CanPol: Thread of the Year Edition

[Kontiki]

Originally posted by DanS
What if that friend demanded respect but offered little in return? Wouldn't that begin to sow the seeds of doubt in your mind about the strength of your friendship?" Mr. Wilkins said.

Yeah, it probably would. We've been putting up with it for years.

[DanS]

I can't remember any American politician giving Canada a hard time in public.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Kontiki
Yeah, it probably would. We've been putting up with it for years.

I don't think we even ever mention you, let alone attack you.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Flinx
Here are my seat predictions based (solely) on polling data collected by The Strategic Counsel between Dec 8 and Dec 13 (n=2500)

Canada .....123 94 24 67 0
BC ..........13 12 11  0 0
AB............0 28  0  0 0
SK MB.........6 20  2  0 0
ON...........71 27  8  0 0
QC............8  0  0 67 0
NB NS PE NL..22  7  3  0 0


Everyone can now get back to discussing the issues

Which color is each party?

[Flubber]

So an almost status quo election with minor gains gor the NDP and Bloc. Lets see how these predictions look against the house at dissolution

Atlantic canada at 22-7-3 is identical to the current situation
Sask/ man hardly changes with the biggest change being 2 seats

Alta goes from 1-26 to 0-28

So through 7 provinces the parliament would be relatively the same.


Que-- Going from 21-53 to 8-67 would be a major blow the Liberals (net 13 seats down)

Ont-The prediction puts the Liberals down 3 with the Conservatives up 4 and the NDP up 1. Someone has to find a way to break the Liberal stranglehold on this province or the Liberals will govern forever


BC-- The place with the most changes. The predictions sees it going from 8-22-5 (L/C/NDP) to 13/12/11. The NDP gain would not suprise me but I was a bit startled to see a seat gain in BC for the Libs when they don't gain anywhere else in the country


So overall, it would be the same type of minority parliament with the HUGE exception that an NDP/Lib grouping is still a minority.With 2 elections in a short period, I can't see anyone wanting to go to the polls real soon so we would get to see how a minority governs

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker


Which color is each party?

No Canadian would need to ask which column was which even if they were not color coded ( look at Alberta to tell who the conservatives areLOL) but its

red Liberal
blue conservative
orange NDP
green bloc
other green is probably the green party and independents

[Flubber]

Originally posted by DanS
"What if one of your best friends criticized you directly and indirectly almost relentlessly? What if that friend's agenda was to highlight your perceived flaws while avoiding mentioning your successes? What if that friend demanded respect but offered little in return? Wouldn't that begin to sow the seeds of doubt in your mind about the strength of your friendship?" Mr. Wilkins said.

Ya what if that friend had repeatedly not paid sums of money owed to you ???

What if that friend closed its border to your products (cattle)?

[Ben Kenobi]

Of course the ironic thing in all this is that there would be a not insignificant portion of the population that would spend their "child care money" on popcorn and beer.

It's one thing to say that when you are the parent. Quite another when the parents are the ones who are paying your bills. How arrogant do you have to be to tell the people that you know better then they do how to spend their own money?

[Ben Kenobi]

The place with the most changes. The predictions sees it going from 8-22-5 (L/C/NDP) to 13/12/11. The NDP gain would not suprise me but I was a bit startled to see a seat gain in BC for the Libs when they don't gain anywhere else in the country

Indeed, as well as an overall drop in Conservatives from 99 to 94.

I don't see why they figure the Liberals will gain in BC either, they will keep the seats they have, due to massive majorities, but none of the Conservative seats will be lost to the Liberals.

[Ben Kenobi]

Projection

13 LIberal
12 Conservative
11 NDP

Excluding all the close seats, assuming the Conservatives lose them all you still have: 17 seats.

CON Abbotsford +20k
CON Cariboo-PG + 8k
CON Chilliwack +24k
CON Delta East + 6k
CON Dewdney + 3k
CON Kamloops + 6k
CON Kelowna +11k
CON Kootenay +11k
CON Langley +12k
CON Nanaimo + 4k
CON Shuswap +11k
CON Coquihalla +13k
CON PoCo + 6k
CON PG-Peace +14k
CON Saanich + 5k
CON White Rock + 3k
CON Surrey N + 7k

Now, this means these seats are up for grabs, and assuming the runnerup wins this time around:

LIB Sunshine Coast
NDP North Island
NDP Southern Interior
NDP New West-Coquitlam
LIB Newton N.Delta
LIB Fleetwood Pt Kells

However, it should be noted, the NDP were very close behind the Liberals in Newton and Fleetwood. If NDP support jumps I would expect to see these seats taken by the NDP.

For the remaining seats, here are the only safe ones.

LIB Vancouver South +7k
LIB Vancouver Quadra +15k
LIB Vancouver Centre +4k
LIB Richmond +4k
NDP Vancouver East +13k
NDP Nanaimo Cowichan + 6k

Which leaves us with these seats up for grabs. Brackets are the number 2 in the riding

NDP Burnaby Douglas (Con)
NDP Burnaby New West(Con)
LIB Esquimault (NDP)
LIB North Van (Con)
NDP Skeena (Con)
LIB Victoria (NDP)

So, if we feel the Liberal support is going to drop in their narrow seats, we could see 2 more NDP seats, and a conservative.

In the end, this would be your tally.

18 - CON
5 - LIB
11 - NDP

Plus another 2 seats due to the redistricting. So assuming one of those goes to the NDP and the other to the LIB, you have:

18 CON
6 LIB
12 NDP

and your over all projections would then be:

123 (-7) 94 (+6) 24 (+1) 67 0
116 100 25 67

So another 8 seats in Ontario, and we see a mess. No wonder the NDP surge in BC is troubling him.

[Kontiki]

Originally posted by Flubber


Ya what if that friend had repeatedly not paid sums of money owed to you ???

What if that friend closed its border to your products (cattle)?

Or complained about your lack of military spending? Or your immigration policies? Or your proposed loosening of drug laws? Or one of the people making a presidential run called you "Soviet Canuckistan"?

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi


It's one thing to say that when you are the parent. Quite another when the parents are the ones who are paying your bills. How arrogant do you have to be to tell the people that you know better then they do how to spend their own money?

JUst a question-- do you dispute that their would be people that would spend their child care money on "popcorn and beer"-- or bingo or blackjack or heroin??


That said, I'm on the same side of this issue as you. I believe most people would use their money wisely particularly compared with what this government might use it for

[KrazyHorse]

What about if a leading politician speculated for days that certain men being sought by the FBI were, in fact, terrorists who had crossed to the US from Canada, despite having no evidence (or, indeed, basis in fact)?

What if the previous ambassador to Canada had spent 4 years berating his hosts in public?

What if numerous politicians had used the threat of terrorists crossing the open border wih Canada as a scare tactic to get themselves face time on national television?

That being said, Martin's engaging in a bit of silly scaremongering of his own. Wilkins (?) has the right and the duty to call him on it.

[Ben Kenobi]

do you dispute that their would be people that would spend their child care money on "popcorn and beer"-- or bingo or blackjack or heroin??

Not at all. Folks will always abuse the system, I mean, look at welfare. We all know how no one ever spends their welfare cheque on beer and popcorn.

[Ben Kenobi]

Quebec - BQ

Projection 67 BQ - 8 LIB

LIB Bourassa 5k
LIB Hull-Aylmer 5k
LIB Lac St Louis 26k
LIB LaSalle Emard 12k
LIB Laval 5k
LIB Mont Royal 25k
LIB Notre Dame 14k
LIB Outremont 3k
LIB Pierrefonds 22k
LIB Pontiac 3k
LIB St. Laurent 21k
LIB St. Leonard 17k
LIB Westmount 16k

13 Liberal safe seats in Quebec.

I can't see them losing more then that.

So 62 BQ 13 Liberal in Quebec.