latest polling thread - 5 july, 2012

Most of the drop in NDP support nationally is because in Quebec they have gone from 42% to 31% - why? My theory is that this poll was in field entirely during that last week and immediate aftermath of the Quebec election. Its natural that the two federal parties that share a brand with the two leading Quebec provincial parties (the BQ and Liberals) will get some "bounce" due to people being aksed how they would vote federally when 99% of political space is being occupied by provincial politics....I suspect that within weeks the BQ and LPC will drop back into the teens in Quebec and the NDP will be back at 40%+

This poll is a weird one and any poll reversal is concerning to people after a huge bounce of the last year. But poll numbers are not the issue here as I'll explain.

An end of summer poll has the lightest weight of all; a fall session is coming up and it will overwhelm this poll in importance within a few days. The NDP will have to perform well the next two months. If they perform badly a slide could start that could be very difficult to break if only because there are too many in the media that will want to ride it for all its worth. But, more likely, the NDP will come back knowing what they need to do. This will lead to a see-saw fight with the Liberals as they go through their convention year. I suspect the NDP will have some difficult days but will come out ready to fight the Conservatives for the government in the next election.

The greatest fear of course is that even with a dropping Conservative support which is likely to come over time, the Liberals and NDP could still split the opposition vote enough to allow the Cons to slip through. The NDP has two fights it must win. First it has to beat the Liberals back to hold sole contention for government and then it has to beat the Cons for that role. But, as I'll get to later the greatest fear may not be the greatest challenge.

Still, it is a huge challenge. The NDP strategy in the recent past has been to have the leader ignore the Liberals and prove more effective going after the Cons. This remains the best strategy. The leader will need to stick to it. If the party has to take a shot at the Liberals from time to to time then this would be left to someone other than the leader.

The NDP will need to be careful to pick the right battles but will not have full control of the variables. First the NDP has to fight mostly on the economy because this is going to be where they have to beat the Cons. The supporting fight will be procedural unfairness, corruption, dishonesty in general from the Conservatives a fight that will win points but on its own is not enough to win government. The difficulty that will provide an opening for the Liberals that must be controlled is that the next year will be a national fight by the right against unions. Unfortunately unions have continued to do so poorly with the public that anyone who stands up for them risks losing support.The NDP is going to have to stand up for what is right but at the same time manage the poor state of public good will with the unions.This fight over labour is what will decide the next election and the NDP has to manage it perfectly.

Ontario is providing a specific challenge. The governemnt is setting a horrible precedent in terms of bargaining approach with the teachers but the unions have a no-win fight on the actual areas of dispute-- they have agreed to the wage freeze but still tout it as a reason for the fight. That is extremely dangerous. They do this because the other area of substance is the issue of sick days that are not just banked but cashed out at the end of careers in days off or money. Most Canadians do not support this-- in fact it is a position that could make the existence of sick days (many workers don't have them) untenable. Any support the teachers have in the public could tank because they are fighting a battle of principle with unwinnable areas of substance and doing so with the kids as the battleground. In the end this could play well for the Liberals provincially and help them federally. Of course the unions no-win position is fairly clear: they can't accept the union-busting principle that the government is laying down. The Liberals are smart to recognize the weakness of the public perception of the unions and are coming in tough on unions without making a huge mistake on the issues -- just the methods and approach. The teachers are left fighting the principle and precedent issue they cannot ignore on specific issues they cannot win. All this is critical because all the enemies may label the NDP with this lost-cause fight across the country as it repeats in other provinces. Essentially this could put the NDP in a position where it has to fight the poorly managed public relations challenges of unions for them. I point to the Ontario situation not because I perceive Ontario as the whole country but because this is a fight that risks being played out everywhere and already has been.

Unions need to do a much better job of managing their public relations in a context where they know the public may not be with them. Going after extra-curricular activities of students is not a smart move in this as they are in Ontario. Saying this is all we can do is not smart if this cannot lead to a victory. The federal NDP cannot stay silent on this (the more general union fight not the specific teacher's fight) and are being drawn in to it. This is going to be the big challenge they will face this year. They will need to speak up for labour nationally while avoiding specific provincial fights especially when they are mismanaged by the unions involved.

So the challenges in summary:

1) the fight with the Cons largely over the economy

2) the fight with the Liberals during their leadership

3) the challenge of a public fight between establishment and the right and labour unions which the unions may not be doing the best job on communications as they themselves are in a bad position and the NDP is tied in the mind of the public to them. this in my view is the big one.

Again on the last which I have put the most emphasis because I think it is the most dangerous of the three for the NDP, the NDP must resist the temptation to try to distance themselves from labour if labour is doing poorly. If labour loses this fight so will the NDP. Like it or not the NDP as the left standard bearer is tied to labour's struggle and will need to work with labour to make sure that this extremely difficult conflict is won. At the end of the day if it is lost an NDP government will not be able to function within its principles anyway as there will be no money. This is a basic fact coming from the reality that further erosion of the middle class make collective responses to issues and funding of social programs (as they are or should be) impossible.

This may in fact need to be the main message the NDP and the unions put out-- lose your labour unions, you lose your middle class; lose your middle class and you lose medicare, public education, public pensions, social assistance-- everything that prevents a return to extreme 19th century social inequality. If the public are not made to understand this the battle will be lost-- not just one of whether the NDP will be governemnt, but the viability of any socially progressive approach in politics or public policy. Lose this fight and even if you win government, you won't be able to do much with it.

In other words-- people have to fight for the existence of the middle class- if you lose that then there is no point in the NDP getting government (it will have no economic ability to turn the tide within one term). If we lose, those political parties we think are on our side will sell us out. If we win then political parties that are against us will be forced to do less harm and even perhaps some good. The NDP will rise or fall on the fight for the middle class and that will rise or fall on the fight for unionization and relevance of labour unions and this is a fight that is already underway.

If the NDP get this dynamic, then they have a good chance and a big fight. If they don't get this dynamic then the fight is already lost. You could say this does not belong in this thread. I would reply that this is the reason this current poll and polls in general don't matter-- this is what does matter and the polls of the future as well as the policies of the next decade ride on this understanding.

There is something seriously wrong with that argument.

First, people get vacation pay, vacations or equivalent in holidays. Nobody gets all of them and sick days has absolutely nothing to do with it. The person who suggested otherwise is misinformed even if they are a teacher.

Vacation pay: This is typically paid to people with hours that change such as part time workers. It is also often paid to minimum wage workers. The idea is that you get the same legal entitlement as a full time worker with 2 weeks vacation or holidays a year. They would still get the statutory holidays paid on a pro rata basis.

Vacation: People who work in places where they choose their vacations don't get vacation pay, they get paid vacation days. They also get stat holidays.

Holidays: People who due to the nature of their employment cannot choose their time off like Teachers instead of getting vacation (which you take at your time of choosing) get holidays which replace vacation. That said, while teachers do not choose when the time off is taken they actually get a bit more of it. It is socially understood that while teachers may get extra holidays in some parts of the year they work more than the paid hours at other times of the year. Those who are informed recognize that teachers put in as much work as other workers in a year but it is compressed into fewer days of the year. A large amount of unpaid time is also typical.

There is however, no relationship between the concept, application, public policy or negotiation between sick days and vacation, holidays etc. Also teachers are not the only ones to have mandatory holidays and they are also not the only ones to have sick day banks and there is no consistency between the two as some people who have standard vacations (rather than vacation pay or holidays) also have sick day banking and there is a huge debate over whether this is reasonable.

Connecting teachers' holiday policies to sick day banking is misleading and false. It is also false to suggest that all other workers get vacation pay because vacation pay is actually quite rare among full time workers who instead get either vacations at their choice or mandated holidays where that is not possible.

FWIW: I don't get vacation pay as I am a full time worker. I do get vacations because I get to choose when they are but I do not get long stretches of holidays. Nobody gets more than one of the three: large numbers of mandated holidays beyond stats, 2 weeks plus in vacation days or vacation pay -- you only get one of the three.

Very different numbers this morning from Nanos:

Con: 32.4 (-1.2)

NDP  30.4 (+0.1)

Lib    24.6 (-1.9)

BQ      5.8 (+1.6)

Gr   5.0 (+0.6)

http://www.nanosresearch.com/library/polls/2012-09-BallotE.pdf

Stockholm wrote:

With this Nanos poll as well the NDP would actually probably be in first place were it not for the "Quebec election effect". The poll was in field Sept. 4-9, and had NDP support down to 33% and Liberals support at 25%... But as I have said earlier, I think this is a very temporary Liberal bump in Quebec because people were being asked in an unprompted question how they would vote federally just as 31% of them were putting an "X" in front of a box marked "Liberal" in the provincial election.

Stock, my thoughts exactly. I suspect that in fact the NDP is at least tied, if not leading the Tories. I suspect there may have been a little movement to the Libs as well, but more then likely, right wing Ontario Libs "coming home". Although I generally don't trust Nanos, this confirms what I was feeling after reading Harris Decima. I don't trust Allan Gregg at all, or really Nik Nanos either, and didn't believe the HD poll at all.

Regarding Sean's post, I think he nailed it again. If the NDP is going to break through, we absolutely have to get people to realize that the NDP is the only choice if the Middle Class wants to prosper. I said this before and I will say it again, this means we are going to have to hammer the Libs and force them to take positions on our issues. I suspect they won't want to and will try to obfuscate, and that is the easieest way to get rid of them. Take the MP in my riding, that putz, Lamoureux. He is always talking about how he is "fiscally responsible", minded. We need to nail him on that and force him to tell people where he stands in terms of how the Martin budgets hurt ordinary working Canadians. We need to try and drag Martin, and Chretien into this. They will both blow. Martin because he is the effete "Mr. Dithers", and Chretien, because he has an arrogance and temper that would make it "easy to push his buttons". We have to stop being afraid of these guys and work on getting people to uderstand what voting LPC actually means.

I saw we hammer them, and hammer them relentlessly. Those guys will fold like a House-of-Cards, no question. We need to take the fight to them. They'll blow it big time.

New Abacus poll:

http://abacusdata.ca/2012/09/24/federal-politics-conservatives-and-ndp-tied-at-35/

Con 35

NDP 35

Lib 17

Approval rates:

Harper: -50 +35 Net -15

Mulcair: +36 -22 Net +14

Seats

Date / Poll / NDP / Cons / Libs / BQ / Ind / Grn / Vacant / Total

Sep '12 / -- / 100 / 163 / 35 / 4 / 2 / 1 / 3 / 308

May '11 / GE / 103 / 166 / 34 / 4 / 0 / 1 / 0 / 308

Nov '08 / GE / 37 / 143 / 77 / 49 / 2 / 0 / 0 / 308

Popular Vote

Date /Pollster /NDP /N-Change /Cons /C-Change /Libs /L-Change

May '11 / GE / 31% / +13% / 40% / + 2% / 19% / -7%

Sep 24 / Abacus / 35% / +3% / 35% / -2% /  17% / -3%

Sep 10 /  Harris Decima / 27% / -5% / 34% / +3% / 24% / +1%

Sep 9 / Nanos / 30.4% / +0.1% / 32.4% / -1.2% / 24.6%/ -1.9%

Aug 22 / Forum / 34% / -1% / 34% / +3% / 22% / Flatlined

Aug 12 / Abacus / 32% / -3% / 37% / +2% / 20% / Flatlined

Jul 26 / Forum / 35% / Flatlined / 31% / -4% / 22% / +3%

Jul 12 / Nanos / 30.3% / -3.3% / 33.6% / +0.1% / 26.5% / +1.6%

Jul 5 / EKOS / 32.3% / -0.1% / 30.2% / +0.9% / 19.5% / +0.3%

Jun 27 / Forum / 35% /--- / 35% / --- / 19% / ---

Jun 26 / EKOS / 32.4% / --- / 29.3% / --- / 19.2% / ---

Jun 23 / Abacus / 35% / --- / 35% / --- / 20% / ---

Jun 23 / Environics / 35% / --- / 33% / --- / 19% / ---

Jun 21 / Ipsos-Reid / 38% / --- / 35% / --- / 18% / ---

Jun 18 / Harris Decima / 32% / --- / 31% / --- / 23% / ---

Jun 16 / Angus Reid / 35% / --- / 34% / --- / 19% / --- 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/42nd_Canadian_federal_election

4780

WebRepcurrentVotenoRatingnoWeight

Abacus refused NDP in first place, never beat CON!

age 60+

CON 37% (-7), NDP 36% (+9)

NDP gains in Alberta, Prairies and Atlantic... NDP decrased in BC and Quebec and tortoise in Ontario

Alberta

CON 58% (-12), NDP 29% (+15) and LIB is fourth!
compare to Liberals 35% in 1968 and 25% in 1993

Don't pay too much attention to 308.

Mulcair will be in the process of being sworn in as prime minister and Grenier will be posting that his seat count polling analysis shows the NDP coming in third.   

http://www.threehundredeight.com/2012/09/tories-ndp-tied-in-abacus-poll....

Arthur,

That's the problem with most pundits - they are full of biases, like we all are, so even before they open their mouths, you know what their spin will say.

The Canadian business establishment bosses, their mainstream press allies, even the CBC, do NOT want the NDP elected anywhere. So of course the 99% of people who work for them will sing the company tune or they will be out of a job. Sure they let one or two NDP pundits get a kick at the can occasionally, but overall, 99% of the media coverage in Canada is both anti-NDP and anti-union. 

Under such circumstances it is surprising the NDP ever gets elected anywhere, and is a real credit to the NDP's abilities that they obtain the success they do.

New Environics poll out today. So far as I've seen, ignored by the media, except used tangentially to spin another "Could Justin help?" story.

NDP: 35%

Cons: 31%

Lib: 20%

BQ: 9%

Green: 5%

http://www.environics.ca/uploads/File/Environics-Research---Federal-Vote...

The NDP are showing surprising strength compared to their historical results with 23% in the Environics poll and 29% in the Abacus poll in Alberta, possibly helping to give Linda Duncan some company in the future. 

Forum Research on sept 28

CON 35% (+1)
NDP 30% (-4)
LIB 25% (+3)
BQ 6% (=)
GRN 3% (-1)

Atlantic
NDP 34% (-4)
CON 34% (+6)
LIB 29% (=)
GRN 2% (-2)

Quebec
LIB 30% (+7)
NDP 29% (-5)
BQ 22% (=)
CON 17% (-1)
GRN 1% (-1)

Ontario
CON 37% (-2)
NDP 30% (-2)
LIB 28% (+3)
GRN 4% (=)

Prairies
CON 47% (+6)
NDP 33% (-4)
LIB 13% (-3)
GRN 6% (+2)

Alberta
CON 60% (+5)
NDP 20% (-5)
LIB 16% (+1)
GRN 4% (+1)

BC
CON 43% (+8)
NDP 33% (-6)
LIB 20% (+3)
GRN 2% (-6)

18-34
CON 28% (+1)
LIB 28% (+5)
NDP 26% (-12)
BQ 10% (+5)
GRN 6% (=)

35-44
NDP 36% (+3)
CON 32% (=)
LIB 20% (-2)
BQ 7% (=)
GRN 3% (-2)

45-54
CON 37% (+1)
NDP 29% (-5)
LIB 27% (+9)
BQ 5% (-3)
GRN 2% (-1)

55-64
NDP 35% (-3)
CON 34% (+3)
LIB 24% (+2)
BQ 4% (-2)
GRN 2% (-1)

65+
CON 43% (+2)
LIB 26% (=)
NDP 25% (=)
BQ 4% (=)
GRN 2% (=)

Male
CON 42% (+3)
NDP 26% (-5)
LIB 23% (+1)
BQ 5% (=)
GRN 3% (=)

Female
NDP 33% (-3)
CON 29% (=)
LIB 28% (+6)
BQ 6% (-1)
GRN 3% (-2)

Past vote 2011
CON <- CON 80%, GRN 19%, OTH 15%, BQ 14%, NDP 6%, LIB 5%
NDP <- NDP 77%, OTH 32%, LIB 21%, GRN 20%, BQ 14%, CON 8%
LIB <- LIB 70%, OTH 24%, GRN 13%, NDP 13%, CON 10% , BQ 3%
BQ <- BQ 66%, OTH 5%, NDP 3%, GRN 2%, CON 1%, LIB 1%
GRN <- GRN 43%, OTH 7%, BQ 3%, LIB 2%, CON 1%, NDP 1%

~~~~

With Trudeau

LIB 39%
CON 32%
NDP 20%
BQ 6%
GRN 2%

Atlantic
LIB 53%
CON 25%
NDP 19%
GRN 2%

Quebec
LIB 43%
BQ 22%
NDP 19%
CON 15%
GRN 1%

Ontario
LIB 40%
CON 36%
NDP 20%
GRN 3%

Prairies
CON 45%
LIB 27%
NDP 25%
GRN 3%

Alberta
CON 55%
LIB 28%
NDP 14%
GRN 3%

BC
CON 38%
LIB 33%
NDP 25%
GRN 2%

Current Federal Party Preference
LIB <- LIB 93%, OTH 38%, GRN 31%, NDP 31%, CON 10%, BQ 5%
CON <- CON 89%, OTH 18%, GRN 8%, BQ 2%, LIB 2%, NDP 2%
NDP <- NDP 66%, OTH 10%, GRN 7%, LIB 4%, BQ 1%, CON 0%
BQ <- BQ 92%, GRN 4%, NDP 1%, CON 1%, LIb/OTH 0%
GRN <- GRN 50%, OTH 2%, CON/LIB/NDP/BQ 0%

18-34
LIB 41%
CON 25%
NDP 19%
BQ 11%
GRN 4%

35-44
LIB 39%
CON 29%
NDP 22%
BQ 7%
GRN 2%

45-54
LIB 41%
CON 34%
NDP 19%
BQ 4%
GRN 2%

55-64
LIB 39%
CON 31%
NDP 23%
BQ 4%
GRN 2%

65+
CON 40%
LIB 36%
NDP 19%
BQ 3%
GRN 1%

Male
CON 38%
LIB 26%
NDP 17%
BQ 5%
GRN 2%

Female
LIB 42%
CON 26%
NDP 23%
BQ 6%
GRN 2%

Trudeau enter liberal leadership, i feel he wins in next election likely majority i can predict! Just LIKE MEXICAN 2012 ELECTION! they back old natural ruling! I fear with it! IF Liberals is back ruling, then i will move out of Canada!

That Trudeau poll is ridiculous. The fact that Canadians could be that easily swayed without any policy being involved is pretty sad

I have no doubt that Mulcair would outshine Trudeau in a debate. I do hope you are right about public perception though

Seats

Date / Poll / NDP / Cons / Libs / BQ / Ind / Grn / Vacant / Total

Sep '12 / -- / 100 / 163 / 35 / 4 / 2 / 1 / 3 / 308

May '11 / GE / 103 / 166 / 34 / 4 / 0 / 1 / 0 / 308

Nov '08 / GE / 37 / 143 / 77 / 49 / 2 / 0 / 0 / 308

Popular Vote

Date /Pollster /NDP /N-Change /Cons /C-Change /Libs /L-Change / BQ / B-Change 

May '11 / GE / 31% / +13% / 40% / + 2% / 19% / -7%

Sep / Environics / 35% / Flatlined/ 31% / -2% / 20% / Flatlined / 9% / +2%

Sep / Forum / 30% / -4% / 35% / +1% / 25% / +3%

Sep 24 / Abacus / 35% / +3% / 35% / -2% /  17% / -3%

Sep 10 /  Harris Decima / 27% / -5% / 34% / +3% / 24% / +1%

Sep 9 / Nanos / 30.4% / +0.1% / 32.4% / -1.2% / 24.6%/ -1.9%

Aug 22 / Forum / 34% / -1% / 34% / +3% / 22% / Flatlined

Aug 12 / Abacus / 32% / -3% / 37% / +2% / 20% / Flatlined

Jul 26 / Forum / 35% / Flatlined / 31% / -4% / 22% / +3%

Jul 12 / Nanos / 30.3% / -3.3% / 33.6% / +0.1% / 26.5% / +1.6%

Jul 5 / EKOS / 32.3% / -0.1% / 30.2% / +0.9% / 19.5% / +0.3%

Jun 27 / Forum / 35% /--- / 35% / --- / 19% / ---

Jun 26 / EKOS / 32.4% / --- / 29.3% / --- / 19.2% / ---

Jun 23 / Abacus / 35% / --- / 35% / --- / 20% / ---

Jun 23 / Environics / 35% / --- / 33% / --- / 19% / ---

Jun 21 / Ipsos-Reid / 38% / --- / 35% / --- / 18% / ---

Jun 18 / Harris Decima / 32% / --- / 31% / --- / 23% / ---

Jun 16 / Angus Reid / 35% / --- / 34% / --- / 19% / --- 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/42nd_Canadian_federal_election

Mulcair should push for more debates, get both Steven and Justin outside thier confort zones and into his.

Mulcair outguns any of Harpers would be successors like Baird, Peter, or Jason Kenny.

clambake wrote:

That Trudeau poll is ridiculous. The fact that Canadians could be that easily swayed without any policy being involved is pretty sad

I am not. People love celebrities.  Hell most Canadians know more about reality tv contestants and shows and hockey stats than they do about the real issues of the day. They have a very short attention span.

The sad reality is the sheeple will fall for the media love fest of Justtin. I see it already among people. If trudeau wins Liberal leadership (and I am sure he will)  the NDP will be third or 4th party (if BQ come back)  status come next election unfortunatly. That is the sad cold reality for them.

Well the media, owned by corporations do support the two corporate parties - Libs and Cons. The NDP has always known this and it is just more in our faces now. It's crony capitalism at it's best. They know, as well as the elites in the lib party that Trudeau for all his shallow talk, will do their bidding, and the beat will go on.

That said, Trudeau has done nothing so far but give flowery speech. He is being created as we speak.

And I have faith in the NDP. We actually had to fight hard to get where we are, actually representing the interests of ordinary Canadians. Have faith in Canadians and in the NDP.

Well, I don't have much use for Nanos. It is possible that this is a new reality. So, as I have posted so many times before, the NDP has got to get ahead of the LPC frame that somehow they are Moderates, and the NDP are a bunch of Extremists. They have used that tired-and-true formula over and over. The over thing that the NDP needs to do is start going hard after the real LPC record. Its time to stop being nice about Trudeau, Chretine and Martin. Most of us here know what those guys have done. The party reals needs to give this a good hard though.

On the other hand, the House is just getting back into action, this is one poll, and Trudeau hasn't said a lot. So, we'll see. But we all knew this wasn't going to be easy. 2015 is a long way away, and its pretty presumptous of any LPC supporter to think they have a lock on this.

Things are different, especially because I truly believe things have changed in Quebec and that the LPC is not going to get the kind of support there it assumes it will once they have a leader from Quebec, and it is precisely because of that thinking that is truning Qubec voters off. And one other thing, we have Tom Mulciar, they don't.

ETA: I looked at the Nano PDF. Some thoughts:

I see the Cons gained and the NDP fell in the Maritimes. I wonder how much of this relates to Nova Scotia? I don't see this as a permanent trend. As always, the NDP is still getting screwed in Ontario. This is clearly our problem area. Rae really did a number on us and the NDP continues to suffer from the Rae Hangover. The only place that was a surprise was BC. This numbers irritate the hell out of me, but I don't believe they represent a long term trend either. When you look at the rest of the poll, the Libs either stayed stationary or experienced small losses. They really didn't grow else wise. So, overall, I think this poll is not really that bad. I would have been worried if the Libs have moved in Atlantic Canada or the Pariries, but that simply didn't happen. I think there are other things at play here. Of course LPC partisans on this board and the MSM will play this otherwise, but I am not sure there is a lot to worry about here, even in the mid term. So, big breath on this one. This poll isn't anywhere near as bad as I expected. By the way, I believe Nanos numbers on the Pariries are just plain wrong; the LPC numbers are much higher then they likely are.

I wish I knew what was going on in BC. But, I think this is temporary. The MSM is pushing Trudeau as a "Son of BC" really hard right now. This will pass.

So, over on Huff Post some Lib posted that based on what he has found, however he did it, the surge is no surprise. This is after I posted much the same commentary that I posted here. So, I will ask, anyone who knows BC politics, as I don't, is there some kind of "Red Wave" I don't know about that is a secret known only to BC Lib partisans? Anyone want to take a shot at that?

Oh and by the way, there is things "

Probed about the NDP at the media scrum after the Facebook summit, Trudeau said, "I'd say they have to watch out. I look forward to waving at the NDP as I pass them on the way to the Prime Ministership."

What a jerk. He has as much class as brick in a pool of S***!

The NANO polling has always been higher for Liberals, and lower for the NDP. And Nanos has been the outier in comparison to other pollsters in this regard.

As usual, the NDP will have to fight hard against the corporate media and power brokers in this country in their quest to ensure only Liberals or Conservatives form federal govt. Crony capitalism lives on and is well in Canada.

I am not sure if I trust the BC results and NANOS is always out oof line compaed to other pollsters when looking at the LPC. However, the constant love Justin is getting fom the media is going to eventually put them in second or first-for awhile at least. That is the key. All this Trudeaumania 2.0 is coming too early. It's a long ways to 2015. Plenty of time for Trudeaumania to recede and the NDP to respond with good policies and an imaginative platform.

Finally I see some potential chinks in his armor. First I think he is immature and arrogant. His old man was also arrogant but let's face it he had something to be arrogant about. Justin seems to have inherited the arrogance without the intellectual curiousity or heft one gets by pursuing knowledge for its own sake. If the press starst to pursue Justin as featherweight his rock star status will suddenly go from asset to liability.