Campaign 2011: They Shoot Horses Don't They?

Politics for Joe 24

By: Hubert O'Hearn

For: Lake Superior News

April 28, 2011

I don't know what's going to happen on Monday any more than you or any of the national pollsters. The spread of the three most recently released polls is:

EKOS

CPC: 33.9

NDP: 27.9

LPC: 24.0

Harris-Decima/CP

CPC: 35

NDP: 30

LPC: 22

Nanos/Globe/CTV (three-day rolling average)

CPC: 36.6

NDP: 30.4

LPC: 21.9

EKOS has under-sold the Tories since Day One. It's methodology of random automated calls that do not control for who answers the phone may be causing for a disproportionate number of youth respondents - after all, who answers the phone in your house?

Still, it has been an incredible election and for all I have tut-tutted covering the horse race, it has been a helluva horse race. Pretty much any possible result is still in play, from Tory majority to NDP majority. The Liberal horse has pulled up lame and will be shot at dawn. At that, one has to wonder how deep the commitment of the anti-Harper vote which has perched itself on the NDP branch really is. And at that will the Green vote (somewhere between 4-7% declared) scatter itself over to the NDP?

The three things that I think we safely do know are:

1) The Conservatives will come out of that night with the most seats

2) The Bloc Quebecois will be going the way of the Creditistes. And if

you don't know what that was, that's exactly my point.

2) There will be a sea change of leaders in the next year or two. Gilles

Duceppe will regret not having taken over the PQ when he had the chance. A majority-less Harper will be moved along. And Michael

Ignatieff's horse will be shot at dawn.

Change partners and dance!

Unless the declared vote for the NDP absolutely implodes back into the teens (and I truly can't see it happening) we do have a real shift in Canadian politics. At the very least, from now through all foreseeable future elections the NDP must be seen as true and equal contenders for government formation. The real question will be, will the Liberal Party (Canada) go the way of the Liberal Party (UK)? That has been the dark boogeyman that has lived in the shadows of Liberal bedrooms for years. Once passed by the NDP, could the Liberals ever elbow their way back to the front?

I suspect that we will have the 1985 Ontario result all over again. Harper will get first crack at forming the government, and it still could be a majority. But if the numbers break, ballpark-ishly at:

Conservatives: 130

Reckless Coalition: 180

Under those circumstances I think Harper and the Tories are done for. The Reckless Coalitioners (and someone has to start a band or improv group called Reckless Coalition) will turn the Tory argument around. We can't go back to the polls again because the country needs stability etc. etc.

I do owe the reader an apology. I wanted to write more, but I picked up a couple of writing contracts and money trumps passion when one has bills to pay. But if you're reading this before the polls close, if you haven't voted yet - do. And if you don't, then know your role and shut your mouth because you've lost the right to bitch for the next four years. And what fun is that?

Be seeing you.