“Some combination” probably covers it. If a nominee is well known and respected in the community that’s never going to hurt. A veteran MP’s incumbency counts for something because they’re more likely to get a cabinet position if their corresponding party wins, and having a cabinet minister representing your riding has residual benefits.
There are other factors as well: my hometown riding one year bucked the Conservative national trend when the Conservatives nominated someone who was really too old to be running (he in fact did pass away not long after the election).
South Nanaimo has traditionally been an NDP stronghold and would always go to the NDP candidate but I see we’ve been redistricted to include North Nanaimo, which always goes to another party (currently Conservative although I am pretty sure James Lunney made himself persona non grata in the party with some wingnuttery that was too much for even them). My vote might actually count this time! I’m voting NDP most likely but that was a throwaway vote in the last election because it was never going to be decided by a margin of one. This time might be different.
I don’t think they work in a Westminster parliament either. Such a parliament works because it depends on confidence in the government–not because some law decrees a date on the calendar to be Election Day. No confidence in the government means an earlier election, as Joe Clark found out. Plenty of confidence in the government means a mandate–until the constitution’s time limits kick in, when the people may be quite unhappy with the government. Right, Mr. Mulroney?
No matter who forms the next government, I hope they repeal this silly piece of legislation.
The law only exists in the first place because Reform/Alliance/CPC were butthurt over Chretien calling elections earlier than they were ready for back when they couldn’t decide what to call their party. It’s a dumb law with absolutely no legal force, as Harper demonstrated when he ignored it to call the last election.
I am in Vancouver, in the new riding of Vancouver Granville. It too is a reconfigured riding, breaking up traditional strongholds. This will be my first federal election since my family moved to Vancouver in 2012, so it is interesting seeing the difference out here. (I have actually lived in BC twice before, but for my partner and son this is a first) Last election I voted for Bruce Hyer, famously the only other Green Party member beside Elizabeth May. This election may actually come to whichever NON conservative party has the best shot at winning on election day. Or as my partner says, “This is one election I was willing to hold my nose and vote Liberal to stop Harper, but hopefully I may not need to”.
I take the ferry over to Naniamo almost monthly. My parents live in Parksville and this will be their first election outside of Ontario… ever. I will have to look up their riding soon.
My eleven year old is fascinated by politics and trying to absorb every minute of the campaign. He did one of the political compass polls on line yesterday and he is a true lefty, although he admitted, in tears, not to know what to think about Syria. (I told him the vast majority of the world secretly feels the same.)
I’ve felt that this election campaign started the minute the last election ended. Just because the writ has been dropped, didn’t really change a thing. The politicians and wannabe politicians continue to say the same old thing.
The only thing different now is that I don’t watch the news every day.
I personally think the party is the most important factor, because both the party leader and the local candidate are committed to that party platform. By and large, you have a pretty good idea of what each party is advancing, and that doesn’t usually change radically with a new leader.
I follow politics, so I usually know a bit about the local candidates. In my riding, there’s one I personally do not like at all, one I like and think would make a good MP, and one that I’m sort of “meh” about. That will factor into my ultimate decision.
With respect, I disagree. It’s not straightforward in the US, because voters can consciously make contradictory choices.
In the US system you can cast your vote for a president who favours expanding social programmes, and vote for a congress-critter who wants tax cuts, and vote for a Senator who favours the military over social programmes, all on one ballot.
In essence, the US system is set up to allow for people who want free ponies and a tax rebate. Gridlock is the inevitable result.
Voting in a parliamentary system forces you to make hard choices:
• Do I think tax cuts are more important than social programmes? Then I should vote for Party A.
• Do I think taxes should be raised to pay for social programmes, but keep a balanced budget, then I should vote for Party B.
• Do I think social programmes are worth running a deficit for? Then I should vote for Party C.
And so on.
Voting in the US system allows for undisciplined voters to vote for contradictory things, leading to gridlock.
Voting in a parliamentary system is for adults. It forces each voter to weigh in the balance the different issues, and actually make a disciplined choice. That in turn leads to governments with clear mandates and the voted on the Commons to achieve it.
From what I’ve heard, they are ramping up new attack ads now targeting Mulcair. It appears they will attack whoever the presumed primary competitor is at the time the ads are commissioned. I haven’t heard the radio ads but the TV ads will feature the same group of pretend-employers who declared Trudeau “not ready”, and in the fine tradition of clean Conservative campaigning they will declare Mulcair some sort of opportunistic lying dirtbag.
Not explicitly. Though all the one’s so far have been against “Trudeau” not “Liberals” or “Justin Trudeau”. I wouldn’t be shocked if the ad people are hoping that some of the NEP-hate rubs off on him.
I don’t think the attacks on Trudeau are an attempt to revive memories of the NEP, I think personal attacks are just what they do. Probably, in part, because if they can’t win on policy they’re going to try to exploit Harper’s image as a seasoned politician. The emerging attack themes seem to be that Trudeau is an immature kid whose major asset is nice hair, while Mulcair is going to be portrayed as an untrustworthy opportunist.
Trudeau is also going to legalize WEED, it’s his first priority according to the radio ads I hear every day. Gosh darn it, not WEED! What kind of country will this turn into… if everyone continues smoking it like they already do… and has to pay taxes on it? Won’t somebody think of the children? If it’s legalized you won’t be able to get a sack at your nearest high school anymore and whatever will that mean for those young entrepreneurs?
The Trudeau attack ads go back a long way. I started a thread quite a while ago asking if anyone was scared of Justin Trudeau. The prevailing consensus was no, although he did shit the bed supporting bill C-51.
The former head of Elections Canada accuses Harper of gaming the system and effectively avoiding all the checks and balances, his agency was meant to oversee! Calls it a disgrace.
Harper has imported every dirty American political tactic he can. He redistributed the ridings to overwhelmingly suit his party. Cancelled funding that matched the donations of regular Canadians, giving his party an huge financial advantage, as all their funding is corporate. He hides a 36m health care funding cut, in an omnibus bill. Names things the opposite of what they are. Totally misrepresentative attack ads, “I guess income splitting for seniors is next!”, um, no. Straight up falsehood! Giving every household with kids a big payout right before the election. (While at the same time removing the child tax deduction!) and says he’ll still sell us all out to the TPP - even while the government is dissolved!
No matter how inept the NDP may be at governing, they can never match Harper’s evils. He has made politics dirtier in this country, in every way.
Creative boundary drawing is not an American invention; Macdonald was famous for it in his day, when the boundaries were drawn directly by Parliament. He called it “hiving the Grits” - i.e. putting as many Liberal supporters as possible into one riding, like a bee-hive, to give the Conservative party better chances in the surrounding ridings.
Which is why in Canada, the federal electoral boundaries are not drawn by politicians, but by independent electoral commissions, one for each province, chaired by a superior court judge.
The Members of Parliament and the Government do not have the authority to change the boundaries. Each Commission makes an initial report, which is filed with the Speaker of the Commons. A committee of the Commons then reviews the report, and if there are any formal objections to any of the boundaries, and the Committee agrees with them, the Committee can refer the objections to the Commission. The Commission is not required to accept those objections. It can consider them, and then issues a final report. The final report is then implemented automatically by an Order-in-Council of the federal Cabinet.
Not so, because corporations (and unions) are banned from contributing to federal political parties, and there are strict limits on how much individuals can contribute to any party or candidate.
Historically, it was the Liberal Party that got the most corporate donations, while the Conservatives have been better at direct mail solicitations from ordinary Canadians. That may actually be one of the reasons why the Liberals have struggled for the past decade, because their funding model changed dramatically.
However, it does seem that the most likely explanation for the long campaign is that it allows the parties to spend more money, and since the Conservatives have more money, that will give them an advantage, as argued in the Globe & Mail:
If this were true, Saskatchewan would not have gotten rid of its “rurban” ridings, which chopped up Saskatoon and Regina into ridings which were PC-friendly areas and stranding its NDP voters as minorities in them. I dislike Harper as much as the next guy, but there’s no reason to start spreading lies about the system.
