babble is rabble.ca's discussion board but it's much more than that: it's an online community for folks who just won't shut up. It's a place to tell each other — and the world — what's up with our work and campaigns.
St. Paul's the 2nd
August 17, 2009 - 12:48pm
Quote:
I see a lot of similarities between Levy's candidacy and that of Peter Kent in '06 (i.e. there will be a very visible campaign and a high profile candidate but the votes just not being there) - and I think her showing will be similar.
I'm afraid Lord Palmerston is right about that. Unfortunately, Peter Kent was very effective at scaring Lib/NDP swing voters into voting Liberal.
I wonder if candidates actually living in the riding will play any part.
I think Levy lives there while Hoskins does not.
As to LTJ's concern about the presence of a high profile Tory candidate scaring voters into going Liberal, it's a different dynamic in a by-election obviously. Whoever wins, it's not going to skew the balance of power in the legislature. People can vote to 'send a message' while still preserving the status quo.
The Greens Chris Chopik also lives in the riding, has a business in the riding, and is a community organizer in the riding.
I suspect the dippers will have to move their nomination meeting up unless riding Liberals get their way and have McGuinty delay dropping the writ for a few more weeks.
Stuart Parker also lives in the riding.
Jullian Heller also lives in the St. Paul's, and has been active continuously in the local NDP for decades. If commitment to the riding is the litmus test, everyone else might as well give up now.
Levy has to move it 30% to win. I can't see that happening. Liberals have been beating Tories 2 to 1 in that riding.
In the old days (say 20+ years ago) it was a bellweather, but not any more.
Both Bennett and Mihevic and their crews will make sure people do not vote Tory.
Not only that but Forest Hill is the centre of the Rich Liberal Universe.
I heard the Liberals are running around saying the sky is falling, but I suspect it is the usual Liberal Energy Vampires making much ado about nothing.
The only discontent is among businesses along St. Clair W, who are suffering because of the excess of time it is talking to complete the streetcar route. Yet even there people realize that it will make that transit route much much safer for riders and pedestrians.
After a few calls from the usual suspects about supporting a racist and homophobic PC Party, watch for Levy's cage to be rattled. See if she doesn't melt down...
Though in a seat like St Paul's, when have said swing voters ever not been scared into voting Liberal? Or at least lured into voting Liberal through urbane "swing-voter-compatible" candidates like Bryant, Bennett, etc...
I'm a fan of Benedict Anderson's book Imagined Communities, about the emergence of nationalism as an ideology. But I have to say, as a voting reformer, ridings in Canada aren't even imagined communities. They are imaginary communities. The important communities in any major cities (and anywhere really since the advent of the internet) transcend riding boundaries. Communities like rabble.ca are far more substantively real -- in representing real bases of fellowship, community and commonality -- than random selections of 110,000 people delineated by boundaries commissions.
Any democratic leftist is going to have more in common with another Canadian socialist on the other side of the country than she does with her Tory-voting nextdoor neighbour.
So, while I'm a resident of St. Paul's, I'm not going to lord this over Bob Frankford or any other alleged carpetbagger who comes to our judicially-determined turf.
really
Just as an aside there are 57 BIAs in Toronto. Maybe the local shopping neighborhoods would make better ridings than what was arbitrarily decided by the electioral boundaries commission.
It might be good if you were a kulak!
That is an excellent point.
Stall St. Paul's byelection, jumpy Liberals urge premier
McGuinty calls byelection for Sept. 17
Why should the Liberals be "jumpy"? Besides the fact that they're probably making a mountain out of a molehill with Levy, isn't it good form (through British/Aussie/US precedent) to have automatic byelections/special elections?
I'll say one thing for McGuinty. He has been pretty consistent about calling byelections reasonably quickly after a vacancy, unlike Harper who leaves people without representation for as much as 8 months!
Here's the lay of the land:
St. Paul's Riding Map - 2007 Provincial Election
The NDP has moved their nomination meeting to Monday, August 24 at 7:00 pm.
It's still at St. Matthew's Bracondale House, 707 St. Clair Avenue West. Bracondale House is located at the fourth bus stop westbound from St. Clair West Subway Station, across the street from McDonalds (south side). Here's a Google map.
And strategically speaking, it was clever to call the byelection at a moment when the NDP hadn't chosen their candidate yet, just so the press could report that the NDP (unlike the other three parties) hadn't chosen a candidate yet and lead people to think that yup, once again, the Dippers haven't gotten their act together...
Seems to me that the party slow on this stuff sometimes. I know that they can't predict the call, but Spet 17 always seemed a bit late, especially given that we've known about Bryant's decisions for a while.
From this map, much of Forest Hill did vote PC by over 60%, while other affluent areas voted Liberal. Anyone know the explanation for that?
I'm thinking "old money vs. new money".
Thanks, Scott. I was hoping it wasn't a religious difference.
I've promoting this via Facebook, cold calling and an e-mail blast to the riding members but in case I didn't get ou any of these ways, we're putting on a campaign open house at our home on Sunday afternoon. E-mail me to get more info.
On that front, I'd like to encourage rabblers to check out the new and much improved campaign web site at www.stuartparker.ca.
Looking at the map (thanks), I made a blooper in the first thread about Vaughn & Oakwood. It is clearly still within St. Pauls which means that all the apartment buildings on Vaughn Road are in St. Pauls. It's definitely an uphill battle for whoever wins the NDP nomination.
The blue area west of Bathurst isn't actually Forest Hill but has many "wannabes". It's known as Cedarvale if I'm not mistaken. The affluent areas east of Forest Hill are not as affluent as Forest Hill although that doesn't necessarily explain their liberal inclinations.
Also it's interesting how the map turns yellow just south of the riding border (Trinity-Spadina). Of course having an incumbent (Marchese) helps but I'm not sure that explains it. Could it be a difference in approaches by the two riding associations between elections?
Great improvements to your website Stuart! Best of luck stirring up the race.
Andrea Horwath's YouTube appeal to St. Paul's voters.
Exactly. The area east of Avenue Rd. is more "yuppie" with a large number of condo dwellers and renters and far less grand housing than Forest Hill. Forest Hill is for the most part extremely wealthy.
The 2007 election was unusual with Tory's school funding plan being so prevalent. A lot of normally Liberal Jewish voters went PC because of this issue (and it cost the Tories support among other demographics). In the last federal election the heavily Jewish areas of St. Paul stayed Liberal despite Harper's pro-Israel stance.
Thanks again. I must admit that I had already forgotten about that issue which makes a religious split more understandable, and apparently only temporary.
How is that particular zone "uphill"? Demographically, it's a very NDP-compatible kind of Liberal.
Actually, the present blueness of Cedarvale has a lot to do with its Jewishness--maybe the southernmost manifestation of the "Blue Jew" shift...