evangelical Christians there.
ReplyDeleteNo disrespect to Bob Rae, but the Liberals could have run, say, a barmaid who spent the campaign in Las Vegas and kept the seat.
As for John Wright, what was he predicting after the 2008 election - unless it included the collapse of the BQ and the NDP eclipsing the Liberals by a 3:1 margin, I'm not particularly interested in what he thinks will be happening four years from now.
Harper will have been PM for 9 years, similar to Mulroney and Chrétien. By that time a lot of people (I'm not one of them) wanted JC gone and BM was the most hated man in the country.
Both started out a lot more popular than Harper's ever been. I think he's quite beatable in 2015.
Bob Rae wasn't in danger from the Conservatives, but from the NDP who picked up most of the other downtown Toronto ridings.
ReplyDeleteMaybe Bob Rae even benefited from his NDP past.
There's a longstanding myth each election that the Liberal candidate in Toronto Centre is in trouble with from the NDP candidate.
ReplyDeleteLast time the Liberal candidate got under under 50% of the vote there was 1988 when PC David MacDonald won by 41.36% to 41.21%. The NDP has never been a factor there and are only now a distant second because of the Conservative party's rampant anti-gay bigotry.
As much as Ipsos polling sucks, I think Wright's analysis is spot on. Looking at Layton's gang, how can anyone consider this official opposition a government in waiting? Everyone here knows I can't stand Harper, but even I would vote for him over Layton's sad excuse of a team. And yes, the Liberals growing from 34 seats to 155 just can't happen in one election cycle.
ReplyDeleteHowever I think he's wrong on Ontario. Our province has a 100 year tradition of voting one way federally, and the opposite way provincially. Normally it's Liberal federally and Conservative provincially - but that's head over heals now.
As much as I'd like to see McGuinty gone, he's probably going to survive past 2011 with a majority. This simply because Ontario will want a strong voice against Harper when the upcoming federal-provincial healthcare negotiations begin. Warren Kinsella is the LPO's campaign manager, and I'm certain this will be his angle for keeping McGuinty in power past this fall.
With a more moderate voice like John Tory as leader in 2011 (well someone like Tory, except with actual political skills) the PCPO would score a minority or better perhaps. But with Hudak as leader, the ONT Liberals can make a lot of hay with the healthcare issue.