Election 2019: What the Liberals Don't Want Canadian Voters To Know

10 seats NDP

3 Greens. 

But 25% of the vote between them, therby neutering "progressive" representation in Parliament

Their website shows a full slate.

The election result is not possible to predict at this point becuase the English debate is very likely to change things.

Liberal weakness:

1) not much love for Trudeau

2) no enthusiasm for him like 2015 (people liked the positive message and change from the Conservatives)

3) Many first time voters last time may not be counted on

4) broken promises have angered key constituencies

5) Third parties are at their powest - any recovery will eat into their support

6) Liberal vote strength is efficient for them -- any serious reduction would cause inefficiencies

7) Electoral reform is a sleeper issue. It prevents the Liberals from a shameless strategic vote campaign that in previous elections would already be in high gear. It will likely be muted by the broken promise this year. That could make the difference in some seats if the NDP recovers more. While the NDP is low this has not come up but if the NDP start to threaten the Liberals they have a political problem in their response and may be a little gunshy about it.

Conservative Weakness:

1) Trump, Ford have stunk up the place for the right

2) Scheer has credibility issues and is not seen as very strong

3) Scheer is squeezed from the right if he is not right enough and from the centre when he goes too far right. Bernier is weak but it is a split on the right. Bernier will be in debate.

4) Scheer does not appear to be a good campaigner and there is a perception that he is throwing mud becuase he does not have enough substance

5) the weakness of the thrid parties is helping Trudeau

6) Conservative support is over concentrated (opposite of the Green's problem)

NDP and Green weakness

1) No sugar coating this -- it is each other. The NDP did not fade as the Greens expected and is taking back some support but the Greens did have additional support

2) Economically this is not a fair fight due to cumulative years of election finance changes

3) Both parties way be spread thinly: it looks like the Greens are thinner than the NDP and could even double their support without an substantial increase in seats

4) FPTP is scaring people to vote for Conservatives or Liberals to keep the other out.

Liberal Strenngths

1) Liberals are at the moment in a well-distributed position where they do not have huge majorities but the vote is spread to maximum seats

2) All the Conservative weaknesses help the Liberals

3) Liberals, despite the discomfort with Trudeau still benefit from having done some things better than Harper and having satisfied some people. Despite the blackface, they are percieved as the better party on race and the Conservatives cannot get traction on the issue becuase of that.

4) Incumbancy

5) Divided opposition

Conservative strengths

1) Money - they have more of it than anyone else

2) There is widespread frustration and unease and SNC Lavalin plays in to the storyline of Liberal corruption (reality is Conservatives are not less corrupt but the perception is the problem

3) There is a significant block of Canadians that is racist, sexist, homophobic and anti-Quebec - theya re not as out about it as Bernier needs but just enough to appreciate the cloaked version the Conservatives promote

4) Third parties are poorly controlled in Canada and many of them flog Conservative messages without having to follow the same rules and limits as parties. Even the limits that exist are difficult to monitor since money spent on social media is illusive.

Green Strengths

1) Thumberg - and the fact that environment is the top issue for voters and the Greens are widely seen as the environment specialists politically. Singh can make inroads in this but it is hard to outgreen a Green in the mind of a voter.

2) Dificulties in opponents camps

NDP Strengths

1) Surprise - it turns out that Singh is much better on his feet than people expected and has managed soem things very well especially the blackface scandal. Singh is actually the most likeable of the leaders now. He did better in French than expected.

2) The NDP vote might be more concentrated than people think allowing the party to retain more seats than expected. This is the big unknown and distribution could also be a weakness.

3) The NDP does have a good platform (for those who see it) but this is not everything as the 2015 campaign showed

Overall I think we are in a tight position and none of the parties seems to have the means to break out. The NDP could inch up to where they were in 2015 which would be a surprise -- or they could lose party status. The fact is that these two scenarios are only inches apart. Party status loss and 2015 numbers are barely more than margin of error in the polls and rely on a number of things. This includes how the BQ fare down the stretch. The NDP is very low in Quebec but if the Conservatives, BQ and Liberals are very close a weak NDP has a chance to squeek through where it would be impossible if there were a runaway favourite. The NDP will suffer in the west, outside BC, due to the collapse of the Liberals.

The Conservatives have the Ford problem in Ontario but there are signs that they may overcome that. They have little traction except in MB, SK and AB. Still there is potential in Ontario, Atlantic and Quebec for them to squeek through.

The Liberals are not that high in seats at the moment and stand to lose 1/3 of their seats in Atlantic Canada and the West, They cannot make them up in Ontario and must do it in Quebec to at least have a razor thin majority. Looks like a difficult challenge.

I think that this may be a year where Canada will not know the government before all the votes are counted. If we had rolling poll closures like we used to we would have to wait for BC.

But still -- the numbers could change suddenly after the next debate and in any direction.

Also Canada could have a unique set of incompatibilities following the election:

The BQ and Singh are incompatible and working together would be difficult.

Liberals and Conservatives are incompatible and would also have difficulty although I have pointed out in another thread that this year they may have little choice becuase of the pipeline split.

NDP and Greens hate each other but they would face the greatest pressure from supporters to work together and policies are not that far apart on some things so this is not incompatible but extremely uncomfortable.

The BQ is, as usual, politically toxic to most outside of Quebec. The fact that they are less social democratic and more social conservative, intolerant and anti-immigrant now means that the people open to them in the past may be more cool to them now. This is not Duceppe's party. Balance of power for the BQ could result in an unthinkable agreement between Liberals and Conservatives to prevent them from having power over a government or an uncomfortable alliance between other parties that are also incompatible. It could also lead to a new election. Problem with that is that everyone knows this would favour the Conservatives who have the greatest ability to refill coffers quickly. This last point is why such an unthinkable agreement is more than just a remote possbility. The added fuel of the pipeline debate (pardon the pun) makes a Liberal-CPC agreement more possible than it has ever been outside wartime.

This means that a new election would be only months away. It also means that both parties would have a major challenge with leadership. They likely could not keep current leaders but would be afraid of dumping them in a minority. It is possible that the next election could see two care-taker leaders represent their parties in the next election. Goodale vs Ambrose? Others would likely be working on their leadership ambitions and running the country.

I think Singh will remain unless the NDP loses party status. Early to tell but it looks like he may have saved the furniture for the time being. Elizabeth May might want to step away if she does not get more than 2 seats. Peter Bevan Baker might be taking French lessons six months from now. Maybe Duceppe tries a threepeat? (That last one is a joke.)

That the Italian Cultural Center is every political party's favorite venue on that side of Vancouver. If past elections are a predictor I am sure by the end of the campaign every major party will use the same site.

Polltracker has moved the Liberals slightly back in front of the Conservaties seat-wise, courtesy of Abacus and this morning's Nanos polls, noting clear momentum for the NDP and Bloc.

Seat projections:

LIB141

CON134

BQ33

NDP25

GRN4

PPC1

https://newsinteractives.cbc.ca/elections/poll-tracker/canada/

Even for being out of date, it projects the highest seat count for the NDP any polling or polling-related organization has yet suggested.   I'm thinking the actual seat count, if the momentum continues, could reach or even top the 40 seat mark.  Perhaps even the losses in Quebec will be somewhat minimized.  It would be nice if the BQ could at least be deprived of a third place finish in seats.

Yup, that adds up to 380.

If expanding the House of Commons helps keep the Conservatives out, so be it.