CanPol: Thread of the Year Edition

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Max Webster


Exactly. Tell Mrs Flubber that I think she and people like her are societys true heros. They can't be paid enough.

I know that I often find it difficult to justify my pay being so much higher than hers.


I'm just glad that there was a good result in the situation mentioned. That part of the reason that Mts Flubber likes the cardiac ICU-- many many of the patients get better and get better quickly. The regular or trauma ICU was much less hopeful (burn patients, shootings, crush injuries as well as simply very old people that could no longer breathe on their own . ..

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Max Webster


Plenty here too, I like when they all get together and block Highway 401 with their $100,000.00 plus dollar tractors. While the wifes follow behind in their $60,000.00 pickups.

Yes but there might be a 99,000 loan on the needed tractor and a 55000 loan out on the needed truck.

The unspoken upside for many farmers though is that any of them with substantial landholdings anywhere near a city has seen their land value appreciate markedly. I know as Calgary has expanded it has made multi-millionares of many nearby farmers-- I know this isn't the norm and its of absolutely no help to those that want to continue farming but this phenomenon probably explains why many urban dwellers can be cynical about the the issues of "poor farmers"-- Most of the closest ones they see get rich selling their land !!

[Flinx]

Originally posted by Flinx 2005/12/14
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

The Liberals are up 7% and the Conservatives are down 7% in BC. The liberals are down 6% and the NDP up 6% in SK/MB.

Here are my seat predictions based (solely) on polling data collected by The Strategic Counsel between Dec 14 and Dec 19 (n=2750)

Canada .....124 89 28 67  0
BC ..........19  9  8  0  0
AB............0 28  0  0  0
SK MB.........4 15  9  0  0
ON...........68 30  8  0  0
QC............8  0  0 67  0
NB NS PE NL..22  7  3  0  0

[Tassadar500]

[joncha]

Yeah, I really don't see the Liberals taking 19 seats in BC. I'd like to hear which ridings you think they could win.

[Flubber]

Originally posted by joncha
Yeah, I really don't see the Liberals taking 19 seats in BC. I'd like to hear which ridings you think they could win.

IT does sound like a fantasy but I think he explained earlier that its just a computer model that extrapolates a provincial average to seats but does not factor in any other considerations at all.

Plus an overall sample of 2000 means that samples by province are very inaccurate anyway

[joncha]

Yeah, models aren't terribly useful when it comes to figuring out election results.

[Flubber]

Originally posted by joncha
Yeah, models aren't terribly useful when it comes to figuring out election results.

Models can be incredibly useful if enough data is collected. But a thumbnail calculation reveals that apoll of 2750 equates to less than 10 voters per riding so raw percentages mean very little. Now if they had also done numbers on urban versus rural trends, ethnicity, or sex or voters, income demographics of each party's support etc you might have some useful models.

[joncha]

Sorry, I meant "models like that." A useful model needs to take every riding into account.

[Flubber]

Originally posted by joncha
Sorry, I meant "models like that." A useful model needs to take every riding into account.

Or at the very least group ridings on some criteria and do some analysis.

For example I can see being able to predict some Quebec ridings if you had solid data that 80% of anglophone Quebecers planned to vote Liberal and do some modelling formajority anglophone ridings even if you hadn't polled each and every one

[Seeker]

LOL....why is it that every jurisdiction/riding/province that has had the NDP in charge soon come to hate them forever and punish them at the polls?

That's my interpretation of the data...just get it over and join the liberals NDP.

[joncha]

It's because a vote for the NDP is a vote for hope. Provincial NDP governments have consistently dashed those hopes. Everyone expects a Liberal or Conservative government to screw over the working poor, so even when they are hated, it doesn't usually have an impact on their base. When the NDP do it, their base feels betrayed.

Also the NDP are strongest in BC and Ontario and weakest in Alberta and Quebec. That kind of makes your interpretation of the data suspect.

[Ninot]

Originally posted by joncha
Also the NDP are strongest in BC and Ontario and weakest in Alberta and Quebec. That kind of makes your interpretation of the data suspect.

I asked a good friend of mine, who is a vocal but respectful seperatist, why the NDP isnt more popular in Quebec.

He said simply they don't have any tradition here, and ignored this province for too long. But he also doesnt understand why so many people rather vote Bloc instead of NDP. He actually said if the Bloc weren't an option, he'd vote Conservative, cuz he thinks they have the best promises right now.

I think he said he voted for Mulrooney back in the day, too.

[notyoueither]

http://www.cbc.ca/story/canadavotes2006/national/2005/12/20/elxn-harper-unity.html

Harper, Martin exchange punches on unity
Last Updated Tue, 20 Dec 2005 21:29:18 EST
CBC News
Conservative Leader Stephen Harper should be embarrassed for saying the federal Liberals would prefer to see the separatists take power in Quebec, Liberal Leader Paul Martin said Tuesday.

Martin was responding to Harper's accusation that the Liberals are fighting a phoney war against separatists in Quebec, hoping to distract voters from their own record of corruption.

The Liberals would like to see the Parti Québécois form a government in Quebec so the Liberals can assume the mantle of heroes of national unity, Harper said at a Toronto boxing club while campaigning for the Jan. 23 federal vote.

"I think they can't wait to see a PQ government so that they can stand up for federalism and fight the separatists," Harper said "But frankly, the only thing that can justify the kind of corrupt party that they have been is to have a separatist threat to fight."

But Martin said those comments are "just absurd.

"He really ought to be embarrassed," Martin said in Harrow, Ont. "Fighting the separatists and fighting for national unity, I think that's part of my DNA.

"He makes these comments, I don't know where they come from, and I don't know how he looks at himself in the mirror after he makes them."

Harper's hard-hitting remarks came a day after he told the Quebec Chamber of Commerce that his Conservatives are the better alternative for federalist Quebecers.

But Martin accused Harper of trying to curry favour in Quebec by weakening the federal government.

"We need a strong Quebec, we need strong provinces, but we also need a strong national government, a strong federal government.

Mr. Harper would simply reduce the role of the federal government to that of a tax collector. Well that's simply not on."

This is laughable, but he's getting away with it... so far.

[Tingkai]

Originally posted by Max Webster


Plenty here too, I like when they all get together and block Highway 401 with their $100,000.00 plus dollar tractors. While the wifes follow behind in their $60,000.00 pickups.

Yeah, I've got no sympathy for those tobacco farmers, particularly when they are whining that high taxes on cigarettes are cutting into how much they can make from growing tobacco. Farmers of death.