Quote:
Originally Posted by sailor734
Unless there is a pretty radical change in the next 3 weeks I don't think it's going to be clear what the most likely outcome is going to be.
I think there is a reasonable chance of any of the following three things happening....
1 Razor thin PC majority
2.Minority Liberal government propped up be the Greens (perhaps the worst outcome as the Greens would demand unreasonable spending even past the point of what the Liberals are naturally inclined to do)
3. Thin (1-3 seat) Liberal majority.
I think options 1 and 3 both have pros and cons.  |
He just makes up stuff based on feelings (and doesn't seem to recall Holt being Gallant's senior advisor), you may as well put his account on the ignore list.
Your three items are correct, 100%. The odds of the PCs exceeding 28 seats are extremely low (5%? a polling miss is not out of the question), the odds of the Liberals doing the same are just a hair more likely (10%?), and the odds of both parties between 22-27 seats and the Greens between 2-3 are enormous.
The aftermath is what's interesting. A win's a win and no party has ever learned a lesson from winning, so what does a loss look like for each party?
If the PCs lose their majority, their top concern should be candidate recruitment and vetting, as much as a lot of people will want to make it about Higgs, who will be retiring anyway. They've really never done an impressive job, going back to Bernard Lord. Stiles, Malley, McAlpine, Cardy... not to mention [very red Tories and/or Faytene types, reader's choice]. Fumbling an election when the general public seems to, per polling, prefer your ideology is not a super common situation to be in. Especially if the PCs hold up well in swingy urban ridings but lose safer ones with duds.
If the Liberals flame out and fail to get even a minority, they need to figure out how to balance Acadian and (urban) Anglo interests while avoiding 'sensible centrist' ex-PC dinosaurs, who I generally expect to underperform. Vaguely progressive mild populism seems to be working for Wab Kinew, but that would be an odd and difficult pivot, and in a very different province.
Holt losing her seat, but there being enough Liberals/Greens to govern narrowly, is not an outcome they want, but they must be thinking of it. Would they get a caretaker Acadian leader, or gamble again on an Anglo? Two busts in a row would give them pause.
Greens... what's a win for the Greens, anyway? Treading water? Keeping all three seats? None of their incumbents, Coon included, are safe. Mitton is the safest in her rotten borough, but I don't think a fourth seat is on the table at this point. Their plan to become some kind of opposition to Liberals on the North Shore seems to have been abandoned. What's their future after Coon, whether he retires in the near future or loses? Getting back to 2018 levels, with a single MLA holding a university community, and losing Fredericton-Lincoln to the PCs and Kent North to the Liberals, would be a dire omen.
NDP... 3%+ and 40 candidates or they have to ask serious questions about why they exist.
People's Alliance doesn't have a win condition. They have 13 candidates, some in unfriendly territory, and don't seem to be adding any more six days from the writ. A loss condition would be, I guess, failing to make a dent in Austin's margin, with Conroy winning handily.
No point talking about the others, as the Libertarians secured ballot access for the next election (their only goal), and the Consensus and Social Justice weirdos aren't going to exist in November.
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