Admiral Beez
Superstar
I've never understood why my riding of Centre-Rosedale is always voting Liberal. I can't stand having Bob Rae on my ballot.
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2008 Federal Election: GTA Voting Patterns
- Thread starter kEiThZ
- Start date
urbandreamer
recession proof
Rosedale types probably love Bob Rae.
I predict the Tories win at least 3 GTA seats this time around.
I predict the Tories win at least 3 GTA seats this time around.
King of Kensington
Senior Member
Toronto Center is an inner city riding that completely rejects the Conservatives. The condos go overwhelmingly Liberal as does the low income housing of Regent Park and St. Jamestown. And the patrician Rae is much more appealing to Rosedalians than the Pentecostal minister sacrifical lamb the Tories ran last time.
TC is also probably the most heavily gay riding in the country - and there is no love for Harper among that group.
The likelihood of a Tory being elected in TC is about as likely as a Republican being elected to Congress from Manhattan.
As for the NDP, they have pockets of support in Cabbagetown, St. Lawrence, etc., but there is a ceiling on their support in the riding.
King of Kensington
Senior Member
They already have more than that - Oshawa, Whitby-Oshawa, Durham, York-Simcoe, Dufferin-Caledon and Burlington.
The only GTA Tory seat I think is vulnerable is Oshawa.
adma
Superstar
And they won in Halton, remember. (Of course, Garth switched to Liberal, and Wajid switched to Conservative...)
afransen
Senior Member
There are a lot of CPC voters who just won't vote Liberal, or perhaps even worse, NDP. I could see some of these, not being overly impressed with Harper's manner, protesting by voting Green. But, the best way to know would be to look at second choice votes for CPC, and perhaps the Greens (to see what % of their support is more of the Conservative persuasion vs. classic Dipper socialist hippies).
King of Kensington
Senior Member
I think if May gets in the debates (though why having some disgraced MP who was dumped by the Libs and was never elected as a Green should count for anything), people will at least have to hear what their stances are on the issues and they'll be less of an empty vault in which people can believe what they want to believe about (ex-PC's with composters who hate unions, leftwing radicals who don't think the NDP is "pure" enough, or whatever).
lordmandeep
Banned
I don't care, Stephen Harper must not get a majority and I think enough people will switch from NDP to Liberal or back to Liberal again.
The polls showed the Tories winning Ontario last time and then magically the Liberals went up 6%...
why?
Its simple, they went "I do not want Harper to win a Majoirty"
If it seems that Harper will win a majority you will see a lot of people switching parties.
The polls showed the Tories winning Ontario last time and then magically the Liberals went up 6%...
why?
Its simple, they went "I do not want Harper to win a Majoirty"
If it seems that Harper will win a majority you will see a lot of people switching parties.
urbandreamer
recession proof
I think Harper deserves a majority govt this time around. To be clear, I meant I predict the Tories will gain 3 more seats in the GTA.
What has Harper really done that is so bad? I certainly never read about it.
What has Harper really done that is so bad? I certainly never read about it.
afransen
Senior Member
Harper has done plenty of things wrong, but there are many reasons moving forward why we shouldn't want his legislation passed.
These include a new copyright bill that will make it illegal to break copy protection on CDs you own, in order to copy to a MP3 player. Also, crossing the border with an MP3 player, you will have the burden to prove that you own every song (good luck!). There's more, but this should be enough.
Secondly, he wants to give Ontario new seats at half the rate of BC and Alberta. Because Ontarians are less important than his western base.
He wants to pass a bill making it illegal to harm a fetus. This is obviously an opening move in the battle over abortion (this will inevitably lead to a court challenge on abortion by the pro-life types). He canned this legislation a couple days ago for the purposes of the election. It will resurface if he is reelected.
Despite promising to make government more accountable, he has systematically reduced the ability of the media to report on government business, by filling Access to Information requests with documents that have been 80% - 90% redacted. He has shut down databases that track such requests. When major issues arise, the minister responsible usually flees the country, or outright hides.
He flat-out lied about fixed date elections, and it is more or less clear that he has been lying about them since he proposed the legislation. He stated that this legislation would prevent him from calling the election he is now about to call, and only now has changed his tune to say that this legislation doesn't apply to minority governments, or at least minorities where the prime minister feels that parliament has become dysfunctional.
He and his party have utter contempt for the parliamentary system. They have a 200 page manual for their MPs on how to disrupt committees when they do not like the direction they are taking, including having the Conservative chair fail to show up, or even get up and leave in the middle of the committee. If Parliament is dysfunctional, it is the Conservatives' doing.
You should also keep in mind that Dion's image has been thoroughly smeared by Harper et al. It's not hard to do. I mean, let's have a look at the present 'strong and decisive' leader:
Stuff like this is bullshit, and people should recognise it as such.
urbandreamer
recession proof
Totally agree with this legislation! As a musician, I am pissed off that my livelihood is being destroyed by copyright infringements! However, this is merely a proposed bill--in reality, if passed, it would have to be drastically altered/reduced to something like a tax on ipod sales.
I support the PC agenda here 75%.
Rightly so, because for decades the Canadian Gov't has been dominated by pro-Ontario/Quebec leaders and it is time for a "rebalance." Mix things up a bit, make Canadian politics more interesting....
I support the PC agenda here 100%.
Now, abortion is a touchy issue. However, Human society got along just fine for thousands of years without abortion being "legal." The problem I have with abortion: What if one of the aborted fetuses turned into a genius adult that found the cure to cancer?
Thus, I support the PC agenda here 90%.
The media reports? Good grief, the media does things to support their bias, their advertising revenue, their own self interests. I do not support anything that allows certain "elite" to control what average joe thinks about a gov't. I say, give that minister a pay raise! (And btw, sounds familiar...ever worked for a newspaper?
I support the PC agenda here 100%.
He "flat-out lied...?" Name one human being you know that has NEVER lied! lol. Fixed elections would make life easier, but of course minority gov't are a different situation. However, clearly Stephen Harper is guilty as charged: all politicians (and all humans) lie at some point!
I support the PC agenda here 80%.
All democratic gov'ts are dysfunctional! Which is why I hate democracies....
However, being related to someone that was in the Liberal gov't, I know for a fact the Liberals played similar tricks.... Give the man in charge a pay raise!I support the PC strategy 100%.
Dion's image? He has one? That's funny. "Smeared" by Harper and company? That's rubbish! It's just politics. I mean, look at companies--they're always bashing their competitors. Simple human nature!
Dion is unsellable in English Canada. In Quebec, he is an intellectual, a decent guy. But the reality is, in English Canada, his accent (and lack of brand recognition) kills his chance. That simple. Sure, it's not fair, but it's true!
I support the PC "smear" campaign 100%. The Liberals would be doing the same to their competitors if they were in power.
King of Kensington
Senior Member
Except that Harper is now well established and while clearly right of center he's not the "scary" character the Liberals have made him out to be. I for example don't see evidence of "troops in the streets" that the Liberal ads said would happen with Harper in power. Mike Harris was way more of a rightwing ideologue than Harper has been to date - and to the extent that Harper has been able to get away with anything it is because Dion has propped him up the whole time. For somebody who claims to hate Harper so much, he sure didn't miss an opportunity to prop them up.
I think the assumption (or hope) among Liberal Party supports is that while Dion may be a weak leader, Harper is so terrible and people so want to get rid of him so badly that the Libs will stumble back into power again. That was the assumption that Democrats in the US made about Bush and figured it didn't matter how bad a candidate Kerry was - Bush was so horrible he'd inevitably lose. That didn't turn out too well, did it?
I think we're in for another Tory minority.
kEiThZ
Superstar
I also wonder what the left wing critics are going to say once Bush leaves office. Who are they going to compare Harper too? Sure he's not as much a centrist as the old PC party, but he's nowhere close to the neo-con Republican that his critics like to paint him as.
And he is quickly adopting some Liberal strategies. For example....people complain about the Cons being anti-immigration. Harper offers permanent residency to every foreign student who studies in Canada. This will build a Conservative base in the long term, the same way the Liberals built their base on the ethnic vote in major cities.
And countering Dion's Green Shift is going to be very easy. Step 1) Say you support efforts to combat climate change....done. Step 2) Criticize Dion's plan as doing too little for the environment...done. Step 3) Criticize the Green Shift as a complex tax grab....its coming.....
Even on third rail social issues. He is playing it careful. For examples, studies and polls have repeatedly shown that Canadians support some limits on abortion (ie no third trimester or partial birth abortions, etc.). And I doubt most Canadians and even most women would have a problem with a bill protecting the "unborn victims of crime". All the Cons would have to do would run an ad showing a pregnant women and asking the question, "Don't you want to protect her baby?"
We can disagree with his agenda, but it's ridiculous to make him out to be an arch neo-con. He will run on the centre and govern on the centre-right if he knows what's good for him...electorally speaking. That's no different than the Liberal habit of running on the left and governing on the the centre-right. All those people complaining about the Harper tax cuts and social programs conveniently forget the Martin/Chretien tax cuts and the devastation those brought on the social framework of this country.
The more I think about it, the more I am starting to wonder if he might even make some gains on the fringes of the GTA.
And he is quickly adopting some Liberal strategies. For example....people complain about the Cons being anti-immigration. Harper offers permanent residency to every foreign student who studies in Canada. This will build a Conservative base in the long term, the same way the Liberals built their base on the ethnic vote in major cities.
And countering Dion's Green Shift is going to be very easy. Step 1) Say you support efforts to combat climate change....done. Step 2) Criticize Dion's plan as doing too little for the environment...done. Step 3) Criticize the Green Shift as a complex tax grab....its coming.....
Even on third rail social issues. He is playing it careful. For examples, studies and polls have repeatedly shown that Canadians support some limits on abortion (ie no third trimester or partial birth abortions, etc.). And I doubt most Canadians and even most women would have a problem with a bill protecting the "unborn victims of crime". All the Cons would have to do would run an ad showing a pregnant women and asking the question, "Don't you want to protect her baby?"
We can disagree with his agenda, but it's ridiculous to make him out to be an arch neo-con. He will run on the centre and govern on the centre-right if he knows what's good for him...electorally speaking. That's no different than the Liberal habit of running on the left and governing on the the centre-right. All those people complaining about the Harper tax cuts and social programs conveniently forget the Martin/Chretien tax cuts and the devastation those brought on the social framework of this country.
The more I think about it, the more I am starting to wonder if he might even make some gains on the fringes of the GTA.
King of Kensington
Senior Member
Although there is now this widespread belief that the old PC's were a bunch of lovable Joe Clark-style "Red Tories" and all of these hard-line conservatives came along after the merger with the Reform Party - it's a myth. They were always there. Mike Harris was a PC, so is Jim Flaherty, Tony Clement, Rob Nicholson - these people never had anything to do with the Reform Party. The Reform Party was a populist party focused on electoral reform (triple-E Senate, etc.) and hot-button social issues - Quebec-bashing, anti-immigration, banning Sikhs from wearing turbans at the Canadian legion, etc. - Harper has dropped all of that. He is heavily courting Quebec and ethnic communities and isn't interested in electoral reform. Far from being a Reformer, he is your run of the mill small-"c" conservative control freak.
In fact, Harper isn't governing all that differently from Mulroney. Although there is this idea that Mulroney was more progressive and tolerant than Harper - he wasn't - there were attempts to bring back the death penalty and to restrict abortion under his government.
Exactly. Chretien and Martin governed on the right and did more to dismantle the welfare state than Harper has done. They also did nothing in terms of enforcing Kyoto and the Tories are just continuing what they started in Afghanistan.
Martin was a rightwing Liberal who almost certainly would gave gone into Iraq had he been PM. During the debate over the Iraq war in this country, Martin echoed Harper by saying we shouldn't upset our American allies. The only reason why he governed on the left is because the NDP was propping him up. That of course wasn't good enough for Martin - he wanted a majority and pulled the plug on his government a few weeks early because he was no longer interested in cooperating with the NDP. Of course Liberal apologists will tell us that if only the Liberals were left in power a few more weeks, all this wonderful progressive stuff was going to happen.
ETA: Martin still represents the riding of LaSalle-Emard even though he hasn't attended Parliament for over a year. Does a centi-millionaire like Martin really deserve his taxpayer-subsidized salary for not doing his job?
afransen
Senior Member
I doubt it will be amended much. Harper will make it a confidence motion; we can only assume it will be passed as proposed.
We live in a democracy. I don't see why these provinces should be over-represented in both the Senate and the HoC. You're saying you don't believe in representation by population?
That's silly. Human civilization has got along fine by ethnically cleansing those different from the majority to foster tribalism. Next up: kill all the visible minorities! Ten minute head start.
You support them lying?
Anyway, you clearly said you don't want to live in a democracy. Maybe Castro wouldn't mind if you moved there.
Ouch. Harper's party has less support than Dion's. I guess that means Harper is even more a pariah?