Well, the election’s tomorrow, and there doesn’t seem to be anything posted about it yet. I’d heard of the general feeling of apathy that Ontarians seem to be holding towards their politicians this go-round but seeing nothing here or even in the Canadoper thread comes as a bit of a surprise, to say the least.
Threehundredeight.com’s currently predicting that the Liberals will form the next government, a few seats shy of a majority. Maybe the constant attack ads are working. I was listening to the radio in my workshop the other night; I only heard three commercials, repeating all night, and two of them were anti-PC. (The third was for a bankruptcy firm.)
Additionally, on reddit a lot of people have been making a lot of fuss over declineyourvote.ca, a website created to educate people of a little-known clause in the provincial election law that allows an elector to decline his ballot, which is recorded and counted separately from the votes. The movement’s gaining a lot of traction and has been covered in major newspapers. Of course, now we find out that the movement’s leader is a “dissatisfied” ex-conservative staffer from Windsor (and reddit leans young and to the left). Which parties are most likely to be hurt by the youth of the province deciding to be unorthodox and decline their ballots? So is it conspiracy? Possibly… but at least this time they’re within the bounds of the law. (I’m looking at you, Marty “Robocall” Burke.)
So what are your thoughts on tomrrow’s election? Are you going to decline your ballot?
Interesting link regarding the Globe’s endorsement. Looks like there’s some dissent on the Globe and Mail’s editorial board; they wanted to endorse a Liberal government but were overruled by their new editor-in-chief.
This is anecdotal, but I’m sensing less apathy and more revulsion. A lot of people of my acquaintance seem to dislike all three major leaders. Since I’m in Toronto, between that and the mayoral campaign, people just seem to want it all to stop.
My feelings were made in poetry form in the Canadoper thread (with my apologies to Yeats ):
THE SECOND COMING OF ROB FORD
[Or, the Ontario and Toronto Elections are Upon Us]
Turning and turning in a widening gyre
The mayor cannot find his own car door;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mediocrity is loosed upon the world,
The bribe-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
Confidence in government is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are just as fucking useless.
Surely no revelation is at hand;
Surely nothing good is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image filled with purple Jesus
Troubles my sight: in a waste of crumbling infrastructure;
A shape with bloated body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Crack pipes and empty bottles roll.
The darkness drops again but now I know
That both municipal and provincial elections
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Honest Ed’s to approve condos?
Ive remained silent due to respect for other peoples opinions, but I really dont see how anyone could possibly vote Liberal in this election. Its true that the Liberals may in fact win again, not a majority though, and I just absolutely cannot fathom how that can happen.
This editorial in the national Post sums it up nicely.
I’m with you** Leaffan.**
I see a marginal victory with a Liberal minority as most likely.
From what I 've observed, Tim Hudak’s personality and his Million Job Plan may have actually alienated and scared off people who would generally vote conservative.
I think the big question mark is the NDP vote.
Will triggering the election and their thin platform be enough to attract the folks that have had enough of the Red and Blue?
Do people remember the Bob Rae days?
For me personally, I vote according to the net effect on my wallet.
As it should. What he’s saying is that he will take a million employed people and dump them onto the rolls of the unemployed. I presume that when one’s government job is pulled out from under oneself, that person is then entitled to an Employment Insurance claim. So what he’s saying is he’ll cut the government’s payroll by a million people… by putting them on EI so that the Feds can pay (55% of) their wages for a while. Everybody wins, right?
Well that almost says it all right there. He never said “a million lay offs” but people don’t trust him enough to automatically reject the proposal.
I’m just floored anyone can vote for the liberals at this point. I don’t see how any one in the centre can stand the idea of this tired government clinging on for a few more years.
I think this is a good example of what went wrong with the PCs’ message:
“Million Jobs Plan! And I’ll start by laying off a hundred thousand people!”
“Er, what?”
Never mind that some of those provincial government jobs might be lost by attrition and never replaced, and never mind that the million jobs were supposed to be added to the provincial economy over eight years… If all you saw were the election ads and online news bites, what impression would you have?
Especially if your primary news source is the Toronto Star.
ETA: The message was out there. The message was totally out there if you read the platform and cared enough to check out the facts. Not aimed at you Sunspace, just the ill-informed public in general: low information voters.
I am attempting to watch CBC’s coverage, but it’s just ridiculous right now. They showed one riding where a candidate was leading with 37 votes from 2/150+ polls reporting. What’s the point?
The thing is, although there are still many polls to report, statistics don’t lie. I think we’re in for a Liberal minority, but dancing with majority territory. The numbers will continue to settle, but the writing is already on the wall.
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