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Charybdis,
"Which brings us to the topic of this thread: how do Canadians feel about this. At the end of the day (and with respect), who cares. The issue is whether or not it is constitutional."
That attitude is mind-bogglingly dense from a political standpoint. How Canadians feel means a lot.
1. MP's care about re-election. If Harper wins his propaganda war, mark my words, there will be floor-crossings - or at least something like the gang of 14 in the US (a group of moderates that form a third voting bloc and demand Harper resign/compromise but offer to vote with the Tories if he does).
2. Unpopular governments can reach a point of no return where they just keep plumetting in the polls, and lack the political capital to try anything radical. That is amplified when you have to have three parties with distinct philosophies agree on things (with MP's that can cross the floor in a snit, particularly after they lose leadership races). If you want this coalition to succeed, it needs a popular mandate. Yes, it may come into power, and probably the governor general will appoint it, but governing isn't just passing bills.
3. Even with good conditions, this coalition is not likely to last. 18 months is optimistic in my view. Falling 18 months from now, saddled with a recession there is going to be another election. If you compound the recession with a sense of illegitimacy in many Canadians, you have a defeat of epic proportions.
4. Do you honestly doubt the governor general would make a decision that was unpopular to a large majority of Canadians? And you know, she shouldn't. We are governed by precedent and convention, not law, and we so progress is evolutionary and not static like in the US. If a strong norm has emerged that changes of government must always come through elections, you either need to convince people the norm is wrong, or accept it - you can't ignore it without dire consequences for party and country.
WE know how Canadians feel about this - almost two thirds of them voted for parties that favour the coalition and just 37% voted Conservative. We don't elect a PM. We don't have a presidential system - we elect 308 MPs and those people are there to choose a government by voting in whatever permutation they want.
Right now Sweden (the country I am the capital of) has a four party "bourgeois coalition" government made up of the Moderates (conservatives), Liberals, Centre and Christian Democratic Party. Each of these parties are much smaller than the Social Democratic Party which is currently in opposition. That's the way it works. The parties and MPs have the right to form whatever alliances they want and to vote for whatever government they want.
If you want a US or French style presidential system whereby Harper can get elected President - then i suggest you start a movement to reform the Canadian constitution in that direction.
Just reading that statement made me sick to my stomach.
At the moment it's a political crisis. And Harper brought it on himself. It may turn into a constitutional crisis, or not, depending on what Harper does and what the GG does.
Hopefully smarter than some of the MP's because really there are some stupid ignorant uniformed idiots parading around as if they know something that claim to run our country. Again, I should know, I worked for these people and heard their 'private' conversations.
Brian Topp: Our friends on the blue team seem to mostly focus on sticks, and not so much on carrots. ;)
I feel your pain!
However they are still reporting on the Georgia Senate seat run-off and still offering analysis as to whether or not the Dems can reach a 60 seat fillibuster proof majority.
Polling in this country does stink. I think I overdosed on 538.com too..
Brian Topp: Our friends on the blue team seem to mostly focus on sticks, and not so much on carrots. ;)
I think if Harper wins the immediate propaganda war about 15 or so Liberals will be mysteriously sick for the confidence vote (assuming the House is not prorogued). It's if it is unclear which side has gained enough public support for legitimacy the above is a possibility. The polls will probably determine what Harper will do too.
And usually the Speaker is from the governing party in a majority. In a minority, apparently it can been to be a confidence measure if the minority government runs a candidate for speaker, especially if it is the second minority arising from a call of non-confidence. Harper really should have resigned, after the CPC lost the Speaker's vote. But he cried that the Liberals said they would support the Throne Speech, so all 2nd minority conventions were put off until the first confidence vote. He did not make it that far though.
And now he is failing, or obstructing, the democratic conventions, by trying to postpone the required immediate first confidence vote by proroguing until January. In essence, he is trying to govern by a phoney Order of Counsel, which really means the GG would be governing. He wants rules and precedents made to suit his purpose, and to not follow constitutional convention and laws. Hence he is trying to manufacture uninformed public consensus to bully the GG.
___________________________________________________________ "watching the tide roll away"
Very astute. This is the main reason why if Harper tries to prorogue Parliament that the GG has no obligation whatsoever to accede to his request. Without the confidence of the house he has no real authority.
Brian Topp: Our friends on the blue team seem to mostly focus on sticks, and not so much on carrots. ;)
It depends on when the election is.
With that poll, and all the rhetoric about separatists in government coming from the right wing, the Conservatives might be wiped out in Quebec in event of an election early in the new year. It seems from media interviews the coalition has some support in Atlantic Canada too. The Conservatives can't get too many more seats in Western Canada, so it would all come down to Ontario.
Well, it is pretty easy to understand, once you have a look see. ;)
That Harper is trying to spin lies into truth and truth into lies, in repect to democratic principles, indicates how seriously he must be gone.
The msm playing this anti-democratic mugs game deserves scores of letters and boycotts. I would suggest sponsors be written too as the msm media is interfering directly in democracy. Maybe Canadians should even take out a class action suit against them for their spreading of lies. They are defaming our elected majority House representatives falsely by calling them anti-democratic, when indeed they are are the only ones being so, and thus they are subverting our democracy, with actions that could be considered treasonous, IMV.
___________________________________________________________ "watching the tide roll away"
You need a strong majority behind the coalition - at least something like the 62% number that gets bandied about, lets say 61%, if you want to have re-election numbers. Remember, Mulroney won in 1988 by owning the losing side of a 45-55 issue, while the winning side was split two ways. The pro-coalition vote will be split four ways.
To those that think this won't matter - it depends. In 1926 it mattered big - Mackenzie King overcame a major scandal to win a majority government. In 1975 in Australia "the dismissal" didn't matter, instead people voted based on the economy and Labour lost. However, it is hard to blame the Tories for screwing up the economy because it hasn't tanked yet.
I think that well over 60% combined support is required to win an election (or at least ensure the Conservatives don't get a majority) with the Liberals and NDP (and Greens?) running in every seat and the Bloc running in every seat in Quebec. I have no idea how the parties might present themselves in an election either. Obviously the opposition parties can't say they wouldn't be open to a coalition
.
In order for the coalition to easily claim legitimacy as opposed to legality, a lesser percentage, but over 50% would be acceptable.
Harper could not have said he did not have the confidence of the House when he called the election, because it had not been tested recently. He was saying Parliament was unworkable because the Senate was being obstructionist (a rather flimsy excuse).
The House did win a vote of confidence on the recent Throne Speech I believe, so I'm not sure this analysis has any validity, except that the GG can refuse his request to prorogue Parliament, or place restrictions on his powers while it is prorogued.
No, he actually called non-confidence of the House. Remember that the media smoke screened this with "Harper claims non-confidence in his own government"? Well, that is because he actually went to the GG and told her he did not have confidence of the House, so he was resigning and parliament had to be dissolved because of the non-confidence in his government. The constitutional requirement had to be that reason, it matters not if the senate is being obstructionist. And it was far enough past the election date that the GG was not conventially required to seek House majority to govern and thus an election was called.
___________________________________________________________ "watching the tide roll away"
Angus Reid was on CTV this morning. Talking about the results mentioned earlier.
I saw some mention of those numbers earlier in the thread, but I missed the link.
Key findings Link bolded
64% would not be comfortable with Dion as Prime Minister
53% do not believe the Tories have done a good job
75% believe in a stimulus package
35% believe the Conservatives should govern
40% believe the Conservatives need to go.
37% support a coalition Government
57% are worried about the BQ
68% are against having an election (Look at alberta 56% for another election)
Support for political funding of parties is 34% with numbers from east to west.
34%
48%
17%
15%
31%
39%
41%
and I also heard polling data from Angus Reid regarding the Porogie parliment :) But I can't find it on the poll. They said support for withholding parliment was 32%.
There is no runaway winner in this.
THere is no mass support for Harper or for the Coalition.
Dion has little credibility with the public. (No surprise to me)
People don't support public funding of political parties (which started this whole thing)
And 2% more people support the coalition then harper, but that ain't saying much.
So, where does all that 62% of the public who voted for a Coalition party go? Fact is, people are individuals and make up their own minds.
As you know, I have stated that Dion is the weak link. It is as obvious as this poll. Each day Dion is on television is a negative day for the coalition.
The days ahead are critical. The media is ignoring other key players, and focus on Dion, because he is heading the coalition. He isn't warming up to the public and he won't.
The Coalition needs to be more visible as a force and downplay Dion. Less Dion = Stronger Voice.
More Dion = Less Credibility with the public.
He is liked less then public concern over the BQ.
They should bring back Jean Chrétien. Or Paul Martin. Anybody.
The only reason you thought Dion looked good was by contrast with his usual performance. He was actually shaking with fury. Inappropriate and unprofessional.
Someone should explain to him, in extremely slow speech that his allegedly academic mind can grasp, that what he needs to do right now is stop "defending" himself against Harper's extravagant over-the-top attacks and find a credible spokesperson to just start setting forward what the coalition will do for Canadians.
I would do it like this:
Anyway, you get the picture.
I guess they don't have anyone capable of doing that? Surely they must.
This thread appears to have not much to do with polling, so please take your discussion to one of the already open threads on coalition.
And since it's not likely that we're going to be getting daily poll updates or anything like that about the coalition the way we do with elections, then can we please not start a new thread on this subject? I think you can fit it into an already running thread.