Canada Election 2015

[lio45]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

Fingers crossed that you're right. I'd be pleased.

Harper seems the least centralizating of the Big Three, shouldn't you guys prefer that?

Doesn't seem to me that daily life in St. John's 2011-2015 has been markedly different than during the BH era. The apparent urge to get rid of him seems completely out of proportion.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by lio45

So, out of curiosity, are you going to be voting red, or orange?

I don't tell anyone how I vote, sorry! Even my wife doesn't know. But I won't be voting Tory, that much I will say. I haven't even ruled out voting for the Bloc as a "non-sovereignist, but soft nationalist" statement...

So it will be one of those three.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by lio45

Harper seems the least centralizating of the Big Three, shouldn't you guys prefer that?

Doesn't seem to me that daily life in St. John's 2011-2015 has been markedly different than during the BH era. The apparent urge to get rid of him seems completely out of proportion.

That's a really good question. I mean the biggest fight Danny Williams had was with Paul Martin, who was a Liberal, wasn't it?

[lio45]

Originally Posted by eternallyme

I'm starting to think the Conservatives might actually make *gains* in parts of Quebec thanks to the niqab and refugee issues...those would offset any losses in Atlantic Canada.

BTW, in Quebec you'll find many who are anti-niqab and pro-refugee.

Harper's combined position on both of these would mostly only be ideal for the people who are anti-niqab "for the wrong reasons" as Acajack put it.

[flar]

Damn, I didn't think the niqab bs would sway things that much in Quebec. I still don't think it will change the seat distribution too much.

[SignalHillHiker]

Originally Posted by lio45

Harper seems the least centralizating of the Big Three, shouldn't you guys prefer that?

Doesn't seem to me that daily life in St. John's 2011-2015 has been markedly different than during the BH era. The apparent urge to get rid of him seems completely out of proportion.

It's been mixed. We've had some devolution to our benefit, like oil and gas revenue. And we've had some to our detriment, such as shuttering search and rescue centres and small craft harbour supports. It's bigger than us, though. He was literally found in contempt of Parliament. That alone is urgent reason enough.

The one thing Harper could offer for which even I would be selfish enough to vote for him is control of our fishery.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I don't tell anyone how I vote, sorry! Even my wife doesn't know.

I've been with my gf for a year now and I still have no clue how she'd vote, but seeing that I might be considering a trust-based vote trade with her, we'll have to discuss how we vote for that to happen.

FWIW, I'd find it weird to go lengths to hide that from people close to me...
The reason we don't know how each other would vote is that it never came up as a topic in the past year. We're both not very politized...

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by lio45

BTW, in Quebec you'll find many who are anti-niqab and pro-refugee.

Harper's combined position on both of these would mostly only be ideal for the people who are anti-niqab "for the wrong reasons" as Acajack put it.

Last night was the season premiere of Quebec talk show Tout le monde en parle. One of the guests was film-maker Philippe Falardeau (Oscar finalist Monsieur Lazhar, and also The Good Lie, made with Ron Howard and starring Reese Witherspoon).

Anyway, Falardeau is very obviously a leftist but he spoke strongly against the niqab in official proceedings, but on another front said Canada's doors should be wide open to refugees from Syria and elsewhere.

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I may be proven wrong, but my guess is that the number voters in Quebec at least that will go for the Conservatives over this won't be enough to win them many more seats in Quebec.

Between the people who will transfer their votes to the Bloc and the people who will like me hold their noses and vote for the NDP or Liberals anyway, I doubt there will be much of a pro-Tory seat impact here.

Actually, only slight increases in CPC poll numbers would double their seat count in Quebec. That is largely because their support in Quebec is heavily concentrated in the Chaudiere-Appalaches and Bas-Saint-Laurent areas and around Quebec City. They are completely out to lunch in most of the rest of Quebec, especially in Greater Montreal where in most ridings they will likely finish 4th or 5th.

However, once past the point they get to about 10-12 seats, they have the highest "tipping point" for additional gains, so the CPC at 25% in Quebec would likely not get them much more than their support at 16%.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by eternallyme

Actually, only slight increases in CPC poll numbers would double their seat count in Quebec. That is largely because their support in Quebec is heavily concentrated in the Chaudiere-Appalaches and Bas-Saint-Laurent areas and around Quebec City. They are completely out to lunch in most of the rest of Quebec, especially in Greater Montreal where in most ridings they will likely finish 4th or 5th.
.

Well, most of the seats they could possibly win in this region they already have and so at best they'll hold everything they've got, and might win one or two more. At most.

Keep in mind "doubling the Tory seat count" in Quebec is going from 5 to 10.

I don't see them coming it at more than 8, unless something dramatic happens.

The main movement of anti-niqab votes in Quebec will be by far NDP-to-Bloc. Few NDP voters will go to the Tories.

There may be some Liberal-to-Tory movement, but the Liberals are also in a modest ascedancy in Quebec at the moment (regardless of this specific issue), plus your Liberal voter pool to pick off new Tory voters from is much smaller than the NDP pool the Bloc might feed from.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Well, most of the seats they could possibly win in this region they already have and so at best they'll hold everything they've got, and might win one or two more. At most.

Keep in mind "doubling the Tory seat count" in Quebec is going from 5 to 10.

I don't see them coming it at more than 8, unless something dramatic happens.

The main movement of anti-niqab votes in Quebec will be by far NDP-to-Bloc. Few NDP voters will go to the Tories.

There may be some Liberal-to-Tory movement, but the Liberals are also in a modest ascedancy in Quebec at the moment (regardless of this specific issue), plus your Liberal voter pool to pick off new Tory voters from is much smaller than the NDP pool the Bloc might feed from.

In Anglo Canada though... I'm expecting the niqab business might cause these movements (nothing major obviously, but still, in a three-way tie, likely non-negligible) :

"Blue" Liberal to Tory (based on the parties' positions on the niqab issue)

NDP to Liberal (based on the weakening of the NDP in Quebec, so only indirectly niqab-based)


So, the net effect could well be NDP to CPC, even if few voters end up making that exact switch.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

The one thing Harper could offer for which even I would be selfish enough to vote for him is control of our fishery.

Huh, I wonder why the CPC doesn't promise just that. You seem to think it'd cause an instant transfer of all Newfoundland seats away from their rivals to them... seems worth it.

Plus, it's far from illogical that fishing regions be in charge of managing that resource themselves. You're the ones who know best how to do that. I would support cutting the waters into provincial waters for fishery purposes, with maybe buffer regions near the borders of each province's ocean/gulf area... one thing is sure though, anything caught east of St. John's is clearly a provincial resource. You guys brought it with you in 1949.

[MonctonRad]

Fisheries is difficult. Obviously there has to be a federal presence to deal with international negotiations regarding areas of contention (nose of the Grand Banks, Gulf of Maine, Georges Bank etc), and to establish internationally agreed fishing quotas. There are also interprovincial boundary disputes, especially in the Gulf of St. Lawrence that have to be mediated.

Despite this, the provincial departments of fisheries are a lot closer to the action than distant Ottawa, and it would make sense to have greater provincial control of the onshore fisheries. There should be some degree of devolution - yes.

Despite this, the feds need to maintain overall control, but without stepping too hard on provincial sensibilities and permitting reasonable provincial independence on governance of the onshore fishery.

[Aylmer]

Just voted at my local Elections Canada office! No lines, no hassle, super easy.

[Migs]

So now the Liberals & NDP are attacking Harper for deporting terrorists who plotted to kill hundreds of us. We have now entered crazy town, & the sheep still follow.

[MolsonExport]

stop referring to fellow Harper supporters as sheep. It isn't their fault that they have an inept shepherd. See, after awhile, nobody believes you when you cry "Wolf!"

[O-tacular]

Originally Posted by Migs

Canada is much bigger than the confines of your picket fence. The economy in Canada is going quite well, even with the low price of oil. As much as you seem to hate it, that technical recession blip is already over.

I wouldn't call it a blip.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/cenovus-energy-cuts-jobs-layoffs-1.3244991

You can't have it both ways MIGS. If the economy gets too tied up with oil and gas prices, which it has under the CPC, the price of oil affects us all. Personally I've seen clients who had operations in your home province shutter them because of the price of oil right now. For someone who so doggedly defended Harper's strategy of expanding the oil sands at all costs you certainly seem to be ignoring the consequences.

[O-tacular]

Originally Posted by lio45

Huh, I wonder why the CPC doesn't promise just that. You seem to think it'd cause an instant transfer of all Newfoundland seats away from their rivals to them... seems worth it.

Plus, it's far from illogical that fishing regions be in charge of managing that resource themselves. You're the ones who know best how to do that. I would support cutting the waters into provincial waters for fishery purposes, with maybe buffer regions near the borders of each province's ocean/gulf area... one thing is sure though, anything caught east of St. John's is clearly a provincial resource. You guys brought it with you in 1949.

Except that would undo Harper's precious CETA deal with Europe. He fucked over the Maritimes to get it signed.

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by lio45

I totally agree... there are a bunch of parallel reasons to object to the niqab for the oath that aren't exactly fully aligned.

In my case, it's not feminism at all, but rather the notion that religion shouldn't work as a trump card against rules that are otherwise supposed to be strict.

For example, that May 2013 case in Montreal ("No overnight parking, except for Jews") would be the absolute worst example of this stuff gone wrong.

Religion's totally fine -- as long as you can manage to do it within our legal framework.

I'd be absolutely okay with allowing someone to take the oath faceless, as long as we made it okay to take the oath faceless, i.e. someone can take the oath via the internet, sending an email to say "yeah yeah, I'm swearing I'll be a good, loyal Canadian".

I'd be fine with that... if that's the standard, then that's the standard.

To me, the big problem with that, is that most "legal frameworks" were created under the influence of one specific dominant religion and that legacy ends up enduring and creating persistent systemic biases against religions that weren't influential when the legal framework was in it's formative stages. But like many biases, they aren't blatant enough to notice upon casual observation.

I'm sure there are laws that put restrictions on religions that would never have passed had it been a historically dominant religion that was affected. In other words, the legal framework is naturally permissive of the culture (including its religion) it was developed along side of and in concert with. This is really the big flaw in those "Being equal means being the same" stances.

Of course one could argue that you could address the issue by simply making blanket changes to any law that conflicts with any major religions, like the example of simply offering citizenship oaths online, but I don't see this as practical. There are rules and laws in place that are performing a fairly minor purpose in society in which one could relax for the small percentage of people whose sincerely held religious beliefs are in conflict with the rule without much harm, but if you were to magnify the negative effects of removing the law across all of society, the small amount of harm would be made significant due to scale. Maybe not devastatingly so, but needlessly so.

When considering how to make a rule or a law, we need to weigh the pros and cons, and the pro side may be slightly greater for the vast majority of people who don't have a sincere moral or religious conflict with it, while the effects of the law on people who do would push it greatly into the con side for them. I really don't see how a society is served by insisting on a process that lacks any nuance or consideration of context (aka, understanding that people are individuals.)

What purpose would we really be addressing by allowing the oath to be taken wearing a paper bag or allowing people to have their ID photo taken while wearing a pasta strainer? People making these kinds of protests aren't genuinely advocating for their own ability to move through society in a way that makes them feel comfortable and respected. They're simply doing it to target others out of their own resentments of religion, or immigrants, or what have you. Our society needs to be intelligent enough to navigate these issues without resorting to blunt and simplistic "Being equal means being the same" stances.

[JHikka]

FWIW the NDP have not led in any poll since September 17th (nearly two weeks). Eighteen polls have been released since then. MOI aside they were consistently leading most polls at the start of the campaign.