Miles' Blog

Last pre-election blog on this site

2009-10-19T18:49:00.000-07:00

I have now been blogging for almost fours years on this site, but I have now decided to make a change of plans. At the time I started the blog, I was just a recent graduate from university and like the idea of a blog to discuss and the debate the issues of the day. Over time though I found that I am reluctant to give my views as anything that is controversial will be viewed harshly, especially since associate this blog with a particular party despite the fact the views are all my own, and not simply party rhetoric. In addition, now that I am out in the work force as well as the fact the recession has made me somewhat more inward looking, my views have turned somewhat to the right, although I am not as right wing as I was in high school and nor do I plan to take out a Conservative membership card or even vote for them. Rather I have found that no political party fully supports my views or even close to it, rather I support individual elements from each party, but nothing overwhelmingly. It is true when I started the blog in 2005 and still the case today that the Liberals are the party closest to my views, but I am still more pro free enterprise and believe in smaller government to a greater case than most Liberals do. I consider myself more a classical liberal than a social liberal, although I do not consider the two mutually exclusive as both seek the same end goals, just by different means. As such I have started an blog under a pseudonym so I can give my own political views without all the risks of being attached to a political party or anything else. I would like to thank all my readers who have read this blog and hope you continue to follow my future blog at monkeylovestofight.blogspot.com.
I choose this name since after dogs, monkeys are my favourite animal (I have many models in my room) and I choose the name loves to fight since I recall seeing somewhere about 5 years ago someone using this as their name and I thought it sounded appealing. This blog will not be listed on either liblogs or blogging tories, but if listed on any blog rolls, it will be an entirely independent one. This will be my last pre-election blog post and any future ones during the election will largely be discussing the issues as well as giving my electoral predictions, but it will not be giving my opinions on any of the issues.

Election Averted?

2009-09-16T17:10:00.000-07:00

It looks like at least for now we will not being having an election. Both the NDP and the Bloc Quebecois plan to vote with the government on Friday's motion so the earliest the government could fall is last week of September or first week of October. With the NDP now promising to support the government until the EI changes are made, a fall election seems increasingly less likely. Although it still could happen as Harper seems to be doing everything to keep his distance from the Bloc Quebecois and NDP thus, a fall election is still plausible.

What will be interesting is how thinks affects the NDP's numbers as NDP voters tend to despise the Tories even more so than Liberal voters, never mind they have now lost their main attack against the Liberals, which is that they are the only party to have consistently voted against the Tories. At the end of the day, though I am quite happy if an election is averted and the fact the Liberals don't have to prop up the Tories will still avoiding an election cannot be a bad thing for them. At the same time, I don't expect election talk to disappear completely until one party receives a majority which could be quite some time, although I am sure in the next 20 years, at least one party will manage to get one at some point.

Election Synopsis

2009-09-09T18:43:00.000-07:00

In the past few days we have had a number of polls come out. Although the numbers vary slightly, all of them show the Tories slightly ahead, but far from a majority and also the gap between the Liberals is much smaller than last time around. It is important to remember there is still probably another 8 weeks to go until the actual vote, so much can change during that time. Below I will give a synopsis of where I see things at and what possibilities there are. These are not based on the polls, they also take into account historical voting patterns, general mood in the different parts of the country, and also the different possibilities that could happen. A couple of things that are worth keeping in mind when trying to predict the outcome. Polls change so the numbers we see today are unlikely to be what the actual results are, rather they are a snapshot of where things are. In any given election normally, 80-90% vote the same way they did in the last election, while 10-20% vote differently. Since 1993, in pretty much every election, between 10-20% of ridings have voted for different parties while 80-90% have stuck with the same party. The undecided can either break in favour of the incumbent or the challenger although they usually favour one over the other. Usually the incumbent if there are unsure of the challenger, while the challenger if it is clear the incumbent needs to be tossed from office. So lets get to it on a region by region basis

Atlantic Canada

With a high margin of error and no polls yet from CRA (Corporate Research Associates) giving the province by province breakdown, things are a bit sketchy here, but nonethless here is where I think things are.

Newfoundland & Labrador

Liberals: With Fabian Manning not running again in Avalon and the fact they won the other four rural ridings by large margins, I expect the Liberals to take those five seats barring some major upset. They did face a bit of a challenge in St. John's South-Mount Pearl, but considering that it appears much of the NDP vote came from disgruntled Tories, I think the Liberals will probably hold this, but no guarantee.

NDP: They won St. John's East by huge margins so as long as Jack Harris is MP, this should be an easy hold. St. John's South-Mount Pearl is a possibility, but unlikely

Conservatives: Danny Williams may have given up on his ABC Campaign, but the damage has been done. I expect the Conservatives to recover somewhat from last time, but not nearly enough to win any seats (barring some major upset). I don't think the Tories will be shut out of Newfoundland & Labrador for decades to come like the Liberals have in Alberta, but I don't think they will win any seats here as long as Harper is leader

Nova Scotia

Liberals: Really only two ridings in play for them. With the provincial NDP still in their honeymoon phase, they could lose Dartmouth-Cole Harbour to the NDP, but likewise pick up West Nova which ever since 1867 has always been known for close results and flipping back and forth each election. The other four Liberal ridings should stay Liberal barring some major upset and the remaining five are probably out of reach for now at least.

Conservatives: The Tories should hold Central Nova since despite the risk of MacKay losing his seat, the Tories have consistently gotten in the 40s percentage wise so I think the odds are MacKay holds his seat. Cumberland-Colchester-Musquodoboit Valley is probably the most Conservative of Nova Scotia ridings so with Bill Casey no longer running it should swing back to the Tories, but I think it will only be plurality (40-50%), not an outright majority (over 50%) as Casey got in 2004 and 2006 when he was still a Tory. South Shore-St. Margaret's and West Nova are both vulnerable so don't be surprised if the Tories make some big announcement here or throw a lot of money at those two ridings. Pork Barrel may be seedy, but it does tend to work, although it may not necessarily enough to save those two MPs.

NDP: With the provincial NDP still being in its honeymoon phase, I would not be the least bit surprised if the NDP gains seats here. In fact this is probably the best time possible for the NDP in Nova Scotia as the high polling numbers for the provincial NDP won't last forever.

Prince Edward Island

The Liberals should easily hold Cardigan and Charlottetown. Malpeque will probably stay Liberal, but there is an outside chance of a Conservative gain, but not likely. Egmont is up for grabs as it was a close race last time around, but the Tories now hold the incumbent advantage. Anything from the Liberals narrowly retaking this to a larger Tory win seems plausible.

New Brunswick

Conservatives: Unless there is a major collapse in the Tory vote a la 1993, the Tories should easily hold Tobique-Mactaquac, New Brunswick Southwest, and Fundy-Royal. Fredericton could go Liberal, but considering it rarely tosses incumbents out, the fact COR in the early 90s provincially won here and the combined right greatly exceeded the Liberal vote in 1993, 1997, and 2000, I would give the Tories the edge here, but not a guarantee. Miramichi is traditionally a Liberal riding, but with the Tories holding the incumbent advantage, I would say anything from a narrow Liberal gain to a wider Tory win is plausible. Saint John has been very close in the last two elections and probably will be again. Neither Paul Zed nor Rodney Weston hold the immense popularity Elsie Wayne did thus a landslide by either would be a big surprise. I would say the Liberals have a slight edge here right now, but really this is a toss-up.

Liberals: Beausejour is one of the safest Liberal ridings east of Montreal so easy Liberal win. Madawaska-Restigouche almost went Tory in 2006, but considering that the Tories and Liberals tend to rise and fall more in line with their results in Quebec than New Brunswick, I think the opportunity for a Tory pickup has passed and I expect an even bigger Liberal win here. Moncton-Riverview-Dieppe almost went Tory last time around, but considering this is traditionally a safe Liberal riding, I expect the Liberals will win by a larger margin unless the Tories can recruit Bernard Lord as their candidate, in which case I think the Tories would gain this riding.

NDP: Hold Acadie-Bathurst easily, not even close in any of the other ridings

Quebec

Bloc Quebecois: In all likelihood the Bloc Quebecois will win fewer seats than last time around, although I doubt they will win fewer than the Liberals as due the distribution of votes, the Liberals need a 5 point lead in Quebec to actually beat the Bloc Quebecois in terms of seats. With the sponsorship scandal a relic of the past, I think losing seats to the Liberals is pretty much a foregone conclusion, the question is just how many. Still a see an outside possibility of the Bloc Quebecois picking up more Tory held ridings than the ones lost to the Liberals in which case they would have a net gain of seats. One thing to remember, is everytime it looks like the Bloc Quebecois is in trouble, they always seem to find a way to come back, so don't count them out just yet

Liberals: Gaining seats is pretty much a guarantee as the Liberals as they have recovered much of the lost ground since the Sponsorship Scandal. They will probably get over 20 seats, but not a guarantee. 25 seats is about how many they would get right now while 30 seats is a more optimistic projection. The key battlegrounds are Laval, South Shore Suburbs, and the Eastern Townships. If they cannot gain here, they can forget about forming the next government even if they make gains in Ontario. I could see them beating the Bloc Quebecois in the popular vote, but I would be shocked if they won more seats.

Conservatives: They have made somewhat of a recovery as most polls put them in the 15-20% range thus they at least have a shot at holding the 10 seats they have now, but any pickups seem very remote. Likewise with the Tories facing less negative press than earlier, I wouldn't be surprised if they fall into the low teens once the attacks on them are stepped up. A Tory majority is extremely unlikely, but if they are to get one they must hold the 10 seats they have in Quebec. Picking up an additional 12 seats in English Canada is plausible, but unlikely, while picking up an addition 22 seats is next to impossible. It seems their vote is mostly amongst older Quebecers, likely remanants of the Union Nationale from the 50s. This group generally has a high turnout which is good for the Tories in the short-run, but they are rapidly dying off, thus their future prospects look really dim for now in Quebec.

NDP: The battle will be for Thomas Mulcair to hold his seat, which at the moment I think he would lose, but we will see what happens here.

Ontario

Although the polls have varied somewhat, most show the Liberals either tied with the Tories or slightly ahead. The Tories are either at the 39% they got last time around or very close, while the Liberals are definitely above the 34% they got last time around. Although things are bit fluid here, the combined right has usually gotten between 35-40% in Ontario. Since my birth in 1981, only once have they gotten above 40% (1984) and only once below 35% (2004) thus they should probably get in this range. So a lot depends on the split of the centre-left. Ernie Eves got 35% in the 2003 provincial election, yet got clobbered so the Tories could get in the high 30s and still lose a whole wack of seats if the Green and NDP votes coalesce around the Liberals.

Conservatives: At the moment they would probably lose a few of the close seats, but not a huge amount. They could under the right circumstances gain seats, but 60 seats is their absolute maximum, while I would say the odds are higher they will lose than gain. But by the same token I think the odds are they will get over 40 seats and unless they mess up really badly, I expect them to get above 35 seats. The 416 is probably off the limits unless the Liberals make a huge blunder and even then 1 or 2 seats at the most. The 905 belt is the key battleground and this will play huge role in determining the make-up of the next parliament. The Tories are probably ahead in the 519 (Southwestern Ontario), but with a strong rural-urban split here, I think they are pretty safe in their rural ridings, but are likely to face an uphill battle in holding their two Kitchener ridings (Kitchener-Waterloo and Kitchener Centre) and their one London riding. Brant probably leans Tory, but not entirely safe, while the others are only risk of the Liberals open a wide lead in Ontario. The 613 (Eastern Ontario) is the most Conservative part of the province and the Liberals would need a 15 point lead province wide just to run even with the Tories here. No prospects of pick-ups, but I would say there is a 50/50 chance for Ottawa-Orleans, while Ottawa West-Nepean, Glengarry-Prescott-Russell, and Peterborough lean Tory but could go Liberal under the right conditions. The others they will likely win and in many cases but huge margins more in line with their Prairie and BC interior results than Ontario ones. Northern Ontario, I don't know a lot about, but they should hold Parry Sound-Muskoka, Kenora is a toss-up, while the others are unlikely to come their way.

Liberals: Most have said the Liberals have bottomed out in Ontario and although I don't think they have quite reached their rock-bottom point, I agree the odds of them winning fewer seats are quite low. They should dominate the 416 as usual, the only danger here is if they rack up huge margins they could win the popular vote in Ontario, but win fewer seats as only in Rural Eastern Ontario (which has far fewer seats) do the Tories pile up similiarly large margins. 50 seats is easily doable, but I would say 60 seats is probably their maximum unless the Tories make a huge blunder. 70 seats is possible, but considering that people haven't reached the point of saying throw the bums out, I see this is unlikely never mind in 2004 the Liberals had the incumbent advantage in most ridings, whereas now the Tories have this in almost half. 905 belt is up for grabs and the vote is quite fluid here, but this is an absolute must win area if they want to form government. If they don't gain seats in Ontario, they will not form government, even if they make gains in Quebec and British Columbia. The 519 will probably be difficult to make many gains due to the rural-urban divide, but at least if the Liberals can get over 30% in most rural ridings, that would set them up nicely for future elections. Northern Ontario tends to lean Liberal, but rarely tosses incumbents so in some ways their chances are better now than they would be later as the 7 NDP incumbents out of 10 ridings still are new and haven't fully established themselves. Knocking them off later would be much harder than now.

NDP: The Tories may be closing to maxing out in Ontario, but the NDP have maxed out. Their goal will be to hold the ridings they already have. With the NDP down more than the Tories and their vote being softer, I think they are in even graver danger of losing seats than the Tories. Nonetheless, their vote is quite concentrated so I suspect they will still win some seats such as in places like Windsor or Hamilton. Outside of a few pockets, they tend to be quite weak in most parts of Ontario, while do really well in a few areas.

Saskatchewan/Manitoba

The Tories have a solid lead here and considering few ridings were even close last time around, don't expect many changes here, barring some big surprises.

Conservatives: Winnipeg South Centre and Elmwood-Transcona are really the only ones they could potentially pick up although considering the history of these two ridings I think both are long-shots but at least plausible.

Liberals: Not a whole lot of potential gains and no likely gains but Saint Boniface and Winnipeg South are winneable if they run a strong campaign. Desnethe-Missinippi-Churchill River is also possible if there is a strong turnout amongst Aboriginals (they make up 60% of the riding, but traditionally have a low turnout) and provided they unite behind the Liberals rather than splitting their votes with the NDP. Any other pick-up would be a shocker to say the least

NDP: With Gary Doer no longer as premier, this was a missed opportunity for big gains in Manitoba as he was quite popular, yet this never spilled over to the federal NDP. The only potential pick-ups here are Saskatoon-Rosetown-Biggar and Palliser and neither are anywhere near guaranteed or even in their favour.

Alberta

The question here is not whether the Tories will dominate the province, they will, the question is whether they will pull off a clean sweep or simply dominate. Also, this is the only province I can say with near certainty they will get over 50% and in fact probably over 60%, whereas there is 50/50 chance of crossing the 50% mark in Saskatchewan while possible in Manitoba but unlikely and not possible in any of the other provinces. The NDP will be fighting to hold Edmonton-Strathcona which is really a toss-up. The Tories have consistently gotten around 40% give or take a couple percentage points so they are competitive here. The NDP is strong in the western part where the U of A is and also Whyte Avenue which includes a lot of renters and young singles, but the Eastern part which is mostly middle class families tends to favour the Tories, thus a toss-up here. The Liberals will likely be shut out unless they can convince Anne McLellan to run in Edmonton Centre and even then it is far from a guarantee. Their goal should simply be to get over 20% province wide, forget about actually winning any seats, rather to make steady gains each election which in time will result in wins, but not right away.

British Columbia

Almost all polls show the Tories polling the 30s and the Liberals up substantially, so bad news for the Tories and good news for the Liberals, but we have seen this story before many times only to see the Tories pull ahead on election day and the Liberals see an opportunity slip through their hands. This means the Liberals have potential to do really well, but they need to seize it, not ignore it as they have done in the past.

Conservatives: The odds are greater they will lose seats than gain, but I could see them getting as many as 25 seats under the best case scenario for them. They did come close in several ridings although in many ways 2008 was a high water mark for them in British Columbia. Although the Liberals and NDP may win more seats than the Tories do if you combine their seats, I still expect the Tories to win more than either of them on their own, thus at least win a plurality of seats if not a majority.

Liberals: They have a golden opportunity to do really well and possibly get as many as 10 seats if not more, but only if they seize the opportunity. Their vote is quite soft in BC and they don't have a solid base like they do in Ontario, Quebec, or Atlantic Canada so this could easily slip out of their hands if they are not careful here. Most gains would likely come from the Lower Mainland suburbs. Rural Vancouver Island and the BC Interior are really Liberal dead zones, so no potential gains here. If anything a lot will depend on whether they can swing the ethnic votes back in their favour or whether these will stick with the Tories. This group is crucial, not just in this election, but for their longer term health in British Columbia. Their strength amongst them has usually countered their weakness amongst the white Canadian born population in BC, but last election, much of the ethnic vote swung over to the Tories. Whether this is a one time phenomenon or part of a long-term trend, only time will tell.

NDP: Although not doing too well in BC, the unpopularity of the HST and declining popularity of the provincial government could play in their favour. I would say they will likely get between 7-12 seats, 15 seats being their maximum and 5 seats their minimum. One thing to remember in BC is the Tory and NDP vote is far more motivated to show up than the Liberal vote thus they don't have to work as hard to get their votes out as the Liberals do.

North

No real polls here and usually people vote based on local issues anyways not national trends. If Larry Bagnell could hold the Yukon in the face of the unpopular carbon tax last time around, I suspect he should have little trouble this time around. The Northwest Territories will probably stay NDP although a Tory pickup is possible when one considers how close they came as well as their strong attention to the Arctic. Anything from an NDP landslide to a narrow Tory win is possible. The Liberals could come back to second place as the Tory vote is quite soft here, but winning seems highly unlikely. Nunavut was a three way race last time around but considering their MP is health minister and has a high profile, I suspect they will win by a larger margin, although a loss is at least a slight possibility here.

So in summary, the Liberals may not be off to the best start, but a 3-5 point lead is far from an insurmountable lead. The Tories without question have a better chance of winning than the Liberals, but I would say their chances of losing are still higher than winning a majority, although they will probably still get over 110 seats unless they mess up badly. Likewise I've heard from various sources most say 120 seats is the most optimistic scenario for the Liberals. A Tory majority is extremely unlikely, but there is a slim chance of it happening, while a Liberal majority is close to nil, although more likely than the NDP forming official opposition or beating the Liberals in terms of seats. As for the Green Party, they are largely irrelevant. I don't think Elizabeth May will win her seat, in fact I think her running in Saanich-Gulf Islands just increased the odds of Gary Lunn being re-elected as the centre-left vote is split amongst three not two parties now, so he just needs to get 1/3 of the vote which is not too difficult to do in this riding.

If I have time this weekend, I plan to focus on the policies and the potential issues and give my views on them before the parties release them in greater detail.

Election Speculation

2009-09-03T18:48:00.000-07:00

It looks increasingly likely that we will have a Fall election. While nothing is a guarantee, I would say the odds of an election are far greater than the odds of not having one. The Liberals have passed the point of return and so regardless of what happens between now and the next confidence vote, they have no choice but to vote down the government. If they back down now, it would be far more damaging than going through. The NDP and the Bloc Quebecois however have at least left the door open to possibly cooperating, however considering the ideological differences the Tories have with both, I doubt we will see a deal acceptable to both sides, although if the Liberals open a lead, Harper may bend over backwards to give them want they want. After all, he is not someone who wants to give up power easily. As for precipitating an early election backfiring on the Liberals, it might in the short-term but by election day, I suspect it will be a non-issue. After all, most didn't like Harper breaking his election law and calling one last year, yet he still won a stronger minority. If the Liberals perform poorly on election day, it will likely be due to other factors

As for my views on the election, I am not entirely keen on the idea. This goes beyond my partisan views and more to my view that we are probably going to have more minority than majority governments in the foreseeable future and having an election every year is not a good thing. This is what Italy had for most of the latter half of the 20th century, so hardly a road I want to see Canada go down. Ideally, it would be nice if the government reached out to the opposition while the opposition should a willingness to compromise and if everybody compromised a bit, we might even get some good legislation we wouldn't see otherwise. Unfortunately, our political atmosphere is far too politically charged for this to happen. I just hope after the election, that if Ignatieff wins, he reaches out to all the opposition parties and tries to find a way to have a stable government than can last 3 years or more. Likewise, if the Tories are re-elected with a minority, hopefully, they will replace Harper with someone who is more concillatory and willing to work with others. I don't think an election would harm our economic recovery as the Tories suggest, but I do think having elections every year going forward would be bad in the long-term.

As for predictions, it is too early to tell. This is Ignatieff's first campaign so his numbers can either go up considerably if he impresses Canadians or drop considerably if he is a turnoff. I think in terms of order of likeliness, I would go Tory minority, Liberal minority, Tory majority, and Liberal majority, the latter two both being highly unlikely and the last one being next to impossible while the first one only being slightly more likely than the second one. On the surface a Liberal minority looks quite easy, but when one looks at things on a riding by riding basis there it is a bit more challenging as the Tories have 66 seats more and even if the Tories lost every riding they won by 10% and the Liberals won every riding they came within 10%, the Tories would still come out ahead. Now that doesn't mean it isn't impossible to overcome such a gap, I am simply pointing out a minor shift from last election won't be sufficient enough. I'll have more once the election gets under way if it does this Fall.

Obama's Health Care Plan

2009-08-16T08:57:00.000-07:00

I haven't blogged in a while and since there are so many issues that have come up since, I thought I would focus just on one. Obama's health care plan has undoubtedly taken a toll on his approval ratings which are nowhere nearly as high as they were earlier this year. Most of us by now are well aware of the Republican smear campaign which has attacked our health care system in Canada and is even getting notice across the pond as the NHS in Britain is also being frequently attacked by the Republicans. Some of the accusations are inaccurate while some are just outright stupid such as those made by Sarah Palin. Nonetheless, one cannot deny Canadians and Americans are far apart on the issue of health care and simply trying to adopt something mid way between the two would be considered hard core socialist in the US while hard core right wing in Canada. I fully prefer the Canadian system over the American system, but I do realize due to different value systems, trying to copy the Canadian system in the US wouldn't make sense just as trying to copy the American system here would be even dumber. I nonetheless do believe that the private sector should be allowed to operate along side the public sector like it does in most European countries provided the public system is available to everyone regardless of income or health status and the private system is run by doctors who work exclusively in the private system and receive no public subsidy.

Much of the attacks on the Canadian health care system are based on false premises. One of them is people die due to long waiting times. While waiting times are a problem that must be addressed, if your illness is life-threating, you will be treated right away. Only if it is non-life threatening does it involve long wait times such as a hip replacement. In essence, any parallel private system should only be available for non-life threatening illnesses and injuries here in Canada. Another myth is your doctor will be a civil servant. While it is true in Britain, the NHS runs most hospitals, Canada's system is one of public financing but private delivery. Otherwise the doctors operate much the same way they do in the US, only they bill the government instead of the patient or insurance company. The other myth, which is the most false of them all is that the government will decide where you can be treated and what can be treated. In fact, you can see any doctor you want in Canada, whereas in the US you can only see doctors that your insurance company says you can, so you actually have more freedom, not less freedom under the Canadian system. As for what the Conservatives should do, I believe they should correct some of the errors being presented on the Canadian system, but at the same time stay out of the debate otherwise as what type of health care system the US chooses to adopt as this is their choice, not ours, just as they have no right to tell us what health care system to adopt. In addition, the Obama plan only calls for a public plan to be available to those who don't have private insurance, the private insurance schemes would continue to exist. In many ways, he is only expanding medicare and medicaid to include the 47 million who have no insurance. Still, one should recognize that Americans have a much stronger mistrust of government than Canadians do and tend to be more rugged individualists versus communitarian in their views, thus it only makes sense their system would be different.

One type of system those who support universal health care might consider looking at is the Dutch and the Swiss systems as both are universal in terms of 100% of the population is insured, but at the same time still allow private insurers to compete. I am against Canada adopting such system, but based on the views Americans have on universal health care, trying to adopt either the Canadian or British or in fact the systems of most other industrialized nations is doomed for failure. In the Dutch and the Swiss system, every person must have health insurance by law. The insurance companies must accept everyone who applies and may not charge differential rates or refuse someone because they are too high a risk. The social welfare system covers those who are unemployed or on social assistance. If a person needs medical treatment, the insurance company must pay out the whole cost, they cannot look for reasons to avoid paying for the treatment like many US insurance companies do. A patient has the right to visit any doctor they wish and the insurance company cannot dictate which physicians they see nor can any physician be they public or private refuse a patient due to who they are insured by. In order to avoid a loss for companies that take high risk patients, all insurance companies are required to put money into a pool and those with the highest percentage of claims and high risk patients can take money out of the pool to compensate for this, thus there is no profit incentive to refuse high risk patients as there is in the US. This may not be the only solution, but it is probably about the furthest Obama can go without taking a big hit in public opinion.

Update

2009-06-15T14:33:00.001-07:00

My blog was earlier disabled as being suspected as spam, which it isn´t. Thankfully it has been restored. I will be in Europe until June 27th so will have more when I return home.

BC Election

2009-05-12T16:35:00.000-07:00

Today BC voters head to the polls to decide who will govern the province for the next four years. While most polls show the BC Liberals in the lead, and Liberal win is far from a foregone conclusion. I am almost certain they will win the popular vote, but only think they are likely to win the most seats, not certain. After all, Gordon Campbell got almost 3% more than Glen Clark in 1996 yet still lost the election, so the NDP vote tends to be more efficient than the Liberal vote. Also, the NDP base is much easier to motivate to show up than Liberal supporters. As explained in my earlier post, I unequovically support the re-election of the BC Liberals and in fact fear what would happen if the NDP got in. Electing an NDP government is bad news in good economic times, but downright disastrous during a recession. For all of Campbell's flaws, he is the right person to lead us through these difficult times. Tomorrow I will blog on the final results which I hope is a strengthned BC Liberal majority although a BC Liberal win of any size would be fine by me.

On the issue of STV, I hope it gets defeated. One of the most fundamental things about voting is to ensure each voter understands how their vote is counted. Unless you are a political junkie or a mathematician, it is difficult to understand how the system works. I've tried to explain to people not as interested in politics as myself and the fact many could understand it shows the major problem with the system. Some may say this doesn't matter or voters should educate themselves better, but I disagree. If a voter thinks their vote is being counted differently than it is being counted, you can get an election result than no one wanted. MMP which was proposed in Ontario was bad enough, but at least I saw some logic to the system, while STV is one of the worst possible choices. Hopefully it gets soundly defeated.

Obama's 100th day in Office

2009-04-29T18:29:00.000-07:00

Today marks Obama's 100th day in office and while it is way too early to fully judge what he will be like as a president, I think he is off to a very good start. On the domestic policy, he is taking action necessary to kick start the economy and he has some of the best advisors here. The only concern here is the big spending will lead to a larger deficit and while this is necessary to help lift the United States out of the recession, it could be harmful in the long-run if not dealt with once the economy begins to recover. Since Obama did promise to cut all wasteful spending and so far he has been good at keeping his word, I trust he will take action to curb the deficit once the economy turns around. After all, the last the the budget was balanced was under Bill Clinton. Obama has several of his advisors, so I believe he is far more in line with Bill Clinton than Jimmy Carter when it comes to his economic policies. On the environmental front he is finally starting to take action, something that was woefully lacking under the Bush administration. Despite the fact those on the right hate his policies with a passion, he is very popular with approval ratings over 60%. While I doubt his approval ratings will stay this high throughout his term, it does show that many Americans are open to ideas that stray from the right wing ideology we have been so use to over the past 20 years.

On foreign policy, we have seen a dramatic shift and so far I have been very pleased with what I have seen. He promises to close down Guantanamo bay, re-engage the Middle East including countries such as Iran, ease the embargo act against Cuba, and draw down the troops in Iraq. This is the type of foreign policy many outside the US have wanted to see from an American leader and are now seeing. He may not go as far as some want, but at least he is moving in the right direction. I am a realist and realize that if he goes too far just as the Republicans did, although in the other direction, it will backfire and he will be a one-term president.

The other big news on the eve of his 100th day in office was Arlen Specter's defection from the Republicans to the Democrats. This puts the Democrats 1 seat shy of a filibuster proof majority and assuming Al Franken wins the recount in Minnesota, they will get their filibuster proof majority. For those claiming this will pull the US too far to the left, I say nonsense. Trying to pull the US as much to the left as Canada is won't happen even with a filibuster proof majority and considering how successful we have been as a country, I fail to see how moving to the left in the case of the US would be that bad. Maybe in some countries in Europe or even Canada to a lesser extent, it might be a bad idea, but not the with the US. Also, unlike Canada, party discipline is very weak so having 60 Democrats doesn't mean an automatic filibuster proof majority as many are Blue Dog Democrats who would likely join the Republicans in a filibuster if the Democrats bring in some legislation that is too controversial. Considering how diverse the US is in its views, having a 60 seat majority is more of a sign which party is a big tent party and which one is a narrow tent.

In the case of Arlen Specter, political opportunism may have played a role, but the reality is that as the Republicans moved further and further to the right they become less electable in Pennsylvania and also further from the views he held when he joined. He didn't leave his party, his party left him. There are many other moderate Republicans such as Lincoln Chaffee, Wayne Gilchrist, and Jim Leach who supported Obama last presidential election so he is not the only moderate Republican to leave his party as they became more and more ideological. Besides most Republicans on the West Coast and Northeast were usually moderate ones as you need to be moderate to win there. The hardcore conservative ones are largely in the South which is where the Republican's strength is increasinly becoming concentrated. If the Republicans wish to start winning again, they might consider being more moderate or at least not trying to push out every moderate. Reagan was no moderate in the party, but he at least understood the party needed both Conservatives and moderates if it were to be successful. People such as Rush Limbaugh appeal to a narrow base mainly of rural, Southern, older white men. Trying to push out anyway who isn't as right wing as them is the main reason their party is losing in many traditional strongholds. In the case of Pennsylvania, over 200,000 voters switched their registeration from Republican to Democrat between 2004 and 2008 and today, the number of Americans who identify themselves as Republicans is at an all time low. In some ways, Specter's defection is not unlike Scott Brison, Belinda Stronach, and Garth Turner's defections to the Liberals as all were former PCs (who are much like the moderates in the Republicans) as opposed to the Reform/Alliance (who are more in line with the conservative elements in the Republicans). They left since they felt the party swung too far to the right. I fully support his decision to defect, but I do believe any democracy requires a healthy alternative and I also believe the Republicans need a strong moderate element in it so I hope the few moderates left fight hard within the party to pull it back to the centre-right from the hard right. This should also be a warning to any Conservatives here in Canada that think going further to the right is their ticket to victory as support for hard right conservatism is even less north of the border. After all, Pennsylvania is still more conservative than most parts of Canada.

BC Election, Ontario PC race, and Liberal convention

2009-04-20T18:06:00.000-07:00

BC Election

On May 12, 2009, British Columbians will go to the polls to decide whether to re-elect Campbell for a third term or put the NDP back into power. As someone who joined the BC Liberals back in 2001 and has never waivered on my support, I fully support the re-election of the BC Liberals. Being in the midst of the worse recession since World War II, putting a party in power whose economic credentials are quite poor would be disastrous. If the economy was doing well, we might be able to get away with electing an NDP government although it would still be a bad choice. Campbell is far from perfect and has made his mistakes, but clearly BC is far better off than in 2001 and he is taking the province in the right direction. In 2001, he promised to balance the budget and cut taxes and turn BC's economy around and he never waivered even when his poll numbers fell and there were massive protests. After being re-elected he offered signing bonuses for unions who signed contracts ahead of schedule, which helped bring about labour peace in a province where labour strife was quite common. And this was done after the fact many of those unions spent millions of dollars trying to get him defeated. Unlike Harper, he didn't try to punish those who opposed him. On the environmental front, he showed leadership with his carbon tax. Campbell is truly a leader as when he says he is going to achieve something, nothing will stop him from following through and this is the kind of leadership BC needs. By contrast Carole James may be a nice person, but her policies are completely out to lunch. She wants to scrap the carbon tax and replacing it with a cap and trade system which works but not as well. Has no plan to balance the budget when the economy starts to turn around. She wants to put a moratorium on independent power producers despite the fact these create jobs and help meet BC's energy needs and tries to put the whole fear of private power when the BC Liberals have not privatized BC Hydro and will not. Besides the NDP had no problem with IPPs in the 90s, so this smacks of pure populism and opportunism, not sound policy. She plans to tax the exports of all raw logs when in reality this is being dishonest as only logs harvested on provincial crown land can they control. Those harvested on private land fall under federal jurisdiction. While I am no fan of raw log exports, I do think we should be allowed to export our surplus (otherwise what can be produced locally should be, but what cannot can be exported). I will have more on the BC election as we got closer to voting day. The BC Liberals have a solid lead in the polls, but it would be very foolish to automatically assume they will win. They have a definite advantage, but an NDP win is still possible. For starters, the NDP base is far more motivated to show up and they are far better at bring their supporters to the polls, so it is important the BC Liberals get every supporter they can out. As for the BC Conservatives, they could be a bit of a problem in the Interior, although in the ridings they ran in last time around, the Liberals performed worse than the surrounding ridings, but so did the NDP so I suspect a good chunk of their vote will come from those who wouldn't vote otherwise. For example in Okanagan-Vernon, the BC Liberals got 43%, BC Conservatives 10% and BC NDP 33%, so yes the BC Liberals did worse, but the combined right vote was 53% which was higher than either Kelowna riding and both Kelowna ridings are more conservative than the Northern Okanagan Valley. Likewise in the two Cariboo ridings which went NDP in 2005, the Combined Liberal + Reform vote in 1996 was in the high 50s, as opposed to the BC Liberal support of high 40s suggesting not all Reform voters from 1996 went to the BC Liberals.

As for BC STV, I will have more on it later, but I voted No in 2005 and I would emphatically vote No again if I still lived in BC. If it is too confusing for a political junkie like me to understand, it is probably too confusing to your average voter. When I cast my ballot, I don't want to second guess how it was counted, which is exactly what happens under STV. Under FTFP, there is no ambiguity as to how one's vote is counted.

Ontario PC leadership Race

Below is a summary of the four candidates running for the Ontario PCs and my view on each

Christine Elliot:

She is best known as Jim Flaherty's wife and undoubtedly this will be a liability towards her chances. I am myself quite skeptical of having someone related to Jim Flaherty in power at another level, that being said being married to someone doesn't mean they have the same views. Marriage is about love, not about one's political preferences and in fact even in my family, not all members vote the same way and nor do they all have identical views so it is possible she has different views. In fact she strikes me as more centrist than her husband Flaherty. After all she is pro-choice and for same-sex marriage and she has argued the Common Sense Revolution is a thing of the past which Ontario should not go back to unlike her husband who still reminisces for those days.

Randy Hiller:

If you want to talk about a nutbar, this would be him. Its questionable whether the guy is even fit to be MPP, but certainly not premier. Being premier is a big job that requires a lot of responsibility and is not meant for your average Joe. It would be like having your average Joe be a CEO, doctor, or lawyer. He also would unnecessary pit rural vs. Urban Ontario. While I agree the government needs to do more to reach out to Rural Ontario, we don't need someone who is openly hostile to urban Ontario, where the majority of people live. I doubt he will win the leadership race though and certainly not in a general election as in both cases, the PCs need to do well in the 905 belt and he is exactly the type of person who would ensure it goes solidly Liberal. He may pick up a few seats in Rural Ontario, but this won't be enough. The federal Conservatives in 2006 won almost all rural ridings in Ontario yet still won fewer seats than the Liberals in Ontario. They only pulled ahead when the started winning in mid sized cities like Kitchener and London as well as some of the 905 suburbs.

Tim Hudak:

He is without question the front-runner and probably has the most experience of the four contenders. The problem with him is he strikes me as too much of a yesterday politician. Whether one agreed or disagreed with the Common Sense Revolution, it is clearly not the type of solutions Ontario needs now. While he could conceivably win in 2011, I suspect the Liberals will have plenty of ammo against him. Also a lot may depend on what happens federally as I suspect his chances of winning will improve if the Liberals win the next federal election as it seems Ontario likes to go one way federally and another provincially.

Frank Klees:

Definitely a dark horse candidate and don't really know a lot about him. Although the fact he started his campaign on TV with Charles McVety says a lot about the types he appeals to. As someone who finds Charles McVety a right wing lunatic (He is your Pat Robertson/Jerry Falwell of the North), I cannot say he is someone whom I am very impressed with.

However, regardless of who they choose, it will result in the party moving to the right, which I think is the wrong direction. The party should be a centre-right party not overly ideological as the right wing base may want to see the party go further to the right but their hatred of the Liberals is enough to get them to vote Tory and even if they do stay home, elections are won and lost amongst the swing Liberal-Tory voters, not the right wing base. Every vote the PCs take from the Liberals has twice the impact as every right winger who didn't show up in 2007, but did in 2011.

Liberal Convention

The Liberal convention is coming up very soon in Vancouver in which Michael Ignatieff will be crowned Liberal leader. Undoubtedly, many Liberals are buoyed by the recent poll numbers. Some Tories point out Dion had similiar numbers after winning the leadership race, although any Tory who assumes Ignatieff will face the same fate as Dion is being delusional. After watching the mistakes Dion made, I think Ignatieff will take greater caution to make sure they aren't repeated. By the same token, Liberals should not get too overconfident. Polls come and go in cycles so the Liberals should not assume they will automatically win the next election. Its still way too early to predict the outcome of the next election. We don't know what point in the recession we will be at when this happens, what type of platform the Liberals will propose as well as Ignatieff is still not well known to most Canadians so a lot can happen between now and then. The only likelihood is that it will probably be another minority government. I think a majority government for either party is extremely unlikely. With Harper being extremely unpopular in Quebec and having limited room for growth in English Canada, that puts a majority out of reach for him. Likewise for Ignatieff, a breakthrough in the West is highly unlikely. He should continue to woo the West, but this is to build a base there for three or four elections down the road, not the next one. That doesn't mean the Liberals cannot gain seats in the West, but not the amount they need to get a majority. And likewise sweeping either Ontario (as Chretien did) or Quebec (as Trudeau did) is unrealistic now with the existence of the Bloc Quebecois and the right being united.

Tory loses by-election and resigns

2009-03-09T17:26:00.000-07:00

Last Thursday, John Tory lost the by-election in Haliburton-Kawartha Lakes-Brock, which is a rural riding located in Central Ontario. This is one of the safest Conservative ridings in all of Ontario, so if he cannot win there, I don't know where he can win. This has been in their top 10 best showings in Ontario for the Conservatives both federally and provincially in recent elections. In addition, I generally believe that when a leader performs below expectations in a general election they should resign. Tory didn't need to win the election to stay on, but he certainly needed to perform better than he did. So I think what happened was simply long overdue. However, getting rid of Tory will not automatically bring the Ontario PCs back to becoming a strong contender for power in 2011, in fact his loss may have put the party in a lose-lose situation. Unfortunately, it appears much of the party brass feels the party needs to move to the right to win the next election and return to the Harris era of smaller government. This may make the base happy, but will make winning the election in 2011 far more difficult. Now it is quite possible the party could choose a moderate such as Elizabeth Witmer, in fact that would be my pick. The party simply needs someone with Tory's moderate views, but better political judgement. Bill Davis was a moderate and was quite successful in winning elections so this nonsense that only right wing Tories can win is just that. If anything, the recent economic crsis has probably made people more wary of smaller government as many rightly or wrongly blame lack of government oversight and regulation for causing it. So why would they want someone who advocates the same ideology they believe caused the mess? I know some will say this was not the reason, but that is besides the point, whether it was the reason or not, most in the public believe it was the reason. Also simple math and understanding of electoral politics would show why choosing a moderate leader, not right wing one would increase their chances of winning the next election. The right wing base contend Tory lost due to the fact many of them stayed home. While it is true that this may have contributed to him losing really badly, it is highly unlikely that a better turnout from this group would be large enough to overcome the gap between the Ontario PCs and Liberals. As noisy as they may be, this group is far smaller than most right wingers claim it to be.

How the Ontario PCs will win the next election is two fold

1. Attract more Liberals and Green voters
2. Ensure the NDP and Green vote splits enough of the Liberal vote to win

By staying close to the centre, they can appeal to many Blue Liberals as well as some right of centre Green voters who simply voted Green Party due to their dissatisfaction with both McGuinty and Tory. Moving hard to the right will ensure those voters don't switch to the Ontario PCs. This will also achieve the second objective as with a moderate Tory, NDP and Green voters are likely to have little to fear in electing in a PC government, so they won't feel the need to vote strategically. When Bill Davis was in power, the NDP was far stronger than when Mike Harris was in power in part because many NDPers were quite content to have Bill Davis win over his Liberal opponent, whereas in the 90s, many NDPers voted strategically Liberal simply to kick Harris out of office (albeit they failed). If they choose a right winger, the centre-left vote will likely coalesce around the Liberals like it did under Harris and that might work if the PCs can get above 45% as Harris did, but won't work if they only get 40% of the popular vote which is far more realistic for them. By contrast with a moderate Tory, 40% would probably be sufficient enough to get a majority government. The reality is moderate Tories have a lower floor in terms of votes than right wing ones since they fail to energize their base, but they also have a higher ceiling than right wing ones due to their ability to appeal to swing voters. A party that simply wants to exist as a perennial opposition party may focus on its floor more than ceiling such as the NDP, but one that wishes to form government should focus more on its ceiling rather than floor.

I am a Liberal federally, but as a former Progressive Conservative federally, I would happily vote for the Ontario PCs if they choose someone moderate like Elizabeth Witmer, but not likely if they choose a Harrisite such as Tim Hudak and definitely not if they choose a right wing knuckle dragger like Randy Hillier. That is not to say cutbacks and privatization may not be necessary after the recession is over if the deficit becomes too large in which case another Harris style government may be needed, but this should only be done if absolutely necessary, not as a first option and having not seen how bad the recession will be, how quick and how soon recovery will come, or how much the debt will grow, it is premature to comment on the type of cuts and privatization that may be needed if any at all.

Budget and death of "Conservatism"

2009-02-01T10:53:00.000-08:00

It appears the budget will pass, albeit with one caveat, the government present updates 3 times a year on its progress and at anytime it can be defeated. Although my preference was to amend the weaknesses in the budget, this is not a bad idea as its keeps Harper on a short leash and prevents him from returning to his previous style of government. Also for the Liberals it allows them to focus on re-building and increases their chances of winning the next election. Right now, I don't think they could win an election, but as the recession wears on and as Michael Ignatieff becomes more known to Canadians, I think a Liberal win, while difficult no matter what, becomes more plausible. The coalition is also dead, which I am pleased to see as while I think it was a good threat to keep Harper in check, allowing the NDP to be part of government and the Bloc Quebecois to hold the balance of power would be bad for Canada. Neither party has ever formed government and they both appeal to a much narrower base, one geographic and one ideological. Since the Liberals have formed government in the past and plan to in the future, they will make realistic promises rather than pie in the sky ones. It does look like Ignatieff has one problem which is at least 2 and possibly up to 6 MPs from Newfoundland & Labrador. Danny Williams is furious at the budget and wants the 6 Liberal MPs to vote against it unless amended. I don't think one province should hold the whole country hostage, but I don't think his demand of a one year moratorium on equalization changes is totally unreasonable. At least this buys time to do a more thorough analysis. Up until now, I have been generally supportive of Newfoundland & Labrador's demands, but this was when it was still a have not province. The idea of a have province still receiving money beyond regular transfer payments just doesn't seem right to me. That being said the equalization formula has been so bent out of shape that it was bound to create problems. My solution would be to have an independent panel make the recommendations and even make them binding on the government so that why we could remove the politics from equalization. And also if Canadians were more mobile and we had a more centralized government we probably wouldn't need equalization as the programs it funds would be handled by the federal government as well as when one region has more people than jobs available while another has a labour shortage, the people would move from where the labour surplus is to where the labour shortage is. Most European countries such as France don't have it as they have a very centralized government, whereas the United States has a highly mobile population. Still both are unrealistic and until such time as they are achieved, equalization needs to stay in place.

The other issue is many Conservatives are screaming mad at the fact Harper introduced a non-Conservative budget. I would argue they need to brush up on both their understanding of our parliamentary system and Canadian history. I can assure them that if Harper had a majority government he would have introduced a truly Conservative budget, the only reason he couldn't is he would have been defeated and the coalition would have likely formed. Under our parliamentary system, one must get the majority of MPs onside to pass any legislation. The Conservatives have a plurality of seats not a majority. So it is not possible under our system to introduce a "Conservative" budget. Besides Harper like most complaining about him was a Reformer, not a Conservative. And Conservatism in the Canadian sense is very different than what most complaining are advocating. They are advocating neo-conservatism, not conservatism. Conservatism comes from the word "conserve" and it is about putting the interest of the community ahead of the individual and preserving government institutions. Joe Clark, Bob Stanfield, and Bill Davis were conservatives; Stephen Harper, Mike Harris, and Preston Manning are not. They are ones who advocate implementing American style conservatism which is simply a meshing of classical liberalism and social conservatism, both ideologies which have little in common with each other and were largely combined in the US for the goal of creating permanate Republican majorities as the South is predominately socially conservative whereas the Midwest and Mountain West are more libertarian. Thankfully that coalition was eventually blown apart in the US. Also Canada has always been a fairly centrist country and likely always will. As a country that is both diverse in culture and regions, running it successfully requires compromise and consensus, something that neither right wing nor left wing ideologues seem to understand or believe in. That is why Canada is one of the few countries in the Western world asides from the US to have never elected a socialist government nationally and also never elected a majority neo-conservative one federally. About 20% of Canadians are right wing ideologues and 20% are left wing ideologues, but the remaining 60% are close to the centre. Some lean a bit to the left, some a bit to the right, but they are largely not highly ideological and pragmatic. Otherwise one cannot form government without appealing to this group which is why the NDP has never formed government since they only appeal to the left wing ideologues and why the Reform Party couldn't win elections since they only appealed to the right wing ideologues. For those referring to Reagan, Thatcher, and Harris, I can easily explain why neither can win in Canada right now.

1. Reagan - The United States was founded as a country on individual liberty and limited government. Smaller government is in their blood, whereas here in Canada it has never been a dominate ideology. In addition things tend to go in cycles in the US and if anything the recent financial crisis has probably made those policies not so popular. Also, the Republicans largely only appealed to White America and as this demographic shrinks, their ability to win will become more difficult unless they can expand their appeal to African-Americans and Latinos, which they have failed to do. And never mind White America was never monolithic as usually only 50-60% would vote Republican while 40-50% would vote Democrat. However, today even 60% of the white vote may not be enough to win for the Republicans.

2. Thatcher - In many ways she simply cancelled out Labour's hard swing to the left. The Labour party in 1979 was to the left of the NDP today. Major industries were being nationalized, taxes were way higher, unions were out of control in terms of their power and militancy, and government was far larger than it is here in Canada. Once the Labour Party moved towards the centre under Tony Blair, the Thatcherites stopped winning and the Conservatives are only in the lead in the polls in Britain again since their current leader David Cameron is farily centrist himself. If Jack Layton were prime-minister for three terms, I suspect Canadians would be open to electing a Thatcher style government. In fact I suspect that is why the Tories want the Liberals destroyed so badly since they know if the NDP is their main opponent, they can move further to the right as there would be no centrist option. As long as the Liberals exist and remain a centrist party, the Tories will have to stay to close to the centre if they want to win.

3. Harris - In 1995, Bob Rae was extremely unpopular and Harris was the antithesis of the Rae government so he won largely as a backlash to the Rae government. In 1999, the economy was doing very well in Ontario thinks to the strong economy in the US. Since most people were better off in 1999 than 1995 that is why Harris was re-elected. If there is any politician he should thank for his re-election, it is Bill Clinton. Also, even if we take the dubious assumption Harris could still win in Ontario, this would still put the Tories will short of a majority. The policies he advocated would ensure a near wipe out in Atlantic Canada and Quebec which have 1/3 of the seats. In fact rural Southern New Brunswick and the Appalaches-Chaudiere are about the only right wing areas east of the Ottawa River. So that means such a leader would have to make up the ground in Western Canada and Ontario and I doubt they could do that.

That being said, I see this as a positive development. The Tories overflowing cash largely came from their right wing base not the centre-right voters they were trying to appeal to, so this means they likely won't have the same monetary advantage. But more importantly, if Harper fails to win a majority, he is gone as leader, and if the right wing base deserts the party, the next leader will hopefully be a more moderate one who Canadians won't have to fear and one I might even be willing to vote for. Besides, I've always argued as Roger Gibbs from the Canada West Foundation argued that for every hard right vote you lose, you pick up five moderates. And I doubt the right wing base will vote for any other party since as mad as they are at Harper, where else can they go. Joe Clark won this vote in 1979 and 1980 and he openly despised them and did nothing to appeal to them, but they voted for him since as much as they hated him, they hated the alternatives more. Also in Alberta, Peter Lougheed who was a Red Tory won the biggest landslide of any Tory premier and in this is in the heart of Conservative country so if anything moderate conservatism versus ideological conservatism probably is more successful throughout the country. Never mind here in Ontario, Bill Davis is still extremely popular, while Mike Harris remains quite controversial so it seems people like moderate consensus builders not conquere and divide ideologues. Bill Davis is liked be people across the political spectrum while Mike Harris is hated with a passion by those on the left and disliked by those in the centre and only well liked by those on the right. After all, as a Conservative you may never get the left wing vote, but if they don't hate you, they probably won't spend a lot of money and time trying to see you removed from office, whereas if you are a right wing ideologue they will do everything possible to see you get defeated and since Canadians generally don't like confrontation, it usually results in the right wing ideologue losing even if people don't care much for the left wing opponents. From what I have seen of Stephen Harper he is very much a right wing ideologue, he is just more patient than his base as his goal is to build a right wing Canada 20-30 years down the road not instantly as if you move the country incrementally to the right it is more likely succeed than if you go too fast.

Budget

2009-01-27T21:47:00.000-08:00

I haven't had much time to look through every single detail, but based on what I have seen, I believe it goes in the right direction, but still has plenty of room for improvement. I am glad to see EI rules loosened, more money infrastructure, but I also feel that permanent tax cuts for the middle class should be held off until the economy starts to recover. We do need tax cuts in the long-run, but since most will simply save the money it does little good, so better to what until we enter the phase of recovery. Also the size of the deficit is quite worrisome. Bad policies in the past years when the economy was good was what led to where we were at. Voting against the budget would be foolish, but I don't think the Liberals should support it without at least some changes. My suggestion is offer an amendment to correct the deficiencies and should the Tories support the amendment, then vote for it. Another election or a coalition are less than ideal and should be avoided if possible and based on this budget I don't think either are necessary. At the same time voting for it without changes will give Harper the impression he can continue his old ways. He has already caved on many aspects and I think a reasoned amendment that improves the budget, but doesn't radically alter it would be the best solution. Based on the various leaks, which I find unreliable, this seems to be the direction the Liberals are heading, but lets wait and see. I am at least glad the party hasn't just come out against the budget like the NDP and Bloc Quebecois have, mind you the Liberals have formed government before and plan to again so they don't want to make unrealistic demands that they could never deliver on, whereas the NDP and Bloc Quebecois can make ridiculous demands as they know they won't ever form government.

Tomorrow's Budget

2009-01-26T16:20:00.000-08:00

The Conservatives bring down their budget tomorrow and on Wednesday we will find out the fate of the minority government. While it is almost a certainty the NDP and Bloc Quebecois will vote against the budget, the Liberal position is far from certain. The burden falls on them to make the right judgment. Having another election, forming a coalition, or letting the budget pass all contain risks and so I am glad to see the Liberals will take a wait and see attitude and not make a decision without putting some careful thought into it. The stakes are too high to play games. As for what should be in the budget, below is what I personally would like to see in the budget.

We are in a recession and so government's primary job should be trying to find a way to kick start the economy and at the very least minimizing the impact of the recession. Although, I normally oppose deficits, I believe that right now running a deficit is appropriate, however it should be a modest, not large one and one that will return to a balanced budget once the economy recovers. Otherwise, it should be a cyclical deficit, not a structural deficit. Some government spending is needed to kick start the economy, but overdoing it can carry many risks too so it is important to spend wisely and spend in areas that will have the greatest impact. Our infrastructure is in bad need of repair so I believe more funding for infrastructure should be a top priority as this will create jobs and also deal with areas that needed to be dealt with anyways. The main problem here is that in the past, there has been too much bureaucracy and it has taken way too long for the projects to get going, so by the time they get started the recession would be over. It is important the shovels are in the ground in the shortest time possible. I support loosening the EI rules as unemployment rises, but to ensure this doesn't cause a permanent drain on the treasury, I would support imposing a sunset clause of 2-5 years at which point it would revert back to the old EI rules unless renewed. More money for training and skills as many of the job losses are in dying industries so now is the time to help re-train workers so they can find jobs in new industries as when one industry goes under, new ones develop. A modest tax cut should also be offered but it should be aimed at low income Canadians and should be one that encourages spending not saving. Any tax cuts to the middle income and wealthy should be done in the form of tax credits for large purchases (i.e. homes and cars) as encouraging people to make more large purchases also stimulates the economy. Likewise business tax cuts should be for capital so that it encourages businesses to expand not save. Major tax cuts that lead to structural deficits should be avoided. Likewise another GST cut is a bad idea since had the Tories left the GST at 7%, our deficit would be much smaller than it is now. Bailouts for firms should be done sparingly and should have strings attached to them and only if firms comply with conditions should the money be available. In normal conditions, I would oppose bailouts under any circumstance, but under today's economy I suppor them in limited circumstances, but with conditions. In the case of the auto industry, they should bring wages in line with the Japanese automakers and be required to make more green cars and smaller compact cars, not more SUVs.

As for how the Liberals should vote, I believe they should consider one of three options depending on what is in the budget.

1. If the budget is totally unacceptable and does little to deal with the sliding economy, then vote against it and take the chance of an election or coalition (my preference is an election, although a coalition may be acceptable as an absolute last resort, although it should be no more than a year without going back to the public)

2. If the budget heads in the right direction, but needs some improvement, introduce an amendment to deal with its deficiencies and if the Tories support the amendment, the Liberals should support the budget, if they oppose it, they should oppose it.

3. If it is very similiar to the Liberals own planned budget, the vote for it without amendments.

In the case of the Bloc Quebecois, I cannot see them getting what they want. They only were able to vote in favour of the first two budgets as Harper dumped loads of money towards Quebec as the Tories believed their majority came through Quebec. If the last election showed the Tories anything, any future possible majority will come through Ontario, not Quebec. Finally for the NDP, the ideological difference between them and the Tories is so large that it would be next to impossible to support the same budget without one party caving on their principles. I am aware that grand coalitions between Conservatives and Social Democrats are quite common in Europe (i.e. Germany today) but usually both the Conservatives and Social Democrats are more centrist than their counterparts here in Canada, thus making it possible. Besides the NDP is a perennial opposition party that is about promoting a certain ideology and pulling the country in their direction, not about actually forming government, whereas the Liberals are about actually forming government, so they play a different role.

Obama is finally president

2009-01-20T18:19:00.000-08:00

Although we knew this day was coming for the past 10 weeks, it has finally arrived and Obama is finally the 44th president of the United States. Today was largely a day of celebration, while tomorrow the hard work begins. Obama no doubt faces some daunting challenges both on the home front and global front. Still although he may be entering the White House at a less than ideal time, this is a time when we need strong leaders and I believe Obama is the right person to lead the country through this difficult time. Many people argued Obama's great speeches, charisma, and call to unity were symbolic and meaningless when it came to how he would argue, but I would argue that if we are going to make it through the current crisis, one thing the US and the world needs is a strong sense of unity and willingness to work together. Under Obama, he can help bring people together rather than polarize the country. Polarizing a country is never good, but it is especially bad during a recession. I don't expect Obama to be a messiah and I do expect he will make some mistakes as every president has and any human being would, but for me the main question will be in 2012, is the United States and the world better than it is now or worse. I am quite confidence the former will be the answer and that is ultimately how I will judge Obama's presidency.

Today was also a historic one in many cases as Martin Luther King Jr's dream of creating a society where people would be judged by the content of their character not the colour of their skin became reality. Some will say race should be a total non-issue, but I would argue the election of an African-American president is a big one when one considers the United States history. As recently as the 60s, many Southern states still had segregation laws that required Blacks to use separate facilities that were often of poorer quality and used literacy tests and various other methods to keep as many Blacks as possible away from the polls. This is no doubt a shameful part of American history, but the fact they can move beyond that to one day elect a Black president shows the ability of the nation to change and that no matter how many awful things it does, it has the power to do much good and more importantly the power to correct its mistakes. I can fully understand why for some many Blacks not just in the United States, but globally this is such a historic moment. Many who had grand dreams always faced the worry that they could never achieve those dreams not because they weren't capable, but simply because of the colour of the skin and the way society judged them for that. With the inaugration of Barack Obama, this has sent a message to Black people (and people of all races as a matter of fact) than you can reach dreams if you have the will and the desire and that the colour of your skin will not act as a barrier. While the effects of this may not be known immediately, I think this will give a strong sense of hope to many Black people who simply felt their colour of their skin held them back from reaching their full potential, but now it is shown this is a relic of the past and that the future is wide open. I especially understand how emotional this must be for many older African-Americans who saw first hand the horrors of racism, segregation, and Jim Crow Laws. To many, this is a sweet vindication that their struggles for equality and freedom have paid off and as painful as they were at the moment, the day that Martin Luther King Jr's dream would be realized would come in their lifetime. I remember when I was only 13 how a big a deal the election of Nelson Mandela in South Africa was, so I think the election of someone from a race who historically faced much discrimination and injustices is truly historic and something to be proud of. Here in Toronto, many in the Black community were rejoicing at this moment and certainly for many, the history of facing discrimination is all to real, even here in Canada.

Like any historic moment, the question asked is always where were you? Today, I decided to take my lunch break early at 11:50 saw I could watch Obama's swearing in and his speech when they actually happened. We had a television in our lunch room so that is where I watched out and many others where I worked were also there to watch this historic moment. While the swearing in seemed to have a few hitches, his speech hit the right notes. In may have not been his best in style, but when looking at the substance, he said the right things. Now he needs to deliver on those and all the evidence I have seen today suggests he will.

Bush Legacy

2009-01-19T17:04:00.001-08:00

In less than 24 hours, Bush will no longer be president of the United States, which all I can say is good riddance. He was without question one of the worse presidents in US history, although I am skeptical to say he is the worst ever, rather I would say he is the worst in the last 100 years. In the 1800s you had some pretty bad presidents such as James Buchanan who advocated the expansion of slavery and you also had several cases of unprovoked attacks on foreign countries such as the Mexican-American War, Spanish-American War, War of 1812 etc. However, attacking countries unprovoked was the norm in the 1800s and widely accepted and likewise done by many other countries. So in the absolute sense he maybe wasn't the worst, but when one considers how much we have evolved as a society over the past 100 years, saying he is the worst ever in a relative sense, is something I would wholeheartedly agree with. So below I will summarize his legacy. Obviously only time will tell how he is judged, but I highly doubt he will be vindicated. If anything, I wouldn't surprised if he is judged far more harshly in 30 years when the classified documents become available and the full extent of how bad the government was is revealed. Even Nixon at least did some good things as president, whereas with Bush, it is hard to find anything good he did. While he may have done a few good things, they were mostly minor policies and almost every major issue, he was on the wrong side of the issue.

Foreign Policy

On September 11, 2001, the United States faced a horrible attack in New York City, Washington, and Pennsylvania. Much of the world was sympathetic to the US and even many countries that normally had cool relations with the US were fully behind it. As one French paper read "we are all Americans". This was a time when Bush could have united the world behind the US, but instead of uniting the world, his reckless foreign policy increased anti-Americanism to all time highs and brought public opinion of the US to all time lows globally. Whatever sympathy the world had for the US after 9/11, he did everything to ensure it disappeared. The decision to attack Afghanistan to hunt down Bin Ladin was the right one which even Obama fully supports. However, rather than going after Bin Ladin who the culprit behind 9/11, Bush became focused on Saddam Hussein, who was a brutal dictator, but had nothing to do with 9/11 and posed absolutely no threat to the US or any of its allies. In the lead up to the Iraq War, Bush used blatant lies to try and make the case for invading Iraq. Traditional allies like Canada, Germany, and France who refused to sign on, were threatened with retaliation and made clear that there was no accepting of those taking different views. After failing to get a UN resolution, the US went and attacked Iraq anyway which was a violation of international law. An attack on a sovereign country is only permissible under two circumstances: it is in legitimate self-defence or it has UN authorization and in which case Iraq met neither. After Iraq was invaded, the US had no plan to deal with the aftermath. Instead Bush had this delusional idea the Iraqis would welcome them as liberators. Instead, the country has fallen into chaos, terrorism has risen, and as bad as Saddam Hussein was, in many ways Iraq is even worse off. This also costed massive amounts of money that could have been much better spent elsewhere. He also showed blatant disregard for both the Geneva Convention and the US constitution. Whether it be Abu Gharib or Guantanamo Bay, these were both examples of blatant disregard for both the above. In fact the whole reason Guantanamo Bay was located in Cuba, not on US soil, is because such place would violate the US constitution and would be ordered shut down by the courts. As awful as terrorists are, every person deserves the right to a fair trial, legal counsel, and the presumption of innocence until proven guilty. Even the most brutal serial killers are given this and so should terorrists. I don't condone terrorism and nor do most others, however, mistakes can happen and people can be accused who are not guilty, which is why the US constitution has the position of innocent until proven guilty and the right to a fair trial. In addition, one does not defeat terrorism by descending to their level. In the meantime, rather than hunting down Osama Bin Ladin, he is still free. In the mean time civil rights at home have been frequently disregarded and he created a culture of fear and division

Domestic Policy

If Bush was a disaster on the foreign policy, he was equally bad on domestic policy. In fact it was domestic policy more so than foreign policy that turned public opinion in the US so strongly against him and why he has one of the lowest approval ratings ever of an outgoing president. In 2000, the US had a strong economy and a surplus. Under the Bush presidency, the national debt doubled for $5 billion to $10 billion and their current account deficit also increased. Bush advocated deficit financed tax cuts mainly targeted towards the wealthy. Tax cuts for the wealthy are not wrong in themselves, but should only be done if the country can afford to do so, which clearly the US could not and tax cuts should go to those of lower and middle income Americans before the wealthy. He created the patriot act which violated many Americans rights and wiretapped phones without a warrant which also is a violation of the US constitution. The sheer incompetence of his presidency was no more evident than during Hurricane Katrina were the response of a terrible natural disaster was slow and inadequate. Likewise, his love for de-regulation partly played a role in creating our current economic mess. Excessive regulation is a bad thing, but that doesn't mean you blindly de-regulate everything, rather it is about balance which the Bush administration lacked. While the economic downturn is not solely Bush's fault, his actions did more to make it worse rather than alleviate it. On social issues, Bush also was a strongly divisive figure who wanted to stack the court with conservative judges who would overturn socially liberal laws that Conservatives hated. I agree that judges should follow the letter of the law, but that also means upholding the constitution, not finding ways to ignore it when it doesn't suit one's ideology. He even tried to pass an amendment to ban gay marriage. This is not an issue of him supporting or opposing gay marriage which reasonable people can agree to disagree on, rather it is a complete pervision of the constitution. The constitution is about giving people rights, not taking away rights. On the environment, he was a disaster too. Pulling out of the Kyoto Protocol sent the wrong signal to the rest of the world, but considering the US has a long isolationist past and mistrust of international organizations, he could have at least shown strong leadership on tackling environmental problems without necessarily signing onto Kyoto. Instead he did absolutely nothing to deal with global warming and any progress the US made here was due to actions by state governments, not the federal government. Likewise he favoured drilling in the Alaskan Wildlife Refuge despite the fact this was an ecologically fragile area. Thankfully enough moderate Republicans in the senate broke ranks to defeat this. Rather than finding ways to end America's addiction to oil, he simply wanted to find more places to drill. He gutted several environmental acts too. There were many other disastrous domestic policies that I don't have time to list.

Canada-US relations

Many on the right argue Bush was a free trader and that he was good for Canada-US relations and things will get worse under a Democrat president. I would argue that relations between our two countries were the worst they've been in many years. While Canada and the US have traditionally had frosty relations as Canada has historically had a strong anti-American under current and the US back in the 1800s saw Canada as a mere extension of their country under their Manifest Destiny and Monroe Doctrine. However those days are now long gone and with our countries being increasingly intertwined, the days of hostile relations should be a thing of the past. Yet under Bush, he ensured either we had bad relations or if we complied with many of their wishes they would be bad for Canada. I cannot list all the bad parts in our relationship, but I will list just a few. It is true that Raymond Chretien's statement saying Canada would prefer Al Gore won and Francois Ducros calling Bush a moron were not appropriate diplomatically even if most Canadians shared this view. Still this was minor compared to how he treated us. The reality is he was unwilling to work with leaders who didn't share his worldview whereas a good president would understand the importance of good relations even if the leaders of the two countries do not share the same ideology. Obama certainly understand this, which is why I am sure he will get along well with whoever is in power in Canada, be it a Liberal PM, Conservative PM, or god forbid an NDP one. After 9/11, Bush toughened up the border security leading to long line-ups and some Republicans even called for building a border fence. When it comes to border security, it was the Democrats, not the Republicans who stood up for keeping the free flow between the two countries which is just as vital as free trade. In 1981 when I was born, Europe had long line ups and required one to carry a passport whereas between Canada and the US, line ups were short and usually only a few questions asked and only a driver's licence was needed. Today, their are long line ups, passports required, extensive checks whereas in Europe, they have abolished their border controls completely. Now I am not suggesting we should go this far, but the stricter checks were not necessary, especially considering none of the 9/11 hijackers came through Canada even though some Republican politicans repeated this falsehood. For all this talk of Bush being a free trader, we had relatively few trade disputes under the Clinton administration, however under Bush the softwood lumber dispute dragged on for six years and despite several court wins by Canada, Bush stated he would ignore them since the US was not bound by international agreements, they could do whatever suited their interest much as they did with other agreements. It was only in 2006, when Harper signed an agreement that placed an export tax on our lumber exports, restrictions on imports of softwood lumber and could be ripped up in 2 years time. The deal signed in 2006 was not a good deal as some claim, but clearly a bad deal. Some could argue the US was going to continue to fight us until the industry went out of business so we took the best deal possible. Whether it was the best possible or not, it was a lousy deal and would have never been necessary if he followed NAFTA. So for those claiming the Republicans are free traders and the Democrats are protectionist, the Republicans may talk the talk on free trade, but they don't walk the walk. Finally when Canada had a legitimate disagreement over the Iraq War, Bush made sure we paid for. We disagreed with Reagan on Star Wars and Apartheid and with Clinton on the Cuban Embargo Act, but we respectfully agreed to disagree and moved on and none of those cases we were punished for taking a different approach. Both Reagan and Clinton understood we were different countries and would sometimes take different approaches while Bush was unwilling to listen or learn about our side. The fact he still thinks he is well liked globally today shows how delusional he is and ignorant on foreign policy. After the Iraq War, Bush cancelled his visit to Canada, but instead visited with Australian PM John Howard at his ranch, who did back the Iraq War. This was an example of diplomacy at its worst and one former president Clinton rightly condemned. In late 2003, Bush released a list of countries eligible to apply for contracts in the re-construction of Iraq, but only those who either supported or at least didn't oppose the invasion were permitted to apply. This decision was called dumb by John Kerry and likewise Germany even threatened to take the US to the WTO over this as this violates WTO rules. The administration eventually backed down. But if there was any message from either of those two incidents, it was that countries were expected to blindly follow the US and those who dared to take different approaches, even if supported by the majority of their population, would pay. Most past presidents usually placed Canada as one of their most important allies, be they Republican or Democrat, whereas to Bush we barely registered on his radar. And when we played a big role in helping out in Afghanistan where the real threat was (and we did far more than the most so called coalition of the willing countries did) or took in the US planes on 9/11, he refused to even thank us, but rather showed contempt for us when we took different positions. Bush was not a friend of Canada and relations were not good with the US under Bush, not because of the Liberals being hostile to him (although this didn't help), but due to his actions. Obama may not be perfect for Canada, but I am almost positive relations will be far better under his administration than Bush. Tomorrow, I will post on Obama's first day (or at least half day) as US president. For all the bad things Bush did, hopefully this will be a lesson learned and at least we get a really good president to follow so for all the bad things the United States can do, it can do good things too. After all, when a country with a legacy of slavery 150 years ago and segregation only 40 years ago, can evolve to the point it can elect a Black president, this shows the ability of the country to change for the good. If Bush represented the ugly side of the US, Obama represents all the great things about the United States and hopefully he can once again restore their confidence domestically and their image globally.

Recent Events

2008-12-17T16:24:00.000-08:00

Its been a while since I have posted and a lot has happened here in terms of the domestic political scene, so below is my summary on what has happened and my personal views on it.

Coalition

I am glad to see that it is no longer a guarantee, but simply a possibility. Harper has become quite arrogant in the way he has governed and I agree the opposition needs to stand up to him when he oversteps things, but that does not mean that the alternative will automatically work. I don't buy the argument of an enemy of my enemy is my friend. Just because I don't like Stephen Harper doesn't mean I will automatically support any alternative. I would accept the idea of a coalition as a last resort if there is no other alternative. Otherwise keep the idea around to keep Harper in check, but only pursue it if it absolutely necessary. It contains many risks which should not be underestimated. The Bloc Quebecois is a legitimate party, however they are a Quebec only party and I believe that any national government should be one that governs for the benefit of all of Canada, not one particular region. We should focus on issues that united Quebecers and English Canadians, not ones that divide them and unfortunately in the past, all too often, the Bloc Quebecois has focused on issues that split the two. Likewise I am not very comfortable about working with the NDP. If they were like New Labour in Britain or their provincial counterparts in Saskatchewan and Manitoba, I would be far more comfortable working them as in those cases they may share the same ideals as the federal NDP, but they are far more pragmatic and less rigid in their ideology. Rigid ideology, be it left wing or right wing doesn't work and is especially undesirable at this time. In addition the Coalition contains other risks including regional alienation and lack of democratic legitimacy in the eyes of some Canadians. Considering how unpopular the coalition was in Western Canada, I worried this would only encourage further Western Alienation. Also this would be bad for the Liberals and NDP long term as both parties need to do well in the West if they wish to remain strong. Also, although the coalition is entirely legitimate within our parliamentary system, as recent polls, have shown, many Canadians don't understand our system very well and if the public doesn't like the idea, it is likely to backfire. Also being constitutionally legal, doesn't make it morally right in the eyes of all. Floor crossing is perfectly legitimate, yet many oppose this. Now I am not against the idea of coalitions neither do I see them as undemocratic, but I am aware that for those who don't follow politics closely, their views may be a bit different. Ideally, I would rather one of the following two things happen
1. Harper resigns as Conservative leader and they choose a new leader who is more moderate and more willing to cooperate.
2. We go to another election and hopefully with a new leader, the Liberals can win it and govern on an issue by issue basis like they did after the 2004 election or if the Tories win again, they will likely be forced to cooperate while they are in the process of choosing a new leader.

Both of these scenarios would be preferable to a coalition, but I understand neither two seem likely. Some say coalitions are the norm in other countries, but I should point out we don't have a history of them so just because it works elsewhere doesn't mean it automatically will here. Also coalitions in most European countries usually include the party with the most seats and also parties usually during the election will state who their preferred partner is, who they are willing to consider, and who they will not align with under any circumstance. Finally, Europe is not monolithically full of centre-left governments, in fact quite the contrary. At the moment, there are more countries with centre-right governments in Europe than centre-left so Europe is not the left wing paradise some like to think it is. In addition many coalitions in Europe, have parties on both sides of the spectrum such as in Germany amongst many others. In fact only a minority of countries in Europe have coalitions that are entirely right wing or entirely left wing, most are mix. Some also say, 62% voted for the coalition, but the reality is you cannot add the sum of separate parties and assume everyone who voted for each would vote for the combined. In 2000, the PCs + Alliance got 38% of the popular vote, but in 2004, the Conservatives only got 30%, otherwise uniting two or three separate parties does not result in the sum of the two. And if one looks at the recent polls, this seems to bear out as I have a tough time imagining the Tories getting around 50% in Ontario if the Liberals, NDP, and Greens run as separate parties, but as one, then it suddenly becomes possible.

Michael Ignatieff chosen as new Liberal leader

I think Michael Ignatieff is a good choice and he would make a good PM, so I am not at all opposed to him becoming Liberal leader, although I wish we had an actual race since as nasty as they can get, this would help rebuild the party. We all remember how nasty the race between Clinton and Obama was, however I would argue this helped the Democrats in the November election as it created more interest in the party resulting in new members and therefore more volunteers come election time. If the Liberals had a similiar type race, I believe it would mean more members, more money in terms of fundraising, and more volunteers for the next election since if the Liberals want to win outside their strongholds, they need to grow their members and have active supporters in all parts of the country. The only danger with such a race is if the infighting continues after the race is over. Otherwise have a strong fought leadership race, but once the leader is decided, then all sides should unite behind the leader. But now that Ignatieff is the leader, the focus should be on a full re-building of the party. That means not thinking about the quickest way back to power, but thinking long-term. Too many Liberals I fear are interested in short-term answers rather than long-term ones. The Democrats in the US spent eight years in opposition, but during that time, they went through a whole re-building process and were able to come back in areas few thought they could win in as they built up their organization from Coast to Coast. The Liberals need to do the same. Increasing the membership, donors, and building up strong riding associations in all 308 ridings is something the Liberals should remain committed to. The goal should be not just to take back power, but to be a truly national party that is competitive in all parts of the country. The party should also plant itself firmly in the centre, not on the left. They should try to appeal to both soft NDP and soft Conservative supporters as the party needs both if it wants to ever win another majority government. If the Liberals do end up forming a coalition, it is essential the coalition stay as close as possible to the centre and if the NDP are unwilling to do this, then go to an election instead and let them take the blame for wanting to govern by ideology rather than pragmatism.

Parliament Prorogued

Certainly what happened here sets a bad precedent and I fully understand why many were against this. That being said, I am glad parliament was prorogued. Anger on both sides was so strong that decisions were being made based on emotion, not reasoned thinking, so both sides needed a cooling off period. During union negotiations this is commonly done and often works as both sides take a step back and look at things rationally. Hopefully, come January, a workable solution, whatever it is, can be reached. That being said, I am dead set against Harper making any senate appointments. I think he should be required to secure the confidence of the house before he makes any senate appointments. If he insists on making them, though, he should at least ensure the opposition gets to appoint some members as well, otherwise no stacking the senate. If he agrees to have each party appoint senators in proportion to the seats they hold, this would be an acceptable alternative, so that would mean 8 Tories appointed and 10 opposition members. However, I would much rather we wait until after parliament returns and one party regains the confidence before any appointments are made.

Finally, turning South of the Border, I must say I have been quite impressed with the appointments Obama has made and I think the US has a very competent government in waiting. Four years ago, I talked about how proud I was to have the government we did and how glad I was I didn't have to have the government the US has, but today I almost wish we could trade our government for the US one in waiting. Unlike in Canada where parties are fighting and thinking about what is best for their party, the Obama administration has included Republicans and they are working cooperatively on trying to deal with the issues at hand.

Liberals win in Quebec

2008-12-08T17:39:00.000-08:00

The results are still trickling in, but it is clear that Jean Charest will win the election with a majority government this time around. I believe this is a good thing as during these difficult economic times, it is important to have stability and of the three leaders, Jean Charest is clearly the best leader to handle this. Mario Dumont is too inexperienced and his caucus is full of many erratic members which would be a disaster during these difficult economic times. Also interestingly enough, this cannot be good news for Stephen Harper as the ADQ was the party that was coziest with the federal Conservatives and it appears they will lose their official party status. The Parti Quebecois also has not the best track record on economic management as well as with our current difficulties federally, it is important to have a federalist in power provincially. If Ottawa is stroking the flames of separtism it is important they have someone provincially who can put them out. Also the PQ is generally social democratic in its policies which as we saw with the NDP in BC in the 90s and NDP in Ontario in 90s, this is not the best course. So I am pleased to see the Liberals win a majority in Quebec.

Why I reluctantly accept the coalition

2008-12-01T17:36:00.000-08:00

There has been lots of political drama over the last week and we still don't know for sure what the final results will be. Although it looks likely that the Harper government will fall on December 8th and be replaced by an opposition coalition, we are entering unchartered waters meaning nothing is for 100% certainty. So until things are decided one or another, I am limited in what opinion I can give, but as the coalition details become more clear, I can at least give my opinion as to what I would think if the coalition were to actually come to be. I don't support the idea of a coalition, but I accept it. There is a difference here as support implies I think it is a good idea, while accept means I am willing to live with it. The harsh reality is neither the option of keeping Harper in power or supporting an Liberal-NDP coalition backed by the Bloc Quebecois are ones I feel supportive of, but we are in a situation where what I desire is highly unlikely to happen. My ideal scenario would be Harper would resign as PM and the Tories would choose someone more moderate and concilatory such as Jim Prentice and therefore the Conservative government could continue or The Liberals would govern by themselves and present a strong economic plan that any party which opposed it would pay a price at the polls. But the unfortunate reality is neither scenario is likely to occur. So we must deal with what possibilities are on the table. Until today, I was dead set against the idea of a coalition. In the case of the Bloc Quebecois, I realize separtism is on the backburner so that is not a major issue for me, but I am dead set against policies that favour one region over another. Quebec is an important part of Canada and their concerns must be fully addressed, but so must every other region in Canada. The reality is a strong Canada is good for Quebec and a strong Quebec is good for Canada. Likewise I have seen the NDP in power in BC and the thought of them being in government terrifies me. I may dislike the Conservatives, but I would prefer them over them over the NDP. Why my views changed today is the Liberals did a decent job of assauging many of my concerns. The NDP will not get finance, treasury board, PM, or deputy PM and this is big for me. Had the NDP gotten any of those positions, I would have torn up my Liberal membership card in an instant. However, despite having 1/3 of the seats between the Liberals and NDP, they will only get 25% of the cabinet posts and nothing anywhere near finance. If anything this will probably deal more with regional issues as including them would give more representation to the West, allow Alberta to have at least one cabinet minister, and ensure the cabinet in Ontario is not solely in the GTA as with only the Liberals they would have no cabinet ministers (asides from the senate) in Alberta and few selections in the non-GTA parts of Ontario. However, this alone was not enough. What made a difference is the Liberals promised to only run a deficit through the recession (which we already have anyways) and return to a balanced budget at the earliest date possible. Also the $50 billion corporate tax cuts, despite earlier reports, will continue. I am shocked the NDP agreed to allow this to happen, but glad it will go through as rejecting this would be bad for the economy. The reality is I care what is best for the country, not for anyone party, so if the NDP have to sell out their principles to make this work, that is their problem. Also I think choosing Frank McKenna, John Manley, Paul Martin, and Roy Romanow on the economic advisory board was wise as all have shown they are prudent fiscal managers. John Manley and Frank McKenna are both Blue Liberals while Paul Martin was a strong finance minister despite his weaknesses as PM. Roy Romanow may be an NDP
er, but if anything he is more like the Labour Party in Britain than the NDP in Canada and considering Britain has done alright until recently I would hardly worry about that. At least he is a social democrat who has modernized unlike the most of the NDP.

Now I still have serious reservations about this coalition if it goes through and could still turn against it if things don't work out right. The three parties involved still have major policy differences and while it maybe easy to put those aside when you have a common enemy, that can change once the enemy falls off the radar. I hope for the sake of the country, the NDP doesn't go back to its usual socialist positions and the Bloc Quebecois don't go back to their usual favouring Quebec over the rest of Canada positions. But if they do, it is imperative the Liberals say no, even if it means another election and causing the coalition to collapse. If the other parties want to govern by ideology rather than pragmatism, let them expain that to the electorate, don't give into them. I also worry about this causing Western Alienation to increase. Most of my family lives in Alberta, I was born in British Columbia, and I currently live in Ontario so I am able to see things from both sides. The reality is many in Alberta will be enraged by this feeling that Central Canada once again decided to take away a government that represented them. Whether one agrees with these feelings or not, they must be addressed as the last thing we need is another national unity crisis. Likewise, I know this is perfectly legal and legitimate under the Westminster system, but the harsh reality is the West tends to be far more populist than the East and this will not be well received. That doesn't mean the coalition cannot proceed, but this must be kept in mind and their needs to be a plan to deal with it. I would suggest that once Harper resigns as Conservative leader, the party offer an olive branch to the Conservatives should they choose a more moderate leader. I would even be willing to form a three party coalition with the Conservatives if they were to choose someone like Jim Prentice. More importantly, the opposition should make clear that after the next election whichever party gets the most seats will be given a chance to govern even if a minority and this will only be done as a last resort when all other options are exhausted. Likewise developing policies that are good for the West may help deal with some of the problems too.

There is much debate whether this is legitimate or not. I understand it is perfectly legal, but I do agree that both sides have legitimate points. For me, the legitimacy is not an issue, I care what is best for my country. In fact I would be willing to support giving the Tories another chance if they could show they truly were willing to be more moderate and concilatory, so this is not an issue of party politics. We are entering tough times and regardless of who forms government, the time has come to put partisan politics last and country first. What is irnoic is that is what almost every other country is doing. Barack Obama has agreed to include Republicans in his administration while Labour PM Gordon Brown is working cooperatively with opposition Conservative leader David Cameron despite their political differences and despite the fact Labour has a majority in Britain, since both know it is the right thing to do in their country. Why can't we do the same. Ideally I would like to see all four parties work together cooperatively as each one has their share of good ideas and by working together you get better results than working alone. Unfortunately, Harper is more concerned about his partisan agenda than the good of the country and that is why he needs to go as PM one way or another. I am more than happy to accept him resigning as PM in replacement of a more moderate Conservative in return for letting the Conservatives stay in government, but either way he needs to go. It is ashame that this type of partisanship has to take place at the moment. I just hope that whatever the result is, we can move beyond the current partisanship.

As for what should be done. I agree Canada is in better shape than most other industrialized countries largely thanks to the policies of the Martin/Chretien government, but we are not immune. I think doing nothing is not an option, but the stimulus package should be very reasonable, not overboard. Spending yourself out of a recession will not work. At the moment I would suggest putting more money towards infrastructure and loosening the rules for qualifying for EI, but beyond that I would wait until we see how bad things are or not, but more importantly what the administration under Barack Obama does. The reality is what the US does will have far more impact than anything we do. If we decide to bailout the big three auto companies, but the US administration lets them go under, it will be wasted money, so I am not opposed to holding off on some things until Barack Obama takes office and puts his plan in place. But a good government would say this and would be in contact with the Obama transition team so that they could prepare a plan that was complimentary to it.

Regardless of the outcome, I hope Canada comes out the winner as neither option is fully attractive and we are in one of the worse situations in years.

Updates on the Canadian political scene

2008-11-29T11:04:00.000-08:00

We have had some pretty dramatic things happen in the last few days here in Canada. No doubt passions are boiling high on both sides. This is unfortunate as during a recession we need all parties to work together not pick fights and I hope after this ends, whatever the outcome, we see a more collaborative approach. Below I will try to give a non-partisan summary that at this objectively.

Those supporting the move to form a coalition claim it simply representing the will of the majority of people who didn't vote Conservative while those opposing it are claiming it is a coup d'etat, although both sides have a valid point, they should consider the other side for a moment and maybe we would get a more rational decision.

In Canada, we vote for individual MPs, not the prime-minister and the individual MPs colletively can decide whoever they think would be the best PM. If the majority decide someone from the opposition should be PM, that is perfectly legitimate and within their right in a Westminster parliamentary system.

On the other hand, those claiming this represents 62% need to be careful about saying this. The reality is each vote was for an individual party, not a coalition and no can say for certainty how the public would have voted had they known such coalition would happen. The reality is despite their similiarities, all three parties have some fundamental differences so although I am positive if they ran under a single slate they would get more than either did on their own and possibly win the election, it is unlikely they would get the sum of their votes as some Blue Liberals might find supporting a coalition with the NDP too much to stomach and likewise the Bloc Quebecois due to being a separtist party might be hard for some to support. It is true the Bloc Quebecois has largely put separtism on the backburner and I think that is the only reason the coalition is even plausible. In most countries where coalitions are the norm, parties usually give their preferred partner, who they would be willing to work with if that doesn't work, and which parties they would never consider. Since Canada doesn't have a history of coalitions no party addressed this, but either way I am sure it will be brought up next election and either it will be shown to be legitimate by the Tories losing seats or losing outright or the public will say it is not by giving the Tories a majority.

As for the Governor General, she has a number of options and lot will depend on the results in the next week. If the Liberals + NDP + BQ formed a formal coalition she would have no choice but to grant their request. If only the Liberals + NDP form a coalition, this would put them at 114 seats, 29 seats less than the Conservatives so she can only say yes if there is a written agreement from the Bloc Quebecois pledging support to such coalition. Finally she can exercise another discretion, which is refuse to dissolve parliament due to an election being so recent and also the fact we are in an economic crisis where an election would be harmful to the national interest. In that case she would ask the opposition to form government and if they could get the confidence of the house, they would form government, but if not, there would be an election. Although I am sure she faces a difficult decision, I am sure it will be one done based on constitutional precedence not her own feelings.

As for the precedence of this, it does have precedence in the King-Byng affair in 1926 as well as David Peterson's agreement with the NDP in 1985. Where this becomes unchartered territory is the fact Meighen actually beat King in 1926 in seats and was only not PM since he formed a coalition with the Progressive Party. Likewise in 1985, David Peterson won the popular vote and also the NDP + Liberals had the majority of seats and the Liberals were only four seats behind the Ontario PCs. This time around, the Liberals got significantly less votes than the Tories and significantly fewer seats, at the same time, never have we seen a prime-minister so partisan and confrontational and so vindictive towards his opponents. Also we are in an economic crisis, not a boom. If the economy was doing well, expect such a coalition would be far less likely to fly with the public. In fact that is probably why one never materialized in Harper's first term despite the fact he had far fewer seats.

Now as for what will happen, I don't want to make any bets. I think Harper likes being PM and suspect many of his new MPs, especially those who are in cabinet are probably giving him an earful on this, so he may very well blink, although the opposition could say too little too late. Also, public opinion could come out strong against this causing one opposition party to blink although I wouldn't count on that happening. I think that is what Harper is hoping for, but it seems if this has done anything, it has only polarized the nation further, not united it. Also I think the coalition has a very good chance of going ahead, but there are still many things to be worked out so whether it will be a short lived one that lasts only until next spring or one that lasts a few two years remains to be seen. The longer it lasts the issue of how it came about will fade from the public mind and the next election will be based on its performance not how it got there.

As for my opinion, I think Harper's arrogance got the better of him. He probably figured a leaderless Liberals having just fought an election and performed poorly wouldn't have the stomach to stand up to this. Also this time around, only 11 members needed to come down with the diplomatic flu. However, I think the Liberals reached their boiling point in which the bullying by Harper was too much to take and they were going to fight back. As for my preferable outcome, unless Harper makes changes to his economic statement, they need to not back down, but at the same time they shouldn't go ahead no matter what. As a Blue Liberal and a strong federalist, forming a coalition with the NDP and working with the Bloc is not something I am very comfortable with and in fact if such a coalition had existed on the ballot, I probably would have voted for a smaller party is neither option is desirable for me. I am a centrist, not a left winger, not a right winger and I feel both options stray too far from the centre. If Harper does back down on this, I hope he changes his tone dramatically, although my guess is he will go back to his own ways in about 6 months to a year when he has a better chance at getting the governor general to agree to a dissolution. By the same time, a Liberal-NDP agreement is somewhat worrying to me as well as relying on the Bloc's support. I don't mind helping Quebec industries and workers who are struggling, but all regions should be helped equally, no favourtism to one over another. If the NDP gets cabinet posts like environment or foreign affairs that is fine with me, but for heaven's sake, keep them as far away from finance as possible. This would be a disaster and if they get finance, I will have to reconsider my options. Harper has put partisan interests ahead of the country, therefore any replacement coalition must place country first and party last. Also, if this only increases Harper's chance at a majority next time around, I would look for a way out. Governing temporarily only to see Harper get a majority is not desirable. I would rather let him govern longer and then lose in the next election than the former.

Budget Update

2008-11-27T17:32:00.000-08:00

Today, Jim Flaherty brought down the fall update. With the opposition parties pledging to oppose it, we could be back in another election after having one only a mere 6 weeks ago. I highly doubt this will trigger an election, still I think the update clearly was provocative and should be changed.

As we enter a recession, now is time to put partisan interests aside and put the interests of the country and its people first and partisan interest lasts. We can get more done by working together rather than apart. In the US, both McCain and Obama in the last election talked about times when they reached across the aisle and throughout the world, parties of different political stripes are putting aside their narrow partisan interest. Unfortunately that is not happening here in Canada. I am not oppose to the fact the Tories do not include an economic stimulus at the moment, since in crisis like these I would rather the government take their time to consult and look things over carefully so we can get it right. The main thing is that the government is taking the economy seriously and taking action. Unfortunately it appears the Tories are asleep at the switch and don't seem to take the situation seriously. I also believe we should do as much as possible to avoid a deficit, but not at all cost, however, if we do go into deficit, it should be as small as possible and their should be a plan to get out of it as soon as we recover. My greatest worry is that once we go into deficit it could be many years before we come out. United States had a surplus when Bush entered office in 2001, but few today talk about it going out of deficit anytime in the near future. In fact the chances of the United States being in the black before 2016 are very low. The problem is once we get into deficit, the kind of changes that are going to need to made to get out of deficit will not be popular with the public and few governments will be willing to take the political risk involved with raising taxes or cutting spending. At the very least, we should only post a cyclical deficit, not go into a structural deficit. For those unfamiliar with the two terms, a cyclical deficit means that when the economy as growing at its normal rate, the budget will be balanced or in surplus and it will only fall into deficit when there is below average growth. A structural deficit means there is a deficit regardless of what part of the economic cycle one is in, even during a boom. Ontario right now has a cyclical deficit whereas the United States has a structural deficit.

On the issue of spending cuts, I am all for trimming the fat, but it should be done smartly and done on what is best for the country, not what is best for the party in power. Unfortunately, the governments decisions to cut funding to political parties seems to fit the latter. For one thing, this is only $36 million, so if not coupled with cuts elsewhere, it will make hardly any difference and considering an election would cost $300 million, it would actually save more to not do this if it avoided an election than to do it. This is clearly an example of the Conservatives wanting to knee cap the opposition parties so they can establish themselves as the natural governing party. I am not opposed to cutting the political subsidies if it involves spending cuts to all discretionary spending and it is in proportion with cuts elsewhere, but I do oppose doing it on its own. For one, thing I believe a strong healthy opposition is vital for a successful democracy. One party rule is not something anyone should want regardless of their ideological leanings. Also, this does not involve one subsidizing a party that they oppose. Each party gets $1.95 for every vote they receive, so otherwise your money is going towards the party you voted for, not towards a party you may not like. In fact I would argue this is the fairest way as it ensures every vote gets equal weight rather than giving an advantage to whichever party has more wealthy donors or most likely in the current case, whichever party has the most committed base. The Tories have a strong committed base who are happy to fork over much dollars, but many of those people hold views that are outside the mainstream of Canadian politics and donate precisely to move things in their direction, whereas those closest to the centre, they are happy with the status quo and have less incentive to donate. However, regardless of what one thinks here, this is a divisive issue when now is the time for parties to work together and now is the worst time to introduce divisive policies. Unfortunately, it seems Harper and many in his party do not know how to work with those with different views which I think if anything is just as big a problem as their views in themselves. If Harper held the same views as he does, but was more willing to work with those with different views, I would have a far less negative view of him.

As for what will happen, I think there are three possibilities. The most likely is one party blinks. This could be either by having 11 members not show up so it passes or the Tories realizing the opposition is serious about bringing down the government and realizing it could mean a coalition of the opposition without an election will cause them to back down. The other possibility is the government is defeated and we go to another election. This seems highly unlikely and I doubt any party actually wants this, but accidents do happen and it is quite possible we could get an election no one wants. I suspect much of the campaign won't be on the issues, but rather who to blame for causing an unnecessary election. The final possiblity which I think is more likely than the second is the opposition parties agree to back the Liberals and they are then able to go to the governor general and ask her to let the Liberals form the government. This would be unprecedented since although this has been done before in Ontario in 1985, David Peterson won the popular vote and had only 4 seats less than the Progressive Conservatives. With the Liberals having only half as many seats as the Tories, 26% of the popular vote, this would be entering unchartered waters. In fact I cannot think of any Western democracy where a party that finished 12% behind the first place party formed government. There are cases of the winning party getting less than 26% of the popular vote, but these are countries with far more parties than we have. For example, in the Netherlands, the governing party almost always gets under 30% of the popular vote, but there they have around 10 parties with seats, so a totally different scenario than in Canada. Never mind all of those that have had governing parties who win under 30% use proportional representation not first past the post. In addition, I highly doubt the Tories really want this since this would allow Dion to become prime-minister and considering how low they set the expectations of him, if he does a half decent job he might just win next time around, so this just might be a case of where Harper's ego ended up blowing up in his face.

For the Liberals, I would make clear that all members will be present for the vote, so the Tories cannot count on 11 members having the diplomatic flu. I would also make clear that we are willing to back the government if they agree to remove the plan to cut funding to political parties and promise to work cooperatively with the opposition an putting together a stimulus plan for the spring budget. In minority governments, all parties have to make compromises and this is a reasonable one and if the Tories agree to it, we back the update, if they don't we vote against it and accept whatever the outcome is.

US politics going forward

2008-11-16T16:22:00.000-08:00

Now that the US election is over, the hard work begins on where to go. In the case of president elect Barack Obama, he enters office under probably the worse conditions any president has since FDR, so he has a very difficult task ahead. Likewise expectations of him are very high. So the question becomes how will he satisfy all the groups who supported him and achieve his promises. With the economic downturn, his goal should be to achieve his promises by 2016, not necessarily in his first term as the next two years will likely be focused simply on getting out of the crisis the US economy faces. What he needs to do is at least get started on his promises once the economy begins to recover which in all likelihood will happen before 2012. In addition he needs to have a strong team and show strong competence during the recession. While most people generally don't take too kindly to their political leaders during a recession, that is not always the case. FDR governed during the great depression and was re-elected so the main thing is that Obama is able to show he is effectively dealing with the crisis. Also, he can always recover from low approval ratings if the economy starts to rebound. Reagan in 1982 and Clinton in 1994 both faced low approval ratings and in the case of Clinton in 1994, the Democrats suffered badly in midterm elections. Yet in both cases, the above leaders went on to be re-elected. Since things will be tough in the next few years, it wouldn't surprise me if the Republicans make gains in the 2010 midterm elections, which is why it was so important for the Democrats to make gains in 2008 so they can at least maintain control of both houses even if it is weaker than it currently is. He also needs to stick close to the centre. The areas Obama gained in are mostly moderate areas, not liberal ones so if he is too liberal, he will likely go the way Jimmy Carter did in 1980. However, I think after being in the wilderness for many years and having more losses than wins in the past 25 years, the Democrats have learned the dangers of being too liberal and therefore will govern close to the centre.

For the Republicans, it is a very different scenario. The once dominate GOP has been shattered and the strong coalition that Reagan built in the 80s has been blown apart. The question becomes where does the party go in order to regain its trust with the electorate. The GOP will some day return to power as no party ever stays in power forever, but it still remains to seen whether it will be soon or many years away. Many Republicans are already claiming the party was too moderate and needs to move even further to the right. This would be a completely dumb idea as most of the areas the party lost are moderate areas, not hardcore conservative ones. The reality is that many Americans are sick and tired of politics of division and governing by ideology rather than pragmatism. They want a party with principles, but one that can also deliver results and one that tries to unite people, not pit group against group. They would be best to focus more on the fiscal conservatism rather than social conservatism as this is very divisive and is not a major issue for most people asides from the white Evangelicals who are a large voting block, but not the majority (and also vote Republican anyways). For one thing, advocating balanced budgets and keeping spending under control might be a smart start as these are conservative principles that were widely discarded by the Bush administration. And these are ones that actually sell amongst the public. Either way, the good thing about the last election is it was a final nail in the coffin to ideological conservatism. The fact that one of the most conservative countries in the Western World turned its back on it should be a sign to all leaders in the democratic world that ideological conservatism is bound for failure. The Conservative Party in Canada would be well advised to take note of this, as it seems a large chunk of its members at the convention want to move the party to the right and back to its Reform roots. Likewise the Liberals could learn a lot from the Democrats. Besides better fundraising techniques, our party is too quick to write off certain regions of the country and certain groups when we need to appeal to Canadians from coast to coast not just in Toronto and Montreal. We also need to be a party of unity, not division and I feel some in the Liberals are too quick to label certain parts of the country and segments as un-Canadian who don't vote for them. This is what the Republicans did and we should not follow this route. The reality is if the Democrats can come within three points of winning in Montana and won in many rural counties of Michigan, Illinois, and Wisconsin, so there is no reason the Liberals cannot win in similiar areas directly north of the border. They simply need to do a better job of appealing to those people. If people see a party as hostile to their region or who they are, they won't even give the party a second look. But if the see the party as caring about them, they will give the party a serious look. And while not all will support it, some will. I will have more on the Canadian political scene in a later post when I get around to posting it.

US Election post-mortem

2008-11-06T18:41:00.000-08:00

If there was one word to describe the election two nights ago in the United States it was historic. While the fact the United States elected its first African-American president was undoubtedly the main reason many said it was historic, it was historic in many other ways too. And in fact it could possible turn out to be historic if this results in a political realignment much the way Roosevelt's victory in 1928 and Reagan's in 1980 did. 45 years ago, Martin Luther King Jr., had a dream that one day America would be a country where people would not be judged by their colour of their skin, but by the content of their character. And the results last night vindicate that for the most part (although not fully) this has happened. The reality is most Americans voted for who they thought would be the best president, not what his skin colour was. I supported Obama right from the beginning when few thought he even had a shot at winning the Democrat nomination and I supported him over Clinton and over McCain because I thought he had the best vision for the United States. I first saw him interviewed on Larry King about a year and a half ago and I when listening to his vision I was truly amazed. I was convinced this was someone who could do very good things if only he had a chance. I went on his website to check out his policies as some are great orators, but lousy politicians and sure enough I found many policies that I agreed with. I am a Blue Liberal myself so hardly some socialist and hard core lefty as some Republicans called Obama, but instead very much like a typical moderate voter even though I cannot vote in the US. I also saw in his senate race in Illinois how he not only won in Chicago where the Democrats usually pile up huge majorities, but won in the suburbs which lean Republican and the rural areas of Illinois which are solidly Republican. I figured if he could do this in Illinois, why not nationally and in many ways he did so. He not only picked up swing states like Florida, Ohio, New Mexico, Iowa, and Nevada, but picked up states few thought the Democrats could win 4 years ago. Colorado was seen as a real stretch while until the midterm elections, the idea of Virginia turning blue seemed impossible. But that wasn't it, he even won Indiana and North Carolina which a mere six months ago had someone told me those would be blue states, I would have said they were completely nuts. Clearly the idea of the Democrats being a bi-coastal party and only winning in the large cities is no longer the case. In many ways it is the Republicans who face the problem of not being a truly national party. Not only are the cities rejecting them, they are also losing in the suburbs and even rural areas are only narrowly voting Republican, not by the huge margins they use to win there. Also the fastest growing areas and the fastest growing demographics (Latinos, educated voters) are all turning away from the GOP. This doesn't mean the GOP is finished as a party. They still got 46% of the popular vote and can certainly come back much the way the Democrats did, but they will have to make major changes if that is to happen.

The loss for the GOP was partly over the unpopularity of the Bush administration, the economic meltdown and certainly Obama's outstanding campaign and strong appeal helped turn what should have been at least a narrow Democrat win into a Democrat landslide. However, there is another factor not talked about much here which I think happened. Whenever major shifts happen in the American political alignment, it is usually when one party shifts too far from the centre and loses touch with the average American voter. In the late 20s, the Republicans hands off approach to the economy and unwillingness to deal with the impending Great Depression led many to believe they were too right wing on economic policies so the Democrats were elected and remained the dominant party for many years to come. By the late 70s and early 80s, high taxes, excessive regulation, and excessive government intervention were all seen as not working. Reagan said government is not the solution, but the problem and this reasonated with many as despite the heavy levels of government intervention, the economy wasn't doing too well. In many ways the Democrats had swung too far to the left and they paid a price for this. Fast forward almost thirty years later and what looked like a permanent realignment in favour of the Republicans appears to have been shattered. During those thirty years, every victory the Republicans won only convinced the hard right elements that if they moved even further to the right they would win even bigger. This worked in the short-term, but it eventually blew up in their faces as the Republicans are simply too right wing for many in the US despite the fact the US is one of the most conservative countries in the Western world. The United States is still a centre-right country, but it is not a right wing country and that is where the Republicans messed up. Had they stayed a centre-right party rather than swinging hard to the right they probably wouldn't be in the mess they are today. If we look at the areas in each state Obama picked up that swung it in their favour (DC suburbs in Virginia, Denver suburbs in Colorado, I4 Corridor in Florida etc.) these are all moderate areas, not liberal, not conservative areas. Today the Democrats more or less occupy the centre while the Republicans don't anymore and I think that has a lot to do with the change that happened last night. Obama's policies of giving a tax cut to the middle class and lower income Americans as opposed to the very wealthy, using war as a last resort rather than first resort, and focusing on the economy rather than moral issues that pit community against community are all examples of him appealing the middle centrist voters. In fairness, McCain was initially a moderate, but his party had been hijacked by the hard right and if he wanted to keep the party united behind him, he really had no choice but to turn to the right. It was not just McCain/Palin that caused the results, it was the general rot within the Republican, the divisive tactics, and the ideological rigidity that hurt it.

Now that Obama has been elected, the tough part is going to be living up to expectations. Many people are very pleased he won and certainly globally, there is probably no day ever in history where America's image around the globe has changed so dramatically in 24 hours. But with high expectations, Obama will undoubtedly disappoint something. The important thing is that he moves the country in the right direction even if he doesn't get everything done. Also the good news for him is he won't face re-election until 2012 and his toughest decisions will likely come early in his mandate so although I expect his popularity to take a hit early on, Reagan and Clinton both faced the several problems after two years in power, yet both were handily re-elected. Also, the Democrats have a large enough lead in congress and the senate that it is unlikely the Republicans will regain control of either house in 2010 even if the Democrats do lose some seats, which will be a good thing for Obama. As for what direction he should take the country, I believe he stay as close to the middle as possible. The liberal areas of the US were already going Democrat to begin with, it was the moderate areas that put him over the top. Likewise the rejection of the Republicans was not people embracing liberalism, it was a rejection of neo-conservatism. Americans want a president who will unite people, not divide them, and who will govern based on what works not blind ideology. Drifting too far to the left would divide people and cause the same problems and governing by ideology be it left wing or right wing never works.

As for my predictions, it looks like I got two states wrong again (Indiana and North Carolina) so not bad in terms of my predictions and in both cases they were won by very narrow margins. Another interesting thing is the US for the first time ever had a higher voter turnout than Canada and while we had our lowest ever, they had their highest in over 100 years. Maybe this should give politicians an idea of what needs to be done to increase turnout. Likewise the Democrat gains in areas that seemed impossible 4 years ago shows the Liberals can rebound if they put their mind to it. In a span of four years, both countries have dramatically seen their political landscapes change, albeit in totally different directions. While the Conservatives have won many traditional Liberal strongholds and the Liberals are reduced to a shell of their former self, in the US the Democrats have won in many Republican strongholds who are reduced to a shell of their former self. This does not mean we are now a more right wing country. Harper got 38% while McCain got 46% so more still voted for parties on the right in the US than Canada and likewise 2/3 of conservative voters wanted Obama to win. But it certainly does mean in many areas are policies will be more conservative albeit the ability for any government to radically to change anything is difficult so we will still have tougher gun control laws and more public health care system than the US does despite having a more conservative government.

Since this is simply too much to discuss in one post, I will have more in the following days on how things shape up. The Democrats did gain in congress although it was not one sided like in 2006, but rather net gains and as expected, they lost seats in the South, but gained everywhere else. There are also still three senate senates that are uncalled including Minnesota which will be going to an automatic recount so a filibuster proof majority in the senate is possible but not likely.

Live Blogging US Election

2008-11-04T15:39:00.000-08:00

In less than 20 minutes, the first polls will close in several states. We have a few early polls in Kentucky and Indiana, but way too early to make any predictions. McCain is doing well in Kentucky, but Obama is doing surprisingly strong in Indiana and this is without any of the counties that voted for Kerry in 2004 reporting. The big states to watch are Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Florida. If Obama wins only 2 of those, that should be enough to put him into the white house. If he wins only one, then Colorado and Nevada will become crucial in determining who becomes president. The first states to close are Georgia, South Carolina, Virginia, Vermont, Kentucky, and Indiana. I expect them to call it pretty early in South Carolina and Kentucky for McCain while Vermont for Obama. I doubt they will call Indiana right away while Georgia leans McCain and Virginia leans Obama so depending on whether they call those right away or wait may be our first signs of what is to come. I plan to sign off at midnight at which point I hope Obama has won. I doubt he will win before 11:00 as he won't have enough electoral votes until the West Coast states close, but hopefully once Washington, Oregon, California, and Hawaii close, this will put him over the top. Alaska is largely irrelevant in the presidential election, although it could be pivotal in the senate as this could decide whether the Democrats get a filibuster proof senate or not. Unfortunately it closes at 1:00 AM which is too late for me to stay up so I will have more on the results tomorrow.

7:00 PM EST

So far CNN has projected that Obama will win Vermont and McCain will win Kentucky so no surprise here. At 7:30 Ohio, West Virginia, and North Carolina close. I doubt they will call North Carolina or Ohio immediately and maybe West Virginia for McCain, but all of them are probably too close to call. I have also seen the first exit polls and things are looking good in Indiana and Virginia so far, although I want to see if the results follow. Also Kerry only won four counties in Indiana last time around, but this time around there seems to be a lot more blue counties than in the past, which is good a sign.

7:30 PST

No more calls, although no surprise. At 8:00, Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, DC, Tennesse, Alabama, Mississippi, Illinois, Minnesota, Missouri, and Oklahoma. I expect Maine, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, Maryland, Delaware, DC to go for Obama, while Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama, and Oklahoma for McCain. If they call Pennsylvania for Obama, this will be very good news.

Update: John McCain carries South Carolina as expected. Also, in Indiana McCain is ahead, but if you look at what counties votes for in 2004 and what they are going now, things are looking good for Obama. He is competitive in rural Indiana which went solidly Bush in 2004 and the Chicago suburbs still haven't reported where the Democrats are strongest in the state.

8:00 PM PST

Now 77 Electoral votes for Obama to 34 EV for McCain however, none of them so far have been surprises. All were states that were considered either safe Obama or safe McCain.

Update: NBC has projected New Hampshire and Pennsylvania for Obama so this looks good. CNN is always one of the more cautious than the other networks.

Update: CNN calls both New Hampshire and Pennsylvania for Obama, so at this point McCain absolutely needs to win states such as Colorado, Nevada, Florida, Virginia, and Ohio. Other than Nevada, he loses any of those and that is assuming he doesn't lose Indiana, he is likely toast. Also the Democrats pick up both North Carolina and Virginia in the senate. At 9:00 several states close including some key ones. I expect Obama to easily take New York, Rhode Island, Michigan, probably Wisconsin and Minnesota right away and possibly even New Mexico. Colorado probably won't be called right away. McCain should take Wyoming, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Texas. While North Dakota is probably too close to call while Arizona might be called for McCain.

9:00 PM EST

Obama wins New York and Rhode Island as expected, but also takes Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota which went narrowly for Kerry. McCain is projected to win Wyoming which is no surprise, but North Dakota was called right away for him which is surprise. Although I expected McCain to win this, not as decisively as he did.

UPDATE: CNN projects Georgia will go for McCain which is not a total surprise. Although I had hoped Obama would pull off an upset, it seemed a bit of a long shot.

BIG UPDATE: Barack Obama wins Ohio. I think with this win, it is mathematically impossible for McCain to win, even he takes Virginia and Florida. Now is time to watch just how badly Obama beats McCain.

UPDATE: Obama also picks up New Mexico. No real surprise, but nice to see another pick-up. In fact Washington, Oregon, California, and Hawaii are the only states Kerry won that have not been called for Obama and they have not closed so he will almost certainly win all the states Kerry did.

Up next is Iowa, Nevada, Utah, and Montana. McCain should win Utah, maybe Montana, Obama should win Iowa, while Nevada is another key state although with Ohio now going Obama, it probably won't matter at this point.

10:00PM PST

Obama wins Iowa, while McCain wins Utah. So far Obama has now won every state that either Gore or Kerry won in the last two elections plus Ohio. Iowa is also a big victory in the sense it is a fairly rural and predominately white state which is generally a demographic that goes Republican. At 11:00 PST, it will likely be declared that Obama will become the 44th president of the United States as based on the states they have already called + California, Washington, Oregon + Hawaii would put him over the 270 electoral vote threshold even if McCain somehow manages to win Virginia, Colorado, and Florida (all which look unlikely at this point). Even Missouri, Indiana, and North Carolina are still in play, although I think McCain might narrowly win them. Missouri looks the most promising as most of the urban results haven't come in while Indiana looks like Obama will just fall short, but the fact he was that close to winning a supposedly solid red state is big news.

UPDATE: CNN projects Obama will win Virginia, so it is definitely over. It is only waiting for the final call which should be minutes away.

CNN Predicts Obama will become the 44th president of the United States!! I will sign off and have more on this tomorrow.

US Election predictions

2008-11-03T15:20:00.000-08:00

# 1 #2

With approximately 24 hours until the first polls close, I am now going to make my predictions. Rather than listing them off I thought I would show it visually and give an explanation below. Although it is still technically possible McCain could win the electoral vote, he would have to win every state he is within 5 points which seems extremely unlikely. So in summary, an Obama win is pretty much close to a certainty. In terms of the popular vote, my predictions are:

Obama 52%

McCain 47%

Other 1%

Map #5 above (sorry for the confusion, but I am not good with computer graphics) is what I think is most likely to happen. Last time I around, I got only two states wrong (I predicted Bush would win Wisconsin while Kerry would win Ohio, so Bush still would have won), so lets see if I can beat that this time around. This would be 338 electoral votes for Obama to 200 electoral votes for McCain.

Map#4 is the more optimistic scenario for Obama where he would win 378 EV to McCain's 160 EV. This one is quite plausible if there is a strong turnout amongst younger voters, African-Americans, and Latinos and likewise by the same token a lower turnout that expected amongst White Evangelical voters.

Map#3 is the dream scenario. I don't actually expect Obama to win this type of landslide, but essentially, any blue state here, he has at least a slim chance at winning while the red states, I am so confident will go McCain, I would be willing to bet $100 on each one of them. In this case Obama would get 411 EV vs. McCain's 127 EV.

Map#2 is the nightmare scenario where McCain would get 299 EV vs. Obama's 239 EV. Although all the red states are ones I could theoretically see McCain winning, I doubt this scenario will play about.

Map#1 is the most plausible scenario for a McCain win, which would involve only two states changing hands, Obama gaining Iowa and New Mexico, but McCain holding everything else Bush won in 2004 which would give him 274 EV to Obama's 264 EV. Were Nevada to go Democrat in this case, we would have a tie, however since both the senate and congress will likely be Democrat controlled, Obama would therefore become president.

In terms of the senate, I haven't analyzed all the races closely, so my predictions are as follows

56 Democrats

42 Republicans

2 Independents (Liebermann and Sanders)

So although the Democrats would gain in the senate, it would still put them short of filibuster proof majority, albeit since party discipline is much weaker than here in Canada, they could pass a filibuster if they could get two moderate Republicans to support them on any given bill which is much easier to do than trying to get nine. Ironically if McCain becomes president, the Democrats would gain one more senator as the governor, which is a Democrat would then appoint the replacement. In the case of Obama, Illinois has a Democrat governor so no change here.

In the case of the house, I predict a net gain of 5 seats for the Democrats. Most of the pick-ups will likely be in open seats in the West and Northeast where many Republicans from the days when the party was more moderate will become vulnerable as much of that area has shifted towards the Democrats. Likewise, I predict the Republicans will pick up a few Democrat congressional districts as it is extremely rare (not even in 1994 Republican Revolution) for all the losses to occur on one side. Mostly in the South where some Democrats have won due to incumbency but those areas are now Republican unlike in the past. Also, there were a few districts (i.e. Mark Foley's in Florida and Tom DeLay's in Texas) that are solidly Republican and were only lost due to corruption charges for the sitting or retiring incumbent, so a few of those should swing back to the Republicans.

The case of the governors and state legislatures, I predict Democrat gains as well and this is actually more important than most think. In 2010, there will be the new census and therefore re-districting for the congressional districts will occur. This means that in states that are heavily gerrymandered in favour of the Republicans, they can be re-distributed in favour of the Democrats or preferably in a neutral fashion as I oppose gerrymandering regardless of who it favours.

Harper's Cabinet

2008-10-30T16:50:00.000-07:00

Like any cabinet, it is neither 100% good nor 100% bad and although some hardcore partisans while argue one way or another, I thought I would give a fair analysis. Now note, my predictions could be totally off as with many inexperienced cabinet ministers who knows what kind of mistakes they will make. I thought Maxime Bernier and Gordon O'Connor would have been good picks last time around, but yet both were disasters. By the same token I thought Stockwell Day would have been a disaster, yet he at least stayed out of trouble to my surprise. Also, Harper is a real control freak, so my comments below only matter if he grants his cabinet ministers some independence, otherwise it is just window dressing. I was pleased there were more women and I felt the regional representation was good. I was also glad no senators were appointed like last time around and no floor crossers were appointed to cabinet. At the same time I thought there were a few who should have been demoted who weren't as I will explain below.

Of the Atlantic Canada ministers, nothing too surprising here. It was off course expected Gail Shea would go into cabinet since she is the only member from PEI and it would make sense for them to have some representation. I though do think that one of the existing senators from Newfoundland & Labrador could have gotten a junior post so they would also have representation. Harper's choice of two ministers in New Brunswick was certainly good political tactics, after all the province rewarded him with more seats so it would seem logical politically to give them another spot.

In Quebec, I was glad he didn't go overboard here. Despite the breakthrough last time around,the depth of talent was quite shallow. Only Lawrence Cannon had any talent. I am glad Josee Verner was demoted and I am glad Maxime Bernier was not appointed to cabinet. As for foreign affairs, I don't have a lot of confidence in Harper here, but I hope that with Lawrence Cannon being one of the more moderate members he can help moderate Harper on this. Also hopefully an Obama presidency will mean no allies for his policies and that more than anything will mean change.

In Ontario, there were both good and bad picks and some mixed. I think appointing Lisa Raitt to cabinet made sense, but natural resources was the wrong portfolio. The GTA is not exactly an area known for its natural resources. I think transport would have been a more appropriate one for her since beside her experience at the Toronto Port Authority, her riding is on the edge of the GTA and one of the fast growing in the country so transportation is a big issue for many people in her riding, especially considering a lot spend over an hour every day commuting into Toronto. Appointing Peter Kent to a junior post made sense as he doesn't have the experience to take any senior one, at the same time he was the closest they have to Toronto proper. I am disappointed Jim Flaherty wasn't shuffled out as finance minister as he has handled this portfolio poorly whether it be his reckless spending, calling Ontario the last place to invest, and the fact as provincial finance minister he left a $5.6 billion dollar deficit. I am glad Bev Oda, Peter Van Loan, and Diane Finley were demoted while disappointed Tony Clement and John Baird weren't demoted to lower level portfolios. In crisis times, we need people who can work together, not always be picking fights and fierce partisans as the Harrisites were. I think Jim Flaherty, John Baird, and Tony Clement should still be given cabinet posts, but lower level ones that don't involve dealing with others a lot.

In the Prairies, I was very disappointed Gerry Ritz was kept on as agriculture minister. His comments about Listeria were clearly enough to deserve a demotion. Yes, I realize he was a farmer himself, but I am sure there are others Harper could have tapped into. Despite the large number of MPs in Saskatchewan and Manitoba, this is probably the part of the country with the shallowest talent. Many are ex-Reformers who are populist and rather right wing. Although BC, Alberta, and Ontario have plenty of those two, at least they have some more moderate and knowledgeable ones too.

In the case of Alberta, I think Diane Ablonczy should have gotten a more senior post as she is one of the more talented members. Jim Prentice is definitely one of the brighter lights in the party and an improvement on the environment, although I doubt he will do as good a job here as his previous portfolios. Appointing Jason Kenney as immigration minister seemed more about party politics than public good. He got this mainly because he was successful in wooing many ethnic voters and helping the Tories breakthrough in these communities. But just because he maybe best for the party doesn't mean he is best for the country. I fail to understand why Rob Merrifield got a cabinet post. I don't think it is necessary to have a cabinet minister from Rural Alberta if none is qualified. Monte Solberg was clearly cabinet material while Rob Merrifield is not. Ted Menzies is the only rural Alberta MP who could potentially be a cabinet minister. In fact the two strongest rural MPs, Bob Mills and Monte Solbert both retired so not much talent in this region this time around.

In the case of British Columbia, I thought giving James Moore a promotion to a more senior post was good. In fact I fail to understand why it took so long for him to go into cabinet as he should have been in the very first cabinet in 2006. Gary Lunn should have been sacked from cabinet altogether, but at least a demotion is better than the status quo. Stockwell Day did an okay job as public safety minister and therefore should have stayed in that position. I think moving him to international trade was a bad choice. Although there are no obvious choices here, this is going to be an important file as protectionism become more prevalent in the United States. Not solely because of the Democrats gaining all three branches, but also Americans tend to be more protectionist during recessions in general, so we need someone who can work with the next administration.

In the case of the North, Leona Agulukkaq got the position of minister of health. As a representative from the North, female, and Inuit, she definitely deserved a cabinet post, but I am not sure if health was the right choice as this is a big responsibility. Yes, she has some experience here, although I am not sure if this should go to a rookie. Still I do hope she does make progress on the aboriginal health file as this has been neglected for much too long.

McKenna out, Manley maybe, Leblanc in

2008-10-29T18:30:00.000-07:00

Already the leadership race is starting to shape up. Frank McKenna announced yesterday he would not run for the Liberal leadership race. While I think his position is perfectly understandable and I fully respect it, I think he would have been exactly the type we need to re-build. He would have little difficulty raising the money necessary, he was a very popular premier in New Brunswick and considering the results in New Brunswick were not far off the national results, this is probably telling about his general appeal. He has a strong business background which in times of economic crisis like right now is very important. He is also a Blue Liberal so he could appeal to many soft Tory votes, which matter just as much as the Green and NDP votes. In areas such as the 905 belt here in Ontario or many of the Lower Mainland suburbs such as the North Shore and Richmond, the party will regain these seats by planting itself firmly in the centre, not by moving to the left. That being said, if there is anyone happy about this announcement, it is probably the six Conservative MPs in New Brunswick as three of them would likely lose their seats and the other three would face much tougher battles than they did this time around.

John Manley is also testing the waters but still has not said whether he will run or not. At this point I don't want to endorse anyone until I see the full slate, but certainly Manley is one I could support. Like McKenna he is a centrist too and also has strong economic credentials. Right now, the economy is the biggest issue for Canadians so having someone with strong economic credentials is important. Now it is quite possible we will be out of the recession by the time of the next election, however, if we do go into deficit, I don't have much confidence in the Harper government pulling us out of it, so that is why is all the more important to choose someone who will be able to balance the budget. As for his chances, it is tough to say. He is popular amongst some, but his somewhat hawkish stances may make him a tough sell amongst those on the left of the party. Also his Afghanistan report may make some feel he is too cozy with the Tories. However, considering that minority governments are likely to be the norm, not the exception in the forseeable future, I think being able reach across the aisle and cooperate with other parties is a good thing for the country.

Dominic Leblanc has declared he intends to run. At only 40 years old, he is young enough that he will be able to stay on even if we don't win the next election. Although our goal must be to win the next election, having someone who can re-build the party is also equally important. I also so far like his talk about moving the party back to the centre and appealing to the middle class. He also comes from a rural riding, which is becoming an increasingly rare for the Liberals and so he probably understands better than some the issues that concern Rural Canadians and what is needed to win back the support in those areas. He also comes from New Brunswick, which was the Tories strongest province in Atlantic Canada and one where we lost a lot of ground (we lost 3 seats, which is 30% of the seats in the province). I highly doubt he will win it, but this will at least raise his profile and improve his chances in any future run. He is young enough that regardless of the results in the next few elections, he will get another chance to run again since even if we win and are in power for 10 years, he will still be young enough to run again.

I will have more on the cabinet appointments tomorrow. My only hopes which may or may not come true are as follows. I hope he adds more women to his cabinet. I hope that we get more GTA cabinet ministers considering they did make gains in the 905 belt. In addition to Lisa Raitt, I think either Bob Dechert or Peter Kent should be made cabinet ministers as there ridings are close to Toronto, more urban, and more multicultural, whereas the other ridings they won maybe in the GTA, but are far enough removed from Toronto that their issues are quite different (i.e. Oakville, Whitby-Oshawa, Newmarket-Aurora, and Halton) and they are also ridings that are over 80% white as well, so hardly reprensentative of the GTA. Thornhill and Mississauga-Erindale on the other hand have much higher population densities than the other GTA ridings the Tories won and also are multicultural and diverse. I think Jim Flaherty should be moved out of Finance and instead either Jim Prentice or Lawrence Cannon should get this one. He should stay in cabinet, but get a lower profile position as he clearly is not competent enough to be a senior cabinet minister. Diane Ablonczy and James Moore both should get cabinet posts unlike last time around. Since appointing Diane Ablonczy would mean four cabinet members from Calgary if you include the PM, I think Jason Kenney should be dropped from cabinet. He maybe good for the party, but he has little to offer the country. If any senators are appointed to be cabinet members, they need to be from Newfoundland & Labrador as that is the only province they were shut out of. I also oppose appointing any defectors to cabinet. If one wishes to cross the floor, I respect that right, but they should not go into cabinet until they have earned it. As much as I hate to see any Liberals defect to the Tories, I have been consistent in my view of supporting the right of MPs to cross the floor and will not change that view regardless of who it benefits.

US Election Predictions

2008-10-26T19:07:00.000-07:00

Much as I did with the Canadian election, I thought I would give the various scenarios on what I think might happen in the US election in just over a week. So below is where I think each state stands and at the bottom will give the total electoral votes

Safe Obama

Washington
Oregon
California
Hawaii
Illinois
Michigan
Maine*
Vermont
Massachusetts
Rhode Island
Connecticut
New York
New Jersey
Delaware
Maryland
District of Columbia
Total EV: 206

* 2 Electoral Votes for the state of Maine as a whole and 1 for Maine 1.

Likely Obama

New Mexico
Minnesota
Iowa
Wisconsin
Maine*
New Hampshire
Pennsylvania
Virginia
Total EV: 277 (safe Obama + Likely Obama)

* All four electoral votes for Maine not just three.

Toss-Up

Nevada
Colorado
Missouri
Ohio
North Carolina
Florida
Total EV: McCain 261, Obama 364 (safe + likely + toss-up for each candidate)

Likely McCain

Montana
North Dakota
Indiana
West Virgina
Georgia

Total EV: 174 (safe McCain + likely McCain)

Safe McCain

Alaska
Idaho
Utah
Arizona
Wyoming
South Dakota
Nebraska
Kansas
Oklahoma
Texas
Arkansas
Louisiana
Kentucky
Tennessee
Mississippi
Alabama
South Carolina

Total EV: 137

With eight days to go, things can still change, but at the moment, Obama simply needs to win all the states in the safe and likely in order to win the White House, whereas McCain would have to win all the safe, likely, and toss-ups, plus one of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, or Virgina, or two of the other listed toss-ups. So a McCain win is still possible, but not likely. The biggest factor in determining who wins will be voter turnout. A high turnout should favour Obama as he has around 90% support in the African-American community while a solid lead amongst the under 30 age group and both these demographics have traditionally had much lower voter turnouts than the general population. On the other hand a low voter turnout could allow McCain to win as he is strong amongst older population, white, male, above average income, rural/suburban, and regular church goers. The other important factor for McCain is the Evangelical vote. This group heavily favours the Republicans and the increased turnout in 2004 vs. 2000 amongst this group played a strong role in Bush's better showing in 2004. Many in this group feel McCain is too moderate for them, so a big question is whether their dislike for Obama will be enough to bring them out to the polls or will they simply stay home. Unlike Canada, where this group is quite small, in the US they make up around 25-30% of the population so they are a significant voting bloc that cannot be ignored by the Republicans. The final factor, is are the polls showing the Bradley Effect. This is named after Tom Bradley who lost the governor's race in California in 1982 despite having a lead in the polls. This claims that African-American candidates tend to poll higher than what their real support is as some who are racist and refusing to vote for the candidate simply because of race will lie to the pollsters. I would like to hope this is no longer an issue, but one can never be sure as I still think there is a sizeable portion of the population that feels anyone who isn't white should not be president. True, this group is probably far more likely to vote Republican than Democrat, but if things tighten up this could have an impact. Anyways I will post my actual predictions on the night before the election when the final polls come out.

One final prediction I will make now though, is the US will have a higher voter turnout than Canada had in its most recent election. If this does materialize as I think it will, it will be the first time in a long time that the US has had a higher voter turnout than Canada, despite the fact registering to vote is far more difficult in the US than Canada.

UPDATE:

I am moving Pennsylvania to safe Obama and Colorado to likely Obama, so that makes it 227 electoral votes for safe Obama and 286 electoral votes for likely Obama + safe Obama.

Post-Mortem

2008-10-20T18:28:00.000-07:00

Now that I have had time to digest the results, I thought I would give my opinion on how each party performed.

Bloc Quebecois

If there was any party that can be fully satisfied with the results, it would be them since few expected them at the outset of the campaign to hold what they already had. True, they didn't gain seats and they did get fewer votes, however, Duceppe said from the outset his goal was to stop Harper from winning a majority and after last night's results, it is absolutely clear that it was the Bloc, not the Liberals, Greens or NDP who prevented Harper from winning a majority. As much as I disagree with the Bloc Quebecois, you got to give them credit for being able to stay relevant even when separtism dies down. Every time it looks like the party has run its course, they always seem to find some raison d'etre to exist and are successful at convincing voters to vote for them for that reason.

NDP

I would say the results were mixed for them. Few in their right mind actually thought the NDP had any chance at forming government and even forming the official opposition seemed like a long shot. However, breaking the record Ed Broadbent sent in 1988 of winning 43 seats and 20% of the popular vote was certainly doable and that they failed to do. Still, they did gain seats and increase their share of the popular vote. They also won seats in 8 out of 10 provinces including ones they normally don't do to well in such as Alberta, Quebec, and Newfoundland & Labrador so at least they can claim they are a truly national party. If I am not mistaken, I believe winning seats in 8 out of 10 provinces is the best they have ever done in a general election in terms of the number of provinces they won seats in, so that should at least count for something and never mind they came very close to winning a seat in Saskatchewan meaning they could have potentially won seats in as many provinces as the Tories and Liberals.

Green Party

As with the NDP, a decent showing, but not as good as they probably wanted. Once again they failed to win a seat, which was not a surprise for me. For one thing, Elizabeth May choose the wrong riding to run in. There was no way she was going to win in Central Nova and she should have run somewhere like Saanich-Gulf Islands, Guelph, or even Vancouver Centre where she might have had a shot at winning albeit a long one. Also most polls showed they would get over 10% of the popular vote, which they failed to do, although I was not surprised they only got 7%. Their support was quite soft and never mind it was heavily skewed towards the younger demographic who traditionally have a lower voter turnout than the older voters. In fact this may explain why the NDP, Bloc, and Greens did worse than the last polls said, the Tories did better, and the Liberals the same as the former parties tend to do better amongst younger voters and the Tories amongst older voters while Liberal support is pretty even across all age groups.

Conservatives

They failed to win a majority as they wanted, but I would still say it was a good night on the whole for them. I never bought the idea that Harper saw anything less than a majority as a failure. In fact, I suspect he probably realistically only expected a stronger minority, somewhere in the neighbourhood of 140 seats. As Tom Flanagan said in an article in the Globe and Mail before the election, Harper is an incrementalists, so as long as the Tories are moving in the right direction that is what counts and for now they are doing so. If anything it was Quebec that was a disappointment for the Tories, not the results elsewhere. In the case of Ontario, I suspect the Tories weren't even trying to win seats in the 416, their goal was to make gains in the 905 belt, which they did. Now that doesn't mean it was a great result as the Tories clearly did have a chance to get a majority and they blew it big time in Quebec with their stance on the arts cuts and changes to the young offenders act. Still they made the gains elsewhere as they wanted to, so I would say it was a good, but not great result.

Liberals

If there was any party that had little to be cheering about, it was the Liberals regretably. The lowest vote share in Canadian history and second worse seat count as well as being dead in the water in huge swaths of the country (almost all of the West, Rural Ontario, off the island of Montreal in Quebec). Clearly the once dominate party is now a former shell of itself. Still, I don't think changing leaders is going to solve all the party's woes. Just as the Tories came out of the wilderness after doing poorly in the 90s, the Liberals can do the same, but they must re-build fully, not make cosmetic changes. Dion is an honourable man and I think would have made a good PM if given a chance. He ran a respectful campaign and clearly showed a vision for the future. However, as it goes with all things in life, when the leader cannot get the results, they have no choice but to step down. For myself, I would have argued Dion should have definitely stayed on had the Liberals gotten over 100 seats, anything between 80-100 seats, I would have had to look at the situation, however anything under 80 seats meant he had to go. Unfortunately the Liberals did not get over 80 seats, therefore Dion in my view should step down, although I have no problem with him staying on until a new leader is selected just in case we are thrown into an early election. However, we must not assume the next leader will lead us to the promise land. The Liberals must find a way to re-connect in the parts of the country they aren't doing well in. The party does not have a lot of money, but that does not mean they cannot find ways to re-connect. My suggestion would be that the party begin its nominations ASAP so we can have our candidates in place for the next election whenever it is. Both the current MPs and candidates should start door knocking right away as well as holding regular town hall meetings. This should not be about identifying supporters, but rather engaging people and seeing what issues matter to them. Likewise the leader should meet with the candidates on a regular basis and listen to their feedback on what they are hearing. We need to put an end to the idea we are a top down party and instead become a grassroots one. There is much talk about whether we should move to the left or return to the centre. The reality is Canadians are some of the least ideological people anywhere in the world. Unlike in the United States and many European countries were most people can cleary be identified as "left wing" or "right wing" most Canadians are neither but rather look at each issue on an issue by issue basis. That is why support for the parties is quite soft and why people frequently vote for parties of different ideologies at different levels. So with this in mind we should forget about whether an idea is a "left wing" or "right wing" idea and rather focus on whether it is a "good" or a "bad" idea.

Voter Turnout

Considering how low this was, I thought I should mention something here. I think it is absolutely shameful that 41% couldn't be bothered to vote. Many people around the world are willing to risk their lives just to have the right to vote, so there is absolutely no excuse for not voting. And claiming that no party represented their views is not an acceptable excuse either. As with any choice, you vote for the least bad. Someone has to run the government, so one should always vote even if they don't like any of the leaders. As the saying goes, if you don't vote, you don't have the right to complain. I don't support compulsory voting, but I do hope something can be done to reduce voter apathy. I would be fine if we had 80% voter turnout, but 59% is just way too low.

Regional Analysis

2008-10-18T15:28:00.002-07:00

Now that I have had a few days to digest the election results I thought I would give a regional breakdown on how things went. My next post will then look at each party.

Newfoundland & Labrador

Danny Williams had stated he intended to see the Tories get a goose egg in the province and he succeeded in doing it, however it does mean for the first time since joining confederation, Newfoundland & Labrador will have no members sitting on the government benches. Also looking at the vote totals, it appears the huge decline in Tory support primarily benefitted the NDP as opposed to the Liberals. In fact the NDP was able to win a seat in a province that rarely elects NDP members. Although I expected the Tories to do poorly here, I am surprised they got only 17%. That being said, at least one province seems to share my views on them, well at least sort of, since as much as I don't like the Tories, I still believe they should have some seats, just not be in government.

Nova Scotia

Not a whole lot of change here. Peter MacKay easily beat Elizabeth May as I fully expected. Also, Robert Thibault lost to the Tories in West Nova, which was not a total surprise as this has always been a competitive riding and even this time around it wasn't by a huge margin. One interesting fact in Nova Scotia, is no party got over 30% of the popular vote. I don't think this has ever happened in any province ever to the best of my knowledge, so a historical first here. If anything this probably shows just how little confidence Nova Scotians have in any of the parties.

Prince Edward Island

It may have gone predominately Liberal as expected, but for the first time in over 20 years, the Tories broke the liberal fortress of PEI by winning on seat. In the past, votes have usually been fairly evenly distributed throughout the island, whereas this time around the Tory votes were more concentrated thus despite getting a lower share of the popular vote than Mulroney in 1988, Jean Charest in 1997, and Joe Clark in 2000, there were able to win a seat. I think it is fair to say Gail Shea will get a cabinet post being the only member from PEI.

New Brunswick

This is a case where individual polling of each province would have made predicting the results in Atlantic Canada easier. The Tories were doing poorly in this region, so I assumed they wouldn't gain seats as many others did, but what many didn't realize is they had fallen through the floor in Newfoundland & Labrador, held their vote in Nova Scotia asides from Bill Casey's riding, went up slightly in PEI, while they declined slightly in the French speaking parts of New Brunswick but increased significantly in the English speaking parts. That being said, Miramichi was the only riding that I was surprised the Tories won. Fredericton and Saint John were both ridings I saw as vulnerable so the Tory pick ups there are not a total surprise. New Brunswick is the most conservative province in Atlantic Canada, so it makes sense it would be their best province. I also think regretably the Green Shift was a tough sell here, especially considering New Brunswick is quite rural.

Quebec

Gilles Duceppe claimed only the Bloc Quebecois could stop the Tories from forming a majority and based on the election results, it looks like he was right. This is not the first time people have talked about the Bloc Quebecois vanishing, after all, many said the same thing in 2003 before the sponsorship scandal erupted, yet each time there is talk of the Bloc Quebecois' demise, they somehow come right back. The Liberals got more votes and seats than the Tories, so at least the bleeding has stopped in Quebec, still they have a long ways to go before they return to their previous strength there. The Tories hopes at making a breakthrough in Quebec clearly failed to materialize, that being said they did manage to hold onto their own seats which most polls said they wouldn't. Considering how many close ridings there were in English Canada, I almost wonder had the Tories spent less money on Quebec and more on Ontario if they could have gotten their majority through English Canada. The NDP breakthrough in Quebec also failed to materialize, although they did win Outremont, which was a first as they have never won a seat in Quebec during a general election, only in a by-election (once in 1990 and again in 2007).

Ontario

In the past many Westerners, especially Albertans have blamed Ontario for preventing the Tories from doing as well as they thought they should have. This time around, Ontario clearly delivered the seats the Tories were hoping for. In fact, this is the first time since 1988 that they have beat the Liberals in seats in Ontario and the first time since 1984 they have beat them in the popular vote. While they were shut out of the 416 (thankfully where I live didn't fall for them) they did make gains in the suburbs. Despite the talk about Toronto shutting out the Tories, I suspect they never really targeted the 416 to begin with. And never mind they got as close as its doorstep to winning in Toronto (Thornhill). While I am not surprised the Tories gained seats in Ontario, I am surprised how well they did in terms of the popular vote and seats. I figured 48 seats and 37% of the popular vote was their ceiling in Ontario. The biggest surprises were the two Kitchener ridings, which I was positive would go Liberal. The only good news for the Liberals in Ontario was Gerard Kennedy won back Parkdale-High Park and also Bonnie Crombie defeated Wajid Khan (off course the Tories were able to defeat Garth Turner in return). What is though really worrying for the Liberals is how poorly they did outside the GTA. They not only lost all of rural Ontario, they got clobbered. The last three elections have resulted in a steady slide in Liberal support in Ontario, so the party must re-build there if they ever want to return to power. The NDP also gained seats, primarily in Northern Ontario, which was not too big a surprise. It also appears strategic voting was largely useless in Ontario as some ridings such as that of Finance minister Jim Flaherty or Health minister Tony Clement would have gone Tory no matter what (they both got over 50% of the popular vote). If anything the Liberals will win Ontario back by increasing voter turnout not going after strategic voters as it appears a large chunk of Liberal voters just stayed home rather than vote for other parties.

Manitoba

In what has usually been the most Liberal friendly of the Western provinces, it was not a good night for the Liberals. They only won one seat, while both the Tories and NDP were able to make gains. The Tories got 49% of the popular vote which is their best showing ever in the province and in fact I couldn't imagine them getting over 45%. Even Winnipeg which never elected a Reform/Alliance member went Tory winning 4 of the 8 seats and having the highest vote total of the parties.

Saskatchewan

Went largely Tory as I expected with the exception of Ralph Goodale who is able to win due to his personal popularity. Jack Layton was once again shut out of the birthplace of the CCF for the third time even though he was able to win a seat in the normally conservative Alberta. I though wonder if Harper will use this as evidence to make changes to the Canadian Wheat Board since with the kind of numbers he got in the Prairies he can at least claim he has a mandate to make changes (although there is no way of knowing how the farmers in the wheat and barley industry voted since they make up less than 2% of the population).

Alberta

The big news here was the Tories weren't able to sweep the province. Alberta always goes for the most right wing party on the ballot, so the question becomes more will it be a clean sweep or simply domination. This time around, the NDP won Edmonton-Strathcona. This was not a total surprise as this riding has a large university population and is somewhat an anthema to what most people stereotype Alberta as being. You have several cafes along Whyte Street and many young singles living there. Likewise you have the U of A is in this riding so despite being in Alberta, the demographics are clearly not conservative. In fact, this type of riding in any other province wouldn't even be competitive for the Tories.

British Columbia

The Conservatives won close to the number of seats I thought they would, what was the big surprise here was the popular vote totals. I was surprised the Tories got 44% and the Liberals only 19%. I was also surprised how close the Tories came to unseating Ujjal Dosanjh and how easily they won Richmond (which I thought would be a lot closer). I guess the party is making inroads amongst the immigrant community, or at least the Chinese community and I would also add the Jewish community in Central Canada (i.e. Thornhill). I never really bought into the idea the Tories were making gains amongst these groups, but I guess I was wrong. If there is any lesson here, the Liberals should never take any group for granted as that is how surprises like this happen. Another interesting news is how this foreshadows the upcoming provincial election. The smashing of the Liberals certainly shows how unpopular the carbon tax is in British Columbia, however the Tories not the NDP being the primary beneficiaries shows there are probably many in the province uncomfortable with going back to the NDP. In fact if the BC Conservatives had a real party, not a joke one they might be competitive in the province. In many ways both the BC Liberals and BC NDP should be thankful the BC Conservatives are such a joke party. As much as I do support a carbon tax, the thought of the NDP returning to power in BC sends shivers up my spine. My hope is that Campbell drops it before the election and then re-introduces shortly after being re-elected. This is something you do at the beginning of a four year term, not near the end. It is the right policy, but unfortunately the public doesn't understand this and cannot made to understand it, so the only solution is to introduce far enough ahead of an election and when things don't all collapse, the public will forget about it.

North

Something here for everybody as the Liberals take the Yukon, NDP take the Northwest Territories, and the Tories take Nunavut. Also looking at the Tory numbers in Northern ridings, I wonder if they made gains amongst the Aboriginal community or did this community simply not show up as their numbers not just in the North, but in Northern Ontario, Northern Quebec, and Northern Saskatchewan are unusually high. After tearing up the Kelowna Accord, I would have thought the Aboriginal community would be infuriated at the Tories, but maybe the residential school apology is what they remember.

I will have my summary later on the parties, however I will say briefly that it was an good but not great election for the Tories and NDP as both increased their seats but failed to achieve their ultimate goals, while a disastrous one for the Liberals. As much as I like Stephane Dion and think he would have made a very good PM, I believe he has little choice but to step down.

Preliminary Results

2008-10-14T21:14:00.000-07:00

Being late and still taking in the surprising showing by the Conservatives, I will give a post-mortem tomorrow. Thank God, Harper made his comment about culture, because had it not been for Quebec, we would be talking about a Conservative majority. Also it looks like Ontario seems to like to break in favour of the incumbent party at the last minute. How else can one explain the better than expected Liberal showing in 2004, while better than expected Tory showing in 2008. I will have more tomorrow on this.

Comments on Blog

2008-10-14T04:38:00.000-07:00

In order to comply with the elections act which prohibits broadcasting results in one part of the country when polls are still open in another, I am temporarily turning off the comments. I will turn them back on at 10:00 PM EST when the BC polls close.

Election Predictions

2008-10-13T08:02:00.000-07:00

Based on the fact there are no major news items out today that are likely to change things significantly and based on the predictions I have seen elsewhere I am going to post my predictions below. In the case of the Tories, they have zero chance at getting a majority, even if there is a last minute surge in their favour. They needed to gain seats in Quebec and at this point, the best they can hope for is to hold the seats they have. The Liberals could still win, but not likely though. The NDP vote is pretty firm and I doubt there will be a lot of late breakers there. On the contrary the Green vote is still quite soft as well as there is the undecided. If those two break heavily in favour of the Liberals, they could pull off a weak minority, although I am pretty much certain the Tories will still win the popular vote, just not certain as to whether they will have the most seats or not. And even if the Liberals lose, they should still have a decent size opposition and win considerably more seats than either the Bloc Quebecois or NDP. The Bloc Quebecois has totally turned things around and unlike at the beginning where many expected them to lose many seats, they now have a shot at breaking their record of 54 seats, although I doubt they will break their popular vote record of 49%. The NDP won't win become the official opposition and certainly not government as they have hoped for, but they still have a shot at breaking Ed Broadbent's record of 43 seats. So the question becomes is whether there will be a coalition or not. At this point, it seems unlikely as the philosophical differences between the Liberals and NDP are still pretty large, that being said will have to wait for the results and see what transpires. So below are my predictions.

Atlantic Canada

Liberals 21 seats
Conservatives 6 seats
NDP 4 seats
Independent 1 seat

Quebec

Bloc Quebecois 50 seats
Liberals 16 seats
Conservatives 7 seats
NDP 1 seat
Independent 1 seat

Ontario

Liberals 48 seats
Conservatives 42 seats
NDP 16 seats

Manitoba

Conservatives 9 seats
NDP 3 seats
Liberals 2 seats

Saskatchewan

Conservatives 13 seats
Liberals 1 seats

Alberta

Conservatives 28 seats

British Columbia

Conservatives 21 seats
NDP 9 seats
Liberals 6 seats

North

Liberals 2 seats
NDP 1 seat

CANADA

Conservatives 126 seats
Liberals 96 seats
Bloc Quebecois 50 seats
NDP 34 seats
Independent 2 seats

So after all this, it looks like we more or less have the status quo again. Talk about a wasted election. Off course maybe I will be wrong here and the numbers will be different. We shall see tomorrow night

The Home Stretch

2008-10-10T15:53:00.000-07:00

We are now into the final days of the campaign and it looks like we will be getting another minority government. Based on the recent polls, it is more likely to be a Conservative than Liberal, although a Liberal is still possible, and certainly the possibility of a Tory majority is definitely gone. I will make my predictions once the final set of polls come in on Monday. This week has been a rough week on the market and no doubt this is hurting the Tories. While it is certainly not their fault the market is faltering as this is a global problem, their inability to deal with the issue is a serious problem. The reality is Harper has been asleep at the wheel and only woken up to the issue once it become obvious to everyone we were heading for a recession. The Liberal campaign seems to be improving, although it may be a little too late. Nonetheless, there is no risk of the Liberals doing worse than official opposition. All the talk of the Liberals falling behind the NDP is clearly just talk and won't happen. The other issue was Dion's ATV interview that he flubbed. CTV certainly should have not aired it, but the reality is any politician should never assume something won't be aired even if the media say they won't. The question was poorly worded, although I think Dion would have been better to simply repeat what he thought Steve Murphy was trying to say and then give the answer to the question to what he repeated. Even if not exactly what Murphy was asking, at least he could have gotten his ideas out on the economy. And in the case of Harper, he should have just said nothing on this rather than attacking Dion. When your opponent is self-destructing, you stand aside. But Harper did intervene and the damage this will cause to him will hopefully offset any damage it caused to Dion. For things complaining about Dion's poor English, his English is not that bad. I have met him and spoken to him in person. I have also travelled to Quebec and extensively in Europe and when travelling abroad, I had to repeat myself often, speak slowly, and use simple vocabulary. When talking to Dion, I spoke at regular conversation speed, never had to repeat myself, and used my normal vocabulary and he understood just fine. In fact his English was better than many of those in the tourist industries when travelling abroad. The final issue is the Afghanistan cost over-runs. While it is true the Liberals started the conflict and this includes the time both when the Liberals and Tories were in power, I think this can still be an issue as the Liberals had a large contigency in the budget so even with cost overruns like this (18 billion/10 =1.8 billion a year) they would still have a balanced budget, whereas with almost no surplus left under the Tories, cost overruns in Afghanistan could cause a deficit.

Anyways I am going to Kitchener for the long weekend and will make my last election post Monday night, where I will give my seat projections.

Recent Polls

2008-10-06T18:31:00.000-07:00

We have seen a recent spate of polls which have showed slightly different numbers, although the one constant theme is Tory support is declining, while Liberals are rising. Based on how far the Tories have fallen in Quebec, I think the chances of a Tory majority are extremely low, while by the same token I think a Liberal win is still very much within the realm of possibility, even if the odds are not favourable. Based on the recent polls, I would I am revising my projections to 100-145 seats for the Tories, while 70-120 seats for the Liberals and 20-50 seats for the NDP and 40-60 seats for the Bloc Quebecois. So this means the Liberals will at the very least form the offical opposition if not win outright, while the Tories will get a strengthned minority in their base case scenario, while lose outright in the worse case scenario. This last week should be interesting as the election is far from decided.

Debate - My take on it

2008-10-03T14:51:00.000-07:00

Unlike the French debate where either Dion or Duceppe was the clear winner and Harper was the clear loser, picking a winner here is much tougher. In fact, asides from Duceppe, you could probably make a sensible case for each one. Here is my take below.

Harper: Certainly performed better than the French debate. Remained calm and collective and also did explain some of his policies when attacked and the same time he spent far more time fending off attacks then going on the offence. If his goal was just to hold his ground, he achieved that, but if his goal was to come out stronger, he failed. That being said, considering it is Quebec that is dragging him down the most, it was more in French debates rather than English debates he needed to turn things around.

Dion: Not the greatest performance, but at least he beat expectations, which were extremely low. With many expecting him to bomb the debate, the fact he stayed above water was in many ways all he needed to do. He had a rough start, but improved as the debate progressed. Although he has a strong accent, his English is not imcomprehensible. He was also very polite but not interjecting unlike the others so in that since he looked more prime-ministerial than Layton or May. I suspect he got what he wanted and this debate will at least help him hold what he has now. He won't make the gains like he did in Quebec from the French debate, but at least be coming out fine, he can still portrary himself as the best person to Stop Stephen Harper and if past campaigns are any indication, the progressive vote tends to coalesce around the Liberals towards the end, although it is still too early to say if he can overcome the current deficit or not. By the end of the weekend we will have a better idea. The Nanos poll looks encouraging so I want to see if others follow suit or if Nanos starts going towards the others.

Layton: If I had to choose a winner, I would probably go for him. He was very strong in attacking harper and even occassionally Dion. And he certainly put out his ideas well. He came across as an ideal opposition leader, but he didn't came across as a PM in waiting. Now that is probably what Layton is looking for as contrary to what he claims, I think even he knows he has no chance at being PM.

May: Also feisty like in French and took Harper on well. A little over aggressive at times, but I still cannot see this debate being anything but good for her. The only thing she has to worry about is the Green vote is quite soft and much of that could shift to the Liberals or NDP in the later days to block the Tories.

Duceppe: Considering he doesn't run candidates outside Quebec and that most Anglophones in Quebec don't vote Bloc Quebecois, he just had to stay out of trouble, which he did. As long as there was no negative headline splashed on the Quebec papers the next day, he was in good shape and he did that.

As for how things will turn out, it won't be until early next week we get the full picture. In addition, people are paying more closely attention that at the beginning as well as we probably haven't seen the strongest ads yet, so any change from the debate can easily be offset much like Mulroney did in 1988 and Martin did in 2004 when both turned around their losses at the debate into wins.

As I expected I was not influence at all by them, but I am already one of those decided voters. In fact I went to the advanced polls today to cast my ballot for Christine Innes. Her chances are not great, but I would sure love to see her beat Olivia Chow. One thing that might be interesting if any Liberals accidentally vote Conservative since her first name also Christine.

English Debate Preview

2008-10-02T16:08:00.000-07:00

Now that we've had a day to digest last night's debate, here is what each party needs to do in order to succeed in the English language debate. Dion and Duceppe were the big winners last night while most would agree Harper did not perform particularly well and even if he didn't perform horribly, he needed to gain in Quebec, not hold what he already had. So here is what each party leader needs to do tonight.

Stephen Harper

Staying calm and looking prime-ministerial like last night does make some sense, but not to the point that of letting your opponents rip you apart. He cannot be too passive like last night, but not overly aggressive either like he sometimes is in the House of Commons, rather he needs to strike some balance in between the two. It goes without question he will have four leaders ganging up on him again, although it is this time in his native language and he kind of has an idea of what is coming at him. In addition his lacklustre performance last night probably more or less killed any chance of him winning a majority, so now the goal is to hold what he has.

Stephane Dion

If he can perform as well as he did last night and do the same things, he should be in great shape. Yes, he has the disadvantage of not being as good a debater in English as French, but if expectations wer low for him in the French debates, I suspect they are even lower in the English debates, so even a half decent performance should be win. He needs to do two things, attack Harper hard, but also show how he would be a better PM. Unlike the other three leaders who have zero chance at becoming PM, he does. Saying how bad the current government is can only get one so far. He needs to show how a Liberal government would be better.

Jack Layton

He will probably have a decent showing but not a great one. He needs to focus most of his attention on Harper, but still make occassional references to the Liberals. His main theme should be how the NDP is a progressive party on a whole host of issues, not just when politically convenient, but consistently. Also how the NDP is the only party to have consistently opposed the Harper agenda.

Gilles Duceppe

Considering that most viewers of this debate won't be able to vote for the Bloc Quebecois and even the few English speakers in Quebec who are watching are not likely to go Bloc Quebecois, so all he needs to do is not get eaten alive. Essentially, he did what he needed to do last night, now he needs to simply make sure nothing bad about him appears on the front pages of the Quebec papers tomorrow. And off course if there is an opportunity to attack Harper had, seize it since even if few Quebeckers are watching the debate, any major statement or knockout punch will get media attention, but otherwise lay low.

Elizabeth May

Just being in the debate should be a huge victory for her. Her main goal will be to hold what she has and maybe pick up a few votes here and there. As in the past, she is good at attacking Harper and needs to continue this by being feisty but not looking overly nasty.

Anyways I will have more on my take after the debates are over.

Les Debats

2008-10-01T19:52:00.000-07:00

Okay, now that the debates are over, here is my initial take on it. As always, each party is going to spin it in a way that will make them look good. And never mind most studies on debates generally show that debates don't to tend change how people vote, but either re-affirm their decision was correct or maybe make them pause for a moment, but only switch if other events in the campaign give them reason to. So without delay, here is my personal take on each of the leaders'

Gilles Duceppe - Has always been a strong debater in French and I think he did a fairly good job as expected. He did challenge Harper on a number of issues and show how he was out of touch with Quebec, at the same time he didn't deliver any knockout punch. Probably won't gain him much in support, but at least help solidify what he already has and at this point, that is what he needed to do.

Stephen Harper - Not the greatest performance from him. He undoubtedly faced the most daunting challenge of all five of the leaders since they all ganged up on him. In the past he has often been accused of being over aggressive, but this time around I think he was little too passive. While I doubt it will cause his numbers to sink any Quebec any further, he needed to shore up some of the lost support, which I don't think he was able to do.

Stephane Dion - All in all a good night for him. Whether it be the economy, environment, or Afghanistan, he seemed to actually have a plan of what he would do in government not just attacking how bad a government Harper was and if anything he made clear that he was still trying to become PM, not just stop Harper from getting a majority. His only possible mistake was releasing the economic plan in the debate. Although not a bombshell like Martin dropping the plan to get rid of the notwithstanding clause during last debate, I would still say it is better to announce plans either before or after the debates. That being said, there was low expectations and he did peform well, so a good night for him. I doubt it will gain him a lot, but at least maintain the support he has and considering Liberal support is very concentrated on the island of Montreal, and some of the suburbs he really only needed to win back a few swing supporters in some of the ridings they narrowly lossed in 2006, which I think he might have done.

Jack Layton - A steady debater as usual and confident in French. Didn't say anything or do anything that would help him gain much in Quebec, but nothing to either hurt him. So I guess depending on what his goal is, it could be described as a win or loss.

Elizabeth May - Her debating skills in a language she was weak in were actually pretty good and she did a great job of taking on Harper. I guess the only thing is she might have seemed a bit too aggressive, but probably not too bad an idea. After all, if Harper struck back at her too hard, he would look a lot worse.

As for the winner, I would have to give it to Gilles Duceppe as his goal was to show how the Tories were out of touch with Quebecers and the best choice to stop a majority and he did it. And the loser I would have to give to Harper. Although not an absolute flop, it was definitely not what he needed and I wouldn't say a good night for him, although not a bad night. It will be interesting to see how he does in the English debates as he tends to do better there.

Les Debats - Preview

2008-10-01T16:03:00.001-07:00

Tonight are the French debates and off course any impact from this will be primarily felt in Quebec. That is not to say this won't matter. Obviously for the Bloc Quebecois, this is the more important debate, but I would say in many ways this is just as important if not more important for the Tories. They have been sliding in Quebec and without gains in Quebec, a majority government will be next to impossible so tonight's debates could play a major role in determining if the Tory slide continues in Quebec, they level off, or they rebound. Here is my to do list for each party.

Bloc Quebecois

At the beginning of the election, many talked about them having their worse showing ever and being irrelevant. That proved to be somewhat premature since although sovereignty is now on the backburner, the Bloc Quebecois has been successful is portraying Stephen Harper as a right wing extremist who is out of touch with mainstream Quebeckers and that the Bloc is the best party in Quebec to prevent a Tory majority. This has paid off, in part because of some of the statements and policies the Tories have made (Funding cuts to the Arts as well as their Justice plan) and now we are talking about minimal losses for the Bloc Quebecois. In fact, we may even be talking about the Bloc gaining seats if the trend continues. So for Gilles Duceppe, do what he has been doing, which is working, and that is continue to hamme Harper as being too right wing for Quebec and out of touch with Quebec values.

Conservatives

At the beginning of the election, things looked pretty good in Quebec, with the Bloc and Tories almost tied and the Tories polling around 30%. Now, the prospect of big gains in Quebec is fading and the possibility of losing seats there, which was unthinkable a few weeks ago has now arisen. Harper therefore must turn things around in the debates since even the most optimistic gains in British Columbia and Ontario would still put him short of a majority, therefore he must win more seats in Quebec to win a majority. He needs to portray himself as moderate and one who understand's Quebec's distinctness and culture. He needs to play up his policies on having more Francophones on the CRTC, recognizing Quebec as a nation, and giving Quebec a seat at UNESCO. Debates are never a time to drop new policies, but they can at least set the stage for new ones. This is what Harper needs to do.

Liberals

Despite the dissatisfaction with the Tories in Quebec and the retreat of the NDP, the Liberals have not been able to gain much traction. Although Dion is hated by some in Quebec, he is also respected by others. More importantly, French is his native language so he is likely to have a fairly solid performance tonight (tomorrow is a different story though as he struggles in English still a bit). He needs to argue the Liberals cannot only stop Harper from winning a majority but also form government and introduce many of the priorities Quebec wants. The reality is Harper was able to make the arts cuts even with a minority so to prevent this, the Tories need to be defeated and the Liberals not the Bloc can do this. Likewise, Quebeckers tend to be more environmentally conscious than English Canadians and more open to the Green Shift, so tonight, not tomorrow is the time to sell it. Finally, he needs to address the economy which is faltering. Many see the Tories as better economic stewards despite the fact the Liberal record is far better than either the present Tories or past ones when it comes to the economy. He needs to emphasize this.

NDP

For a while the NDP was doing quite well, polling in the high teens, but has fallen back to the low teens. To regain what they have lost, the NDP needs to emphasize all the issues where they are the party that is most in touch with Quebeckers as Quebec is generally more left leaning than the rest of Canada and thus more likely to support Layton's policies than elsewhere. He needs to capitalize on this. Finally he should point out that the Bloc supported the Tories on the first two budgets and the softwood lumber deal. Only the NDP has consistently voted against the Tories, so for those who want a party that will stand tooth and nail against the Tories, the NDP is the best choice. This is what he needs to say. Also the fact he is a native son of Quebec and fully bilingual helps.

Green Party

They don't have a living hope in hell of winning seats in Quebec, and nevermind Elizabeth May's French is probably the weakest of the five leaders. Tonight is rather a warm up night for tomorrow which is what really matters for the Greens. She needs to do more listening and less debating. This is a time to see what issues the other party leaders are going to discuss and then she can use this to help prepare for tomorrow's debate

Election possibilities

2008-09-29T18:03:00.000-07:00

Earlier I made some predictions on what might or might not happen. Since then a few things have happened. Last week, the Liberals came close to a statistical tie with the NDP while the Tories were on the cusp of a majority. It seems now the Liberals have rebounded and are clearly in second place again (thankfully, although first would be better), while the Tories are not polling at around 36%, otherwise exactly what they got last federal election, meaning an election today would only yield a slightly stronger minority, around 130-135 seats. So if the momentum keeps up a Liberal win, is at least within the range of possibility, although not likely, but I would rather it was possible than not. Never mind, the NDP taking over as the second place party would be a disaster for Canada. We have already seen the right become less moderate as the Reform/Alliance replaced the more moderate Progressive Conservatives and I would hate to the same thing happen on the centre and left. Having a polarized electorate and wild swings in the pendelum is bad for Canada and something that needs to be avoided at all cost. Ironically, Britain which was known for its polarized electorate is moving away from that with both the Labour Party and Conservatives moving closer to the centre, so I would hate to see us go down the failed path they did in the past.

Anyways here are the possibilities for each party from the best and worse case scenario

Conservatives

Best case scenario: 160 seats - The Tories run a very strong campaign from now until the end and more importantly are able to allay fears with the 3-5% who are swinging back and forth between the Tories and other parties that a Tory majority is not something they need to fear. Also, voter turnout is low and since those over 50 tend to have the highest turnout and are also the group the Tories are strongest amongst, they do better than expected. This would be done by gaining rather than losing seats in Atlantic Canada, They make a modest recovery in Quebec and end with around 20 seats there. In Ontario they make strong gains in the 905 belt and mid sized cities outside the GTA, therefore picking up 15 seats in Ontario. In the West, they pick up 2-3 seats in Saskatchewan and Manitoba, sweep Alberta, and gain 10 seats in British Columbia, otherwise win most of the seats that when for the Canadian Alliance in 2000, but since the centre and left is far more divided than it was then, they don't need to get the 49% the Alliance got in 2000.

Worse case scenario - 100 seats - The other parties continue their attack on the Tories. This leads to major strategic voting so the split on the centre and the left doesn't materialize, while enough soft Tory supporters decide to move elsewhere so the party only gets 33% (that is only a few points lower than what they have now). In Atlantic Canada, they take a big hit and win between 2-4 seats, in Quebec, they lose rather than gain seats winning only 5-6 seats as the Bloc Quebecois continues their relentless attack on the Tories being out of touch with Quebec and the Tories make another announcement than turns off Quebecers. In Ontario, the NDP and Greens realize their vote is only a vote for the Tories, so they coalesce around the Liberals and knock off the Tories in the ten closest ridings (i.e. St. Catharines, Barrie, Kitchener-Conestoga, Ottawa-Orleans) reducing the Tories to 30 seats in Ontario. In Manitoba and Saskatchewan, the Liberals retake Winnipeg South and Desnethe-Missinippi-Churchill River, while the NDP picks up Saskatoon-Rosetown-Biggar. In Alberta, the NDP scores a stunning upset in Edmonton-Strathcona. While in British Columbia, the centre and left split on a province wide basis, but in each riding there is strategic voting whereby in Liberal/Tory ridings such as Richmond, the NDP and Greens swing over to the Liberals while in NDP/Tory ridings such as Kamloops-Thompson-Cariboo, the Liberals and Greens swing over to the NDP. The Tories end up dropping two seats to 15 seats.

Liberals

Best case scenario - 120 seats - The Liberals continue their uptick as NDP and Greens abandon move over to the Liberals to stop Harper while a few soft Tory votes swing over there way as well as the undecided (which is around 15%) breaks heavily in favour of the Liberals as it has in the past two elections. Dion is also performs surprisingly well in the English debate, while the four leaders do a good job of ripping Harper apart and he is unable to counteract their attacks. The Liberals win over 25 seats in Atlantic Canada. In Quebec, the NDP and Green vote collapse in the greater Montreal area while the Tories arts cuts and law and order platform swings a sizeable chunk of Tory voters over to the Liberals. They end up with 20 seats in Quebec, all in the Greater Montreal area and Outaouis though. In Ontario, the NDP and Green vote collapse while the Tories lose some soft supporters and drop to 32-33% in the province. The Liberals snatch half the ridings they lost in 2006 and get between 60-65 seats in Ontario. In the West, the Liberals pick up Winnipeg South and Desnethe-Missinippi-Churchill River in Saskatchewan/Manitoba, while in British Columbia, they maintain 9 seats (lose West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country, but win either Fleetwood-Port Kells or Saanich-Gulf Islands).

Worse Case Scenario - 60 seats - Dion makes a major blunder in the debates and both the NDP and Tories make the carbon tax a major issue for the remainder of the campaign. It becomes clear Harper will be re-elected, so the question is who would make a better opposition leader. Dion comes across as looking weak, while Layton as a competent and strong one. In Atlantic Canada, they are unable to capitalize on discomfort with Harper and instead the NDP is the prime beneficiary. The Liberals lose seats here. In Quebec, the NDP makes a strong rebound on the island of Montreal pushing the Liberals to an all time low in seats and votes in La Belle Province. In Ontario, the Liberals are reduced to a Toronto party winning around 35 seats, mostly in the 416 and inner 905 ridings and a smattering of ridings elsewhere in the province such as Ottawa-Vanier and Kingston & the Islands. In Manitoba and Saskatchewan, Ralph Goodale is the lone Liberal left standing and his margin of victory is significantly smaller than the last two elections. In British Columbia they take a big hit and win only 2-3 seats.

Bloc Quebecois

Best case scenario - 60 seats

Gilles Duceppe continues his relentless attack on the Tories and how their out of touch with the priorities of Quebecers. This works in getting the progressive vote to unite behind the Bloc Quebecois. Although the Bloc fails to break their popular vote record of 49%, they do break their seat record of 54 seats taking half the Tory seats and also picking up a few Liberal seats.

Worse Case scenario - 30 seats

Harper's numbers remain steady in British Columbia and in Ontario he is ahead in all the swing ridings that matter, so he spends much of the latter half of the campaign, trying to shore up support in Quebec as this is the only thing standing between him and a majority. Likewise both the Liberals and NDP also see their numbers rise. The Bloc Quebecois still comes in first for votes and seats, but has their worst showing since their founding.

NDP

Best Case Scenario - 55 seats

Jack Layton succeeds in setting an all time record of breaking Ed Broadbent's 1988 record in terms of both popular vote and seats. Add to the fact the NDP vote is fairly concentrated, so even with only 20% of the popular vote, they can win many seats. In Atlantic Canada, he capitalizes on Harper's unpopularity in the region and opposition to the Green Shift. He comes out with 8 seats. In Quebec, he attacks the Liberals as being weak, the Bloc Quebecois as being ineffective and the Tories as too extreme for Quebec. He is able to take advantage of Quebec's more left of centre politics and get in the high teens in votes and pick up 2-4 seats. In Ontario, it becomes clear Harper will win, so Layton is able to convince progressive voters he is a more effective opposition leader pointing to the fact the Liberals abstained on 43 confidence measures, while the NDP has voted against the Tories on every single one. He is also picks up some Green supporters. With gains mainly in Northern Ontario, he wins 18-20 seats, the best showing of the party in Ontario. In Manitoba and Saskatchewan, he is able to convince his provincial counterparts to stump for him and in the case of Manitoba have Gary Doer who is very popular give him a strong endorsement. He comes out with 6 seats here. Picks up Edmonton-Strathcona in Alberta. In British Columbia, he turns to his provincial counterparts who are polling at close to 40% for help. The BC NDP and their leader Carole James make clear that Harper does not in any way shape or form represent what they stand for and that he represents what Campbell was like in his first term all over again. Also, they pick up many Green votes as well as those who vote Liberal federally but NDP provincially. Layton walks out with 12-15 seats in BC.

Worse Case scenario - 20 seats - Despite the strong campaign showing, the fear of a Harper majority is strong enough to scare a large chunk of NDP voters into the Liberal arms. In Atlantic Canada, the two incumbents are re-elected, but nothing else, the NDP loses Outremont to the Liberals in Quebec, while in Ontario drops to 5-7 seats. In Manitoba and Saskatchewan, they win Winnipeg Centre and Winnipeg North, but lose Elmwood-Transcona to the Tories. In British Columbia, they are unable to unite progressives and instead end up losing seats to the Tories, only winning 5 seats.

Green Party

Best case scenario is just to win a seat everywhere, but even if they fail to win a seat, if they get above 10% of the popular vote, this will at least make them be taken more seriously next time around. More importantly the fact they could get 10% under the FTFP system will be a huge breakthrough as this is their best showings in European countries that use some form of proportional representation, not their average showing. On the other hand if they win no seats, have no second place finishes and get less than 7% of the popular vote it will undoubetdly be considered a disappointment.

This means that while a Conservative majority is possible, it is not likely and likwise a Liberal win maybe difficult but not impossible. That being said, time is running out and by next week if the Liberals still have a deficit of more than seven points in the polls they are finished in terms of their chances of winning and likewise if by the Thanksgiving weekend, they are not within 5% of the Tories they are also finished. Due to last minute shifts, as long as the last string of polls place them within 5% of the Tories, they could still pull off an upset.

Why I still support Dion

2008-09-24T17:45:00.000-07:00

As the polls have shown the Liberals to continuously struggle and many suggesting at the moment the Liberals may fall below 28% (that is their worse showing ever in terms of popular vote, which happened in 1984), so many people are questioning whether Dion was the right choice. I know many people not involved in politics who have views very similiar to what Dion espouses, yet refuse to vote for him since they somehow believe he is a weak leader. As someone who follows politics closely, the problem with Dion, is not what he stands for, the problem is he does a poor job of selling it. In fact if people would actually listen to his speeches and read his platform, I believe he would be doing much better. Anyways here is why regardless of opinion polls, I plan to vote Liberal and not just to stop Stephen Harper, but actually to vote for Stephane Dion.

Stephane Dion is a leader

Contrary to popular position, Stephane Dion has shown that he is a true leader, not a weak leader as the Tory ads portray. What is ironic is the whole weak leader idea was started by the Tories, yet somehow people bought into it. After all, your political opponents are rarely going to say nice things about you and that is about the last place one should look for an honest opinion on someone. However, the reason why I believe he is a leader is his introduction and defence of the clarity act as intergovernmental affairs minister. Back in 1995, the Yes side nearly won a referendum in Quebec, yet a full 1/3 of Yes voters thought Quebec would still remain part of Quebec in the event of Yes victory due to the convuloted question. As someone who put his country first, Dion wanted to make sure this would never happen again. He introduced the clarity act which stated Quebec could only separate with a clear question and a clear majority. The Quebec media ridiculed him to great lengths but he stood his ground and in the end succeeded. Today separtism is at an all time low and even so much that the Bloc and PQ have put the idea of another referendum on the back burner. This is an example of a true leader, not a weak leader.

Stephane Dion is a centrist

Harper has gone to great lengths to argue that under Dion, the Liberals have taken a dramatic shift to the left and are socialists in disguise. This is again totally untrue and anyone who bothered to read their platform and also read the NDP would realize the differences between the two parties are just as stark as they are between the Conservatives and Liberals. If Dion were really as left wing as Harper says he is, I would have torn up my Liberal membership card in an instant, however, I know full well this is not the case. Dion favours both corporate and income tax cuts, hardly a socialist policy. He favours helping low income parents with childcare, not a full blown childcare program like Martin proposed. He has stated unequovically we will have a balanced budget even if it means spending cuts, again hardly a hallmark of a socialist. In fact ironically, his policies are very similiar to other conservative leaders abroad such as Angela Merkel in Germany and David Cameron in Britain, neither who anyone would describe as socialist. Likewise, his platform is one that I could easily see a Red Tory from the former Progressive Conservatives supporting. True, those on the centre-left would also agree with much of the platform, but I suspect the ideologues on both the left and right would find it tough to stomach, which is off course a good thing in my view. I lived under a socialist government in the 90s in BC, so I know what a socialist government is like and Dion is not even remotely similiar to one. In BC politics, he would be closer to Gordon Campbell than Carole James although still to the left of Gordon Campbell.

Liberals have the best platform

Forget about the ten second sound bytes and front page news, if you want to see who would be the best person to run the country, the best thing to do is to read the party platform and check out the party website. There are many Liberal policies I disagree with, as no party perfectly matches my views, however on the whole I feel their policies are well reasoned and balanced. More importantly, they are made based on what works best, not on some populist slogan or as others have done based on what side of the spectrum they fall on. In fact, I get the impression Dion is the only leader who ignores the whole idea of whether an idea is a "right wing" or "left wing" idea and instead looks at whether it is a "good idea" or "bad idea". Now some may say it is great to make great long speeches and have good articles, but if you want to sell something you need to do it in ten second bytes. While that maybe the case regretably, I think that is unfortunate and is certainly not what will influence how I vote. When buying a new house, you don't take just a minute looking through, you spend a whole day looking through several carefully and likewise when buying a new car, you test drive each one, not just look at the exterior. When choosing the next PM, one should look carefully at each party's platform. There is no reason why one cannot spare 10 minutes to read the party platform.

So while it is looking increasingly likely that Dion will not win the next election (although still possible), I will still happily vote for him as I believe he would make the best PM of the choices available.

Conservative Justice Plan

2008-09-22T20:18:00.000-07:00

Today the Conservatives unveiled their plan for revamping the young offender's act. While I have no doubt it will be popular outside of Quebec, I think it is a bad idea and regardless of its appeal, needs to be opposed. This is also the case that if framed properly, the Liberals can turn this against the Tories, however it has to be done right. I am not opposed to charging young offenders as adults in the most extreme cases, but this should be an option available, not a requirement. In addition, it should only be done in the most extreme cases when a psychiatric assessment shows there is little to no chance of rehabilatating the offender such as the killers of Rena Virk in BC in 1996. However, this discretion should be left up to the judge in charge of the case. Instead the Tories are trying a failed system of lock them up approach used in the United States, which has failed on all accounts. It has not reduced crime, while the rate of incarceration has skyrocketed and it has been a huge cost to taxpayers. Instead rehabilatation in the majority of cases not only reduces the risk of the person re-offending, but also costs less than incarceration. By rehabilatating young offenders, they can become productive citizens as adults rather than hardened criminals. The most troubling part of all is to release the names of convicted young offenders. This is I oppose as once it is known someone has committed a crime, their chances of receiving any meaningful employment as an adult is considerably reduced. This increases the chances they will continue to commit crimes as an adult and even if they don't if they cannot find meaningful employment they are more likely to cost taxpayers money in terms of having to support them on social assistance. So from a taxpayer's point of view, this will cost a lot. In the case of the United States, their total prison population is larger than the population of the ten smallest states and in fact 1 in 10 Black males between 25-29 are currently incarcerated. Yet despite this, the United States has one of the highest crime rates, if not the highest in the developed world. Regardless of ideology, I believe in doing what works rather than what does not work. Now I understand why this might appeal to some and this will be where the Liberals face their main challenge in challenging this. Arguing the experts say this won't work probably won't work to well with your average citizen. That might work with the converted like myself, but that is besides the point.

Instead the Liberals need to point out that Harper's plan likely violate the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Ask him if the courts strike down his plan if he is willing to use the notwithstanding clause. If he says yes, then ask what other areas he might be willing to use it against such as abortion, death penalty, gay marriage etc. Otherwise bring up the old hidden agenda which has worked fairly well in past elections. If he says no, then point out he will have to break his promise by either not implementing his plans or use the notwithstanding clause and tie this into his other broken promises such as not taxing income trusts and breaking the Atlantic Accords. These are simple easy ideas that can make a difference. Long detailed articles on why the policies are bad only works with those who are active in politics and most of them have made up their mind on how they plan to vote. To appeal to the undecided, the Liberals must make it easy and simple to understand, something which regretably they haven't done too well recently unlike the Tories or the NDP.

As for other issues, most of the party policies have been not too controversial, although each party seems to have had their few controversies recently. In the case of the Tories, they had to dump a candidate in Toronto Centre after his comments on his blog on Natives as well as why allowing people to carry concealed weapons could have prevented the greyhound bus murder in Winnipeg of Tim McLean this past August. While the Tories have no chance at winning Toronto Centre, which is probably why they never bothered to properly vet their candidate, this is not too helpful. The Liberals big dumb move was Dion's statement that the Carbon Tax is not a major policy plank. Even if unpopular, backing down only makes things worse. He should stick with the policy and argue it is the right thing. After all, when Trudeau introduced bilingualism, abolished the death penalty, and introduced the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and likewise when Mulroney brought in Free Trade, these were controversial policies with many detractors. But both stuck by their guns and won out in the end. Also the NDP has had a few problems with some of its BC candidates, although I wonder how much it will really hurt them since their stances on marijuana are most likely to anger the types who would never consider voting NDP in the first place.

As for the polls, the Tories are still ahead, although clearly in minority territory. In the case of the Liberals, their numbers are somewhat scattered from being only 5 points behind in the Nanos poll to in a dog fight for second place with the NDP in some other polls. This means the Liberals do still have a chance at winning if they can turn things around, but also could mean falling into a dead heat with the NDP and possibly next time around having the NDP supplant them as the centre-left alternative if things go poorly, so all the more reason to fight hard regardless of which polls one believes.

Gerry Ritz needs to resign or be fired

2008-09-18T18:00:00.000-07:00

Over the last few days, we have had a number of campaign announcements and none really too controversial but none overly bold either. Probably makes sense considering the fact we are now entering a recession, people want steady policies, not radical changes. However, the one big headline today was Gerry Ritz's comments about hoping the one listeria death in PEI (it turns out no one died in PEI of listeria) was Wayne Easter. I know that some Tories will argue people sometime say stupid things they shouldn't which is a fair argument. However, there is a time for joking and time not for it. An event as serious as several people dying from listeria is no joking matter. I agree with Wayne Easter, that this is not about the comment of Gerry Ritz against him, but his poor handling of the issue. If Harper is the true leader he claims to be, he would fire him. Likewise if Gerry Ritz is willing to live up to his responsibility he would resign. As for how this will affect the polling numbers, my guess is as good as anyone else's, but I am pretty sure the Tories will at least lose some points over this, although how big the drop will be is hard to say. We probably won't know for three to four days as that is how long it usually takes before the full effects are seen. This along, with Ryan Sparrow's comments, and the Poopin puffin point to an obvious flaw in Harper's team. I've always seen him as a nasty partisan who is a bully and usually people like that tend to attract others like that and surround themselves with people like that. Now Harper, can easily switch to a more gentler personality, but if you surround yourselves with others who are mean and nasty don't expect all of them to easily shift gears when an election is called. As for how this will affect the outcome of the election, that is hard to say as we still have 3 and half weeks and lots can happen so as stated earlier anything from a Liberal minority to a Conservative majority is within the realm of possibility. While the Liberals would probably be doing better in the polls if they were more aggressive, I do like Dion's more consensus oriented approach as opposed to Harper's confrontational approach. A confrontational approach may work well politically regretably, but it is not good for the country. Lets hope the public eventually says enough to smearing and mud slinging and instead debates issues honestly and openly in a respectful manner. Just because someone has different political views doesn't make them automatically a bad person. I have friends and even family members from pretty much every political party and I get along fine with all of them regardless of their views and recognize most have good intentions and in fact our views are not as different as one might think.

Election Predictions

2008-09-15T16:41:00.000-07:00

Earlier I said I wouldn't make any predictions until the election gets closer and at this point predicting the outcome is still too early, although every week, I thought I would give a range for each party from the worse case scenario to the best case scenario. Below is the breakdown by region.

Atlantic Canada

This is the one region the Tories have been struggling in. The Liberals are competitive here although it still remains to be seen how well they will do. Likewise the NDP has a golden opportunity to gain based upon the Tory and Liberal mistakes, but whether they will capitalize on this or not remains to be seen.

NEWFOUNDLAND & LABRADOR

Liberals 4-7 seats (Worse case scenario, hold what they have now, best case scenario sweep the province)

Conservatives 0-3 seats (Worse case scenario lose all three seats while best case scenario hold what they have now).

NDP 0-2 seats (Best case scenario, win both St. John's ridings).

With Danny Williams being very popular and the fact he is campaigning against the Conservatives, I would be extremely surprised if they held the three ridings they currently hold. Fabian Manning's riding is the only riding I think they even have a decent shot at holding.

NOVA SCOTIA

Liberals 5-8 seats (worse case scenario lose West Nova, best case scenario pick up Halifax and South Shore-St. Margaret's)

Conservatives 0-3 seats (Best case scenario, hold the two ridings that have incumbents and pick up West Nova)

NDP 1-4 seats (Worse case scenario lose Halifax, best case scenario pick up South Shore-St. Margaret's and Central Nova)

Green Party 0-1 seats (Win in Central Nova which is possible albeit a long shot)

Independent 1 seat (Bill Casey)

Although the Tories could get shut out of three provinces potentially, I think the chances of them getting shut out of Nova Scotia are pretty low whereas I would not be surprised if they won 0 seats in Newfounland & Labrador and PEI.

PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND

Liberals 3-4 Seats (Egmont is the only seat that I am not totally certain they will hold, although I think their chances are still better than even)

Conservatives 0-1 seats (Egmont, which is still an uphill battle, although at least possible)

NEW BRUNSWICK

Liberals 2-7 seats (best case scenario, pick up Tobique-Mactaquac, while worse case scenario lose every riding except Beausejour and Moncton-Riverview-Dieppe)

Conservatives 2-7 seats (best case scenario, win every riding except Acadie-Bathurst, Beausejour, and Moncton-Riverview-Dieppe, while worse case scenario lose Tobique-Mactaquac, New Brunswick Southwest and Fundy-Royal are the two safest ridings in Atlantic Canada

NDP 1 seat (Acadie-Bathurst)

If the Tories do make any gains in Atlantic Canada, they are most likely to be in New Brunswick. At this point, I am predicting this will be their best province in terms of their share of the popular vote in Atlantic Canada

Total:

Liberals 14-26 seats
Conservatives 2-14 seats
NDP 2-7 seats
Green party 0-1 seat
Independent 1 seat

Quebec

The Bloc Quebecois has been struggling here and unless they can turn things around, they will likely lose seats. The Tories have had some strong polls putting them at over 30% in the province, but their support is quite soft and may or may not materialize depending on the campaign. The Liberals are largely limited to the island of Montreal and Outaoais region and are dead in the water elsewhere in the province. The NDP has a very good chance at winning at least one seat, but it is unlikely they will have a large breakthrough. Below will be the ridings I am nearly certain each party will win, while the winneable ones are not necessarily ones I think they will win, but at least where the possibility exists. In bold will be potential pick-ups over last time based on how they voted in 2006, not who holds them now.

Bloc Quebecois: Safe Bloc ridings: Rimouski-Temiscouata-Neigette-Les Basques, Bas-Richelieu-Nicolet-Becancour, Sherbrooke, Shefford, Compton-Stanstead, Brome-Missiquoi, Saint Jean, Chateauguay-St. Constant, Longueil-Pierre Boucher, St. Bruno-St. Hubert, Vercheres-Les Patriotes, Chambly-Borduas, Laurier-Sainte Marie, Rosemont-La Petite-Patrie, Hochelaga-Maissoneuve, La Pointe-de-l'Ile, Marc-Aurele-Fortin, Terrebonne-Blainville, Riviere du Nord, Laurentides-Labelle, Riviere-des-Milles-Iles, Abitibi-Temiscamingue, Montcalm, Repentigny, Manicouagan, Abitibi-Baie-James-Nunavik-Eeyou) 26 seats

Winneable ridings: Haute-Gaspesie-La Mitis-Matane-Matapedia, Montmagny-L'Islet-Kamouraksa-Riviere-du Loup, Richmond-Arthabaska, Drummond, Saint Hyacinthe-Bagot, Beauharnois-Salaberry, Brossard-La Prairie, Saint Lambert, Vaudreuil-Soulanges, Ahuntsic, Jeanne-Le Ber, Papineau, Honore-Mercier, Laval-les Iles, Laval, Alfred-Pellan, Argenteuil-Papineau-Mirabel, Gatineau, Hull-Aylmer, Pontiac, Berthier-Maskinoge, Joliette, Trois Rivieres, Saint Maurice-Champlain, Quebec, Louis-Hebert, Charlesbourg-Haute-Saint Charles, Beauport-Limoliou, Montmorency-Charlevoix-Haute-Cote Nord, Chicoutimi-Le Fjord, Roberval-Lac Saint Jean) 58 seats

Liberals: Safe Liberal ridings (Lac Saint Louis, Pierrefonds-Dollard, Notre-Dame-de-Grace-Lachine, Saint Laurent-Cartierville, La Salle-Emard, Mount Royal, Bourassa, St. Leonard-St. Michel) 8 seats

Winneable ridings: Brossard-La Prairie, Saint Lambert, Jeanne-Le Ber, Ahuntsic, Papineau, Outremont, Westmount-Ville Marie, Honore-Mercier, Laval-les Iles, Laval, Alfred-Pellan, Gatineau, Hull-Aylmer, Pontiac) 22 seats

Conservatives: Safe Tory ridings (Levis-Bellechasse, Lotbiniere-Chutes-de-la-Chaudiere, Megantic-L'Erable, Beauce, Louis-St. Laurent, Jonquiere-Alma) 6 seats

Winneable ridings: Gaspesie-Iles-de-la-Madeleine, Haute-Gaspesie-La Mitis-Matane-Matapedia, Montmagny-L'Islet-Kamouraska-Riviere du Loup, Richmond-Arthabaska, Drummond, Saint Hyacinthe-Bagot, Beauharnois-Salaberry, Vaudreuil-Soulanges, Argenteuil-Papineau-Mirabel, Pontiac, Berthier-Maskinoge, Joliette, Trois Rivieres, Saint Maurice-Champlain, Quebec, Louis-Hebert, Charlesbourg-Haute-Saint Charles, Beauport-Limoliou, Montmorency-Charlevoix-Haute-Cote Nord, Chicoutimi-Le Fjord, Roberval-Lac Saint Jean) 27 seats

NDP: No safe ridings but three winneable ridings (Outremont, Westmount-Ville Marie, and Gatineau)

Independent: 1 seat (Andre Arthur is re-elected)

Ontario

Prior to the election, the Liberals had a comfortable lead here, but now the Tories are at the very least tied if not ahead. Tory support is consistently been between 30-40%, but Liberal support is a lot less predictable as is Green and NDP support. While the Liberals have a lock on much of the GTA, there are very few safe Liberal ridings outside the GTA. For the Tories they have a lock on most of the rural ridings, but almost every riding with a decent size centre is at least somewhat vulnerable for them. The suburbs, mid sized cities, and mixed/urban rural ridings is where the main battles will be fought. The NDP have a few core ridings, mostly in large urban centres, where their potentials for gains are mostly in Northern Ontario.

Liberals: Safe Liberal ridings (Davenport, Toronto Centre, Don Valley East, Don Valley West, Willowdale, Eglinton-Lawrence, St. Paul's, York South-Weston, York West, York Centre, Etobicoke-Lakeshore, Etobicoke Centre, Etobicoke North, Scarborough Southwest, Scarborough Centre, Scarborough-Agincourt, Scarborough-Guildwood, Scarborough-Rouge River, Pickering-Scarborough East, Markham-Unionville, Thornhill, Vaughan, Richmond Hill, Bramalea-Gore-Malton, Brampton-Springdale, Mississauga-Brampton South, Mississauga East-Cooksville, Kitchener Centre, Kitchener-Waterloo, London North Centre, Sudbury, Nippissing-Timiskaming, Ottawa-Vanier, Kingston & the Islands) 34 seats

Winneable ridings: Parkdale-High Park, Trinity-Spadina (my riding), Beaches-East York, Whitby-Oshawa, Ajax-Pickering, Oak Ridges-Markham, Newmarket-Aurora, Brampton West, Mississauga South, Mississauga-Erindale, Mississauga-Streetsville, Oakville, Halton, Burlington, Ancaster-Dundas-Flamborough-Westdale, Hamilton East-Stoney Creek, Hamilton Mountain, St. Catharines, Welland, Niagara Falls, Simcoe North, Barrie, Guelph, Cambridge, Kitchener-Conestoga, Brant, Huron-Bruce, London-Fanshawe, London West, Sarnia-Lambton, Essex, Kenora, Thunder Bay-Rainy River, Thunder Bay-Superior North, Algoma-Manitoulin-Kapuskasking, Nickel Belt, Sault Ste. Marie, Parry Sound-Muskoka, Ottawa West-Nepean, Ottawa South, Ottawa Centre, Ottawa-Orleans, Glengarry-Prescott-Russell, Peterborough, Northumberland-Quinte West 79 seats

Conservatives: Safe ridings (Durham, York-Simcoe, Niagara West-Glanbrook, Simcoe-Grey, Dufferin-Caledon, Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound, Wellington-Halton Hills, Haldimand-Norfolk, Perth-Wellington, Oxford, Elgin-Middlesex-London, Lambton-Kent-Middlesex, Chatham-Kent-Essex, Renfrew-Nippissing-Pembroke, Carleton-Mississippi Mills, Nepean-Carleton, Stormont-Dundas-South Glengarry, Leeds-Grenville, Lanark-Frontenac-Lennox & Addington, Haliburton-Kawartha Lakes-Brock, Prince Edward-Hastings) 22 seats

Winneable Ridings: Oshawa, Whitby-Oshawa, Ajax-Pickering, Oak Ridges-Markham, Newmarket-Aurora, Brampton West, Mississauga South, Mississauga-Erindale, Mississauga-Streetsville, Oakville, Halton, Burlington, Ancaster-Dundas-Flamborough-Westdale, Hamilton Mountain, St. Catharines, Welland, Niagara Falls, Simcoe North, Barrie, Guelph, Cambridge, Kitchener-Conestoga, Brant, Huron-Bruce, London-Fanshawe, London West, Sarnia-Lambton, Essex, Kenora, Parry Sound-Muskoka, Ottawa West-Nepean, Ottawa South, Ottawa-Orleans, Glengarry-Prescott-Russell, Peterborough, Northumberland-Quinte West 56 seats

NDP: Safe ridings: (Toronto-Danforth, Hamilton Centre, Windsor-Tecumseh, Windsor West, Timmins-James Bay) 5 seats

Winneable ridings: Parkdale-High Park, Trinity-Spadina (my riding ugh!), Beaches-East York, Oshawa, Hamilton East-Stoney Creek, Hamilton Mountain, Welland, London-Fanshawe, Kenora, Thunder Bay-Rainy River, Thunder Bay-Superior North, Algoma-Manitoulin-Kapuskasing, Nickel Belt, Sault Ste. Marie, Ottawa Centre 20 seats

Green Party - Guelph is the only riding they have any chance at winning albeit a low chance here

Manitoba

Few accurate polls on this region, although the Tories have a lock most of Rural Manitoba whereas Winnipeg will be a three way race in all likelihood.

Conservatives: Safe ridings (Selkirk-Interlake, Dauphin-Swan River-Marquette, Brandon-Souris, Portage-Lisgar, Provencher) 5 seats

Winneable ridings: Winnipeg South, Charleswood-St. James-Assinboia, Kildonan-St. Paul, Saint Boniface, Winnipeg South Centre, Elmwood-Transcona 11 seats

Liberals: No safe ridings in Manitoba, although I would be very surprised if they actually did get shut out of the province

Winneable ridings: Churchill, Winnipeg South Centre, Saint Boniface, Winnipeg South, Charleswood-St. James-Assinboia, Kildonan-St. Paul 6 seats

NDP: Safe ridings (Winnipeg Centre and Winnipeg North) 2 seats

Winneable ridings: Churchill, Winnipeg Centre, Winnipeg North, Elmwood-Transcona 4 seats

Saskatchewan

With the Tories dominating much of rural Saskatchewan and every riding having at least a sizeable chunk of rural area, I expect the Tories to win the majority of seats here, although I doubt they will sweep it whereas Alberta there is a better than even chance of pulling off a complete sweep. The NDP may get shut out again, although I wouldn't be surprised if they do win one seat or more.

Conservatives: Safe ridings (Prince Albert, Battlefords-Lloydminster, Cypress Hills-Grasslands, Souris-Moose Mountain, Yorkton-Melville, Saskatoon-Wanuskewin, Saskatoon-Humboldt, Blackstrap) 8 seats

Winneable ridings: Every riding except Wascana - 13 seats

Liberals: Wascana is a safe Liberal riding, but beyond that all other ridings will be an uphill battle, although I could see the Liberals regaining Desnethe-Missinippi-Churchill River, so 2 seats at the most.

NDP: Saskatoon-Rosetown-Biggar is their best bet, although it is very much a possibility they will be shut out of the province for the third time in a row. There are four winneable ridings for them, which are (Saskatoon-Rosetown-Biggar, Regina-Lumsden-Lake Centre, Palliser, and Regina-Qu'appelle)

Alberta

Largely ignored in this election as it is pretty much a Conservative fortress. Asides from Edmonton-Strathcona and Edmonton Centre, the Tories pretty much have a lock on every other riding, meaning a minimum of 26 seats in the province. They could off course and in all probability will sweep the province again. For the NDP, Edmonton-Strathcona is their only hope while Edmonton Centre is the only hope for the Liberals.

British Columbia

The Tories have generally stayed out in front although the size of their lead has varied. With the NDP and Greens being quite strong in BC, there is the potential for vote splitting here even more so than other provinces. The NDP are quite competitive here and in fact are probably more of a threat to the Tories than the Liberals. The Greens could also win a seat here although again not likely. The Liberals are struggling in BC, although I still suspect they should at least hold their ridings in Vancouver and maybe could pick up some in the suburbs.

Conservatives: Safe ridings (Prince George-Peace River, Cariboo-Prince George, Okanagan-Shuswap, Kootenay-Columbia, Okanagan-Coquihalla, Kelowna-Lake Country, Port Moody-Westwood-Port Coquitlam, Delta-Richmond East, South Surrey-White Rock-Cloverdale, Langley, Abbotsford, Chilliwack-Fraser Canyon) 12 seats

Winneable ridings (Skeena-Bulkley Valley, Kamloops-Thompson-Cariboo, British Columbia Southern Interior, Vancouver Island North, Nanaimo-Alberni, Nanaimo-Cowichan, Saanich-Gulf Islands, Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca, West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country, North Vancouver, Vancouver-Quadra, New Westminster-Coquitlam, Pitt Meadows-Maple Ridge-Mission, Richmond, Surrey North, Newton-North Delta, Fleetwood-Port Kells) 29 seats

Liberals: Safe ridings (Vancouver South) 1 seat

Winneable ridings: Victoria, Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca, West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country, North Vancouver, Vancouver-Quadra, Vancouver Centre, Vancouver-Kingsway, Burnaby-Douglas, Burnaby-New Westminster, Richmond, Newton-North Delta, Fleetwood-Port Kells 13 seats

NDP: Safe ridings (Vancouver East) 1 seat

Winneable ridings: Skeena-Bulkley Valley, Kamloops-Thompson-Cariboo, British Columbia Southern Interior, Vancouver Island North, Nanaimo-Alberni, Nanaimo-Cowichan, Victoria, Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca, Vancouver Centre, Vancouver-Kingsway, Burnaby-Douglas, Burnaby-New Westminster, New Westminster-Coquitlam, Pitt Meadows-Maple Ridge-Mission, Surrey North, Newton-North Delta, Fleetwood-Port Kells 18 seats

Green Party: In all likelihood will win no seats, however both Saanich-Gulf Islands and West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country are ridings that they have the potential to win, so 2 seats at most.

Territories

Liberals 1-3 seats (Definitely Yukon, likely Nunavut, and maybe Western Arctic)

NDP 0-2 seats (Likely Western Arctic, while a remote chance of winning Nunavut)

Conservatives 0-1 seat (Nunavut is the only one of the three they have a reasonable shot at).

Summary

Conservatives 81-179 seats

Liberals 59-152 seats

Bloc Quebecois 26-58 seats

NDP 10-59 seats

Green Party 0-4 seats

Independents 2 seats

So in summary, the Tories could get anything from a stable majority to an outright loss with fewer seats than in 2004. While the seats given here are all the extremes, it is at least a good indication of what is plausible and what is not. The Liberals even in the worse case scenario would almost certainly still remain the official opposition so to those in the NDP who want to displace the Liberals as the official opposition and to those in the Tories who want to see the Liberals disappear it won't happen. By the same token, a Liberal majority appears to be out of the picture, however under the best case scenario they would be close enough that they could easily convince a few members from the opposition to cross the floor and join the party or barring that as long as they don't do anything too stupid, they could probably pass most confidence measures as only 4 members would need to be absent if the speaker is from the opposition while six if the speaker is a Liberal. The Bloc Quebecois will still remain a force, although breaking their record of 54 seats looks increasingly unlikely and if they were to fall below 30 seats, I suspect many would question their usefulness. In the case of the NDP, getting over 50 seats would make them a force to be reckoned with while 10 seats would mean losing their official party status. In the case of the Greens, just winning one seat would be a major breakthrough. In fact, no Green Party member has won a seat in any country that uses First past the post as its electoral system so this would be a first. As the election progresses I will revise these weekly, but only listing the changes, not the whole thing.

Campaign Week 1 wrap up

2008-09-13T19:30:00.000-07:00

The first week is now over of the campaign and so far it appears the Tories have a sizeable lead although only a few polls actually show them winning a majority. The Liberals are certainly behind, although it seems that while the Tory numbers are pretty constant, the centre-left vote is being fought over between the Liberals, Greens, and NDP. The Prairies is strong Tory as expected, British Columbia the Tories lead although the Liberals are struggling and the NDP gaining. In Ontario, the Tories appear to be up although again the centre-left vote seems to be uneven meaning it is unclear whether the Liberals are as low as the low 30s or as high as the high 40s. The Bloc continues to struggle in Quebec while the Tories are fairly competitive outside of Montreal. Atlantic Canada, the Liberals are still in front, NDP gaining, and Tories struggling in this one region. As for each party, below is my summary since my last post.

Conservatives

Not exactly the greatest week in terms of gaffes. First the poopin puffin and then Ryan Sparrow's remarks about a father of a soldier killed in Afghanistan are all negatives against the Tories. Although Harper has taken on a softer approach during the campaign, if you have a mean nasty style at other times, it only makes sense he would surround himself with people who have a simliar style and unlike him not all will be able to switch modes easily. In terms of it not hurting their polling numbers, I would argue that it is still too early in the campaign to say for sure. A few gaffes rarely sink a campaign, but repeated gaffes eventually cause a party to plummet so if the rest of the campaign is gaffe free it likely won't hurt them, but if there are several more gaffes than it should hurt them. In terms of policies, Harper promised to pull out of Afghanistan in 2011, ease rules for foreign investment, and lower small business taxes. I support lowering small business taxes, which incidentally the Liberals have long championed and likewise also pulling out of Afghanistan in 2011, another thing the Liberals have supported long before the Tories. As for relaxing rules on foreign ownership, this seems like a risky policy, although I agree with parts of it and disagree with other sections. In the case of banking, we already have competition is foreign ownership rules only apply to Schedule I banks, but Schedule II banks are subsidiaries of foreign owned banks and Schedule III ones are foreign banks, so really no need to change here. In the case of telecommunications, I wouldn't mind seeing Bell Canada, Telus, and Rogers facing a bit more competition, so I support opening up service providers to foreign competition, however ownership of the lines should remain predominately Canadian as this is essentially a natural monopoly. For example, here in Ontario, Bell Canada owns all the lines, however, one can get service from other companies if they so choose and they simply pay a fee to use the lines. As for Airlines, I am not opposed to raising it to 49%, but no higher provided the other country reciprocates. Since it is 49% in the EU but only 25% in the US and unlikely to change anytime soon there, it would mean more European ownership. I flew to Europe twice last year, once by KLM and the other time by Air Canada and the service by KLM was far better so it would be nice if our airlines could learn a bit from European airlines such as KLM-Air France, Lufthansa, and British Airways, however I am not keen on more American ownership here as their airlines over even worse service. However, I disagree with Harper on making changes to ownership of uranium. Since this can be used for nuclear weapons, we should not even think about raising foreign ownership rules here. As much as I support free trade and liberalized investment, this is an area that should be off limits to more foreign ownership and this affects our sovereignty and national security. His feud with Danny Williams seems to be continuing. Although I agree with much of what Danny Williams says about Harper, my question to him is how is he going to work with him if Harper is re-elected which is looking increasingly likely. If he feels so passionate about federal politics, he should resign as premier and run as a Liberal candidate. If the Liberals win, he would be a strong minister due to his experience, while if they lose, he could help re-energize what has been a lacklustre opposition. There is a place for vicious attacks against the PM and place not for them and Danny Williams is not in the proper place. I don't have a problem with him campaigning and endorsing any given party or candidate, but there is a civil way of doing it and an over the top way of doing it.

Liberals

Lots of strong well reasoned policies and certainly reading their website and their promises I am impressed with them. However, the problem is I am keen follower of politics and will read the newspapers from back to front and go to their website. For the non-politicos, they won't do this and that is partly why the party is struggling. They need to get their policies on the front page of newspapers and make their policies easy to sell in only 10 seconds as most people don't follow politics as closely as I do. You can have good policies, but you will not win if you cannot sell them. We have good policies, now is the time to sell them to the public. Their promise of increase funding for health inspectors is definitely a good one in light of the listerous outbreak. I also think their immigration policy on the whole sounds reasonable, although I oppose increasing our immigration intake until we can resolve the backlog and help ensure those already here are able to get jobs that match their skills (i.e. cut the number of taxi drivers with Ph.D's). Only after this is achieved should increases be considered. That being said, all of this I got on the Liberal website, not from the front page of any newspaper. Therefore the Liberals need to get their message out a lot better. I will be voting for them, but I will admit if it didn't follow politics as closely as I do, I don't know if I would be leaning towards the Liberals now. They also handled their one candidate in Quebec who made an insulting comment about aboriginals in 1990. While the riding of Quebec is strictly a race between the Bloc Quebecois and Conservatives just like Halifax is a race between the NDP and Liberals (Conservative candidate was dumped here), having a candidate with negative baggage is never a good thing.

Bloc Quebecois

Once again, their campaign continues to falter. Much of their raison d'etre is gone as sovereignty is no longer a major issue. Now they are trying to position themselves as the centre-left alternative to the Tories, but the problem here is the Bloc Quebecois was always a diverse coalition of unionists and progressives mainly found in Montreal ranging to more conservative nationalists found in the regions. The only thing uniting them was the desire for an independent Quebec.

NDP

While the Liberals are staying off the front page, the NDP is doing a good job of being on it despite being a fourth place party in the House of Commons. Jack Layton promises to tackle high gas prices which is good politics, however regulating gas prices is extremely dumb economically. If the oil companies are colluding, we already have laws to stop this as well as price fixing, but setting prices below world market prices will only ensure more of our oil is exported where prices are higher and less used here. He also promised $10 billion more in equalization to Newfoundland & Labrador which may help him win seats there, but I doubt this will go over well in Ontario especially considering Newfoundland & Labrador is on the verge of becoming a have province while Ontario is on the verge of becoming a have not province so the idea of a poorer Ontario transferring money to a richer Newfoundland & Labrador just doesn't sound right.

Green Party

Lots of attention after being in the debates, but little on policies yet. In addition, it appears any gains they are making are coming at the expense of the Liberals and NDP, not the Conservatives so if anything a strong Green Party will only increase the chances of a Conservative majority.

As for predictions, while the Conservatives definitely have a large enough lead that their chances of winning are better than the Liberals, there is still enough time that the Liberals can come back and win although at this point I think a Liberal minority is probably the best case scenario. A Conservative majority is possible, but I would still say not likely.

Campaign Update #1

2008-09-10T18:51:00.001-07:00

We are not even through the first week and already lots has happened so far, so below is my summary by each party.

Conservatives

Lots of attention their ad on www.notaleader.ca that showed a puffin deficating on Stephane Dion. This ad was definitely over the top and certainly looks bad on the Tories. Whether Harper approved or didn't, I think this does say a fair bit about some of the people they attract. That being said, Harper did do the right thing by apologizing and likewise Dion did the right wing by accepting it. As for their two main policy planks released, the one about cutting the diesel tax in half is much like the GST cut. Sounds good, but isn't really all that good. We need to cut our dependence on fossil fuels and this is the wrong way to go. We do need lower taxes overall, but this should be done by cutting income and corporate taxes. As for ending combat in Afghanistan in 2011, I am glad to see Harper has come around to the Liberal position. The Liberals can use this to point out how they were right after all. Still, I think whether one agrees with the Afghanistan mission or not (and I don't), no one can argue that Canada has carried way more than its fair share relative to other NATO allies. In other news, Danny Williams is stepping up his ABC campaign (Anything but Conservative). While I can understand why as a former Progressive Conservative himself he may find Harper too right wing for his views, he is the premier and he cannot determine the outcome of the next election, so he has to at least be able to work with whoever wins. I think Dalton McGuinty's approach of going after the government when they adopt policies that he feels are bad for Ontario is the right approach as opposed to doing it just out of a personal vandetta, which is what it looks like in the case of Danny Williams.

Liberals

Definitely a slow start out of the gate, but considering the situation the party is in I think they are doing alright, although their polling numbers could certainly be better. At the same time despite what some say, the Tories are not on the cusp of a majority. Based on the results from last time around, they need around 42-44%, not 40% to get a majority. Now this off course assumes the shift is even across the country and the Liberals only bleed votes to the Tories not anyone else. In reality, only a riding by riding poll could really say how close or not close they are. The Liberals new ad portraying Stephane Dion as an ordinary Canadian seems like a good idea as this seems to have helped Harper, so maybe it could help Dion. Also, I like the fact they are taking the high road and not using the gutter tactics the Tories are using or what the Liberals used in the two elections. Still, I fear they may have no choice but to go negative if they want to win, which is regretable that elections are more about how bad one's opponent is than how good one is on their own merit. Dion's proposed gun ban is a logical sensible policy as it would exempt all firearms that can be legitimately used for hunting or sporting purposes. In the past, I have been reluctant to support tighter gun laws as Canada's gun laws are already very strict and they do have legitimate purposes for hunting and target shooting. However, this is definitely one I could support. Although I do think cracking down on gun smuggling at the border is where the biggest problem is. I would suggest doing more checks for weapons at the border and giving longer jail sentences for those illegally importing firearms as well as barring all non-citizens without the legal right to reside in Canada from entering Canada for five years if caught smuggling in firearms. His move on the childcare tax benefit was brillant and totally discredited one of the Tory attack ads still up on their webpage incidentally. I also agree with his plan to restore the court challenges program as access to justice should not depend on one's size of their wallet. Many Tory supporters argue the program only supported left wing causes, however even if this were true, this should be corrected by reforming the program not scrapping it. I do agree those who decide which cases to fund should be non-political people from the legal community such as lawyers and retired judges as this would eliminate the idea it was a liberal slush fund.

Bloc Quebecois

If there is one party that seems to not only be polling poorly, but also making mistakes, this is it. Going after a Conservative candidate for her religious views clearly stepped over the line. Attacking someone because of their views on certain issues, even if they are religiously motivated is fair game, but attacking someone for what religion they belong to is not as we have religious freedom in Canada. More importantly many people who have strong religious views believe in practicing them personally, but not imposing them on others. As long as one can keep their faith separate from their political decisions, I could really care less what faith they belong to. To make matters worse today, one former PQ minister attacked the Bloc Quebecois as being an NDP clone. Considering that separtism is declining (note it was already in decline prior to adscam so it has simply returned to pre-adscam levels) the Bloc Quebecois has to have some reason to exist and trying to block Harper from getting a majority seems to be the only raison d'etre. Unfortunately, the Bloc coalition was far from ideologically coherent. While strong in the East end of Montreal, which is working class neighbourhood with a large number of social activists and union members, they were also strong prior to 2006 in the Appalaches-Chaudiere region (just south of Quebec City) which is where the Union Nationale and Credistes were historically strong and now the ADQ, thus a conservative nationalist area. Without the issue of separtism, keeping these two groups together really wasn't possible. That being said as much as I would hate to see the Tories win more seats, I would welcome the decline of the Bloc and seeing Quebec move away from its separtist/federalist to the left vs. right like the rest of Canada.

NDP

As usual overshadowed by the other parties, although it appears their efforts in trying to stop the Green Party from participating in the debates hurt them and in many ways more than the Tories as according to an Angus-Reid poll, their supporters overwhelmingly supported Elizabeth May being included whereas Tory ones were evenly split.

Green Party

The big issue was about them being excluded from the debates. Unlike most Liberals and Canadians, I do agree they should be excluded but for totally different reasons than Stephen Harper or Layton argue. That being said, I would rather than consortium set out clear guidelines for next election on what one needs to get to qualify for the debate. My proposal would be any party who has an elected member or gets over 5% of the vote, which the Greens did neither in 2006 although they probably will get over 5% this time around. This would prevent leaders like Layton and Harper from bullying the consortiums to exclude someone without looking stupid. That being said, strategically it seems odd the Liberals favoured including the Greens but the Tories opposed. After all, the Tories are the most dissimiliar to the Greens of all parties. In terms of votes, the Greens are far less likely to siphon off votes from the Tories than the Liberals. If anything this will only make the centre and left more crowded thus helping the Tories. Even though Elizabeth May claims many Red Tories and ex Reformers are supporting the Greens, my guess is these are probably people dissatisfied with Harper who weren't going to vote Tory anyways. In addition, unlike some, I don't believe more parties is necessarily a good thing. Ideally, I would like there to be three parties since it gives more choice than having just two, but at least allows for stability which usually doesn't exist when one has many parties. In many multi-party European countries, the party with the most votes frequently gets less than 30% thus leading to less stability and also meaning each party represents a different niche market rather than a large chunk of the population. Ideally, we would have one party on the right, one in the centre, and one on the left. Instead as Suzuki himself pointed out, it is better to promote environmental policies within the greater scheme of things rather than on its own. I would agree with this and I would make far more sense to have an environmentalist wing within each party rather than its own party. In Britain and the US, all major parties have environmentalists caucuses or wings and this is more likely to bring about change, than from a party that will never form government. Off course with Harper's tight control and dictatorial tendencies, we won't see one form within the Conservative ranks here.

They're off and Running

2008-09-08T19:59:00.000-07:00

As expected, Harper asked the governor general to dissolve parliament yesterday and this was done. Interestingly enough I was in Ottawa when this happened on the way back from my trip to Quebec City. Didn't discuss politics with the locals too much so I cannot really comment on the recent spate of polls in terms of what is going on in Quebec. While a week ago, the Liberals looked very competitive with the Tories, the Tories now have a pretty solid lead in the most recent polls with some showing them competitive with the Bloc Quebecois in Quebec and surprisingly ahead in Ontario. However, if the Tories can go from a statistical tie to a large lead in a short time this could easily evaporate so I think trying to predict the outcome is a bit premature at this point. The Conservatives and Liberals both have their advantages and disadvantages. For the Conservatives, the fact this is Harper's third campaign as well as they fact they have plenty of volunteers, which is essential to bringing out the vote are their advantages, however there are a couple of things that could sideswipe them. More deaths in Afghanistan or from the Listerious outbreak (this could be especially bad in Ontario where it brings back memories of Walkerton) are all things that can totally turn things around for them. As for the Liberals, they have undoubtedly had a difficult start and do face many obstacles, however they do have a few positives. The constant Tory attacks on Dion have set the expectations of him so low that he only has to perform half decently. Much like Chretien, but unlike Martin, he has set expectations low and if he does as I expect perform better, this will likely help his numbers. Also Green and NDP voters tend to be less firm in their voting intentions and by a 3-1 margin, they choose the Liberals over the Tories.

As for the other parties, the Bloc Quebecois seems to be in major trouble and will need a real turnaround if they just want to hold the seats they already have. The only advantage they have is they only have to campaign in one province so they can devote more resources to the ridings they think are vulnerable. Still they are this time fighting a two front battle, possibly three front with the Liberals and in a few areas the NDP being their main competitor in the Greater Montreal area, while the Tories being their main competitor elsewhere in the province. The NDP has changed tactics being going after the Tories and ignoring the Liberals. While now may be the best time to supplant the Liberals as the dominate voice for the centre-left, I highly doubt they will succeed. Still attacking the Liberals and ignoring the Tories would probably anger many of their centre-left supporters. The NDP's best chances for gains would come under three scenarios, which are, Harper is polling over 45% and is going to get a majority no matter what, Harper is ahead of the Liberals by enough to guarantee a win, but still well short of the majority mark, or the Liberals pull ahead with at least a 5 point lead. Under both scenarios, there will be little need to strategically vote to block the Tories whereas if the Liberals and Tories are running neck and neck or the Tories are on the cusp of a majority then there might be a need to strategically vote. As for the Green Party, I wouldn't be surprised if they crack the 10% mark, although my guess is they still won't win any seats or very few as their vote is too evenly spread out so even if they get a similiar vote total to the NDP, the NDP vote is more concentrated than the Greens. As for excluding them from the debates, I support this decision since until they either get over 10% of the popular vote or win a seat they should be excluded. Even in countries with proportational representation, many have a minimum threshold of 5%, which the Greens did not get last election and despite polling above that now, their vote is very soft so until they actually do get above that, it makes sense not too. Besides, they would, if anything steal votes more from the Liberals than the Tories.

As I am taking on additional responsibilities in work life now, I will only be doing some limited campaigning on the weekends and blogging a few times a week. I will have more as issues emerge.

Wilson's defection to the Green Party and the upcoming election here in Canada

2008-08-30T17:50:00.000-07:00

Today the Green Party got their first MP when Blair Wilson defected to the Greens after being kicked out of the Liberal caucus and not being re-admitted over possibly over-spending during the last campaign. I have always supported the right of MPs to switch parties and so I have no objections to Blair Wilson's decision to join the Green Party, although I think he will face a difficult time getting re-elected in West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country. That being said, the riding is probably one of the more favourable ones for the Greens when you consider it includes the Sea to Sky Corridor and Sunshine Coast so a Green Party win there, while unlikely, is not impossible. As for what this will mean for the Greens, it is tough to say. They could have a large breakthrough like the Reform Party did in 1993, or it could be meaningless and the party goes nowhere. That being said, I think the Liberals and NDP are probably hoping it doesn't benefit them while the Tories probably hope it does.

As for the upcoming federal election, the polls are certainly not looking good for the Tories, especially in Ontario where they are polling at their lowest since being elected in 2006, so my guess is they want to go now since they fear things will get even worse, not because Harper feels he has a good chance at a majority government. As for the Liberals, the numbers are not ideal, but they are good enough, so I am content with them. As for what while happen, there are five possibilities that I could forsee, two being very plausible, another two being highly unlikely, and the final having almost no chance of happening.

1. Another Conservative minority - How this would play out would depend on whether this was a strengthned minority for the Tories or a weaker one. A weaker one would divide both parties between those wanting their leaders to go and those wanting them to stay. Some Tories would argue with everything going in his favour, the fact Harper couldn't move them any further is proof they need someone new to take them to the next stage, while others would argue that since he would still be PM, he should be able to stay on. As for the Liberals, some would argue anything less than winning the next election means Dion was the wrong choice and needs to go, while others would argue he is taking them in the right direction and with Harper being damaged after the election, he should stay on and try to win it next time around. A stronger Tory minority would mean Harper was safe as leader and could probably govern reasonably effectively for at least a year. Since we will likely be out of the recession (or near recession) by then, he will at least be able to avoid an election when the party runs into its biggest difficulties. Dion off course would have no choice but to step down under this scenario.

2. A Liberal minority - Although many Tory bloggers will dismiss this as impossible, looking at the poll numbers and the general mood of the country, I think this is just as likely as the above option. Dion, would obviously get to stay on, so his main challenge would be not over his leadership but rather entering during bad economic times and possibly bringing in the carbon tax at the worse time. If he can avoid an election for the first year, he should be in good shape after that as once the economy starts to recover his numbers will likely rebound and he will be able to run under the platform of turning things around, however he has to be careful to not do anything too controversial to trigger another election as things will be rough in the next year for whoever wins. Harper will off course be gone as leader, so the big question is what direction will the party go in. The right wing of the party will argue that those who didn't vote Tory never will and the party is wasting its time going after them while alienating its core supporters. They will argue the party needs to choose someone more right wing in order to bring out their base, which they believe is large enough to win (I disagree with this off course). On the other hand, many moderates will argue Harper's failure to connect with groups he struggled amongst and his failure to expand beyond the party's right wing base is proof they need someone more moderate who can also appeal to centrist voters as there are simply not enough right wingers in Canada to win by appealing to them only. How it will turn out is anybody's guess.

3. Tory Majority - While highly unlikely, it is not impossible. A strong negative reaction to the carbon tax could turn things around in Atlantic Canada (although I am skeptical), rural Quebec could certainly swing in favour of the Tories as the Bloc continues to decline, the 905 belt and mid sized cities in Ontario, although not Tory now and unlikely to go Tory, they are not so hostile they won't ever go Tory, they simply don't feel comfortable with going for the Tories under Harper at the moment. While this is not likely to change, it is still possible. The few seats they don't have in the Prairies are not enough to make a difference. Finally in British Columbia, it is a real wild card and with the Greens, NDP, and Liberals splitting the centre and left votes, they could pick up a number of seats there, although with BC's past history of bucking national trends, any gains here could easily be offset by losses elsewhere. The chances of this happening are pretty slim and the Tories would have to run a near perfect campaign while the Liberals a disastrous one for this to happen.

4. Liberal Majority - While most Tories would say I am insane for even suggesting this as a possibility, I do believe it is possible, although not likely. Although it is true I have a tough time thinking where they will pick up another 50 seats, I've seen more than enough elections where a 10 point or greater swing has occurred, so with the Liberals polling around 33% and the fact they tend to do well amongst undecideds as well as have a much better ability to pick up soft Green and soft NDP votes still makes this a possibility even if remote.

5. A party other than the Liberals or Conservatives win the election. The chances of this happening are pretty close to zero as besides the Green Party and NDP, all the other parties are either largely unknown or don't run candidates in enough ridings for this to be even feasible. In the case of the Greens, people may like them, but they still have too low a profile. Never mind, even in Europe where the Greens are much stronger, they have only been in government when included in a governing coalition, they have never won on their own right anywhere in the world and somehow Canada just doesn't seem like the most likely place for the first Green Party victory. While the NDP is polling almost as high as Bob Rae was going into the 1990 Ontario election, I suspect if the NDP was to see a large enough rise during the election, the question would turn from do they deserve a larger voice in parliament to should they form government since as good sounding as their ideas are to some, I suspect at the moment Canadians are not in the mood to go into uncharted waters.

As for predictions, it is too early to make them. For one thing, the large margin of errors makes the regional numbers suspect and therefore makes it difficult to make seat projections. During the election there will be enough polls as well as several regional ones that it will be clearer on not only the regional numbers but also the distribution within each region as well. I will post my predictions in the final week.

In the mean time I will be in Quebec City and Ottawa for the next week for my vacation so I won't be blogging until the second week of September.

McCain chooses Sara Palin

2008-08-30T08:12:00.001-07:00

Its look like McCain choose a complete dark horse that few of us thought or had even heard about. The choice was a gamble which could work out well, but also blow up in his face. On the surface it was definitely a good choice, but beneath it she has many weaknesses and a lot will depend on how good a job both the Democrats and media are at pointing that out. Her positives are she is a maverick like McCain, it is a woman so she could tap into some Hilary supporters who are reluctant to support Obama, comes across as your average everyday Joe, is a conservative so this will keep the Conservative base happy. Her weaknesses are she has very little experience especially on the foreign front. If the McCain people want to accuse Obama of lacking experience they should look at who they are placing just a heart beat away from the presidency. And with McCain's age, his VP pick is probably more of an issue than Obama since there is a much greater chance of him dying in office than Obama or his health deterioriating to the point he cannot continue the presidency. So while I expect the Republicans to close the lead the Democrats have opened up, whether this will be a good pick or not still remains to be seen.

Democratic Convention

2008-08-28T20:13:00.000-07:00

With the Democratic Convention now wrapping up, I cannot be happier with how it turned out. With the Democrats and Republicans tied and the momentum being lost by the Democrats, they did everything right to turn things around and I wouldn't be surprised if we at least see a temporary bump in the polls, although a strong convention by the Republicans could erase this. First night, we had Ted Kennedy show his courage that despite his illness, he was willing to come out for probably his last election and make a strong one. Hilary Clinton gave a strong one and gave every reason for her supporters to rally behind Obama even those who were skeptical. As expected Bill Clinton gave a strong speech, but this was definitely an important one. Clinton is regarded by most as a successful president, especially considering how well the economy did under his administration. To date, many felt that he didn't fully support Obama and many pointed to his past statements of saying Obama was not ready to be president. I thought his line about pointing to how many said that about him in 1992 was a classic. This clearly put an end to the idea Clinton was not fully behind Obama. Biden's speech was also strong too and I am sure he will make a good Vice-President.

Tonight was the big one and Obama not only gave a strong speech as he usually does, he did everything he needed to. His speech was not just a fuzzy one about hope and change, he specifically laid out what he planned to do, reached out to all the different groups of Americans, and most importantly took on John McCain's policies as being wrong and out of touch with the present day reality without engaging in personal smears against him. The Democrats did everything right here and the main thing between now and November is to keep the momentum going and not let up, as we have seen to date, things can change quite quickly.

Biden for VP

2008-08-24T10:13:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama yesterday choose Biden as his running mate. Although there were many good quality candidates he could have chosen, I do think this was a good choice, even it wouldn't have been my first choice. Ideally, the VP pick should compensate for whatever areas the presidential candidate is weak in and Biden certainly does this. His experience on foreign policy will make it harder for McCain to attack Obama on this. Besides, even if Obama is less experienced on foreign policy than McCain, his political instincts here are a lot better than McCain's. McCain seems to be good at promoting a foreign policy that benefits the US, but not others whereas Obama and Biden both support a foreign policy that benefits both the United States and the rest of the world, not the United States at the expense of others. Also Biden comes from a working class background and this could help Obama appeal to the white blue collar workers which he has struggled with so far. If he wishes to pick up Ohio and likewise hold Michigan and Pennsylvania, this is a key group he needs to do well amongst. As for the current poll numbers, they are not exactly encouraging, but the reality is there are more Americans who are philosophically in line with the Republicans than Democrats so winning is going to always be a challenge for Democrats. According to a strategic counsel poll recently, 51% of Canadians identified themselves as Liberal and 41% Conservative, whereas in the US it was 57% Conservative and 37% Liberal, which could explain why the Liberals here have to mess up a lot more than the Tories to lose and likewise the Republicans have to mess up a lot more in the US to lose than the Democrats. Usually the VP picks and conventions tend to give each party a bounce, so will have to see who gets the larger bounce here. Right now neither McCain or Obama has been able to crack the 50% mark, whereas I suspect after the Labour Day weekend, one of them will crack it and hopefully that is Obama. Another challenge the Democrats face too as the demographic that leans Democrat (working class, urban, African-American, Latino, young, single) tend to have a lower voter turnout that the demographic that leans Republican (white male, religious, suburban/rural, middle-upper income, married with children). Much like Canada, a higher turnout should benefit the Democrats as opposed to a lower one, so the main thing for Obama will be getting those who normally abstain from voting but like his policies to show up. The only demographic that usually votes Democrat that has a high turnout are those with high incomes living in large urban centres with a post-graduate degree, but that group is not particularly large in terms of their total share of the population.

In other news, it looks more and more likely like we will have a federal election. I do believe that we need one to put an end to Harper's obstructionist tactics and arrogance, however if Harper decides to ignore the law he passed on fixed election dates and goes and dissolves parliament without being defeated in a non-confidence vote, I hope the opposition parties raise this many times throughout the campaign. This would be the height of arrogance and maybe what it would take to see him defeated. I plan to work on Gerard Kennedy's campaign myself who is running in Parkdale-High Park which although I don't actually live in the riding it begins only a few blocks west of where I live (I am in Trinity-Spadina).

On the brighter side, Canada had a great finish to the olympics. After a lousy first week with no medals, we more than made up for that by winning 18 medals which tied what we got in Barcelona in 1992 and only fell short of what we got in 1996 in Atlanta (I don't count 1984 in Los Angeles as these were boycotted by many countries). Add to the fact we had 12 fourth place finishes, many by only a fraction of a second shows we have great potential to do well in 2012. Also of the countries who got more medals than we did, only Cuba, Belarus, and Australia have smaller populations. I don't think we will finish ahead of the Aussies in the medal standings anytime soon (at least not in the summer olympics), but hopefully in 2012, Australia will be the only country smaller than Canada to have more medals than us. In 2010 I am hoping for Canada to come in first and considering we came in third in Turin, I think this is doable. Although I no longer live in Vancouver, I definitely plan on attending the olympics.

Upcoming by-elections

2008-08-15T17:25:00.000-07:00

This coming September, we will likely face three by-elections unless off course the government falls before then. Below is a summary of whats at stake and what I expect.

Westmount-Ville Marie

This is a safe Liberal riding so anything other than a Liberal win would be a huge disappointment, in fact even a near miss like we had in Vancouver-Quadra would be as well. That being said I think the Liberals will win for the simple reason the demographics of the riding are stacked against all the other parties. It has a large Anglophone population so that pretty much rules out a Bloc Quebecois win, includes Westmount, which is a fairly affluent community so, despite the NDP's by-election win neighbouring Outremont, I doubt it will spill over into Westmount-Ville Marie as the NDP rarely does well amongst the wealthy. Likewise being in Montreal proper and considering how poorly the Tories did in Montreal, a Tory win is pretty much out of the picture as well.

Saint Lambert

This could be an interesting one and in fact effect whether we have a fall election or not. On the one hand a Liberal win would show momentum and make them more keen on going to the polls, but a Bloc loss would probably make them less keen so the government might survive after all, but have the Bloc instead of the Liberals propping them up. This was a Liberal riding prior to adscam so I could really see it going either way. The Tories only got 19% in 2006, so a Tory win would be a huge surprise. The main thing here is whether the Tories go up or go down in terms of support, while the NDP is not a factor here.

Guelph

If the Tories do pick up any of the three, this is their best shot, but still despite being surrounded by fairly conservative communities, this is an urban community with a university in it so it is not a conservative town at all. Rather the Tories could pull off a win by a strong split between the NDP, Greens, and Liberals thus coming up the middle. Likewise an NDP win, although not likely, is possible too, while a Green win is pretty much out of the picture, but I could see them doing quite well in this riding considering it has a large university population which they tend to do well amongst. Although this riding did go Conservative in the past, lets remember prior to 2004 federally and 2007 provincially it was Guelph-Wellington instead of Guelph, thus it included a large chunk of rural area which is substantially more conservative than the city itself. Still, my bet would be on the Liberals holding this one, especially considering the Tories have done a good job of alienating voters in Ontario and giving them every reason not to vote for them. I would say this is an example of both Flaherty and Harper letting their ego get ahead of their political judgment.

Now the final question, is will we have a fall election or not. I won't make any predictions, other than it seems quite possible. I don't think the Liberals should bring down the government without having a reason for doing so, but at the same time they should not hesitate to vote against motions of confidence if they feel they are bad bills. The Liberals should vote based on principle, not on political calculations. The reality is despite what some Tories may say, Harper has not overly impressed Canadians and is vulnerable. In particular he seems to be pleasing those who already supported him, but done little to reach out to those skeptical of him in 2006. Ignoring his policies, I find his bully and confrontational style of governing unimpressive and hope after next election we can put an end to this style of government. Minority governments have been successful in many countries elsewhere and many of these have included parties with very different ideologies (i.e. Germany between the centre-right CDU-CSU and the centre-left SPD) so it is possible for parties of different ideologies to work together if they are willing to put the interest of the country ahead of their narrow partisan interests, but unfortunately that won't happen as long as Harper is in charge.

Two other issues are the deportation of the war resisters and the Tories cuts to arts funding. On the war resisters, I think the Iraq War was wrong and immoral, however, I am a bit worried about the precedent of letting anyone who refuses to fight in a non-UN sanctioned war automatically be accepted in Canada. Although there are few wars as big as Iraq, there are many smaller scale ones not sanctioned by the UN i.e. Russia invading Georgia just this past week, so we simply don't have the ability to take everyone who wishes to come here. Instead they should be able to apply under normal immigration channels and if they qualify, their desertion will not play a factor in their decision to be admitted. Likewise I would change it from UN sanctioned to wars Canada disapproves of as the Iraq War would still be immoral even had it received UN sanction and likewise Canada did participate in Kosovo which was not UN sanctioned. Besides, I believe if those war resisters stayed in the US and went to jail, this would show a lot of courage on their part and strengths in their views and would likely have a greater impact in preventing future wars like Iraq. This is what Mohammed Ali did. Likewise Martin Luther King Jr., Nelson Mandela, and Gandhi all went to prison for protesting against what they saw was unjust and all of them in the end succeeded in getting what they hoped to achieve. The above four mentioned are heros in the truest sense.

The other issues is the Tories funding cuts to the Arts. I am a strong believer in the free market and generally believe most things should sink or swim on their own. At the same token I do realize that the positive benefits from the arts can pay off in terms of increased tourism, more investment so therefore if done properly they could be a wise investment. Cultural sites such as the Louvre, Roman Coliseum, Parthenon, and Stonehedge all get government funding and in each of these cases, the economic spinoffs from increased tourism more than offsets whatever costs is involved. My real worry more is the Tories reasoning, as it has less to do with them being for the free market and more to do with them not wanting to fund people who have different views than themselves. Although many of the artist may be centre-left in their views, I would hardly say they are non-mainstream, in fact many are probably closer to the median Canadian voter than the Tories are. Finally I am deeply offended by their idea this would be popular in the West. I am originally from Vancouver which is in many ways even more liberal (philosophically) than Toronto. We are not all a bunch of rednecks and hard right wingers. Even most Albertans are centre-right rather than hard right. Witness how both moderate candidates, Ed Stelmach and Jim Dinning finished ahead of Ted Morton, standard bearer of the Hard right and ironically a close ideological soulmate of Harper in the Alberta PC leadership race. Instead of following the footsteps of the Republicans, maybe the Tories could look across the Atlantic at their British counterparts who under David Cameron have moved away from its more ideological past towards the centre and are also consistently polling above 40%, something the Tories here cannot do.

UPDATE:

Harper has also called a by-election in Don Valley West. Considering this is in Toronto, I suspect the Liberals will hold this, that being said this is almost Toronto's equivalent of Vancouver-Quadra, so if the Tories pull off a surprise win or come close to winning it, I suspect the Liberals will not be eager to go the polls. This did go Tory in 1988 federally and 1999 provincially so it has gone for centre-right parties in the past, but as seen in the 90s when the right was split the PCs got close to 30% while the Reform/Alliance struggled to crack the 10% mark, which suggests it has a large number of slight right of centre voters, but few hard right voters. If the Tories had a moderate leader like James Moore or Jim Prentice they might be able to win this, but if they had a more right wing leader like Jason Kenney or Stockwell Day they would be lucky to even get 20%, so as long as the Tories are clearly a right wing party they will continue to lose this to the Liberals, but if they ever move closer to the centre, this could become vulnerable. In addition unlike Vancouver-Quadra, the Greens and NDP are largely non-existent so even if the Tories got 35% like they did in Vancouver-Quadra (which ironically is only 2% more than what they got last federal election and 4% less than what John Tory got in the last provincial election) they still won't win this. They need around 45% to take this and their ceiling is around 40% here.

Dion's Green Shift

2008-06-28T16:43:00.000-07:00

Dion has finally revealed his plans for a Carbon tax, which will be part of the next election platform. I fully endorse this as this will give people strong incentives to cut back on actions that are environmentally harmful, while save people money who choose environmentally friendly ways of doing things. It is a revenue neutral tax, so it will not mean higher taxes for everyone, in fact for many, it will mean lower taxes. Pollution is what we call in economics an externality and in the case of negative externalities such as pollution you tax them, while you subsidize positive externalities (i.e. education). The carbon tax is simply putting a price on pollution and letting the market take care of the rest. It is hardly a socialist or left wing idea, especially consider BC, which has a centre-right government was the first province to introduce it and many centre-right parties in Europe favour such approach. Now I know some will argue that the centre-right parties in Europe are more like the Liberals than Tories, which is true on some issues, although certainly not all. In fact many centre-right parties in Europe are to the right of the Tories on certain issues. My biggest disappointment with Harper is not that he opposes this, but he takes the attitude that we should do nothing about the environment since it might be too hard. The cost of dealing with global warming now is far less than dealing with it later. Never mind, even here in North America, we have some centre-right politicians such as Arnold Schwartznegger, Brian Mulroney, Jean Charest, and Gordon Campbell who all suppport strong environmental action. In fact even McCain supports doing more on the environment than Harper does.

Now in terms of how this will play out, I would argue it is a risky strategy. Now this is not a bad thing in itself since risky can also mean gaining many seats as well as losing many. In many ways it is like buying a risky stock on the stock market as opposed to the a government bond. You are pretty much guaranteed to get the amount promised on a Canada government bond, but you are unlikely to make a lot of money from this investment strategy. On the other hand investing in risky stocks can result in making a lot of money, but also losing a lot. While playing it safe will ensure that the Liberals hold Harper to a minority at the most, it also means the Liberals won't do any better than a weak minority. Taking a bold move such as a carbon tax, may give Harper his much coveted majority, but it also might be what it takes to return the Liberals to their former glory. How well this goes depends a lot on how the plan is sold to the public as well as how Harper reacts. His over the top reaction and inability to bring about an alternative plan may help the Liberals here, but likewise the rising gas prices now could make this a bad time. Either way, I would rather the Liberals stand for something than have no principles other than winning at all cost.

Ireland Rejects Lisbon Treaty

2008-06-15T17:49:00.000-07:00

On Friday, Ireland voted against the Lisbon Treaty, which although it does not officially kill the treaty, it will make it very difficult to move forward. Worried the treaty would face the same fate as the European constitution when put to a referendum in France and the Netherlands, most countries choose not to put it to a referendum including the normally Eurosceptic Britain. However, Ireland, is constitutionally required to put all international treaties to a referendum. Normally this is not an issue as Ireland is one of the more pro-EU countries.

I would have voted for the Lisbon Treaty if I could have voted on the issue, however I understand why some may oppose it. It had many positives such as applying co-decision to more issues meaning the European parliament who is directly elected would have to approve the laws not just the Council of Ministers. Although the Council of Ministers represent national governments, coalitions are the norm rather than the exception in Europe and it is quite common for parties that received less than 10% of the popular vote to have cabinet ministers, so this makes it difficult to hold them accountable for making bad decisions. In addition, coalitions are not always along ideological lines either; in fact many European countries have coalitions with parties on both the centre-right and centre-left such as Germany. At least those in the European parliament are directly elected, although unfortunatly each country must use some form of proportional representation rather than first past the post, but that is a whole different story. It would apply the principle of subsidiarity and this means if more than 1/3 of member states felt the EU was interferring in areas they don't have jurisdiction over, they could send it back to the European Commission to ask for an explanation. It would have lifted the limit on 27 member states. As it stands now Norway, Iceland, and Switzerland would not be able to join and likewise further expansion into the Balkans including countries such as Croatia who are ready to join the near future, wouldn't be able to. I believe the EU should be open to all European countries including Turkey and even beyond. It has worked well in promoting peace and prosperity amongst its members, so I am all for expanding it. In addition, the idea of a European superstate was not the intention of the treaty.

That being said, I believe the politicians should respect the results of the referendum and not proceed with ratification of the treaty. I don't believe having another referendum as they did when Denmark rejected the Maastrict Threaty or when Ireland rejected the Nice Treaty is the solution either. No should mean No, not keep on asking the question until one receives a desirable answer. Rather I believe the best solution is to adopt a Two speed Europe as I advocated in an earlier blog. It is not right for a country with less than 1% of the EU's population to scutter a treaty for those who wish to move forward with deeper integration. But neither is it right to force a country to give up more sovereignty than it is comfortable with doing so. When the EU was only a common market and had far fewer members, it was possible to have it operate in tandem, but not with 27 members and is it starts to take on many nation like characteristics. I support deeper European integration as with the United States taking a more unilateral and militaristic approach and China becoming a superpower who has a less than stellar human rights record, I believe it is necessary to have a counter-balance who believes in democracy, freedom, progressive policies, and multilateralism. And none of the EU countries on their own can achieve this, but together they can. I also can say that the EU has been of great benefit for me on a personal level. I work in the financial sector and the fact the EU has a common currency saves me about an hour in work everyday. Likewise when I travelled to Europe last year, I didn't have to switch currencies everytime I crossed national boundaries and when planning my trip time wise, I didn't have to worry about long line-ups at the borders as there are no border controls between EU countries (save Ireland and Britain).

Obama Wins Democrat nomination

2008-06-04T18:15:00.000-07:00

As someone who supported Obama right from the beginning, I am quite pleased to see him clinch the nomination. I supported Clinton's right to stay in until the primaries ended, but now is the time to bow out and throw her support behind Obama. The longer the party remains divided, the better the chances are of McCain winning. Now the focus for the Democrats must turn to beating McCain in November, which contrary to what some think, will not be an easy task. McCain is a moderate within the Republicans (although quite right wing by Canadian standards) so unlike Huckabee or Romney, he has a far amount of crossover appeal to moderates. In addition, he voted against Bush on a number of issues so although being a Republican may be a liability, the fact he didn't blindly follow in lock step will be an asset to him. Unlike Canada, where one is expected to tow the party line, senators and congressmen are free to vote against their party without facing party discipline. At the same time McCain does support the war in Iraq and is still more conservative than the average American even though the average American is well to the right of the average Canadian. This has been an interesting race in the sense neither of the frontrunners of either party ended up winning. A year ago, most thought it would be a battle between Guiliani and Hilary Clinton, but instead that will not be the case. Guiliani's campaign fizzled quite early on, while Clinton stayed into the very end, but still could not win the nomination.

As for where from here to go for the Democrats, Obama needs to choose him running mate. Although I would say he should choose Clinton, I don't think it is essential he choose her. Rather he must choose someone who appeals to the demographics he is weak amongst. In particular, he struggled amongst white blue collar voters and this demographic is very important to winning in November. He may be able to pick up states like Iowa and Colorado while hold ones like Wisconsin, however states such as Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Ohio have far more people than the ones mentioned above. Obama cannot afford to lose Michigan or Pennsylvania and likewise will have a difficult time (although not impossible time) becoming president if he cannot win Ohio. These states all have a large blue collar white vote, which is why I think he needs to choose a running mate who can appeal to this group. I don't think the fact he is black will prevent him from becoming president since although some Americans are still racist, they are clearly in the minority. In fact I would argue a black person would have far more difficulty winning in most European countries than the United States despite the fact Europe is generally more liberal than the United States. His biggest liability will be being seen as too liberal. His platfrom is fairly centrist and in fact in relation to Canadian parties, is probably, closest to that of the old Progressive Conservatives, so he needs to highlight the fact he is moderate and not a liberal. As much as some progressives want to see the US move dramatically to the left, they need to be realistic. Trying to move the US as far left as Canada is simply not realistic. Rather the Democrats need to halt America's move to the right and take a more moderate centrist approach than the current administration. That is why I would advise Obama to focus on ending the War in Iraq but still support the use of military force if the US is attacked. Support tax cuts for low and middle income Americans, and make clear that the overall size of government will not get bigger. I have noticed some liberals talk about the US adopting universal health care. As much as a supporter I am of universal health care, bringing in such a program would be political suicide in the US. Instead progressives need to be realistic on what is doable rather than what is not doable. Just because a certain policy sells well in Canada, doesn't mean it will in the US. As Micheal Adams pointed out in his Fire and Ice - Myth of Converging Values, Americans and Canadians have radically different set of values.

In terms of Canada-US relations, I think the Democrats on the whole would be better although I do realize on the issue of free trade the Republicans are probably better, however the Democrats would be at least more understanding on most other issues. Besides, with more than half of Canadians having at least one family member residing outside of Canada, Canadians tend to take a very internationalist approach, so even if McCain is better for strictly relations between Canada and the US, they realize he is not better for relations between the US and the rest of the world.

Harper's Errors and US politics

2008-05-29T19:52:00.000-07:00

This past week, another minister from the Harper government had to resign over a security breach. The question many ask is why was Maxime Bernier even given the foreign affairs ministry. Unlike some, I think he was a capable person, but mainly on issues relating to domestic economic policy so I though ministry of Industry was far more fitting for him than foreign affairs. In fact he probably only got that ministry to help pacify the strong opposition to the Afghanistan mission in Quebec. Also Harper has been over in Europe trying to sell his environmental policy, which isn't going to well. And contrary to what some think, most European countries have centre-right not centre-left governments at the moment (i.e. France, Germany, and Italy) so hardly the people you would usually suspect to be critical of Harper. In fact I don't know of any right wing party in Europe that is against dealing with climate change. While they may take very different views on immigration, law & order, social policy, and fiscal policy, this seems to be at least one of the few issues that are reasonably united behind. Now it is true that Europe will have an easier time reaching their Kyoto targets as they drive more fuel efficient cars, have better inter-city transportation due to their higher population density, spend less on fuel due to their milder winters, and their cities were built prior to the automobile rather than after, but still we could be making the same level of effort, which we aren't. As for my view on the Bernier scandal, I generally tend to ignore scandals as I believe no matter what party is in power scandals will happen as that is just the way government operates. After all, the sponsorship scandal played no role whatsoever in determining my vote last election. Still, this will definitely hurt the Tories in the short-term and if enough of these happen, eventually one of them will bring them down just as adscam wasn't the first Liberal scandal, but it was the one to bring the party down.

In other domestic news, Dion is promising a carbon tax. This is quite similiar to what is already done in British Columbia. I know this might be a tough sell but I totally support it provided it is revenue neutral, which means the reductions in taxes for those who pollute less are equal or greater than the increases for those who pollute more. If it is just a tax grab like some European countries have done, I don't support it, but I think Dion understands this and won't do this. Pollution is an externality so this is simply putting a price on it and then letting the market take care of the rest as any first year economics student will tell you higher prices mean people cut consumption and lower prices encourage consumption. Now off course, the one problem could be on inelastic goods (for those not familiar with economic terms, this means goods where consumption is not highly affected by price, usually essential items) and in this case it probably won't be the most effective, but still no solution will be perfect.

Continuing on British Columbia, the BC supreme court has ruled that the safe injection site will be able to stay open until at least 2009. While it is unfortunate this case had to go to court and not being lawyer I am not sure the exact legalities behind the decision, I do support keeping the site open. I initially opposed the site when it first opened since it worried it would encourage more drug use and create more crime in the surrounding area, but I am a pragmatist and when the facts showed this assessment was wrong, I changed my views. Unfortunately the same cannot be said about our government. Despite the overwhelming evidence that it works and the strong support of the population, they seem more bent on ideology. Now that is not to say I want to see every city open one up, but the decision to have or not have one should be up to the local community and in Vancouver most support it including the municipal and provincial government who are BTW centre-right although less ideological than the federal Tories.

Turning to US politics, it is pretty clear by now that Obama will be the next Democrat presidential nominee. My suggestion to Hilary Clinton would be to graciously bow out after the primaries finish in under a week and then throw her support behind Obama. Polls have shown that the party is becoming more and more polarized with more and more supporters willing to support McCain if their candidate doesn't win. Now is the time to unite the party. Also, while Obama has many strengths, one of his weaknesses is amongst White Blue collar voters and this vote is quite important in some key states such as Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. If Obama, loses either Michigan or Pennsylvania to McCain, he will not be president and not winning Ohio will make it difficult although not impossible to win in November. As with any leader they need to not just motivate their base to show up, they must also reach out to the fence sitters who could go either way.

Recent Issues

2008-05-01T17:20:00.000-07:00

Haven't blogger for a while due to a combination of factors including a bad cold I had recently as well as I also wanted to be outside when we finally got our first spring like weather here in Toronto. Anyways a brief summary of my take on a few recent issues.

Clinton Wins Pennsylvania

The results in Pennsylvania ensure one thing, which is the race for the Democrat nomination will continue. Clinton's win of 55% to 45% over Obama was not a small margin, but neither a blowout. Clinton needed to get over 60% to be fully back in the game, which she failed to do, but she needed to win by more than a few percentage points to stay competitive, which she did. However, I still think it is almost a guarantee Obama will be the Democrat presidential hopeful, so my advice to Clinton would be to bow out if she doesn't win either Indiana or North Carolina. In the mean time the super-delegates need to start declaring who they will support, so hopefully by June when the primaries are over, one of the two contenders will have graciously bowed out. The longer the contest goes on, the more divided the party will become and the better the chances are of a Republican victory in November. As much as Americans don't like Bush, McCain is still reasonably well liked and is electable. As for my opinion on McCain, I am still somewhat undecided, since although I respect the fact he was willing to go against his party on several issues, he is still too conservative for my tastes, albeit he is definitely an improvement over Bush (which isn't that hard to do unless one is a dictator).

Economic downturn and Ontario's struggling economy

A recent report has come out that Ontario may become a have not province in a few years. Perhaps maybe I need to leave as British Columbia became a have not province right around the time I graduated from high school and then moved back to a have province just before I moved to Ontario, so it seems I bring bad luck economically wherever I go. But all joking aside, this could be quite serious for not just Ontario's economy but Canada's as a whole. With 38% of the population and over 40% of the GDP, a downturn in Ontario will hurt all of Canada. It will mean less tax revenue to fund our social programs, debt repayment, and lower taxes. Also if Ontario goes on equalization, it will either mean the have provinces in the West have to pay a lot more into equalization, or those currently receiving equalization will get a lot less, both which are not attractive. Rather than pick fights, the federal government and provincial government should work together to find a way to prevent this from happening. Much of this is off course beyond the control of the government is we live in a global economy and we cannot avoid an economic downturn especially one in the United States. The decline of the manufacturing sector has been happening for some time and I don't think it can be fully reversed, but we need to find ways to allow our economy to make a full transition to new sectors. Economies that can change easily from one sector to another tend to do better than those that cannot. By having a highly skilled and educated workforce as well as making Canada and Ontario a competitive place to do business, this can make the transition easier.

Harper's dispute with Elections Canada

Elections Canada has accused the Tories of using an in and out scheme to exceed the election spending limits. This is an serious issue and if the Tories broke the law, there should be penalties. This also seriously undermines the confidence people have in our democratic institutions. Now I am not saying the Tories are guilty since although the partisan side of me would love to say they are, I do believe in the idea of innocent until proven guilty, so I will wait until the court hands down an opinion one way or another before commenting. I am however, disturbed by Harper's frequent attacks on Elections Canada. Back in his days as president of the NCC, he referred to them as jackasses and his former right hand man at the National Citizens' Coalition, Gerry Nicholls (www.gerrynicholls.blogspot.com) still is attacking them daily. Ignoring the fact Nicholls bashes Harper frequently for not being right wing enough, I think he is simply saying what Harper believes but has enough sense not to say. One may not agree with all of Elections Canada's rulings are all election laws, but independent organizations like Elections Canada are vital to ensuring the fairness of our elections. Unlike in the US where parties frequently gerrymander congressional districts to favour their party, our boundaries are drawn up by Elections Canada in a fair matter that does not favour one party over another. In fact it has helped many other countries around the world including Ukraine and Iraq in their elections. Therefore, I abhor Harper's attacks on them and am very concerned about them. I am all for less government and getting government out of areas it doesn't belong in, but clearly this is a legitimate area for an independent government agency such as Elections Canada.

Conservatives' Immigration policy changes

2008-04-01T18:27:00.000-07:00

The Conservatives have tacked on their changes to Canada's immigration to the budget implementation bill. I believe this is a serious mistake since whether one agrees or disagrees with them, this should be debated on its own. I would urge the Liberals to vote against this for the simple reason this should be a stand alone bill not attached to the budget.

As for the bill, itself, it contains both good and bad points. I support granting points for Canadian experience as well as increasing the availability of work permits. While some criticize this, there are many benefits to work permits for new arrivals. For starters, it ensures they have employment, but more importantly it allows them to begin their new life in Canada while still waiting for their application to be processed. Finding a job is not easy and as someone who has not too long ago gone through the job search, it is very difficult to find one without having any personal connections with someone who works there. While living in Canada, this will give them time to build up the necessary network to find the right job for their skills. Also knowledge of one of the two official languages is essential to finding a job and as someone who always got A's and B's in French in high school yet struggles to even string together a complete sentence in French, I know how difficult it can be to learn another language if not using it on a regular basis. By living in Canada, they will be using the language on a regular basis and thus can improve their language skills. I also support giving higher priority to highest skilled workers and those filling areas we have strong shortages in such as doctors.

On the other hand, I am dead set against the idea of the minister being arbitrarily able to cap applications. This opens the door to being abused for political purposes and should be withdrawn from the bill immediately. It also creates uncertainty for those wishing to apply. All those who wish to apply have the right to apply. This off course doesn't mean everyone will be accepted, but we should not slam the door on those who wish to apply.

However, I think the time has come for an open and honest debate on immigration. Those who favour higher levels of immigration are not doing it to increase the pool of liberal voters and those for lower levels of immigration are not necessarily racists, although some may be depending on their rationale. Those who favour restricting immigration since it is predominately non-European, dislike immigrants, or wish to base immigration based on country of origin are ones I have absolutely no tolerance or time for. But those who believe Canada is taking in more immigration than our economy has the capacity to handle, maybe ones who I disagree with, but at least they have a legitimate argument.

Below are my views on immigration and solely mine, which are in fact somewhere in between that of the Conservatives and Liberals. Before giving my views, I think one ought to know the facts as all too often people's opinions on immigration are based on false information. Getting into Canada is not as easy as some think, in fact most Canadians would likely not be qualified for immigrating to Canada. Canada has more people retiring than entering the labour force, so if we wish to maintain our generous social safety net without raising taxes or going into deficit, we will need to provide a larger tax base and this can only be done through more immigration. More immigration helps Canada compete better globally as understanding other cultures and countries is essential for one to be competitive in their market, so the more diverse our population is and the stronger our connections are, the better our ability to compete. At the same time Canada has by far the highest per capita rate of immigration anywhere in the developed world. Even were Canada to cut its immigration rate to the levels the Reform Party advocated in the early 90s, we would still have the highest per capita rate of immigration albeit by a smaller margin. Also unemployment is significantly higher amongst the foreign born population and has worsened considerably in the last decade. Finally those born outside of Canada make considerably less than Canadians do on average despite the fact the average level of education amongst the foreign born population is higher than it is amongst the native born.

In order to deal with these issues, I believe our current levels of immigration are quite reasonable and should not be cut. However, our selection process should change. In countries with long backlogs such as India, China, and the Philippines, we need to hire more immigration officers to process these applications. Making skilled workers wait over 10 years is simply not acceptable. We need to do a better job of recognizing foreign credentials so as those with high levels of education can get jobs at their skill level, not lower paying jobs. Those who receive a work permit or a student visa should be allowed to have their applications processed based on their skill level at the time their application is reviewed, not when submitted. For example on the question of language proficiency, they would most likely score higher under this scenario. Where backlogs exist, priority should be given to those who score highest and are in areas we have most acute labour shortages. The emphasis should be more on skilled workers and less on family re-unification. I know this goes strongly against the Liberal position, but the reality is immigration should provide a net benefit to Canada in terms of contributions, it should not cost our system more. The problem is when someone brings in their 70 year old grandmother, they will likely use our social system while paying next to nothing into it. That does not mean we should stop family re-unification, it simply means those applications should take lower priority. The points should also be altered slightly. Those with arranged employment should get greater weight than they do now as well as knowledge of one of Canada's two official languages should get greater weight. Being able to speak the dominate language in the area of one's employment is essential in order to finding meaningful employment. My weak French skills severely impair my ability to find work in Quebec and in fact I would not seek employment in Quebec without improving my French skills. Likewise I have wanted to live in Europe for a couple of years for the cultural experience, but should I do so, it would almost certainly be the United Kingdom or Ireland as I do not speak the language of most European countries and in the case of France, Belgium, Luxembourg, and Switzerland my French is weak enough that I probably would have an extremely difficult time finding work. Also as done in Australia and New Zealand, additional points should be given to those who wish to live in regions with labour shortages. The problem now is not so much with the number of immigrants we take, but where they go. Rural Canada and Atlantic Canada have declining labour forces, while Alberta's economic boom has led to massive shortages as there aren't enough jobs being created to sustain the demand. These areas are in desperate need of employees yet few immigrants are moving there to fill in those shortages. On the other hand, the GTA is rapidly expanding and its large population creates the normal problems such as congestion, pollution, urban sprawl, and expanding into environmentally sensitive areas that normally occur in large metropolitan areas. This does not mean immigrants who wish to go to the GTA would be denied, it simply means those that wish to move to other regions that face labour shortages would get additional points while those who choose regions that don't would not lose points, but get no additional points. If one choose to go to Melbourne or Sydney in Australia, they get no additional points, but if they go to the Gold Coast they will.

We can learn both from others successes and mistakes. At the same time we must keep in mind that Canada is quite different than the United States and Europe in terms of the situation it faces so advocating we cut immigration to their levels does not make sense. The best comparisons are Australia and New Zealand as they are both countries made up of people who have largely come in the last 200 years much like Canada and they both would have negative population growth without immigration. In the case of the United States, they may have less immigration per capita than we do, but they also have a much higher birth rate than Canada and so even without immigration their population would still be growing. Europe is a much different circumstance. Up until the 60s, Europe was a land of emigration not immigration. Since then, most have been temporary workers meant to fill jobs that locals were unwilling to take. But rather than staying temporarily, they stayed permanately, but largely lived in their segregated communities and never integrated. I am all for immigrants preserving their culture, but I don't support the idea of ghettoization. Here in Toronto, almost everyone has immigrant friends and people interact and mingle. When I was in Amsterdam, Brussels, Nice, and Strasbourg last June, I stayed out in the suburbs since hotels were cheaper and these areas were predominately immigrants. There is little interaction between the two which has lead to the tensions we saw with the French riots in 2005. Rather than living together peacefully, there has been much racism towards the immigrant community due to lack of understanding while many in the immigrant community don't feel like they are part of the country they live in. This is why I think those who use Europe's woes with immigration as a reason for calling for Canada to restrict its immigration are off base as we have thankfully avoided the problems they have due to our more inclusive and mixed society.

Regardless of what one thinks on immigration, it is important we have a proper debate and that with the exception of those who cleary intolerant, the debate be respectful. Also the facts need to be clearly understood as too many base their opinions on false information.

By-Election results

2008-03-18T18:15:00.000-07:00

Now that the final results are in, here is my take on the by-election and I will try to give a non-partisan approach that looks at the results as fairly as possible. It is important to note voter turnouts were very low in all of these ridings so one should be careful in reading too much into any of these. Since the voter turnout will almost certainly be better in the next general election, the results may be very different.

Conservatives: A good showing, but not great. They won Desnethe-Missinippi-Churchill River and nearly won in the liberal stonghold of Vancouver-Quadra, however they failed to make headway in the two Toronto ridings. So although they are looking strong in Western Canada, they already hold the majority of seats here so they need to make gains in the East if they want to get a majority. In fact most polls showing the Tories up from the Manitoba/Ontario border Westward while down East of the Ontario/Manitoba border, however there are twice as many seats east of the Ontario/Manitoba border as to the West. That being said while polls place the Tories in the low 30s in Ontario right now, they were flirting with the 40% not too long ago, so if they spent less times trying to pick fights with the provincial government and bashing the province, they could also do better in Ontario.

Liberals: Not a great night, but not terrible either. They won both Toronto ridings by solid margins and in fact so their share of the popular vote go up in both, but their loss by a large margin in DMCR and near loss in liberal stronghold of Vancouver-Quadra, shows they Liberals are in trouble in Western Canada. And while they can win a minority without winning many seats in Western Canada, they will need to do much better if they ever want to win a majority government. Since they can no longer pull off sweeps of Quebec (as Trudeau did) or Ontario (as Chretien did) they will need to do better here if they want to do better than a weak minority government.

NDP: They weren't expected to win any ridings, but their drop in the share of the popular vote is not a good thing for them.

Green Party: No wins as expected, but the fact they got into double digits in Toronto Centre and Vancouver-Quadra is definitely a good sign for them in terms of at least making their issues ones the mainstream parties have to contend with.

Toronto Centre

Bob Rae as expected won, but also increased his share of the popular vote by 7% so definitely a good sign with the Liberals. In fact if the trend in Toronto Centre in terms of vote increases and decreases played out across Ontario, the results would be very similiar to 2004 meaning a Liberal minority and that any Conservative gains in the West would be offset by Liberal gains in Ontario. Although I would never want to see Bob Rae become PM after his disastrous rule as premier, he is a very effective debater and knows where Harper's weaknesses are and can take hm on. Dion may be a good future PM, but not a great opposition leader, whereas Bob Rae is a great opposition leader, but not the best PM for the future so he will be strong compliment to Dion. The Conservatives fell to fourth and dropped to 12%. I hope this sends a strong message to them that bashing Toronto running a so-con in a riding with a large gay population and turfing a candidate whose views were moderate and represented the riding will get you a well-deserved slap on the wrist. The Tories never stood a chance at winning this riding, but if they keep acting the same as they are now, they may be in danger of not getting their deposit re-imbursed (one must get at least 10% to get their deposit re-imbursed). The NDP has continued their slide in this riding and this cannot be good news in neighbouring ridings which either went NDP or could go NDP. While the inclusion of Rosedale puts this out of reach for the NDP, this also includes areas such as Regent Park and Cabbagetown, which should be NDP friendly turf.

Willowdale

Martha Hall Findlay easily won this riding and increased her share of the popular vote by 4%. She is definitely a strong candidate and I am glad to have her in the House of Commons. The Tories did lose badly here so one could make he argument there are not gaining in the GTA where they need to, but they still did increase their share of the popular vote, even if only by 1% so one can argue that are making small gains in the GTA. Some Tories might point out that while they are declining the core of Toronto, they are holding steady in the suburban parts of the 416 so using this trend they are probably going up in the 905 belt where they do have the potential to win seats. I don't fully buy this argument, however I do agree that if the Tories stopped picking fights with the Ontario premier and were seen as more Ontario friendly, they would be in a good position to gain seats in Ontario and the GTA rather than lose them.

Desnethe-Missinippi-Churchill River

A strong win by the Conservatives and this cannot be played down by the Liberals. Had the Liberals only narrowly lost this, that might be one thing since they only won by 67 votes, but a loss of this size cannot be ignored. While part of it was the appointment of Joan Beatty, I also think the Liberals have failed to capitalize on potential Tory weaknesses in Saskatchewan. The changes in equalization and ending the Canadian Wheat Board monopoly were all suppose to hurt the Tories in Saskatchewan, but this appears not to be the case. I can see two possible reasons for this and I hope whichever it is, the Liberals figure it out and act accordingly. The first is those issues could harm the Tories in Saskatchewan, but they are buried in the backs of newspapers, not front page, so the Liberals have to find a way to make them front page news. Another possibility is those really aren't issues that harm th Tories. Saskatchewan is a borderline have province so the question of equalization may be less of an issue than in the past since they don't pay much into it, but neither do they get much out either. In the case of the Canadian Wheat Board (please note I support a dual marketing system, even though I understand and respect the Liberal position), I wonder if Harper's position is as unpopular as some say. Most MPs in the Wheat Board district are in favour of the changes while most outside it are not, so I wonder if this is a case of MPs elsewhere assuming the views of farmers in their area are held across Canada (supply management is very popular amongst farmers in Eastern Canada and is somewhat similiar to the Wheat Board in terms of both involve government intervention as opposed to the free market), rather that perhaps realizing maybe Western Canadians are more pro-free enterprise than Eastern Canadians and take a different view on government's role in agriculture. I am not saying this is the case, I am simply raising the possibility. I have lived in both Western Canada and Eastern Canada and I have found people in the East tend to be somewhat more skeptical of the free market than in the West.

Vancouver-Quadra

The Liberals won this, but their margin of victory is nothing to celebrate. If this trend were to play out across British Columbia, we could see the Conservatives dominating BC the same way the Alliance did in 2000. While the Tories are dropping in Ontario, they are going up in British Columbia (for whatever reason) and if the Liberals don't do something about it, it could cost them. Having lived in BC and still talking to regularly to family and friends out there, I have noticed that last election, people's attitude towards Harper was much the same as in Ontario, but since then people have generally been impressed with the job he is doing in BC, while generally unhappy here in Ontario. In addition, Dion is considered an acceptable alternative in Ontario, but not reasonating in BC. The problem in the West is the Liberals have traditionally been seen as favouring Central and Eastern Canada so they have to work hard to win in the West. Paul Martin was able to make gains there by spending lots of time out there, producing a made in BC platform and speaking directly on local issues. Had it not been for adscam, I suspect the Liberals would have made their much wanted breakthrough in BC. Unfortunately the gains by Martin may be squandered. Also fair or not fair, most people in Ontario accept Dion's less than perfect English since being so close to Quebec, we understand Canada is a nation of two languages and considering Dion's English is better than 90% of Ontarioan's French, most accept his less than perfect English. In British Columbia, they are far removed from any French speaking area so most British Columbians tend to think of Canada more as an English speaking country since very little French is heard and you have to drive 12 hours straight for four days before you even get into an area with a large French speaking population. Therefore, the expectation is that any leader wishing to be PM should speak English fluently without an accent. This means Dion needs to improve his English if he wants to do well in the West. I have no problem with his English as his English is far better than my French, but I plan to vote Liberal anyways, so what matters is what the typical swing voter as opposed to committed voter thinks.

So, each party has their work cut out. The Tories were doing well in Ontario until they started bashing it, so they need to find a way to make themselves more appealing in Ontario. While they stand no chance at winning Willowdale and Toronto Centre, they could have at least closed the gap, which they didn't. The Liberals on the other hand need to spend at lot more time in Western Canada and focus specifically on issues important to Western Canadians since if they don't make changes, they could get wiped out in Western Canada and this could not only limit their ability to go beyond a weak minority government, it could also cause Western Alientation to flare up again. They need to keep on doing what they are doing in Ontario to ensure the Liberal momentum continues while improve things in the West, while the Tories need to keep their momentum in the West and regain their lost support in Ontario if they wish to win (off course I hope they don't, but I would rather see them lose support equally in all regions than gain in some and lose in others).

By-Elections tonight

2008-03-17T17:18:00.000-07:00

Tonight, we have four by-elections, all in four formerly held Liberal ridings. In the case of Toronto Centre and Willowdale, I expect the Liberal to win those easily as well as Bob Rae and Martha Hall Findlay will both be strong additions to the opposition bench and hopefully government some day. Vancouver-Quadra will almost certainly go Liberal and in fact it would be a huge blow to the party if they lost here. Even if the Tories come within 10 points of winning here, I would say that is bad news. Joyce Murray, although less known is a very capable candidate and hopefully will be an MP soon. Desnethe-Missinippi-Churchill River is probably the most unpredictable. Considering that the Conservatives, Liberals, and NDP have all won this riding since 1997, anyone of the three parties could win here. For the Conservatives, it wouldn't be a huge gain as they only lost by 67 votes, still any gains in seats is a good thing for them and a bad thing for the Liberals. An NDP win would finally put them back on the map in Saskatchewan, which despite being the birthplace of the party, they have been shut out for two straight elections. A Liberal win wouldn't be as big a boost as some may thing since the riding went Liberal last time around, still four wins by the Liberals, especially if strong ones would give a strong impression of momentum. As for bringing down the government, my view as stated earlier, is the Liberals should vote against any money bill or legislation that is a matter of confidence if they believe it is bad for the country and goes against their principles irrespective of their poll numbers. By the same token, they should support any legislation or money bill that is good for the country and comptable with their values regardless of their poll numbers. Voting based on poll numbers just feeds into the cynicism the Liberals only care about winning and nothing else and this is partly why they are in opposition. However, the Liberals need to quite abstaining and start showing up and voting either Yea or Nay on all confidence measures.

I'll have more later. In the mean time happy St. Patrick's Day to all.

Clinton Wins Ohio and Texas

2008-03-05T17:52:00.000-08:00

Depending on which camp you talk to, you will hear two different stories. For Clinton, she won both Ohio and Texas, which is what she needed to do to stay in the game. At the same time because of the way delegates are divided up, Obama managed to maintain his delegate lead so despite three losses last night, he still is the front-runner. Clinton will still have a tough time catching Obama, however, at least she can claim some momentum. I suspect this might go all the way to the convention. While some worry this may divide the party, I am not sure this will totally be the case. The reality is most Democrats want the Republicans out so badly they will unite behind whoever wins, whereas McCain faces the difficulty of convincing the conservative base in the Republicans he shares their views, but at the same time not so far right he alienates the moderate vote.

In other news on the home front, but still in relation to the primaries, it appears the leaked memo of an Obama economic advisor saying Obama's position on NAFTA was just political posturing was leaked from the PMO's office. This is quite serious and I hope there is a thorough investigation. We should not interfere in other country's elections. If Ian Brodie was in any way involved, he needs to be fired immediately. While I would have a tough time imagining Harper doing this, not because he doesn't privately want McCain to win, but simply because trying to even appear like he is supporting the Republicans is politically stupid in a country where they are so unpopular. That being said, anything is possible. While the Liberals certainly have been undiplomatic in the past in terms of showing favoritism towards the Democrats, they have never tried to intervene directly in the process. As for how it will affect relations, it could put the chill on them, mind you I cannot see relations between a Liberal and Republican administration being any better. Unfortunately, it seems both parties are more interested in supporting the party closest to their ideology than realizing that whoever occupies the White House there will be issues we agree with them on and ones we do not. For one thing, the Democrats are to the right of the Liberals as any party who ran on a platform similiar to the Liberals would get clobbered much like the Liberals did on Monday in Alberta, which like the US, is more conservative than Canada as a whole. Likewise, even though Harper may be privately as right wing as the Republicans, he would not only lose the election, but would get clobbered if he governed that far to the right. The worry is that he will try to get as close as he realistically can. As for the impact, this no doubt hurt Obama, although I should note most polls showed Clinton a bit ahead, so what would have been a nail biter was a more comfortable win. In terms of the NAFTA positions, I suspect both are posturing much the way Chretien was in 1993 when he promised to review NAFTA, still if either do as president or even the Republicans as a matter of fact, try to re-open NAFTA, we need to make clear that it will not be a one way street. I would much rather they explain to the people the benefits of NAFTA and how the job losses in Ohio have nothing to do with it. Immigration is not very popular in the Republican party, yet McCain was willing to stand his ground on the issue despite being offside with most of his party. Still, I suspect NAFTA will be a dead issue by November.

On the home front, the war of words between the Ontario government and federal government is heating up. Besides being politically stupid, considering that it is next to impossible to win without doing well in Ontario, I think the federal government should respect the voters of Ontario and the decisions their government made. It is true they won't see eye to eye, but the federal government and provinces should learn to work together regardless of their ideological differences. In British Columbia, Gordon Campbell enjoyed strong relations with Chretien, Martin, and Harper, so it is possible to work well with people of different ideologies. And it has paid off in terms of what British Columbia has received. Its too bad that we don't have people like Campbell at both the federal and provincial level here in Ontario. Besides, this seems more of a case of Flaherty trying to settle old scores with his former provincial rivals. If this is the case, my advice to Flaherty is to step down from federal politics and try and run for the Ontario PCs, as they will likely need a new leader before 2011. The provincial opposition is suppose to be the one who goes after the provincial government's policies, not the federal government.

The final issue is C-10 which gives the government more power to censor films going against public policy. This is very worrisome as I am a staunch defender of freedom of expression. It is one thing to argue against ending tax credits altogether (and note we are talking about tax credits not subsidies for those who argue we shouldn't have to pay for things we don't like) but quite another to pick and choose. I support amending the bill so films that break the law won't get tax credits as originally intended, but those that are fully legal can qualify without having the government play the role of moral judge. It is especially troubling that Charles McVety is championing this. This guy is the Pat Robertson/Gerry Falwell of the North who seems all about imposing a theocracy and his views on everyone else. Even most right wingers find him too extreme, so I am quite troubled the government would even listen to a wacko like this and if this was by mistake, hopefully this serves as a warning of its dangers.

Clinton wins Ohio

2008-03-04T20:53:00.000-08:00

Clinton has won Ohio, while Texas is still too close to call and considering it is almost midnight here in Toronto, I probably won't find out until tomorrow who wins. Regardless of the results in Texas, it is far from over, still Obama is ahead in the delegate count for now. I'll have more when the Texas results are complete.

McCain clinches the Republican nomination

2008-03-04T18:15:00.000-08:00

Now its official, McCain will be the Republican nominee as he won the number of delegates needed to secure the nomination. His challenge now will be can he bring the conservative vote behind him without alienating the moderates who helped bring him this far. This will be no easy task, but not impossible. What is amazing about this is only six months ago, McCain was considered dead in the water, so talk about the comeback kid. If Clinton doesn't win the Democrat nomination, which looks more and more likely, that will mean neither of the two frontrunners of either party before the nominations (Guiliani for the Republicans and Clinton for the Democrats) won their nominations. Also Huckabee has thrown his support behind McCain and dropped out now that he has no chance of winning. It will be interesting to see if conservatives follow him or not. Anyways I will have more on the Democratic race later tonight when we find out who wins Ohio and Texas. The Republican race maybe over, but the Democrat race is far from over. So far Clinton has won Rhode Island and Obama has won Vermont, which is not a surprise. At least Clinton has ended Obama's winning streak, although neither state has a large enough delegates to make much of a difference, Ohio and Texas will make a far bigger difference and both are too close to call.

Alberta Election

2008-03-03T20:34:00.000-08:00

No surprise that the Tories won another majority, but what many including myself expected to be one of their toughest fights ever, turned out to be a landslide win. The fact they increased their vote and gained seats was totally unexpected. I still haven't seen all the detail and it could very well be simply a result of a higher voter turnout this time around. Last time around, many traditional Tory voters stayed home, so I wonder if the fear of the Tories possibly not winning a majority brought many of these voters out. Also the economy has been doing well, which normally should mean the government gets re-elected, but that was certainly not the case in neighbouring Saskatchewan. The PCs did cede some ground in Calgary as expected, but it appears they kept their seat loss to the minimal, however a big surprise was their gains in Edmonton. I was not totally surprised of the PCs picking up one or two seats in Edmonton as despite Ed Stelmach's lower popularity than Ralph Klein there is a very strong Edmonton-Calgary rivalry in Alberta so it is not uncommon for the two cities to go in opposite directions, but the Tories actually dominating the city other than the core ridings surprised me. In fact looking at the maps, it appears only the core ridings of Calgary and Edmonton are painted red and orange while everything else is painted blue. This brings up the question as to what it will take to bring about change in Alberta. My argument as it has been all along is to win, one must be closest to the median voter and the reality is the average Albertan is centre-right much like the PCs. The NDP are obviously too left wing for Alberta, but even the Liberals who might be most in line with your median Ontario voter, are still too left leaning for Alberta. My advice to them is first to change their name to something such as the moderate party or centre party so as they can end this idea they are associated with the federal Liberals, who for good or ill are still widely disliked in Alberta. Also, they should adopt a centre-right platform much like the BC Liberals. But just as the Liberals and NDP may be too left leaning for Alberta, the Wild Rose Alliance is too right wing. While Albertans are more conservative than most Canadians, they are by no means the Texas of the North or Alabama of the North. Albertans still by and large share the same values as Canadians do elsewhere, they just have a different approach to achieving those goals. Some have argued this doesn't matter as Alberta is receiving so many newcomers who are more liberal than most Albertans, but I have never really bought into this. I generally believe that people after living in any location for a few years tend to develop views more or less in line with the majority of people where they live. It was often said most NDPer's in Alberta were recent newcomers from British Columbia and Saskatchewan, but after a couple election cycles, they would be voting Tory.

As for the parties, it goes without question that Kevin Taft needs to step down. Much like John Tory in Ontario, this was an election he should have gained seats, but instead lost them. While I cannot pinpoint the reasons, it is clear he will not take the party to victory. As for the PCs, they have a mandate to continue with their current approach, but should not take it as a blank cheque. As for who I would have voted, I cannot say since I am generally centre-right so I don't find the Alberta PCs too right wing for my tastes, but at the same time, I do believe 37 years in power is too long for anyone party.

Tomorrow I will have more on the Texas and Ohio primaries. If Obama wins both, then Clinton should seriously consider stepping aside as she really won't have much chance at winning, while if they each take one, Obama will still maintain front-runner status, but I expect she will stay on, while if Clinton takes both, then the race is competitive once again.

Budget

2008-02-26T19:23:00.000-08:00

Of the three budgets that have been delivered so far, this seems to be the biggest yawner. Nothing too controversial, but nothing really great either. A very average budget, which pretty much means depending on whether you are one of the more hawkish Liberals (like myself) you would vote against it, while if a more dovish one you would vote for it. As we enter a recession, big spending is the last thing we need, so I am glad there was no large spending, that being said I don't think much thought was given into how to manage it. In addition, I am concerned by the government's past projections. Jim Flaherty as Ontario finance minister hid a $5.6 billion deficit and my concern that if prudence isn't shown we could see another deficit. Had the government not gone on a big spending binge in past budgets or provided income tax cuts rather than a GST cut, we might have more wiggle room. I am all for paying down the debt as despite the fact most woud prefer tax cuts or more spending, the lower the debt is, the less interest we pay on it and this frees up more money to spend elsewhere.

As for the Liberals voting for the budget, I suspect that if the Liberals didn't support it, the Bloc Quebecois probably would as right now the polls seem to be bouncing up and down and too volatile for it to be to the benefit of any party going to an election. An election right now would be a roll of the dice for all parties. Now off course, I support parties standing by their principles, but the reality this budget for the Liberals clearly falls in the gray area. It is not good enough to warrant its support on its own, but neither bad enough to warrant defeating it either.

BC's Carbon Tax

2008-02-23T17:19:00.001-08:00

As a former British Columbian myself and still a card carrying member of the BC Liberals (mine expires in 2009, however I will renew it if I ever return to British Columbia) I obviously take a great interest in what is happening. As someone who is both pro free market, but concerned about the environment, I believe BC's solution is the best of both worlds. This does not involve higher taxes overall or more regulation, but it gives British Columbians a strong incentive to reduce pollution and GHGs. By rewarding those who cut emissions and punishing those who increase them, this works in many ways like the market where higher prices cause people to buy less and lower prices cause people to buy more. Pollution is in economics what we call an externality, but since it is not priced, an optimal amount is not reached, but rather we have too much. What a carbon tax does, is it puts a price on pollution and then lets the market take care of the rest. This is the first in Canada and I hope others follow soon, although I don't count on Alberta following anytime soon and neither do I count on the federal government following suit as long as the Tories are in charge. However, much as California has been the leader on many issues in the United States, I believe British Columbia can be the same within Canada and on the environment it is. While most applaud this and indeed this will make it even more likely that in 2009 the BC Liberals will increase their seat count, there are some hard core conservatives who feel Campbell has abandoned them. I never really bought the idea he was a conservative ideologue and most close to him would argue he is actually more middle of the road than many think. Rather he is a premier that wants to see British Columbia succeed in all areas and will do what it takes to do so. In 2001, when he became premier, we had a large deficit and high taxes that were driving business away. He reduced taxes and cut spending in order to get our fiscal house in order and once again make BC an attractive place to do business. While he may have adopted many policies the Conservative ideologues liked such as tax cuts, privatization, spending cuts, and battles with public sector unions, his reasoning was he did what was necessary to turn BC around, whereas the conservative ideologues would support these policies whether they were appropriate for the time or not appropriate. In addition, Campbell has avoided federal bashing unlike most other premiers and past ones in British Columbia and this has paid off in terms of what BC has gotten. Although, it would be better if the federal government showed leadership, inaction at the federal level should not condemn the provinces to inaction. While attacking the federal government over their lack of action may be good politics, it will do little to deal with climate change. I am pleased with BC's leadership and would happily support anyone who showed similiar resolve at the federal level whatever party they ran on. Since Dion is still new and unknown, hopefully he can show similiar leadership on the environment (on the economy and taxes, Chretien and Martin took care of this). When it comes to the environment, it does not have to necessarily be a left vs. right thing. In fact the leaders in both Canada (Gordon Campbell) and United States (Arnold Schwartznegger) are both centre-right, they just are not ideologues who oppose doing anything about the environment because it goes against their ideology.

Here in Ontario, John Tory got 67% in a leadership review. Although I would have supported Tory for leader in 2004, I would have also voted in favour of having him step down as leader. I generally believe in giving leaders two shots as most don't succeed on their first try, but the fact he won fewer votes and fewer seats (if you include the re-distributed results) than Ernie Eves did in 2003, which was a bad result for the Ontario PCs, he clearly needs to go. Dalton McGuinty isn't widely hated, but isn't widely loved either so his ability to be re-elected or not depended heavily on his opponent and since his opponent ran a disastrous campaign, he would won handily. This is also not the first time Tory has shown bad political judgement, he showed the same thing when he managed Kim Campbell's disastrous 1993 campaign. The Ontario PCs needs someone who is as moderate as John Tory, but has better political judgement. If I had to suggest who I think would be the best choice, my choice would be Elizabeth Witmer who fits both of those criterias.

Kosovo Independence

2008-02-19T17:47:00.000-08:00

On Sunday, Kosovo declared its independence and was recognized by some countries such as the United States and the majority of EU countries, while not recognized by others such as Russia. Canada has yet to take a firm position, which is one I support. I am not totally opposed to recognizing Kosovo independence, but I think a legal opinion and the potential precedent it could set needs to be sought first before taking a stance. I am very concerned that recognizing Kosovo's unilateral succession could have dangerous implications elsewhere. Here in Canada, we have a strong separtist movement, so we have every reason to ensure Quebec could not use this is a precedent for seeking unilateral independence. One of the few EU countries opposing recognition of Kosovo is Spain who has had to contend with Basque separtists for some time, whereas Germany, France, and Italy don't have any such threats. In fact the United Kingdom and Turkey are the only countries so far endorsing Kosovo independence that have active independence movements in their countries (UK - Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland; Turkey - Kurdistan). However, even if we argue that this should only be applied to groups that have faced persecution and repression, I ask why only Kosovo. The Tamils in Sri Lanka, Tibetans in China, Kashmir in India, Kurds in Turkey, Iraq, Syria, and Iran, Chechens in Russia, Abkhaz and South Ossetia in Georgia, and Republika Srpska in Bosnia-Herzegovina to name a few could all make similiar claims. This is why I think it is important to seek a legal opinion to ensure such move would not strengthen the separtists ability in Quebec to declare independence unilaterally or lead to similar movements globally.

I as a general rule believe unilateral succession should only be recognized if one of the following two conditions are met.

1. The country was illegally invaded and occupied by the country it is seeking independence from (i.e. Palestine)

2. A referendum was held with a clear question and a clear majority in favour of succession (i.e. Montenegro).

3. The country in control of the area voluntarily grants it independence (i.e. India by Britain or through military defeat such as US in 1783).

To date Kosovo meets none of these conditions. Now a referendum probably would pass, but it is still quite reasonable to insist one be held before recognizing it.

Now I realize in the case of the European Union, that their goal is to see Serbia and Kosovo join in the future and in all practical sense, Kosovo would not have any more autonomy as an EU member state than they do now as EU membership does entail surrendering a fair amount of sovereignty (although all EU Countries are still sovereign countries in the sense the EU only has as much power as the consent to give it, but has no automatic right to any power), however it is still at least another ten years before either country will meet the criteria for EU membership. Croatia and Montenegro may join in the near future, but Serbia and Kosovo both still have a long ways to go. And when one considers how weak the economy is in Kosovo and the fact it is predominately Muslim (I don't see this as an issue, but I am well aware many Europeans will), I am not so sure the public is as eager as the bureaucrats in Brussels to see it granted membership, especially considering membership grants them the right to live and work anywhere in the union.

Finally, in the event Kosovo is recognized as an independent country, it is essential that the rights of the Serb minority be fully protected. Just because the Serbs treated the Albanians poorly doesn't give them the right to do the same to the Serbs. In addition, I don't think it is totally unreasonable for the districts in the northeast where Serbs are the majority to rejoin Serbia if they so choose. While Kosovo will be predominately Muslim, the right of the Orthodox Christian minority to practice their religion and as a matter fact all other faiths must be protected as well as the Serbs right to preserve their culture and language needs to be protected.

In summary, I don't dispute that Serbia, treated the Kosovar Albanians horribly and that independence probably was the only solution in the long-run. But even if it is the right solution, the way about going about it is very concerning and needs to be firmly grounded in international law if it is to be supported. There is nothing wrong with Canada refusing to recognize Kosovo as an indepedent country until independence is sought properly.

Recent Events

2008-02-19T17:22:00.000-08:00

I will have more on the US primaries on the Kosovo issue in a different post, but I thought I would lump my views on a few issues in a quick summary

In Ontario, there seems to be some controversy over the new Family Day. While I agree it would have made more financial sense to put it off until 2009 to give businesses more time to plan, I really don't see it as a big deal. Many people, including myself, are still required to work some stat holidays, so contrary to what some say, most businesses can remain open on stat holidays and likewise there is no inherent right to have them off. Rather those who work them must either get an extra paid day off or get paid time and a half.

Today, Quebec released the Castonguay report, which calls for allowing a parallel private system and a small user fees. While such actions would likely violate the Canada Health Act, I still think the report is a good thing in terms of it will hopefully encourage debate on the issue. While the proposals may seem radical to most Canadians, most European countries have parallel private systems and user fees despite generally being too the left of Canada, so it is not as radical as it seems. Also whether one agrees with them or disagrees, I think it is time to have a mature debate on the issue instead of treating the CHA as a sacred cow that cannot be touched and arguing that health care is a black and white issue where either you support a totally private or totally public system and nothing in between. In reality, almost nothing is black and white, so its time to end the idea that issues and black and white (save for perhaps a few). Over 90% of Canadians don't support the American system, but I would argue it is time to start comparing ourselves to the best not the worst. My mom, always said that I should compare myself to the best rather than worst, so I think in health care lets look at what works in those who perform better than us, not say our system is perfect because it is better than the United States, which has one of the worst systems in the developed world. I do believe there are merits for not going to such system as well as merits for going, but lets have an open mind and open debate on this for once.

The other big issue is the OLF (or known as the language police in English Canada) have stepped up their efforts and are certainly get lots of negative media attention in English Canada. I have no problem with ensuring that Francophones in Quebec have the same employment opportunities as Anglophones and I do think that all businesses in Quebec should offer service in French as it is only proper to offer service in the dominate language. However, I clearly believe the OLF has in numerous instances gone too far and caused more problems than its solved. You can give more rights to one group without taking away rights from another, but rather than enhanching the rights of Francophones, it seems to be more about taking away rights from Anglophones. As someone who has defended bilingualism, elsewhere in Canada, instances like this make it far more difficult for me to sell the merits of bilingualism. If anything this will hurt the Francophone minorities outside Quebec as they rely on the goodwill from the Anglophone majority and willingness to provide services in French. My worry is that if the Anglophone minority is perceived as being treated as second class citizens in Quebec, there will be less support for providing Francophone minorities service in French. This would be unfortunate and I don't believe in the idea of two wrongs making a right, however I am a realist and realize such actions only make it easier for those who want to scrap bilingualism.

Today Castro, has handed over power in Cuba. While I do see this as a good thing in the sense that he was a brutal dictator, this does not mean I support the US policy on Cuba, especially considering Batista was even worse, yet actively supported by the US. US policy in Latin America has been less about supporting democracy and more about supporting regimes friendly to the US and opposing ones hostile to them. I hope Cuba does become a democracy that respects human rights, but the type of government and economic system used ought to be decided by the Cuban people and no one else. I fully support capitalism and free enterprise, but I would never argue we should impose those systems on others, rather we should practice them at home and let others decide whether to follow or not.

US Scene

2008-02-10T18:02:00.000-08:00

Since Super Tuesday, a few events have occurred. First on the Democrat side, Obama pulled off a clean sweep yesterday, winning Louisiana, Nebraska, and Washington, while today he won Maine. This definitely gives him momentum, and although not yet the frontrunner, he may pull ahead soon. Nebraska, was no surprise, as he has pretty much won all the Middle American states and likewise Louisiana was no surprise either as all the Southern states with large African-American populations, he has won and Louisiana unlike Tennessee and Arkansas fits this. Washington being on the coast and with a large union population would fit the bill of being a potential Clinton state, however almost all her wins have been in primaries, not caucuses where Obama tends to do well, so no surprise Obama won, but the size of his win was definitely impressive. He not only won in Eastern Washington and the large college towns where he normally does well, but finished ahead in King County, which fits more the profile of a Clinton strength. Most polls also show he has a better chance at beating McCain over Clinton, which maybe helping him.

On the Republican side, Mitt Romney dropped out, and all I can say is good riddance. Whether you are a liberal, conservative, or moderate, this guy was someone who relied on big money, nasty attacks, and was willing to flip flop on just about every position just to win the nomination. Despite being seen as a hard right conservative, he was quite moderate as governor of Massachusetts, so this shows he is willing to change his positions to whatever suits his interests, whereas at least McCain and Huckabee stick to their principles, even if one disagrees with them. Huckabee won Kansas and Louisiana, while McCain won Washington. Kansas and Louisiana are both part of the bible belt so no real surprise here although, I am not surprised McCain was competitive in Louisiana but not Kansas. Unlike most of the South, Louisiana has a large Catholic population and unlike Texas and Florida, where is primarily due to the large Latino community, in Louisiana most Catholics are white (of French ancestry primarily, the Cajuns), so I wonder if this is why his win was smaller as he is strongest amongst Evangelical Protestants. Still, despite Huckabee's impressive wins, I think he is too far behind to catch McCain. The real issue is can McCain unite both the moderate and conservative factions of the Republicans. Despite, what some say, McCain is a conservative on over 80% of the issues. The problem for some Conservatives is anything less than 100% is not good enough. They would rather have a candidate who blindly follows an ideology, rather than one who generally supports a certain ideology but also assesses the facts. Also the fact McCain isn't a rabid partisan and can work with the other side angers many conservatives. But while this may anger many conservatives, I would argue someone who can work with the other side is a good thing considering it is highly unlikely the Republicans will take all three branches so if they don't want political gridlock, they need a leader who can work with others. And never mind, I thought politics was about serving your country and representing everyone, not just representing your base. As Obama, rightly pointed out, the President's goal shouldn't be just to unite his or her party, but also unite all Americans. Although I don't want the Republicans to win, I am happy to see nutjobs like James Dobson, Rush Limbaugh, Rick Santorum, Tom Delay, and Anne Coulter have an egg in their face.

Events at Home

2008-02-10T17:18:00.000-08:00

Most of my last posts have been on what is happening in the United States, so here is one on what is happening back here in Canada.

Federal Election Threat

The Tories have created three different possibilities for the government to fall in the next month. Considering two recent polls show them slightly behind the Liberals, albeit within the margin of error, it seems odd as to why they are so eager to go now. One of the possibilities is the budget, which off course is always a confidence motion, so I won't focus much on this one. My argument is with the next two, the crime bill in the senate and the Afghanistan motion. On the case of the crime bill, I am not sure this is even allowed as I don't believe the government has the authority to tell the senate to do anything. Now I know some will say it is wrong to hold up legislation in the senate, but the issue if senate reform is a whole different issue and should be dealt with separately. This is clearly playing political games and my hope is the speaker rules this as out of order. Likewise since an election cannot be called until October 2009, if Harper goes to the governor general and asks for an election without actually losing a confidence motion, I think she should refuse to grant this and instead ask the Liberals to form the government. While I generally don't like this idea, I wish Harper should quit trying to do things that could provoke a constitutional crisis.

Now on the Afghanistan issue, there is no risk of provoking a constitutional crisis, however, politically speaking, I cannot understand why Harper is so keen on going on this issue considering this is an area his government is weak in, especially in Quebec, where he is hoping to gain seats. I know the Manley panel did give him some cover as Manley is a well respected Liberal and his positions are not totally supportive of the Conservatives, but neither do they fully support the current Liberal position, so I wonder if Harper is hoping to divide the Liberals over this. I think Dion's position of staying in Afghanistan past 2009, but in a non-combat role is quite reasonable. This doesn't mean combat will win altogether, it simply means a country other than Canada will take it on since we have done far more than our fair share, it is not unreasonable to ask someone else in NATO to step up to the plate.

My advice to the Liberals would be to try and bring the government down on the Afghanistan issue as I think this will be the most favourable to the Liberals. However, it looks like a spring election is very likely, although not guaranteed.

Alberta Election

An Election has been called in Alberta for March 3rd. I happen to fully agree with Ralph Klein's prediction, which is the Tories will win again, but with fewer seats. That was the one thing I liked about Ralph Klein, unlike most politicians, is he would say whatever he thought and was a straight shooter. Too bad we don't have more politicians like this. Now, in terms of how I think things will play out, I expect Edmonton to go largely Liberal with a few NDP seats and maybe a few Tory seats. Although Ed Stelmach is more popular in Edmonton than Ralph Klein was, he faces the issue of many feeling the party has been in power too long and it is time for change. In the case of Calgary, the opposite is true, as Klein was very popular here and Stelmach is not. I expect the core of Calgary to go largely Liberal, while the prephery to go PC. Rural Alberta, which is Stelmach's base, should stay largely Tory, although a couple of wins by the Wildrose Alliance is possible as well as they could split the vote enough to allow the Liberals to come up the middle in some smaller cities like Red Deer and Lethbridge.

Although the Tories have been in power long enough that many feel it is time for change, never mind Stelmach doesn't have the personal appeal that Ralph Klein did, so this should hurt them, however, I think they will win primarily due to the alternatives. The Liberals certainly got a boost after getting an endorsement by Ron Wood, who was a former aide to Preston Manning. Much of the Liberals weakness has been they have been seen as too liberal for Alberta, so this might help debunk this. Still I think the party is a bit to the left of your average Albertan. Unlike Ontario, where the Liberal platform would be an easy sell, Alberta is a more conservative province, so the Liberals should probably be slightly more conservative, but still to the left of the Tories if they wish to win. The Democrats in the United States are to the right of the Liberals in Canada, and likewise many of Conservative parties in Europe are to the left of the Tories in Canada. The reason for this is parties position themselves closest to where the median voter is. Also, the word Liberal, is still a dirty word in Alberta for many as many Albertans still associate the Liberals with Pierre Trudeau and his unpopular National Energy Program. I have argued in the past the party should change its name so it is not associated with the federal Liberals. My suggestions were the moderate party or centre party. At least, though the federal Liberals are not in power now, which is why I think they will do better than they have in the past, since in addition to people wanting change and Stelmach being less popular than Klein, the Liberal bogeyman won't work as well as it has other times. The NDP has never been strong in Alberta outside a few Edmonton ridings, so I expect them to struggle just to hold official party status. Albertans have seen the NDP in action in the two neighbouring provinces and have decided they don't want to go there. Finally there is the Wildrose Alliance which provides a right wing alternative to the PCs. While they will be the main competitor in Rural Alberta as this area is staunchly conservative and many find Stelmach too much of a Red Tory, they are likely a little too right wing for Calgary and Edmonton. The people in the cities are more conservative than Vancouver and Toronto, which is why they go Conservative instead of Liberal federally, but they are not hardcore right wingers like you see in the Deep South of the United States. Although history shows usually a non-opposition party on the right side of the spectrum replaces the governing party about once every 35 years, at this point I don't like the Wildrose Alliance is capable of doing this.

As for what I am hoping for, I would like to see the Tories win a weaker majority government. This would give them a good slap on the wrist, but also send a message to the opposition parties that they need to make changes. In terms of how I would vote, I would vote based on the local candidate, so in some cases I would go PC, while other areas Liberal. In 2004, I would have voted PC as I like Ralph Klein and I am generally a Progressive Conservative, but I do feel the party does need a time out. And unlike with Stephen Harper, my problem with Ed Stelmach is not that he is too right wing, after all, asides from the environment, he is a pretty big spender, but rather 35 years of governance by one party is simply too long.

Super Tuesday

2008-02-05T16:44:00.000-08:00

The polls have now closed in West Virginia and Georgia. In West Virginia, only the Republicans held their primary, while Georgia features both the Republicans and Democrats. Huckabee has won West Virginia, which certainly gives him some much needed momentum after it appeared he was out. This is also a state where his views would fit well. Historically, this has been a very safe Democrat state when economic issues were the main issues, but as moral issues rose to prominence this state swung over to the Republicans. Huckabee is very right wing socially, but not quite as right wing economically.

Obama wins Georgia, which is definitely a great start. Not only did he win the state, but by a resounding margin and even was competitive amongst white voters, unlike South Carolina where his support came mainly from black voters.

UPDATE #1: Nine states close and the projections so far are McCain takes Connecticut and Illinois while Romney takes Massachusetts. Obama takes Illinois while Clinton takes Oklahoma. McCain winning Illinois is definitely a big win as it is one of the larger states. Romney's win in Massachusetts is no surprise considering that is his home state. Obama's win in Illinois was off course widely expected. The bigger question later tonight is which will by a larger margin, Obama in Illinois or Clinton in New York. Most polls in Oklahoma showed Clinton well ahead so no surprise.

UPDATE #2

McCain wins New Jersey, which is not a surprise. He does best amongst those who don't like Bush and describe themselves as Moderates and this group is strongest in the Northeast. I know some like Brandon will argue he is a true conservative, but I would argue perception often matters more than reality and he is perceived as more moderate than Romney and Huckabee.

UPDATE #3: NBC has projected that Clinton will take Tennessee. Haven't followed that race close enough to really comment on it.

UPDATE #4: Huckabee takes Arkansas and Clinton takes Arkansas, which is really no surprise. If either lost the state, it would be a huge upset.

UPDATE #5: CNN projects John McCain will take Delaware. Not too big a surprise as this is another Northeastern state where he is strongest.

UPDATE #6: Hilary Clinton wins New York, which is not really a surprise considering this is her home state. Although I am surprised that CNN hasn't projected Arizona for McCain because this is home state, so I wonder what is happening here.

UPDATE #7: Barack Obama carries Delaware, so although not many delegates, at least one more Northeast state. NBC has projected Huckabee has won Alabama. Although Huckabee has won two states, with his support being mostly concentrated in the South, I am not sure that will be enough to save his candidacy. NBC has also predicted Clinton has won Massachusetts and this is definitely huge for Clinton considering the Kennedy family, John Kerry, and governor Deval Patrick all endorsed Barack Obama.

UPDATE #8

NBC has projected Clinton has won New Jersey. Considering a significant portion of the population in New Jersey lives in the metropolitan New York area this is no surprise. CNN Projects Obama will win Alabama, which seems to following the trend of winning Southern states with large African-American populations.

UPDATE #9

NBC projects McCain wins Oklahoma while CNN Projects Romney wins Utah, which is not surprising considering the state is overwhelmingly Mormon. NBC has also projected Obama will win North Dakota. So far, although early, it seems Obama is doing well in the Midwest states and this is definitely a good sign when it comes to a general election as the South and the Midwest is where Democrats need to pick up states if they wish to win the general election. NBC has projected Obama has won Utah. Interesting that it is not just the states with large black populations Obama is winning in, but rather seems to be in the states that are less solidly Democrat (save Illinois and Delaware, and maybe Connecticut).

UPDATE #10

CNN Projects Obama will win Kansas and Connecticut. The Connecticut win is a definitely plus as this is right next door to New York and in fact many of the people in Western Connecticut commute to New York City.

UPDATE #11

CNN projects Obama will win Minnesota, it looks like we are seeing a pattern here. I don't know the exact numbers, but I believe Bush lost all the Northeast states and West Coast states and still won the presidency in 2004, so could Obama win the Democrat nomination by taking the Southern and middle states.

UPDATE #12

CNN projects John McCain will win Arizona, which shouldn't come as any surprise considering this is his home state.

UPDATE #13

CNN Projects Mitt Romney wins North Dakota, although I am not sure how much this will do for him. California is too close to call, so it will be a while before we find out who takes the prize possession.

UPDATE #14

CNN Projects Mitt Romney wins Minnesota.

I am going to sign off for the night. I will have more tomorrow when the results are in.

FINAL THOUGHTS

On the Republican side, McCain has undoubtedly emerged as the clear frontrunner although he didn't pull off the clean sweep some were hoping for. At this point, it is probably a greater than 90% chance he will win the Republican nomination. The only way I could see him losing it is if either Romney or Huckabee drop out soon and their supporters go en masse to the other side. I also see his wins in the Northeast and more moderate states as a plus for him as if the Republicans want to win the next election they need to hold what they had last time around and at least stay competitive in some of the Northeast states. McCain winning is a good thing for the Republicans in terms of the fact he is the only one that stands a realistic chance of winning the next election, while on the surface not good for the Democrats as he is the toughest to beat. However, as I mentioned earlier, I would rather the Democrats face a tough battle since my worry is they might get complacent if Romney or Huckabee was the Republican leader. However, despite McCain's positive polling numbers right now, he does face some major hurdles ahead. Much of the conservative base in the Republican party is convinced he is not a true conservative and unlike Canada where you can win without this group due to how small they are, you need this group to show up at the polls to win. At the same time if you pander too excessively to this group, you scare off many moderates, so if McCain either ignores them too much or panders to them too heavily, this could hurt him. Romney's inability to do as well as expected was definitely a good thing as besides disliking this guys' views, he is a huge flip flopper with few principles. Never mind, it is always nice to see people like Anne Coulter and Rush Limbaugh have an egg in their face. I was surprised to see Mike Huckabee do as well as he did, but considering that he is definitely the most socially conservative of the three and has the strongest appeal to Evangelicals, it is not totally surprising as Evangelicals comprise a large portion of the Republican vote in the South.

On the Democrats, there is no clear front-runner. Clinton won more states winning both New York and California, however, Obama won more states, never mind the Democrats divide up delegates based on congressional districts, not winner takes all, so this means Obama will likely get delegates from New York and California. I also think the fact Obama won mostly in red states shows he has a better chance at winning since the Democrats must pick up states to win the next election. I agree that his wins in the South, although good for his prospects of winning the party nomination, won't mean a lot in a general election as the South is solidly Republican save for perhaps Florida. At the same time the Midwest and the Mountain West is not solidly Republican and this is an area the Democrats can pick up states. His strong support amongst African-Americans in the South, was no surprise, but his large wins shows his support is not just limited to this community, but also includes people from the white community. In addition states such as North Dakota, Idaho, Utah, and Minnesota don't have a very Black population so he also has a strong appeal amongst white voters. In fact according to CNN's exit poll in California, he not only won amongst African-Americans in that state, he won amongst white voters, but lost badly amongst Latinos and Asian-Americans. His weak support amongst Latinos is undoubtedly something he has to overcome. With no clear front-runner for the Democrats, it will be interesting to see who wins the next few states, as this will show who has the momentum when going into larger ones such as Ohio, Texas, and Pennsylvania which come later. I suspect Obama will take the Potomac states and Louisiana, but Washington is still too close to call.

Florida and South Carolina Primaries

2008-01-31T14:38:00.000-08:00

Recently the Democrats had their South Carolina primary and the Republicans had the Florida primary. Below is my take on each as well as Edward's decision to drop out of the Democrats and Rudy Guiliani's decision to drop out of the Republicans.

Obama wins South Carolina

This is definitely a big win for Obama and the fact he won by a such a large margin no doubt puts him back in the game. However, the Democrat race is far from over. Super Tuesday next week might give us a better idea who the front runner is, but that assumes either Clinton or Obama take the majority of states. If the two split the results closely as they have so far, it could be a while before we see who wins the Democrat leadership. Unlike the Republicans who have a clear front-runner, there is not a front-runner for the Democrats at the moment.

Edwards bows out

For John Edwards, South Carolina was his make or break. Considering this was his birth state, he had to win there if he was to have any chance of staying competitive. After losing South Carolina, there was clearly no way he was going to win the Democrat nomination, so it made sense to bow out. I predicted he would drop out if he failed to win South Carolina. Now the big question is who he will endorse since this will provide a big boost to whoever he endorses.

In addition to this, the Kennedy family has endorsed Obama. While I would generally say this is a positive, it could have some negatives since the Kennedy family is viewed as coming from the Liberal side of the Democrats and unlike in the 60s, the word Liberal is almost like a four letter word in the United States these days. I could just see the Republicans running attack ads saying ultra-liberal Ted Kennedy has endorsed Obama, does this mean Obama is an ultra-liberal and do we really want an ultra-liberal. While Ted Kennedy's views are hardly that left wing by Canadian, European, or Australian standards, in the US they are. Still I hope enough Americans will realize all this fearmongering about how evil and dangerous liberals are is just that and they will tune it out, especially with Obama's message of hope and unity, versus pessimism and division.

McCain wins Florida

While there may be no front-runner in the Democrats, McCain is undoubtedly the front-runner for the Republicans. It is not a guarantee he will win, but both Romney and especially Huckabee are going to need to do well on Super Tuesday if they wish to stay competitive. McCain is undoubtedly the candidate the Democrats would least like to face is he actually has a realistic shot at winning whereas Romney and Huckabee don't. At the same time, I generally believe parties run stronger campaigns when they know there is the possibility of losing than when they think it is in the bag. If the Democrats think the election is in the bag, I am worried they might get cocky and then lose by surprise, whereas at least with McCain they will put in their full effort and not take anything for granted. If you want to see an example of a party losing due to thinking the election was in the bag, think David Peterson in 1990, Paul Martin 2006, WAC Bennett 1972, or Harry Strom 1971. These were all people who assumed their opponents had no chance of beating them, yet lost because they got too cocky and thought they had the election in the bag. I hope the Democrats don't make this mistake.

Rudy Guiliani bows out

I always thought Rudy Guiliani's idea of writing off earlier primaries and focusing solely on Florida was a bad strategy. While the earlier primaries may have had fewer delegates, winning those gives the appearance of momentum. By performing poorly in these, Guiliani no longer came across as a competitor, so by the time the Florida primary came around, it was too late to recover. He put all his resources into winning Florida, so anything less than a win in Florida, meant it was over for him. Not surprisingly he threw his support behind McCain, who is probably the next most moderate of the Republican candidates after Guiliani. This will definitely be a huge boost to McCain on the whole. The only liability here is that some hard-core conservatives don't like the fact Guiliani is pro-choice, supports gay rights, and gun control. However, while those views may not be popular amongst the Republican base, he does have a stronger appeal to moderate Americans than either Romney or Huckabee. And never mind he is still a conservative on foreign policy and law and order. By either Canadian or European standards, he would be too conservative to be electable.