CanPol: May(?) 2011 Election. Vote today!

[Asher]

It is a good point. It's increasingly troublesome who Harper surrounds himself with as well.

[Asher]

I'm more amazed how many stupid, stupid things the Tory campaign is doing. Everyone should recognize how stupid they are -- like the campaign site ejections. Just no thought whatsoever. I'm amazed they're polling so high out of Alberta -- Alberta clearly has a vested interest in voting Tory as all of the other would harm the energy industry in one way or another, but the other provinces...?

[Asher]

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-notebook/liberals-narrow-gap-to-9-points-but-is-it-a-bump-or-a-blip/article1971101/

Liberals narrow gap to 9 points – but is it a ‘bump or a blip’?

The Liberals appear to have enjoyed a platform bump, as a daily tracking poll shows them nibbling into the Conservatives’ commanding lead.

Tuesday morning’s edition of the three-day rolling Nanos Research tracking poll conducted for The Globe and Mail and CTV shows the Liberals up about 2 percentage points to 30.2 per cent, now less than 10 points behind the Conservatives at 39.8 per cent. The NDP is at 16.5 per cent.

Outside the West, the Conservatives and Liberals are now statistically tied, with Michael Ignatieff’s team winning back ground in the province with the most seats – Ontario.

Part of the Liberal bump likely came from Sunday’s release of the party’s platform, as Monday’s survey interviews show the second day of responses since the release. The question is whether time bears out that gain.

“It could be a bump or a blip,” pollster Nik Nanos said.

Stephen Harper’s Conservatives held a 14-point lead in the previous tracking poll, which tallies running results of the previous three days. Still, with the Tories still holding a significant advantage across the country, the shift in numbers shows different regional races.

The Conservatives hold a commanding lead in the West – 54.1 per cent of the vote in the Prairie provinces and 48.4 per cent in British Columbia – but big leads west of Ontario don’t necessarily translate into a lot more seats for a party that already dominates in the region.

“When we get outside the West, it’s actually quite competitive between the Conservatives and the Liberals,” Mr. Nanos said.

In Ontario, the daily tracking poll shows what’s in effect a statistical tie, with the Liberals at 41.1 per cent, and the Conservatives at 39.6. The NDP is at 14.7 per cent in the province.

Mr. Nanos said there may be a link between the Mr. Harper’s recent days of campaigning to abolish the long-gun registry to win votes in rural Ontario. His previous rise in Ontario came from gains in suburban and urban ridings, and that may be slipping a little because of the campaign against the registry, Mr. Nanos suggested.

In Quebec, the Bloc Québécois continue to hold a strong lead, with 35.8-per-cent support, and the Conservatives leading a three-way struggle for second place. They have 22-per-cent support, the Liberals 17.6, and the NDP 16.9.

The three-day tracking poll uses a rolling sample of 400 people a day, for a combined survey of 1,200 Canadians. This sample was conducted April 2 to April 4.

Each day, samples from four days ago are dropped from the results, and the latest day’s are added, to get a three-day rolling result.

Nanos Research says the sample is accurate to within 2.8 percentage points, 19 times out of 20. Regional results have higher margins of error because of the smaller sample size – Ontario samples have a 5.6 percentage-point margin of error and Quebec samples have a 6.6-percentage point margin.

[Wezil]

They are running a traditional tightly controlled front runner campaign. The logic is generally sound however in this case it reinforces the perception of Harper as a control freak.

Ditto the 5 questions a day policy.

[notyoueither]

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2011/04/05/roy-green-liberals-sneak-cap-and-trade-back-onto-the-agenda/

Roy Green: Liberals sneak cap-and-trade back onto the agenda
National Post Apr 5, 2011 – 8:10 AM ET

First John McCallum, then Bob Rae. When quizzed on whether a corporate tax rate of 18%, the fiscal foundation on which Liberal campaign promises are built, would result in severance cheques for currently employed Canadians, Mr. McCallum agreed a “minor” job loss was possible. Sunday, on release of the Liberals blueprint, Bob Rae first chuckled at the notion of any Liberal corporate tax rate related job loss, but when McCallum’s words were played back, Mr. Rae appeared to acknowledge potential “minor” job loss, but locked onto McCallum’s prediction net job gains would be the end result.

Reading John Ivison’s story in the National Post we find that Jack Mintz, globally respected tax expert and head of the School of Policy Studies at the University of Calgary assesses the Liberal corporate tax plan as “irresponsible”. Mintz, Ivison writes, predicts the Liberals corporate tax commitment will cause the elimination of 200,000 jobs! Well, now we know at least how federal Liberals define “minor” in the context of a national employment numbers cave in.

The Liberal plan would additionally plunge Canada into the cap-and-trade morass. “We will work to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and advance carbon pricing through the kind of equitable cap-and-trade system already operation in Europe”. A system denounced in the most direct terms possible by Northern Ireland Minister of Finance Sammy Wilson as a massive job killer, while simultaneously driving consumer goods and energy prices dramatically upward. I played back Minister Wilson’s cap and trade review to Mr. Rae. He was unimpressed.

Perhaps I should also have played back the views of Denmark’s Dr. Bjorn Lomborg. Lomborg states that while cap and trade supporters argue global warming’s costs will be $3 trillion a year by the end of this century, meeting cap and trade objectives would require spending $40 trillion annually and gasoline would rise to $9 a litre, or $35 a gallon.

Bjorn Lomborg is not a warming “denier”. Lomborg in fact supports the human induced global warming point of view. In his words, “yes, global warming is real, it’s also often massively exaggerated.”

Lomborg was named one of the world’s 100 most influential people by Time Magazine and one of the “50 people who could save the planet” by Britain’s The Guardian.

Raise the corporate tax rate and piggyback that initiative by subjecting Canada’s still fragile economic recovery to cap-and-trade law, and without waiting for a U.S. initiative in that direction? A U.S. initiative which will not see the president’s desk because even with Barack Obama’s support, cap-and-trade is dead in Congress.

The Liberal route to economic prosperity appears in need of a rewrite. By Stephane Dion.

National Post

[Wezil]

Green party Leader Elizabeth May has lost in her last-ditch effort to get in to the televised leaders' debates.

Federal Court judge Marc Nadon has decided not to expedite the case before the first debate on Tuesday.

The party says it will look at all options before deciding whether to pursue the case any further.

She has also turned down appearing at the Also-Ran debate with the rest of the fringe parties.

[Asher]

The first debate is today? Or a week from today?

[Wezil]

Week from.

She can't get heard before then so pursuing further is pointless unless she hopes to win big and set precedent for the next time.

[Asher]

WTF do the courts have anything to do with a consortium of companies deciding who they want in a program?

[Wezil]

I'm not sure what her legal angle is. I think it has to do with the fact the industry is regulated by the Feds.

She will have serious trouble showing the decision was unfair or unreasonable regardless of who made it imho.

[Asher]

Technically the CRTC != the feds, no?

[Wezil]

You get into legal gray areas with boards and stuff. The Feds don't theoretically control day to day decisions (debatable under this PM) but are ultimately responsible for appointments.

[Wezil]

I suspect she would get the court to agree they have jurisdiction (imagine for instance if the Conservatives or Liberals were excluded) but that she will fail in showing it was unreasonable. The best she might hope for would be a ruling that the "consortium" be required to make clear the eligibility standards so it doesn't seem so arbitrary. That said, I can't envision any "reasonable" requirements that would allow her to participate without opening the gates to every fringe party out there.

[Fake Boris]

Summary of the discussion so far:

-Asher does not understand that out of the $8B we get in equalization, we contribute $3B to the pot. The real amount we receive is thus ~5B. Corollary: we get the less equalization per capita except Ontario (and excluding NF which has found oil and soon will be 'have').

-He also does not understand that equalization is based on fiscal capacity, not provincial budget. We could cut taxes and equalization would still "pay" for the cuts.

-He also claims that equalization is "tampered" to benefit Quebec, while the last modification was made to benefit Alberta.
(The new rule was that a province can choose to deduct 50% of natural resource revenues from the contribution calculation; Quebec asked in turn to deduct hydro power revenue from the calculation, a request that was denied).

-Krill has shown himself to be a tool.

-NYE is against government intervention in the market, except when it's against Quebec.

-Most people seem to be missing the point that whatever part of equalization we receive from Alberta (~1.8B) doesn't compensate for a decapitated manufacturing industry.

[Hauldren Collider]

On the other hand, Oncle Boris is from Quebec, therefore his opinion is invalid. Also, Quebecois are ineligible for basic human rights.