Canada's coup d'etat: Opposition parties join to overthrow gov't (Part 2)

[Wezil]

Originally posted by Oncle Boris
...and it turned out Dion hadn't even pronounced the word "bank".

He probably couldn't.

[Wezil]

Originally posted by Oncle Boris

NYE, Wezil - in the case of a campaign, would the Libs be able to turn against Harper his own flirt with the Bloc?

I don't think the Libs can do much of anything out west. Walking on water would probably fail to impress. I'll let a westerner speak to that however.

There is too much gray area in the question to even guess what the spin would be in ON. When is this election? Who are the party leaders?

The further the election is the better for the Libs. I don't think anything the C-s have done in the past will measure up in the public mind with last weeks coalition talks. Whether they may be comparable or not, last weeks event was MUCH more public than prior C- discussions ever were.

The party leaders will matter as well. If Harper is still C- party leader then the spin of his former dalliances will carry more weight than if he is replaced.

Same thing on the L- side. Ignatieff (the heir apparent) has been pretty invisible in the last week. If this thing turns foul on the Libs he will be better able to deflect criticism than others.

As to the question I asked earlier - I suspect you are right in that the coalition is more likely than not to collapse before the end of January. When it cracks I think it will be in the Liberal side. The pro vs con calculation is worse for them.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Oncle Boris
Anyone still interested in a decent discussion?

NYE, Wezil - in the case of a campaign, would the Libs be able to turn against Harper his own flirt with the Bloc?

I doubt it in the absense of something concrete. People are far more angry with the irresponsible behaviour in the fiscal update.

Some will try, of course. Add another log to the evil Steve fire. Problem is middle of the road people are numb to the hidden agenda rhetoric. You can only play those cards so many times before only the ideological bots pay any attention. You actually run the risk of losing in the middle ground by banging on after a point.

[notyoueither]

http://www.thestar.com/Canada/Columnist/article/548845

PM needs to reach out

Dec 05, 2008 04:30 AM
Comments on this story (154)
Chantal Hébert

OTTAWA—Had Governor General Michaëlle Jean turned down Prime Minister Stephen Harper's request to prorogue Parliament yesterday, he would have had little choice but to resign quickly and, possibly, offer another Conservative leader in his place.

The alternative would have been an imminent and humiliating return to the opposition benches, probably as early as the middle of next week.

By allowing a prime minister to shut down the House of Commons to duck a confidence vote, Jean has set a precedent that will trouble all those who care about the vigour of Canada's democratic life.

That life is less healthy as a result of her decision. But her call may also have been the lesser of two evils. Yesterday morning, the government and the opposition parties were not so much on a collision course as on a race to the brink.

By agreeing to the prorogation of Parliament, Jean has given the main parties some room to set their course on a less self-destructive destination.

Having managed to avoid the imminent demise of their minority government, the Conservatives will now utilize every lever of power to make their case against a less-empowered coalition.

Expect the Prime Minister and his cabinet to be all over the economic file between now and the recall of Parliament next month – with a gathering of the premiers already scheduled for mid-January.

Expect also the Jan. 26 Speech from the Throne to be collapsed into a budget the very next day and that budget to borrow heavily from the policy playbook of the opposition coalition.

All of which will amount to pulling the rug from under the opposition parties before the House of Commons is seized with the fate of the minority government again. But it could also translate – in the best-case scenario – into the comprehensive economic road map Canadians have a right to expect from their government in the current storm.

For the shaky coalition cobbled together over the past extraordinary days, maintaining any kind of momentum in the face of such a government blitz will be virtually impossible.

Indeed, this could well be the end of the road for the coalition. Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion was caught speaking of it in the past tense on a few occasions yesterday. And he left the door open to reconsidering the plan to bring down the Conservatives as soon as Parliament reconvenes.

Even before Jean rendered her decision, there were cracks in the weak foundation of the coalition.

The Bloc Québécois and the NDP leaders would not say so publicly yesterday but Gilles Duceppe and Jack Layton were livid at Dion's mediocre performance on national television Wednesday night.

Predictably, the Liberal leader proved to be both the weakest and the most visible link of the nascent coalition.

For the Liberals, repairing their leadership (or finding a way to put Dion back in his cage) between now and Parliament's return could well become part of an exit strategy from the coalition rather than a remedy to fix it.

As for Harper, by the time the House comes back next month he may have been able to convince a dozen or more Liberals to sit out any early confidence vote, thus ensuring his survival as prime minister for few more weeks or months. But he will need to do a lot more reaching out if he does not want his government to continue to live on borrowed time.

Chantal Hébert is a national affairs writer. Her column appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

[Victor Galis]

Hmm... it will be interesting to watch results from the provincial election in Quebec Monday.

[notyoueither]

I've been thinking just that exactly.

Have you read anything that indicates a significant shift?

[RedFred]

I was in a line up at a drug store yesterday. A visiting comedian was up from the States and he wanted to work in something on the government crisis into his monologue Friday night. But he had no clue. I could already see I'd lost him when I said the Queen was the head of state through her representative the GG...

Not that I understand the US system much better. I know people's votes for the President get translated to Electorial College votes. But at this point it all goes hazy. I believe there is some variation on how it is done by state. Some sort of hocus pocus, maybe a ouja board, a hanging chad or two and presto, you have a new president.

[Kuciwalker]

In almost every state, there is one (pre-determined) set of electors pledged to each candidate. Whichever candidate wins the popular vote in a state, his electors are sent to the electoral college to vote for him. Thus every state is "winner-take-all".

There are two states that are not winner-take-all - Maine and Nebraska. Their method of selecting electors is actually more complicated.

[KrazyHorse]

Red:

The number of EC votes per state are determined by their Congressional representation (House+Senate seats). In addition, the District of Columbia gets 3 EC votes (despite having no Congressional representation). The way each state apportions its EC votes is up to the state itself, however it's winner take all except in 2 states: Nebraska and Maine.

In both of those states 2 EC votes (representing the 2 votes from Senate representation) go to the statewide winner as in other states. The rest of the votes go to the winner of each Congressional district.

[KrazyHorse]

Note that my post describes what happens if all the EC electors (described in Kuci's post) actually vote for who they're supposed to. There have been a number of occasions when electors chose not to do so (so-called "faithless electors") but AFAIK this has never changed the outcome of the Presidential election (at least not this century).

Previously, IIUC, state legislatures used to choose electors directly and there were no popular presidential elections at all (at least in some states)

EDIT: by "this century" I meant, of course, "this century or last century"

[Kuciwalker]

There have been a number of occasions when electors chose not to do so (so-called "faithless electors") but AFAIK this has never changed the outcome of the Presidential election (at least not this century).

Not ever, actually.

[Kuciwalker]

Previously, IIUC, state legislatures used to choose electors directly and there were no popular presidential elections at all (at least in some states)

The [Republican] Florida legislature planned to do this in 2000 if they had to to meet the federal deadline.

[KrazyHorse]

What federal deadline? Do you mean the deadline to send their electors to Washington or something, which they would be in danger of missing because of recounts etc.?

[Victor Galis]

I believe Congress has the ability to decline to allow a state's electors to vote or something like that. I don't believe that has ever happened.

[notyoueither]

Are there better English language papers in Montreal?

http://www.montrealgazette.com/opinion/real+Quebec+election+campaign+lasted+only+days/1040415/story.html

The real Quebec election campaign lasted only 7 days

Since the leaders' debate, the federal battle has diverted public attention

By DON MACPHERSONDecember 6, 2008

From beginning to end, it was a cynical election campaign that Jean Charest fought.

The pretext on which he called the election was a lie. Charest said he feared his Liberal minority government would be defeated. But his opposition would have been in no shape to fight an election in the foreseeable future.

Then, after claiming that the economic "tempest" would be so terrible it could be navigated only with a single, firm, pair of hands on the wheel, he proceeded to make campaign promises like a drunken sailor with somebody else's credit card.

His Liberal Party estimated the total cost of its campaign promises over the next five years at $1.5 billion - not counting another $1.6 billion to be paid for with political Monopoly money. That is, it would go directly to the public debt without passing through the budget and creating a deficit.

The Liberals promised a mountain - literally. To the hotly contested electoral battleground of Quebec City, they promised a sports-facilities plan that would include building up ski runs at the nearby Le Massif centre so it would qualify for World Cup competitions.

And they counted on the electorate being so campaign-fatigued that it would be resigned to trusting Charest with a majority just so he would leave it alone for the next four years.

And it appears as though cynicism has worked.

The final pre-election polls, including the one by Léger Marketing for The Gazette and other media, suggest that a Liberal score of 80 seats, out of 125 in the National Assembly, is not out of reach. That would be the most for any party since the Liberals took 92 in 1989.

Indeed, the polls might have underestimated the final Liberal lead, if they further demoralize already wavering Parti Québécois and Action démocratique sympathizers.

In some ridings, notably Mercier in central Montreal, some sovereignists now might turn to the small left-wing party, Québec solidaire.

"A victorious army first wins and then seeks battle," Sun Tzu wrote in The Art of War, the ancient Chinese classic on military strategy that Charest has said he consults.

And "those who know when to fight and when not to fight are victorious."

The great advantage of Quebec's parliamentary system for the incumbent head of government is that it allows him to seek battle when he believes he has already won.

And that's the real reason Charest called the election when he did.

The most reliable political indicator in the polls outside of actual election campaigns is the government's satisfaction rating. If it is positive - that is, if there are more voters satisfied with the government than dissatisfied - then the government can expect to be re-elected.

And on Nov. 5 when Charest called Monday's election, his government's satisfaction rating in the polls had been positive for at least seven months.

Also by then, support for the ADQ had collapsed, disproving the theory that its breakthrough last year signalled a permanent realignment of Quebec politics.

Political scientists such as Éric Bélanger of McGill University and Richard Nadeau of the Université de Montréal say that for every vote the ADQ took from the PQ, it took two from the Liberals. Also, ADQ voters were closer in their characteristics and attitudes to Liberals than Péquistes.

So when the ADQ lost the accommodation issue and Mario Dumont proved to be a disappointment as opposition leader, most of the ADQ's support reverted to the Liberals.

In fact, Liberal strategists worried throughout the campaign that the ADQ would lose too much support, so that the PQ would start to gain as well.

Charest also received more than one unintended gift from Stephen Harper.

First the Conservatives' cuts to cultural programs gave Charest an opportunity to strengthen his appeal as a defender of Quebec's interests and identity, to soft nationalists who had supported the ADQ.

Then the crisis in Ottawa both underscored Charest's argument for political stability and distracted voters' attention just when the PQ and the ADQ needed it most, to try to catch up to the Liberals.

The campaign will have had the voters' undivided attention only from the leaders' debate on Nov. 25 until voting day on Monday, interrupted for a week by the Ottawa crisis.

So in all, the real campaign lasted less than seven days. And by then, probably all that remained to be decided was the size of the Liberal majority.

dmacpher@ thegazette.canwest.com

© Copyright (c) The Montreal Gazette

I like them. They are easy to quote.

And the column quotes Sun Tzu.