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.
Support rabble | Advertise with us | Contact our staff | About rabble | Log-in or Register for a new account | Corrections | Privacy policy | Newsfeeds | Mailing lists
rabble: Features | Columnists | In Cahoots | Blogs | Books | Photos | What's Up | Polls
babble: Forum Topics | Active Topics
The rpn: About the RPN | Become a podcaster
rabbleTV: Program Guide | Features | Indie Inside | Best of the net
Copyright © 2001-2013 the authors
Syndicate
Yes but now that Danny Millions is gone how many of those people see Blunderdale as much of a stand-in???
64% according to the most recent poll.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nlvotes2011/story/2011/09/25/nl-on-point-l...
St. John's Centre and St. John's North seem to be the two districts in play for the NDP now.
These are only two among many that may go NDP on Oct. 11.
The story line for this election has has become highly unpredictable, due to the Liberal implosion, a power vacuum among the PCs, and a newly resurgent NDP. It's worth noting that Lorraine Michael performed strongly in the televised leaders debate this evening. While debates seldom change people's minds, they often reinforce existing trends - so the next two weeks promise to be interesting indeed.
Which districts then? These are the ones that parties are saying are close races.
I wish I had access to the same party "insiders" as Newfoundlander_Labradorian. If I did, then I'd REALLY know what's going on!
Too bad for you. Maybe you should volunteer and make connections.
At this point in a campaign, still two weeks away, I don't think even the luminaries behind the scenes truly have a handle on what's going to happen.
But one thing is certain: the Liberals have had a few screw ups in the last few days, and I would not be surprised if any polling agencies still covering the province this close to the election verify just that.
The Liberals' announcement that they would pursue the Muskrat Falls deal only along with the rest of the Lower Churchill, and negotiate it with Hydro Quebec instead of Emera, is going to hurt them even further in the polls, even in Labrador.
Danny Dumaresque's flippant remarks about St. John's is not going to help, and has probably done a great deal to sink any hope in hell that George Joyce had of making a come back, not that he had much hope of doing that any way.
Although I didn't watch the debate, the one thing that passes for consensus from all the reviews I've been reading about it was that Kevin Aylward came third. Actually, the consensus seems to be that no one 'won' the debate. But the blogosphere and twitter commentary seem to confirm that either or both of Dunderdale and Michael did passably and comparably well.
The Libs still do not have a full candidate slate. Apparently Mount Pearl North remains unfilled. That's interesting since Mount Pearl is touted to have been where Siobhan Coady got much of her support federally in SJS-MP in the previous three federal elections. Although that assertion is typically by Liberals themselves, and her support clearly was not very substantive or loyal or transferrable to the provincial scene.
Also, the party has 'show candidates' in a surprising number of districts. Many are party insiders and EAs who were thrown in as last minute installments to fill the slate. In fairness, some of the current PC MHAs got elected this way, and the NDP is also using placeholders in this election (Matt Fuchs in Burgeo--La Poile, par example).
How this will effect outcomes for the other two parties remains to be seen.
New Poll... thanks to the CBCvotes tweets
MQO Poll:
PC: 54 (+1)
NDP: 33 (+4)
LIB: 13(-5 ouch)
LEADER - KD: 62 LM 27 KA: 11
Who won debate? KD 36 LM 22. KA 6
Sample 464 +/-4.6%
That is nothing but a disaster for the Liberals, but without having regionals we have no idea how this is broken down.
Wow !!!
I always loved Newfoundland.
I think there is a longterm re-allignment of Canadian politics whereby the NDP is growing fast in regions where it was very weak until recently like the Atlantic and Quebec and at the same declining in former areas of strength like the prairies and rural BC.
It is astounding how many seats the NDP won the Broadbent area that it did not carry this year despite the record haul. I think the figure is about 30 seats out of about 50 seats that it carried in at least one of Broadbent's elections.
Stunning numbers. I hope they translate into some strong NDP MHAs on election day.
ETA: MILDLY concerning is that Michael's leadership numbers lag her party's numbers and Dunderdale's numbers exceed her party's numbers. This could indicate that the NDP vote is softer (which would make a lot of sense given how NEW it is). The poll puts the NDP at 33%, exactly what the party achieved federally over the last two elections. This raises another question, has the NL NDP topped out? Can it go and make inroads into PC support, a lot of which must go Liberal federally? Sounds like the Dunderdale + Harper tack is/has been a good place to start.
I think even that overstates the case. The NDP are now polling in first place in BC federally and provincially. In Saskatchewan, the NDP is still at about 30% despite having a leader who reminds people why they threw out Lorne Calvert, and federally there are 3 seats the NDP narrowly lost, as opposed to 2 when Jack took over as leader.
Even in Alberta, left-wing support is starting to coalesce behind the NDP, and I believe the NDP has great potential in Alberta. The Alberta NDP did so well in the late 1980s that I'm comfortable suggesting they would have governed Alberta by now if they were not taken out by the Liberal resurgance of the mid-1990s.
In 2003, the provincial election results by vote percentages were: PCs - 59%; Libs - 33%; NDP - 7%.
Those results are in the rough vicinity of today's poll results, with the Liberals and NDP switching places (PCs - 54%; NDP - 33%; Libs - 13%).
At the time, the Liberals got 12 seats out of 48 from one third of the vote.
Something to keep in mind.
Given the Conservative numbers, there may not be much of an increase in seats, if any, depending on concentrations. The Liberals look like they're on the verge of being wiped out, again depending on concentrations.
12 seats would be a nice increase, but I expect the NDP vote concentrations will be different than those of the Liberals in 2003. On the other hand, the Conservative vote was higher in 2003.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nlvotes2011/story/2011/09/30/nl-cochrane-o...
NDP mainstay Nancy Riche dies
Things are starting to look bad for the PCs in Burin-Placentia West.
And NDP candidate Julie Mitchell sounds ready to replace Clyde Jackman.
given the context, this is a really nice poll: PC: 38 - NDP 23 - LP 9
http://thechronicleherald.ca/Canada/1266958.html
Here's the first poll with regional breakdowns:
http://www.thetelegram.com/News/Local/2011-10-06/article-2768220/In-depth-poll-points-to-PC-win/1
from that last link:
Asked which party would be their second choice, 45 per cent of poll respondents said the NDP, while 18 per cent favoured the Liberals. The PCs polled 15 per cent as a second-place party.Mills expects, based on poll results, that the NDP will wind up in second place in terms of popular vote, but may not form the official Opposition.
"They are clearly tracking as the second-choice party," Mills said, adding the NDP has risen dramatically in the polls since the last election.
He noted a lot of people are indicating support for the NDP for the first time and could waver when they actually go to the polling booth.
I think that what people don't seem to want to acknoeledge in NL is that the NDP could easily become the official opposition even in the unlikely event that they don't gain a single seat and just re-elect Lorraine Michael. With the Liberals flirting with being in single digits - I think there is a good chance that the Liberals will get zero seats and one beats zero!
That being said - I am betting that the NDP ends up with about 6-8 seats.
The Liberals will win two seats, Yvonne Jones' district in Labrador and Burgeo La Poile where retiring incumbent Kelvin Parson's son is running. They still have the possibility of holding on to the Straits White Bay North but it's starting to look unlikely, it doesn't appear that they will be able to make gains elsewhere and will lose Port de Grave.
According to the media the NDP's main targets in St. John's are SJ North and SJ Centre, like mentioned above. Besides that they are gunning for Burin Placentia West and Labrador West. So if they will all those as well as Lorraine's district they would have 5 seats.
The PCs are still well ahead of the NDP in St. John's according to the CRA poll, the NDP have 24% and the PCs have 46% while the Liberals are at 7%. So while St. John's North seems to be leaning more towards the NDP who knows what will happen with the PCs well in the lead in the region. The mayor of St. John's will also be campaigning with Minister Shawn Skinner in St. John's Centre, taking him out would be a big win for the NDP.
Olivia is campaigning in St John's today.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nlvotes2011/story/2011/10/07/nl-stjohns-ba...
Keep in mind that in the CRA poll they refer to St. John's/Avalon as the name of the region. Given that NDP support is probably very very low in the rural parts of the Avalon peninsula outside of St. John's - I suspect that the gap is a lot narrower in St. John's itself.
The NDP is apparently making major efforts in some other ridings not mentioned above such as Cape St. Francis where they are running the deputy mayor of Torbay, Bay of Islands near Corner Brook and Conception Bay South, plus all of the directional St. John's seats (ie: north, south, east, west, centre)
My sense is that people in NL know that it will be a Tory landslide no matter what - so they can afford the luxury of electing a solid opposition for once and the NDP is running a lot of exciting young dynamic candidates that are a million times more motivating than the kind of old-style Tammany Hall duds that people are used to seeing from the two old parties.
I preduct 39 PC, 8 NDP, 1 Liberal.
I predict the following:
NDP (likely): Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi, Labrador West, Burin-Placentia West, St. John's North, St. John's, St. John's Centre, St. John's East
NDP (possible): Cape St. Francis, St. John's South, St. John's West, The Straits-White Bay-North, Lake Melville, Bay of Islands
The Liberals will likely retain Cartwright-L'anse aux Clair, possibly Burgeo-La Poile, and perhaps Port de Grave. On a good day they could take a couple of other seats, but this seems hard to believe given their cratering polling numbers and demonstrable ineptitude.
What about Conception Bay East - Bell Island?
What about Darryl Johnson running in Bonavista South? The PC incumbent has stepped down, and Johnson having 20 years experience on Port Union Town Council, eight of which were serving as Mayor, plus a long list of volunteer activities, makes him sound like being the right candidate in the right place at the right time. And, since the outgoing PC incumbent was the Speaker of the Legislature, I would guess that the degree of partisanship heard within the constituency while he was Speaker was probably lower than average -- again, a good fortunate circumstance for challengers from other parties.