Canada election watch

[Project Willow]

okay.. painting.

That's pretty much been the most effective response I've found to all the bad I've faced in life. Good luck with the juried show! I'm hanging some work for our big gallery walk this Thursday.

Back to topic...

[Canadian_watcher]

thanks PW.

[Jeff]

Some admissions from a Liberal strategist:

...

We entered the election with a clear strategy to triangulate the NDP on just about every single issue save Afghanistan. Pick an issue, look at the NDP, look at the Liberals, we consistently got as close to them as possible. The strategy was to push the NDP down, polarize the election as a choice between us and the Conservatives and bob’s your uncle. At least that was the theory.

For the first two weeks of the campaign, the strategy was partially working. The election was polarizing between the Conservatives and Liberals. The NDP’s numbers were staying low. Sure, the Liberals were still double-digit support behind the Conservatives but to the extent the strategy was intended to achieve certain results, there was hope.

And then the debates came, Jack Layton started to gain traction (for a bunch of reasons that will be analyzed to death here and elsewhere) and then the fatal flaws of the strategy quickly crystallized. In short: (a) Layton’s NDP have never been and never were going to be the NDP of 1993. We were never going to get them under 15 per cent, never mind the 7 per cent they got in 1993 – to think otherwise was based on hope not reality; (b) You can’t fake sincerity. The NDP believed in the positions both parties took, the Liberals less so. The voters got that. Why vote for a pale pink imitation when you can vote for the real thing; (c) It allowed the NDP to jujitsu us aside rather easily by focusing on leadership given that there was little to distinguish our platforms; And (d) once the NDP gained momentum, we had little to go after them over.

...

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/pol ... clecontent

[JackRiddler]

fits here more than there.

Cripes, after last night I may work to drum up support for P. Rep in Canada.

There can be no issue other than changing the mechanics of democracy, so that democracy can actually function. It has got all the scope and passion and historical weight and attraction to the people-at-large of a loose gear in the transmission. But if you don't fix it, the car won't go.

In Canada, with Ignatieff booted and a few Liberals actually talking of a merger with the NDP, it should be the uniting issue, with all other matters left to an ecumenical diversity. Hell, the voters on the 60 percent side don't seem to be that far apart, they're all social democrats of one kind or another. They get together so that they can re-enfranchise the people and prevent ever again having a situation where 40 percent choose an absolute ruler and 60 percent might as well be dirt. If they get together now on that basis, it creates a powerful oppositional narrative to the coming Conservative brutality: namely, that all this would not be happening if there was a functioning representative democracy. After winning once on such a platform and actually implementing representative rule, all possibilities open. Disagreements and splits don't become fatal. Everyone is represented and true compromises, between groups of adults who actually have the equal power of their respective numbers, can be found. No one is forced to say what they don't actually think, just so that they can convince some mythical dithering piker in the middle who doesn't even know if (s)he's going to vote. Glittering generalities lose their shine.

Caution: No panaceas. See: Germany. Interesting place. Damned interesting system of elections, and of division of powers between the federal government and the states. One might call it the end of utopia. (That's because, under whatever system, they'd still be Germans. Can't help that, and believe it or not, it has its up sides. You guys, you'd still be English Canadian milquetoasts, plus a bunch of crazy French. No cure for that.)

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[Jeff]

The NDP also had a record 123 second-place finishes. That would be a foolish thing to cheer in a two-party system, but 225 winners and runners up for a parliament of 308 makes a government-in-waiting. And also should at last crush the Liberal "strategic voting" card, which again cost us last night.

I can't imagine there is much appetite among New Democrats for merger. There certainly isn't in this one. It's not like the two represent a single party that split, like Canada's Progressive Conservatives and Reformers coming together as Conservatives. They're two very different political cultures. (The Greens and the NDP, not so much. There were loud ovations last night at NDP HQ for Elizabeth May.)

Ignatieff said during the campaign - during the campaign! the fool - that he never considered the Liberals a party of the left. So long as the Liberals were first or second, and the NDP third, there was a tactical split among left voters that the Liberals encouraged, and for which they were richly rewarded. A third place Liberal party is out of the way, and can be the special preserve of the Business Liberals, the Paul Martins who would never unite with the New Democrats, and who still have a constituency.

[crikkett]

So long as the Liberals were first or second, and the NDP third, there was a tactical split among left voters that the Liberals encouraged, and for which they were richly rewarded. A third place Liberal party is out of the way, and can be the special preserve of the Business Liberals, the Paul Martins who would never unite with the New Democrats, and who still have a constituency.

Thanks for your explanation.

[AhabsOtherLeg]

Jack's just about the only guy I've ever seen online who can quote himself without making it seem like an ego thing, or make me resent the "effort" of re-reading the post. His re-posts always repay the time that is taken to re-read them, which shows the quality of the original posts.

In the current climate of the board, this probably sounds like I'm gearing up for some kind of super-subtle passive-aggressive attack on him. But I'm not. I will instead openly state that he's a dick, because he's smarter than me on a logarythmic scale, and that is inherently unfair. Great posts, though. Can't fault the posts.

Harper, though. Ech. How many votes could the tar sands really buy him? A large number of people must've voted for him out of honest conviction. More's the pity.

[Canadian_watcher]

Harper, though. Ech. How many votes could the tar sands really buy him? A large number of people must've voted for him out of honest conviction. More's the pity.

Yes, it would seem so. They are celebrating 'a great day' all over the internets: Osama's death AND their coveted majority! Whoopee, we're USjr! *sigh*

[JackRiddler]

The NDP also had a record 123 second-place finishes. That would be a foolish thing to cheer in a two-party system, but 225 winners and runners up for a parliament of 308 makes a government-in-waiting. And also should at last crush the Liberal "strategic voting" card, which again cost us last night.

I can't imagine there is much appetite among New Democrats for merger. There certainly isn't in this one. It's not like the two represent a single party that split, like Canada's Progressive Conservatives and Reformers coming together as Conservatives. They're two very different political cultures. (The Greens and the NDP, not so much. There were loud ovations last night at NDP HQ for Elizabeth May.)

Well, now that I've become an expert in Canadian politics after thinking about it for four days in the course of reading this thread (yes, Internet readers, that was a joke), and even learned the names of several of the politicians in the process, I was thinking it would be more like a split in the Liberals, with Rae leading whatever's still leftish inside the Liberals into the NDP on the basis of proportional representation as the uniting issue, in the process also giving a kill-shot to the business Liberals. But I defer to your definitely superior judgement (no, Internet readers, that was not a joke. Jeff knows, I do not).

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Ahab: ack, don't do that. Head hurts from swelling. Believe it: I am a patsy for flattery.


note the hugger is red-faced

[AhabsOtherLeg]

@ C_W: Don't feel too bad. I mean, try not to judge your fellow citizens too harshly. We gave Blair a second term in office (and then chose Cameron as the "best alternative") so it's not like we have any grounds for complacency or smugness or judgement. It is what it is. An election utilising Diebold machines and their various variants (but with most Albertans voting for their chosen candidate ).

Being a bit facetious, maybe, about the likelihood of election fraud (haven't read the rest of the thread) but I'd bet money there are a record number of "spoiled" ballots.

[AhabsOtherLeg]

Ahab: ack, don't do that. Head hurts from swelling.

Sorry bro. Truth hurts.

[Jeff]

I was thinking it would be more like a split in the Liberals, with Rae leading whatever's still leftish inside the Liberals into the NDP on the basis of proportional representation as the uniting issue, in the process also giving a kill-shot to the business Liberals.

Bob Rae. Hmm. To a Dipper student of WWII, I think that would be like Clement Atlee asking Lord Haw Haw to serve as Communications Minister. Bad blood there. Oooh, so much.

Layton today shot down talk of merger. Liberals are the only ones musing about it, and it takes at least two to merge. Sounds like wishful thinking from those hoping to forgo the hard work of rebuilding their own party by hijacking mine. (I've read too much presumptuous chatter, like, "What should we call it? Liberal Democrats? I like that!")

Progressive former Liberals are welcome. The NDP even received an influx of "Red Tories" (socialist-lite conservatives; Canada was once that cool) after the Progressive Conservative party was absorbed by the Alberta Hive Mind.) Though unlike other parties, the NDP has a principled rule against accepting floor crossers. MPs from other parties can't join the NDP caucus until they resign their seats, win nomination as New Democrats and are re-elected in by-election. Not that that's ever happened. (Though one of the new Quebec MPs, Françoise Boivin, had been a Liberal MP from 04-06.)

And I don't think we should want to kill off the business Liberals. We should still want them around, to split the right vote with the Conservatives.

And Jack, you've become profoundly literate in the arcane doings of this miserable beaver pond in short order. I'm touched, and a little embarrassed.

[DrVolin]

a bunch of excellent analysis.

There is one serious problem with your cunning plan. For purely ideological reasons, the Conservatives will spend the next four years blindly and self-destructively anihilating our carefully crafted, lovingly husbanded and protected campaign finance laws. In an unrestricted bidding war for the House of Commons, the NDP will get completely destroyed. In that fight, I would put my money on the Bay Street Boys rather than the Calgary oil men. Worse, it means that the Canadian establishment will have to compete directly with American interests for control of the government.

That means a return to the subtle brand of sleepy Liberal fascism, most likely with Justin Trudeau as the friendly face of the bankster regime, now become a mere branch office of the Federal Reserve System. As you point out, at least the post-93 Conservatives have the virtue of being open about it, and thus allowing a focusing of opposition. But if the opposition is silenced, it does us no good.

[Jeff]

And Stephen Lewis was just on CBC .. he reminded us that the NDP has something like 44 women going to Parliament.. so that's a plus.

That's something like 40% of the caucus. (Liberals and Conservatives both at 17%.) Still, I read that Canada is 52nd in the world with respect to female representation in politics. This should be a national disgrace. It's a second disgrace that it isn't.

The more I read about the new Quebec MPs, the more I love them.

Pierre-Luc Dusseault, youngest ever MP at 19. First year student of political science. Planned to take a summer job at a golf course.



Social workers, union organizers, teachers, activists, journalists, students, laborers. It's wonderful. It makes me almost glad for a Harper majority, so they can have time to learn their craft.

[JackRiddler]

And Jack, you've become profoundly literate in the arcane doings of this miserable beaver pond in short order. I'm touched, and a little embarrassed.

Hardly. Strike profoundly, replace with almost maybe barely. You're giving me quite the schooling in it, chief. Volin too, my Greek who's dissed me on returning the secret signals though, the malaka. (I think I figured out what Bay Street and the Calgary oil men must be. It's sort of like the Yankees and the Cowboys, or PD Scott's Traders and Prussians. But I guess you already identified the former for what they are: banksters.)

I'm never going to resist raising the banner of proportional representation. For everyone! It sure would change things in my own Greatest Shithole On Earth. I'm not a fan of instant run off, either. A vote for X should be a vote for X. If X gets y percent, they get y percent of the seats. If you voted for X, that's your goddamn representative, no matter who gets the most votes, and they have a lawmaking share equivalent to their voting share. I think every country would benefit from that.

As long as neither X nor Z is hankering to start a civil war and murder its opponents. I hasten to add. In which case any system's going to be in trouble.

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