Trudeau calls Quebec byelection in Chicoutimi-Le Fjord for June 18

I have a theory about North.  I'll message it to you.

JKR wrote:

 He definitely has not promoted solidarity on the left.

I guess if that is the point of babble it is a total disaster.

Jack Layton won a shitload of seats in Quebec because he was the plucky guy with the cane who wouldn't give up. Anyone who thinks any specific policy was the deciding factor is delusional IMO. Quebec voters are sophisticated enough to know that the politicians all say one thing and mostly do another.

Jack's coattails and candidate recruitment brought a slew of really good progressive MP's to parliament and they were immediately silenced into being non confrontational in their comments towards our intistutions including voting to bomb Libya into the stone age. If they had stood up for people abroad and gone into the streets with the students at home the NDP would not have lost the seats they did last time and the rest of their seats this time. Frankly what is the point of a left party if it sneers at student protestors and votes for imperial mayhem? Hell a populist right winger is offering the same, aren't they?

What nonsense.  What makes you think Singh and Caron have more of a “sense”?  

Pondering wrote:

From what Ashton and Angus have  said neither have good political instincts at the federal level.  They speak for their constituents in their ridings and  don't seem to have a sense for where Canadians are. 

So what is your expertise that you think you can tell us "were Canadians are." The concept that Canadians share a single mind and you understand it better than politicians who have criss crossed the country is laughable. I am so happy that the NDP is now attracting brilliant political theorists like you.

If Niki were the leader would we be any worse off? Despite her drawbacks she understands what the party is very well and I think understands the issues I speak about here.

Good call, Ken. Excellent suggestion. but I do not know if there is time or money to 
(a) change the voting system so all constituencies get an equal say
(b) hold & pay for a leadership campaign
(c) introduce the new leader to the public
(d) run a general election.

bekayne wrote:

Latest CROP poll (both provincial and federal numbers)

https://sondage.crop.ca/survey/start/CAWI/blogue/CROP-Politique%20Quebec...

For those who can't be bothered scrolling through dozens of pages, here are the federal numbers (Quebec only):

Lib:   42%
Con:  27%
BQ:   12%
NDP:  9%
Green: 8%

Pretty grim for the NDP. They may get wiped out.

kropotkin1951 wrote:

 So what is your expertise that you think you can tell us "were Canadians are." The concept that Canadians share a single mind and you understand it better than politicians who have criss crossed the country is laughable.  

I spent almost my entire life being a low information voter yet voting in every election from municiple to federal. I am still very ignorant of political history and theories. I have trouble remembering definitions of marxism and communism and capitalism etc. (I'm good with socialism and democracy). The theoretical stuff doesn't hold enough interest to me for me to memorize it. 

The majority of swing voters are low information voters. 

Prior to 2005 I always just voted NDP or whatever the most progressive choice was without paying attention to the details. In the 70s I agreed that gay men shouldn't adopt children but I have always been willing to learn so over time my opinion changed. I traveled around Canada. I became more knowledgable about how gender roles are constructed through general conversation, articles in ladies magazines and watching talk shows. I didn't read books or articles about diversity and rights. Pre-internet I saw an Oprah show about two men who were foster parents to a little boy who had some sort of difficulties that didn't make him a popular choice for people who wanted to adopt. He lived with them for several years in which he blossomed. The men wanted to adopt him but were rejected at which point they wanted to transfer him to a different home. I don't know if I had already decided by then or not, but if not that was the final straw. The boy was obviously better off with them. Prejudice was the only barrier. 

Obviously my experience is not mirrored by all low information voters from coast to coast or even in Quebec or Ontario. I was wrong about Ford in Ontario and Trump in the US. I didn't believe either could win. I was right about Trudeau. 

In all three cases would you not agree that low-information voters determined the outcome?

Having been one I have a lot more respect for low-information voters than many posters here, you among them. Because of that I do believe I understand them better. I'm not above average in intelligence but I am not below it either.  Low information voters aren't stupid. Sometimes they are lacking in knowledge and have other priorities. They are only going to hear the high notes so it is essential that parties make them memorable and personally relevant. 

"Someone you want to have a beer with" is the wrong question but it is getting at the heart of a significant voter motivation. Who would you want as a neighbour, or a co-worker, or to buy a used car from, might be better questions but however it is put the answer is significant. It is really about who you relate to and trust. Perception of character. It was reflected in the Quebec voter who gushed that when she saw him with his family on election night she saw that his family was just like hers. His kids were wearing t-shirts like her kids do. She apologized for not voting. This woman is a writer, a reasonably educated person. 

Low information voters are drawn to people they think will make the kinds of decisions they would make or people who share their values. 

Harper was the reassuring boring accountant type at a time when people were disillusioned by Liberal financial corruption. Martin represented the corruption.  In later elections Harper benefited by being the incumbant at a time when people wanted stability. Dion and Ignatieff didn't have the personality to defeat their respective labeling as not a leader and just visiting. Promising to run deficits would not have helped them. Had Dion been more charismatic he would have kept his leadership position and Canada would have had a coalition government. It would have changed the course of Canadian history. 

Someone recently posted this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=634&v=AToOLMXBILQ

Once I realized what he was getting at I kept thinking "Yes! That's what I've been trying to say!" though I am obviously incapable of expressing it effectively or framing it in such a clear and academic manner. 

I've learned a lot here but I still often feel like a visitor from another planet in which politics is a footnote in daily life that one might come across accidently while watching Oprah or channel surfing or see in the headlines while passing a newspaper stand. 

In hindsight being better informed about the party platforms would not have changed any of my past votes so what's the point? 

kropotkin1951 wrote:

I have lived in 6 of the provinces, I have worked in industrial settings as a labourer and have worked as a professional aiding and abetting union members, I have degrees in political studies and law. My family is significantly mixed race and I have relatives from one coast to the other some of them doing well but most of them doing not so great. Did I mention I have actually worked in campaigns in three different provinces and at the federal level and have attended NDP conventions both provincially and federally.

But Pondering you claim to have political insights without any kind of actual knowledge or expertise. Gee if you were a man it would be the classic definition of mansplaining.

Not political insights. Rather a feel for what will motivate people similar to myself in the past and what will cause them to listen or not listen to what politicians and political types have to say. 

At one point 85% of Canadians were opposed to bill C-51 yet Trudeau voted for it promising he would fix it if elected. People here were convinced it was the beginning of the end for Trudeau. It didn't impact his election in 2015 and it won't impact it in 2019 either. Very very little gets through to voters who tune in during the last week or two. Many of those who do pay some attention to politics are only aware of the top stories and the more sensationalized viewpoints on it. The way headlines are written today they may even believe the opposite of what actually happened. 

I don't think parties should be dishonest on major policies or their general identity but once elected platforms become a very loose draft so it isn't necessary to share all goals in it. 

kropotkin1951 wrote:

So your argument if I get it correctly is that because most voters are not very informed and you are also not very informed then you have available to you a deep understanding of the body politic. Do you really believe that? Do you really believe that sitting in Montreal you know what people all over the country know because you are all poorly informed so therefore are all of one mind?  Fascinating!!

Nope. How they respond to a specific pitch is dependent on their particular politics which differs from person to person and region to region. Which pitches they will be most exposed to is also somewhat dependent on region. 

I am not talking about all Canadian voters. Many low information voters always or almost always vote for the same party. They aren't swing voters. 

In this moment uncommitted low information voters are at most aware of the trouble with Trump, the pipeline and the refugee issue and that cannabis is about to be legal. That's the entire list. They also know in passing about whatever mass killing or disaster is in the news. 

They most likely think that Trudeau is managing Trump the best anyone could under the circumstances. However, if they feel their region is paying the price they could be open to persuation in 2019.

While the pipeline has support, buying it does not. Most Canadians are against the purchase. It probably won't impact 2019 but it could. If Trudeau is successful pushing it through, construction starts, he could gain more seats than he loses. If he fails to push it through but we don't buy it, there will likely be little fallout. He would still lose some BC seats but not gain elsewhere. If he fails to push it through after we have bought it that could hurt but it isn't a guarantee. It still depends on if the other leaders can convince voters they could do better. 

I can already tell you that Trudeau is going to campaign on strong  economic performance, CETA, fulfilled promises and will say he needs a second term to continue working on issues that were begun but not completed during his first mandate. 

He will have a short canned response to attacks on lack of electoral reform and will refuse to elaborate bring the focus back to whatever he is selling. 

If the NDP keeps asking and he keeps giving the same answer people will get bored and think "I get the picture, he didn't do the electoral reform thing, move on already" or they will just change the channel or go to the bathroom. 

If he is called a liar and accused of not keeping all his campaign promises people will think "yeah yeah, politicians never keep all their campaign promises" so tell me something I don't know. 

That is all "in my opinion". I fully acknowledge that on other issues people with more historical and current knowledge of politics have insights that I would not have. 

There are experts on low information voters that know much more than I about the topic and have more nuanced understanding. They aren't here.

I fully acknowledge the value of superior political knowledge, quicker minds, and especially activists who drive resistence against oppression and drag society to more enlightened thinking. 

Having said that there are things I understand better than you do. Sometimes when I am posting here people jump on me for using language that to activists symbolizes something else. I can't even remember them so I wish I had kept track.  I've been here for years but there are still times when I feel like a stranger in a foreign land. 

One of those times is when I supported "helping" Ukraine. I was attacked as if I was a horrible person that wanted people to suffer rather than someone who didn't understand the entire picture. I'm stubborn so I argued while trying to see the other side. That I was wrong doesn't mean posters shouldn't have been trying to understand my side. and reined in the hostility. If you want to effect change understanding the other side's thinking can be very helpful even beyond convincing that one person. 

Pondering I can tell you that from my experience an attitude that sees people as " low information voters" is not a really good way to build solidarity with other human beings and win votes. A social democratic or socialist party needs to educate people about the necesity of change and why its policies are the best direction and that will by definition be in opposition to the MSM view of the world. We have the antithesis these days of a social democratic government so if a political party is mostly in favour of the status quo it cannot really be either social democratic or socialist.  The system needs more than a few tweaks and if no political party talks about the real issues then the debate is stiffled and no progress can be made. If all that a voter wants is incremental change why would they not vote for the real Liberal party? If a lack of education is the real problem then the answer cannot be to just avoid tough issues.