BC May 12, 2009 Election Discussion (Cont'd)

Given that the NDP vote was up slightly province wide could it be assumed that they threw there votes to Vicki in Delta South to try and defeat Wally and embrass Gordo - if Wally does lose would some one step aside for a by-election or who would be the likely choice for A_G - Mike DeJong is a lawyer and a veteran of the political landscape but are any of the newly elected Liberals who are lawyers likely to get the job.

"You can't tell me that we couldn't have got 300 Green votes to switch to the NDP in Oak Bay if Carole had backed the carbon tax and put forward a credible climate change plan. "

I can and I do. At the start of the campaign, polls had the so-called greens with as much as 15% support. They wound up with 8% - less than in 2005 when the carbon tax was a non-issue. Furthermore if you look at where the so-called greens did well, once again it was mostly in safe Liberal seats like West Vancouver and a couple in the Okanagan. The only way we will ever know what would happen if the green party didn't exist would be if we ran an experiment and had them try not running a single solitary candidate! As long as they have a candidate on the ballot in every riding, they will invariably get about 8% of the vote because there will always be at least 8% of voters who say "none of the above" thinking "the Liberals and pro-business, the NDP is pro-union, I want to vote none of the above". So in the end they were a non-factor. We know from polling that SIXTY PERCENT of people voting green were OPPOSED to the carbon tax - why? because they weren't voting green, they were voting "protest/none of the above".

When I have more time, I will write more about what the NDP could have done differently and why I think the election went the way it did. In a nutshell, I think the problem for the NDP was that there was a solid 46% of BC residents who LIKE Campbell and are satisfied with his government - for now (let's see how they feel after the recession really sets in and Campbell starts slashing everything to ribbons. People go on about the economy, but I have yet to see anyone respond to a question I posted a while back asking how the NDP could keep a straight face while trying to claim that were it not for Campbell, there would be no global recession.

"The economy is terrible, which is usually considered bad for the incumbent government."

Usually, is the operative word here. But much as I disagree with this analsis, i think that a lot of people in BC look at it this way - for 7.5 out of the 8 years that Campbell has been in power - the economy has been doing well - now there is a global recession - they still give credit to Campbell for the economy doing well for 7.5 years and have not gotten to the point yet of considering this to be a "made in BC recession". They will eventually.

I think the B.C. NDP has to resist the mistake the Republicans are (rather entertainingly) making south of the border.  Take at least a couple of weeks holiday from analysis, let a good amount of time go by before putting together the next strategy, and avoid conviening any circular firing squads.

Seems to me there's got to be a substantially large baby somewhere in yesterday's dirty bath water.

Congrats, BC NDP, on losing the election!  I hope you lose every election from now on in BC, as a reward for your shortsightedness on BC-STV.  You just couldn't resist the lure of maybe possibly winning phony majorities in the future, could you? You just couldn't do it.

The only thing that would have made this election result more poetic for the NDP is if Carole James had lost her seat - such a pity that she won it. 

Have a lovely life under FPTP, BCNDP!  Hope you lose again!  And again and again.  You've earned it!

As charming as it is insightful. I am left wondering how it could be that a party so many claim is incapable of winning anything could have had as much impact on the STV vote as some of the same people seem to think.

Anyway, not to quibble, but it seems to me that the attacks on Ms. James are missing something; there is a common thread in some of the NDP's lacklustre performances across the country that needs addressing.  NOW communications is a problem.  By all accounts they have some good chops on tactical stuff like candidate training, but their strategic sense sucks large.  These are the people who came up with the vacuous slogan Get Orange for the Ontario campaign.  I have to believe that a large part of the BC NDP messaging muddle is NOW's reliance on poorly conceived focus group testing at the expense of a coherent vision. People can usually tell when they're being fed pablum.

I hope somebody is paying attention.

We'll have to agree to disagree on this one.  FWIW, Gary Holman, the NDP candidate from Saanich North and the Islands who came within 400 votes of beating Murray Coell (which would have been a massive upset for the NDP) while the Greens got 3,000-odd votes in the riding, was on CBC radio this AM.  He said the Green vote-split was the major reason for his loss and specifically said the NDP platform on climate change was not strong enough to attract Green voters.  Holman is going to work within the NDP for a more robust climate change policy next time and to encourage Green-NDP cooperation now that STV is dead.  There will strong support within the NDP membership and many caucus members for Holman's approach.  So, that's the view from a candidate on the ground and I think it merits serious consideration.