When you do the math, it simply doesn't add up.
Stephen Harper. We don't like the guy and we like him less now than ever.
Quebec. Harper has positively gored his Conservatives in la belle province.
The recession. Harper has screwed that up six ways to Sunday. He's screwed us up. He's screwed up Canada. He was hopelessly screwing this up long before anybody recognized the recession was happening in the United States.
The scandals. Harper is up to his knees (at least) in them. He's broken most of the White Knight promises on which he eeked into office. Arrogance and secrecy where he promised accountability and transparency. A flurry of failed and abandoned litigation. Then there's listeria, Chalk River, Cadman, income trusts, the list goes on.
So why, oh why, is the newly-minted Liberal leader not sitting on a solid, 10-15 point lead in public opinion? It's not that the NDP is nipping at Ignatieff's heels.
Could it be that Ignatieff is simply too far right for center-left Liberal supporters? Has he tried to position that party too closely to the Conservatives for his and the LPC's own good? Is there something about the guy that Canadians just don't like? Could it be that Dion left deeper scars on the Liberal brand than anyone imagined?
I'll admit I don't know what's to blame for the Liberal malaise but I do know that being positioned to possibly win a minority with everything Harper has done for the Liberal Party shows that Liberals don't have much to celebrate.
16 comments:
Probably its the recession. Canadians are focused on the financial picture and their own pocket books. They could also fear a Coalition.And they don't want an election.
Many guesses but for me its just the general Canadian malaise of don't rock the boat and as long as its not in my backyard attitude.
If it were Ignatieff's alienation of Dion supporters then this would show up in the polls.
What is the undecided % ?
I don't know if you've gone through Progressive Bloggers entries today but even core Ignatieff supporters are beginning to throw in the towel on this joker. One by one solid Liberal supporters are acknowledging that there's nothing remotely Liberal about Michael Ignatieff.
I'm no throwing in the towel, MoS.. I and others think this supporting Bill C-15 is wrong.. and the LPC needs to reconsider it..
That's a lot different then throwing in the towel.
Mound
You're just seeing what you want to see, and then ignoring everything else positive that doesn't fit into your own personal bias. Liberal supporters aren't walking away, we're adding members.
This post is one of the most ridiculous manipulations and intellectually dishonest arguments I've heard. The Liberals should be up 10-15%, and then you have the audacity to mention math like you can add? Ya, maybe if the Bloc didn't exist, or maybe if the Reform Party was still a pariah east of Sask, a PC party in disarray, then you could posit ridiculous leads. Fact of the matter, 99.5% of people who follow politics professionly know full well it's a long, long shot for anyone to form a majority. Hell, Harper couldn't even do it and we had our worst showing in history? Think about that.
If people want to create false ceilings so they can then claim failure because nobody reached their artificial benchmark, then have it at. But really, you're just lying to yourself, rather than taking an HONEST look at the dynamics at play. If the Liberals win a decent minority, it will be a considerable triumph after winning 77 seats. I don't expect the Liberals to ever be up by more than single digits, no matter how badly the Cons do. That kind of gap just isn't realistic. Period.
Don't mind Steve Mos, he's feeling a little pissy today. His hero Iggy is starting to make him look bad. And I thought Ignatieff was gonna win over a bunch of western supporters Stevie. Won't all these glorious new seats give Libs the majority.Won't that make a double digit gap for your boy. If not maybe you're right. Maybe in the future coalition govt's will be the norm.....ohhh that's right you guys burned that bridge.
LMAO. Dim bulb here spends 2 and half hours on my blog today (yes I have sitemeter). Your obsession is quite flattering, particularly when I don't give you any thought whatsoever. Ankle bitter, ruff ruff. Too funny. Whatever guy, get a life.
Anyway Mound, I would appreciate a detailed analysis of just what numbers the Liberals would need to achieve in each respective province, along with a corresponding calculation for the Cons for the Libs to achieve a 15% lead. If you can give me some plausible, I'll retract my criticism of your math.
Oh Stevie you lightweight. Any extended time on your site was because I happenned to leave it up while I was off doing something or because I kept returning to find out if you had offered your mea culpa on Ignatieff yet. (You never did, saying something about not supporting him while in fact supporting him. I quite enjoy watching you hoisted on your own petard as many commenters did.) I also spent some time commenting. Of course you got all snippy and deleted everything I said. Something you can't do here I will remind you. For a guy who doesn't give me "any thought whatsoever" you sure spend a lot of time deleting my comments. (none of which were abusive) You also responded. another odd response for a guy who doesn't give me a second thought. So how about those western voters?
Get some help man, seriously. You're a joke.
I agree with you Mound. With the Con's in freefall the Liberals should be sitting pretty. I don't know if Ignatieff is to blame but I do think it would be smart for any Liberal leader to be distancing themselves from Harper. Instead Ignatieff is voting for his bills. The blogs are in an uproar about this but like Scott said I haven't seen anyone talking about leaving yet. That may happen when Ignatieff ignores them.
As I posted last week on my blog, Harper and the CPC are playing a game of "a pox on both your houses". His spin machine is working overtime to ensure that any loss the CPC has isn't given to the Liberals. And it is working.
Voting with the CPC on C-15 seems like an odd strategy to counter this approach. I keep waiting and hoping that someone at the LPC is going to do something!
Steve, I really think you're whistling past the graveyard although I won't resort to personal attacks. Just because the new guy isn't the train wreck we experienced from his predecessor is not, of itself, an accomplishment. Improving the party's standing from the low it reached during the Dion years is hardly the stuff of enthusiastic boasting.
Ignatieff ought to have Harper on the ropes but there's no sign that he's connecting on anything that leaves lasting damage to Harper or the CPC. Now, as a serious observer of politics, I'm sure you don't see it that way. It's unfortunate you have but one vote.
Have voters been presented with a liberal platform for them to decide whether to vote Liberal, vote Tory, vote NDp, vote Bloc, or (as so many did in the last election) not vote at all?
Not all that matters is the man,
the man must also have a plan.
Is this Crime Bill going to be non- confidence..who wants an electiom?
Often used excuse that no one wants an election but a lousy excuse – criticize a bill then go ahead and vote for it – incompetence and cowardly.
Not all that matters is the man,
the man must also have a plan.
Bollocks. I'll vote for the fist party whose leader promises to do very little except not screw up.
The whole planning fetish is something we've been conned into believing is essential. Remember Harper's five-point plan? Bold, compelling...and completely useless.
Ignatieff's trying to find a formula that works for the public. I heard him say at a town hall that Harper's moved the centre to the right and pretends it's the centre; Iggy's idea is to move the centre back where it belongs, "where the voters are." The trouble with this is, the majority leans slightly to the centre left. Dion knew where we should be headed vis a vis climate change, but too many Liberals weren't willing to go along and the average guy was too snowed by the War Room to buy into Dion as the strong and visionary leader he could have been.
Iggy's game plan of distancing himself from Dion can't work if Harper's rep continues to slide, because people won’t vote for a fake conservative when the real thing is still out there.
Too many people disgusted with Harper (i.e., the majority) are likely to vote NDP or Green if the LPC doesn't come up with a clear and balanced alternative Canadians can be proud of. I hate to say it, but if Iggy and his people don't get this, they'll go down for the count and Harper, the man we can't stand, will get another minority.
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