Newfoundland and Labrador general election, November 30, 2015

It was actually bekayne who argued that there was a 'Davis Effect'.

I was just pushing back a bit on the notion that his personal approval numbers were good.  They may be okay, but they're not that hot.

And they're clearly not good enough to raise the support of the PC's out of the basement, so if Davis can't reverse the decline of the PC's, what good is he to his party?

Not sure what's so nasty about it.  He didn't personally insult Letto, just raised issues about him being a parachute candidate.  Should have realized it could come back on him, though.

And it's a bit different when bringing in a candidate from outside the riding is the only way to have a candidate at all.  "Parachuting" should only be an issue when its a federal or provincial party leader removing a candidate chosen by the riding association and imposing an outsider in the slot.

McCurdy is easily influenced. 

OK, I have a few questions:

Why are some people voting in Special Polls before the end of nominations?

When is the end of nominations?

The Liberals and NDP have full slates, although many NDP candidates aren't even fly-in-fly-out. Why are the PCs six (?) short at this time?

The first of the two major debates was held tonight. Common consensus on social media was that Davis won. He was very well prepped, polished, and seemed to get his points across. 

Many people noted that McCurdy looked very nervous right from the start of the debate. He was stumbling over words and then forgetting words. He seemed really out of his element. He's had Lorraine Michael and Gerry Rogers announce major campaign planks and after tonight's debate I'm wondering if he's knowledgeable enough on a broad range of issues. As head of the fisheries union Earle always came off well when speaking. He was confident, funny and spoke well. I thought he'd dominate in debates, but in the several that have been held he has struggled.

I don't know if Dwight Ball left much of an impression or not. His performance was probably more so forgetful. Those really committed Liberals wouldn't budge because of his performance but I wouldn't be surprised if he lost some voters who were on the fence or leaning Liberal.

Debater wrote:

Is McCurdy difficult to get along with?

He & Ryan Cleary definitely got off on the wrong foot, and that seems to be a reason why Cleary is running for the PCs instead.

(Although part of that may be Cleary's own opportunism).

The story I heard was that Cleary wanted to run for the NL NDP in a riding that already had a high profile nominated candidate and McCurdy refused Cleary's demand that he dump the already nominated candidate to make way for him - so he quit in a huff.

Stockholm wrote:

Debater wrote:

Is McCurdy difficult to get along with?

He & Ryan Cleary definitely got off on the wrong foot, and that seems to be a reason why Cleary is running for the PCs instead.

(Although part of that may be Cleary's own opportunism).

The story I heard was that Cleary wanted to run for the NL NDP in a riding that already had a high profile nominated candidate and McCurdy refused Cleary's demand that he dump the already nominated candidate to make way for him - so he quit in a huff.

Seems like that might be part of the reason. Cleary's version of him inquiring about the seat was that he asked how Bob Buckingham could be the candidate while in the middle of representing an accused murderer. The murder trial ended late last week and Buckingham has since started campaigning. However, the NDP did not have a candidate in the district that Cleary is now running in so if he was really interested in being an NDP candidate he could have run there or in several other seats.

Newfoundlander_Labradorian wrote:

A poll relased this morning by Abacus shows that McCurdy is in a distance second place in St. John's West. Liberal Siobhan Coady is the choice of 57% of decided voters, followed by Earle at 24% and PC Dan Crummell at 19%. The district level poll also showed that McCurdy was the least popular of the three party leaders.

http://abacusdata.ca/nl-election-2015-st-johns-west-liberal-siobhan-coad...

Queue the NDPers saying the polls are wrong

I got the sense that Siobhan Coady was hoping to run federally & win back St. John's South-Mount Pearl from Ryan Cleary after losing it in 2011.

But Seamus O'Regan becoming the new Liberal nominee for SJS-MP changed that, so Coady switched to provincial politics.

So although Coady missed out on the chance to be in the Trudeau Government, she may get the consolation prize of being in the Ball Government.

Another district poll today has the PCs way back and the NDP with single digits. Bennett Leads Cleary By Almost 60 Points in Windsor Lake. The close races include the districts where the remaining 2 NDP inclumbents are running. Earle McCurdy has been in the media practically begging for votes this week but one of the PC candidates, who dropped out yesterday, sucked up all the oxygen. Tina Olivero steps down as candidate after CBC questions about unpaid wages to Filipina nanny

I guess people consider other reasons when deciding to run rather than just how people will view them.

Stockholm wrote:

Newfoundlander_Labradorian wrote:

I guess people consider other reasons when deciding to run rather than just how people will view them.

I wonder what it is in Cleary's case? It can't be any sort of political principle since he went from leftwing social democratic NDP to rightwing Tory in less than one week - who the hell knows what (if anything) the guy actually believes in...other than perhaps narcissism

Hard to describe the Progressive Conservatives in Newfoundland and Labrador as right-wing. There have been some instances where they've taken a more conservative approach but for the most part they're not right-wing. 

Cleary noted that the reason he decided to run for the PC Party was because he preferred Paul Davis to Earle McCurdy. As well I'd imagine there are a lot more Progressive Conservative supporters voting NDP federally than voting Conservative.

Stockholm wrote:

He seems to have liked McCurdy just fine until McCurdy refused to dump an already nominated candidate to make room for Cleary...If he thinks Paul Davis is so great - i wonder why he didnt announce he was supporting the NL PCs a couple of months ago when he was still running for re-election as an NDP MP - or would that have been a little too "inconvenient" for him?

You'll have to ask him about that. Personally I don't care and don't think it's something to be so upset about.

All parties tend to recat negatively to unprincipled turncoats - or have you forgetten the stream of invective Tories let loose at Eve Adams or the viciousness with which Liberals attacked David Emerson 

Stockholm wrote:

All parties tend to recat negatively to unprincipled turncoats - or have you forgetten the stream of invective Tories let loose at Eve Adams or the viciousness with which Liberals attacked David Emerson 

My comment was about the general state of the NDP which is angry and poisonous on any given day

RandySil wrote:

Stockholm wrote:

All parties tend to recat negatively to unprincipled turncoats - or have you forgetten the stream of invective Tories let loose at Eve Adams or the viciousness with which Liberals attacked David Emerson 

My comment was about the general state of the NDP which is angry and poisonous on any given day

Boiy you really have an axe to grind against the NDP - the only one who seems really "angry and poisonous" is RandySil - what's the story? was your mother an NDP supporter who also didnt love you enough and prefrred one of your siblings? Did your girlfriend or boyfriend dump you for an NDP organizer leabving you with a lifelong grudge? Seriously, its bad for your karma to have so much hate in you...try to do some personal introspection and see if you can find the root causes.

Stockholm wrote:

RandySil wrote:

Stockholm wrote:

All parties tend to recat negatively to unprincipled turncoats - or have you forgetten the stream of invective Tories let loose at Eve Adams or the viciousness with which Liberals attacked David Emerson 

My comment was about the general state of the NDP which is angry and poisonous on any given day

Boiy you really have an axe to grind against the NDP - the only one who seems really "angry and poisonous" is RandySil - what's the story? was your mother an NDP supporter who also didnt love you enough and prefrred one of your siblings? Did your girlfriend or boyfriend dump you for an NDP organizer leabving you with a lifelong grudge? Seriously, its bad for your karma to have so much hate in you...try to do some personal introspection and see if you can find the root causes.

Well, smear and try to discredit all you like but I am here in Newfoundland and you are not. Feel free to lecture me about much more you know about the state of Newfoundland politics from your perch there in downtown Toronto. We love that here!

RandySil wrote:

Stockholm wrote:

RandySil wrote:

Stockholm wrote:

All parties tend to recat negatively to unprincipled turncoats - or have you forgetten the stream of invective Tories let loose at Eve Adams or the viciousness with which Liberals attacked David Emerson 

My comment was about the general state of the NDP which is angry and poisonous on any given day

Boiy you really have an axe to grind against the NDP - the only one who seems really "angry and poisonous" is RandySil - what's the story? was your mother an NDP supporter who also didnt love you enough and prefrred one of your siblings? Did your girlfriend or boyfriend dump you for an NDP organizer leabving you with a lifelong grudge? Seriously, its bad for your karma to have so much hate in you...try to do some personal introspection and see if you can find the root causes.

Well, smear and try to discredit all you like but I am here in Newfoundland and you are not. Feel free to lecture me about much more you know about the state of Newfoundland politics from your perch there in downtown Toronto. We love that here!

I'm not predicting anything. I'm just curious why you are so filled with hate. Do you have a padded cell in your basement with orange walls where you can do primal screaming and bang your head against the wall to let out your "NDP derangement syndrome"? Might be a good investment

Slumberjack wrote:

Well it's plain as day that the NLNDP will be lucky to have anyone elected this time around.  What the polls don't reflect though is the general anger in the province with politics and politicians in general.  It seems people just want the PC crew gone, and in some cases they have calculated that the risk of splitting the vote among Liberal and NDP candidates might possibly give the PC's a hope in hell, and so they're putting all their eggs in the liberal blender.  Many have stated that they intensely dislike Dwight Ball, but feel they have no viable choice but to vote for him because of the risk of the PCs coming up the middle.  There is so little confidence in the NL NDP and Earl McCurdy that people have written them off as an alternative to the liberals.  It's a sad state of affairs politically there's no doubt about it, but really, where on Earth is this level of alienation not in effect?

Where is the evidence to back up the claim that "Many have stated that they intensely dislike Dwight Ball"? The CRA poll released yesterday suggests that the other two leaders are far less preferred

According to this brand new poll by Forum, the gap is actually narrowing

In a random sampling of public opinion taken by the Forum Poll™ among 842 Newfoundland and Labrador voters, just more than half will vote Liberal (52%), while about 3-in-10 will vote Progressive Conservative (29%). The NDP vote is characteristic of one fifth (19%). This stands in sharp contrast to the last time we polled the day after the writs were drawn up, when the Liberals had a 44 point lead (November 6 - Liberals 65% to 21% for the Progressive Conservatives, 13% for the NDP).

Read more at: http://poll.forumresearch.com/post/2431/progressive-conservatives-ndp-increase-vote-share/
Copyright ©Forum Research Inc.

If this poll is correct its very doubtful that the Liberals would win every seat and in fact at 19% - the NDP would likely hold on to a couple as well. If that happens those people suffering from "NDP derangement symdrome" might have to be placed on suicide watch and have all sharp objects removed from their homes...

The Forum poll has the NLNDP at 46% in Labrador. That means Labrador West and maybe more.

Stockholm wrote:

The sample size in Labrado is tiny (23 people) - its actually quite irresponsible of the polling company to even report on such an insignificant finding 

Yeah, well, tell that to the 10.58 people voting NDP. 

Its never been all that clear to my why exactly the Newfoundland PCs are so ridiculously unpopular...apart from some vague feeling that its "time for a change" what exactly have they done that merits being annhilated and possibly losing all their seats. Davis has reasonable personal numbers and close to 50% of people say they are at least somewhat satisfied with the government - so what gives?