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What's the future for the Conservative Party?

I'm certain that Jason Kenney's departure from federal politics to try to go run Alberta is a sign that most Conservative insiders think defeating Trudeau in 2019 is a lost cause, so they're just having their Romney moment. 2023 will be the interesting election to watch.
 
Hopkins123 said:
I'm certain that Jason Kenney's departure from federal politics to try to go run Alberta is a sign that most Conservative insiders think defeating Trudeau in 2019 is a lost cause, so they're just having their Romney moment. 2023 will be the interesting election to watch.
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We have a different system though. It could be the difference between majority and minority government.
 
Hopkins123 said:
I'm certain that Jason Kenney's departure from federal politics to try to go run Alberta is a sign that most Conservative insiders think defeating Trudeau in 2019 is a lost cause, so they're just having their Romney moment. 2023 will be the interesting election to watch.
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I would say its a sign that the Conservatives wants a leader NOT from Alberta. If you look at federal leaders, the Conservatives had the most geographic diversity in their leaders.
 
BurlOak said:
I would say its a sign that the Conservatives wants a leader NOT from Alberta. If you look at federal leaders, the Conservatives had the most geographic diversity in their leaders.
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The Conservative Party has had only one leader - from Alberta - so it's a little premature to say that they have the most geographic diversity. I'd say the jury is out on that one.

As for their predecessor parties, the Reform/Canadian Alliance has a leader from Alberta, followed by an Albertan who was parachuted into a safe BC riding, followed by yet another Albertan. From a leadership perspective, they are probably the least geographically diverse party of modern times - worse than even the Liberals.

The Progressive Conservatives, in contrast, did have quite a bit of geographic diversity in their leaders - starting in 1970 (I have no intention of going back to 1867, and picked an arbitrary start to the modern political era), the PCs had leaders from Nova Scotia, Alberta, Quebec, BC, Quebec, Alberta and then Nova Scotia - that's 4 different provinces (in comparison, the Liberals since 1970 have only had leaders from Quebec and Ontario, plus one BCer who represented a riding in BC while leader but at times also represented ridings in Quebec and Ontario). The PCs, of course, remain the only party to have had a woman PM (although the NDP has had two female leaders).

It's actually the NDP that has had the most geographic diversity in their leaders since 1970, with 5 provinces/territories represented - Saskatchewan, Ontario, Ontario, Yukon, Nova Scotia, Ontario, and Quebec. Although if I had pushed to start date back to, say, 1965, Dief would still have been in charge over at the PCs, and would have tied the NDP. The NDP is the only party to have had a leader elected to a riding in one of the territories.

I didn't count interim leaders, since they are caretakers usually chosen because they won't ever be permanent leader and to give the least offense to various party factions.
 
Its really hard to put some leaders into their correct geographic slot.
Trudeau is 100% Quebec.
Harper was part Ontario, part Alberta (I put it at 25%/75%)
Layton was part Quebec, part Ontario.

Here is the best I could come up with.
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BurlOak said:
Harper was part Ontario, part Alberta (I put it at 25%/75%)
Layton was part Quebec, part Ontario.
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Oh. come on. Harper is "part Ontario"? We are taking childhoods into account? Layton being part Quebec is also a bit of a howler, but at least he graduated from McGill.

Not sure how you compiled your numbers. Does CPC pie chart include the PCs and Canadian Alliance? How did you arrive at 25% Ontario for Harper - what's the methodology? How is the NDP at only 19% Prairies if you go back to 1949 given the CCF only had leaders from Saskatchewan and Manitoba? You actually deemed Harper "part Ontario", but John Turner who was from BC, graduated from UBC and actually represented Vancouver Quadra when he was leader, isn't even part BC according to your pie chart? How did you categorize Paul Martin? Even Trudeau lived parts of his life in BC and Ontario - if we are counting lives long before each leader entered politics, instead of sticking to where they got into politics and then got elected, how is that time not counted? If Harper is 25% Ontario because of where he went to elementary and high school, then surely a not-insignificant percentage of Trudeau is hors du Québec, as they say. If we are dividing lives in %s, then surely we need to be consistent, right? Why is Alberta a separate region, but Saskatchewan and Manitoba are lumped together as "Prairies", not to mention the four provinces lumped together as "Atlantic" - so one leader from Saskatchewan isn't any different from one from Manitoba, but one from Alberta adds to the diversity score? Since no federal leader has ever been from Newfoundland, not sure what the relevance of 1949 is - if you are reaching that far back, well beyond the modern political era, shouldn't we logically go back to 1867?

BurlOak said:
Its really hard to put some leaders into their correct geographic slot.
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It's not so hard. Where was the riding(s) they represented when they were an elected representative? That's the answer. Otherwise, it's a mess of arbitrary and debatable assumptions.
 
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I tried to use 25% for youth (high school), 25% for university, and 50% for adult life. That probably works for me on what influenced my life. I would actually say that my early life had a greater influence on me than later. I agree that choosing the riding that they represented would be a consistent measure, but not likely very accurate. I choose 1949 since that's when Newfoundland joined and the time period needs to be long enough to remove the influence of a single, long-serving leader.

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Considerate of her to remover herself from the running like that. If there's one thing that unites the left in this country with most of the right it's our health care system. It may not be perfect, but it's better than the alternatives.
 
I made a similar comment on Twitter. That coming from a doctor is also something...

If/when she doesn't become CPC leader, I hope she slinks away to the back bench.
 
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