Quebec Election October 1, 2018

Unionist wrote:

Aristotleded24 wrote:

Make no mistake. If I lived in Quebec, I would be perfectly fine voting QS in a general election and voting "non" in a sovereignty referendum. Apparently there are other federalists who agree. 

I'm not a "federalist" - because how nations and peoples configure their sovereign arrangements (separate, federated, something different) is not an article of fundamental faith for me. As long as self-determination is recognized and respected, the rest is up to the players.

But I voted "non" in the latest referendum, and would vote "non" if one were held under current conditions - yet I definitely belong to and vote for QS. No contradiction there.

So welcome to Québec, bro! I like the way you'll vote.

Is there a term in Québec for a person who identifies neither as a sovereigntist NOR a federalist?  It's an interesting space to be in-and I hope its where QS-who I would vote for if I lived there, as the only viable progressive party on the ballot-will head if it does succeed, as now seems increasingly possible, in sending the PQ to the boneyard Monday night.

Quote:

there a term in Québec for a person who identifies neither as a sovereigntist NOR a federalist?  It's an interesting space to be in-and I hope its where QS-who I would vote for if I lived there, as the only viable progressive party on the ballot-will head if it does succeed, as now seems increasingly possible, in sending the PQ to the boneyard Monday night.

The term is ‘most of us.’

i have voted for no party other than QS in Quebec. They lost that automatic vote from me by the terms of the Option Nationale merger but I still hope for strong QS representation and a QS government one day and in anything other than a tight local race I would probably still vote for them. 

But I live in ‘the regions’. My my riding is a tight two way race. The key issues for me are environment and minority rights. Quebec seems likely to vote for a party that barely tolerates minorities-of any sort, that hates immigrants, and that is in thrall to big oil, apart from all the disasters that a CAQ government would deliver. I want the Liberals gone but a CAQ government represents an attack on so much of what I love about the Quebec model, and a return to the racist tone of Values Charter debates that has cooled under PLQ rule. In Montreal I would vote QS in a second, the CAQ is not a factor. In a proportional system I would vote QS each time. But in a close election where one or two seats may separate CAQ majority from minority or even keep them out of power, I am voting for the lesser evil, a party that won’t unleash a wave of racist attacks on minorities. 

‘Unless I get to the ballot box and can’t stomach voting for them after all. 

Quebec’s election frontrunners are frozen in climate denialism

More than 70 people perished in Quebec this summer during an unprecedented heat wave that sent the mercury soaring across the world. Welcome to the new reality: a decade ago, the Global Humanitarian Forum had already estimated casualties in the hundreds of thousands each year as a result of climate change, with hundreds of millions more suffering serious harm.

quote:

Yet somehow, in 2018, we still have two frontrunners in a Quebec election, the Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) and the incumbent Liberals, that are so aggressively oblivious to the climate threat, and so assured of voters’ apathy, as to dismiss nearly all 23 demands of the province’s main environmental groups in the run-up to a closely fought election.

Decades after the danger has been known, these two parties continue to blanket themselves in pretences of “realism” to justify more oil and gas infrastructure, more fossil fuel subsidies, and billions upon billions more in highway construction and other sprawl-inducing policies that will dig us into an ever deeper climate hole.

How do they still not get it? How do we not?

quote:

Come election day, it will be no mystery if the youth of Quebec — who are today the largest voting bloc — turn to the fourth-place Québec Solidaire, who despite their flaws, are the only party to treat the climate crisis with the full attention and seriousness it demands.

We may well take issue with parts of their platform. We may well doubt the timelines and budgets of their ambitious proposals. But we would be missing the point.

The point is that history needs their ideas now, and that their ideas need the largest platform, and greatest influence, the voters can give them. The point is that our species is at risk, and that within our children’s lifetimes, the costs of inadequate action will vastly outweigh the costs of finding the money today to do what must be done.

And the point is that by contrast, the two frontrunners have all but uttered whispers, with stuffed cotton in their ears muffling the alarms sounding from all sides.

epaulo13 wrote:

Quebec’s election frontrunners are frozen in climate denialism

Yet somehow, in 2018, we still have two frontrunners in a Quebec election, the Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) and the incumbent Liberals, that are so aggressively oblivious to the climate threat, and so assured of voters’ apathy, as to dismiss nearly all 23 demands of the province’s main environmental groups in the run-up to a closely fought election....

How do they still not get it? How do we not?

The answer could not be more simple or obvious. Both frontrunners are "federalist" in the sense that they do not beat the drum of independence. That is why referendums are no longer an election issue which means it actually is an election issue in the sense that pro-independence parties aren't even in the running.  Both frontrunners are right wing so don't want to start a debate on the environment. 

If QS said this or something to this effect:

"We understand that people are fed-up with the topic of sovereignty so we are putting it on the back-burner. Through rooting out corruption and waste and through improved management we will prove to Quebecers that we will be more prosperous managing all our own affairs. Only then will we revisit the topic of sovereignty"

If QS said, PR is important to us because it means fairer representation but first and foremost we will support legislation no matter who presents it that improves the lives of the people of Quebec, I could support that.

CAQ will win the election tomorrow, possibly even a majority (shuddering). QS will oppose them all the way but it won't matter. They won't have any power to stop CAQ from passing regressive legislation. People don't vote Liberal out of fear they vote Liberal due to the lack of non-independence alternatives. QS could have filled that void instead of CAQ.

The message I get from QS is that their focus during their first mandate would be writing a constitution for Quebec so they can have a referendum. The priority level of PR is also problematic. It isn't a hot topic in Quebec. This is something opposition parties are pushing not the people. That doesn't mean it can't be part of party policy, but to say that is the condition on which they will work with other parties makes it the number one priority, not the environment and not social justice. 

https://globalnews.ca/news/4494441/caq-leader-distances-himself-from-sup...

Coalition Avenir Québec Leader François Legault was forced to backtrack Thursday after responding with an emphatic “yes” to a woman asking if he would stand strong against immigrants seeking to “erase” Quebecers.

In a Rimouski pub Wednesday night, a supporter called on Legault to defend Quebecers against immigrants who want “to change our customs” and “remove our crosses.”

The woman said she has “nothing against immigration, but bring in the good ones. The immigrants coming in now, they are erasing us. We want to remain Québécois. Are you going to fight for us?”

This woman probably voted PQ since they came into existence but is now considering CAQ. Of course she wants to protect French because it is part of being Quebecois but it's about much more than language. There have been decades of fear-monguering by some sovereignists painting Montreal as a threat to Quebec that must be kept contained. Her vote is not rooted in protecting French or independence from Canada it is purely rooted in the fear of others changing the nature of Quebec. Historic English street names had to be changed to protect "the face" of Quebec. 

Voters like this woman are not within reach of QS. Even though many or most leftists support sovereignty, not all, or even most, supporters of sovereignty are leftist. 

Sure some non-sovereignists may vote for QS  despite their stance on sovereignty as I have in the past but most will not. Every cause picked up gains some voters and loses others. 

We are told, vote for them anyway because they are progressive and won't gain enough power to fulfil their top priorities and that is true. But it is only true because CAQ doesn't need them. If they were still neck and neck with the Liberals QS could have been the king-makers. The party I want in that position would priorize social justice over sovereignty and PR. The excuse used is that those things are needed to deliver social justice but they are not. 

QS doesn't need my vote. They will win my riding this election and every election in my riding for the foreseeable future.

Most people in Quebec probably still don't know that the NDPQ even exists. For that reason the NDPQ will get my vote to encourage them not to disband too soon. 

I encourage anyone on the fence to consider their local race and candidates as well as the party. 

The above is all my opinion and my understanding of Quebec politics based on lived experience. This is not an encyclopedic entry intended to be quoted as though I am some authority. I claim no special insight beyond any other person's lived experience in Quebec.

bekayne wrote:

https://nationalpost.com/opinion/conrad-black-canada-hasnt-noticed-but-q...

And though almost no one yet describes this Quebec election in these terms, the governing Liberals of Premier Philippe Couillard seem to be about even at 30 per cent with François Legault’s moderate left, constitutionally ambiguous CAQ.

What a bozo but this was interesting. It's not the splits I would identify.

The old rule of thumb was that the Quebec vote was divided into five approximately equal blocs: non-French, French Liberal federalists, French Conservative federalists, nationalists and a floating vote.

My list is not even numbers in each group:

French and English conservative federalists* (Lib)

French and English liberal federalists* (Lib)ndpq

French and English progressive federalists*  (Lib,QS)ndpq

Moderate nationalists who might still support separation in theory but don't want any more referendums and have moved on to voting on other issues. (Lib, CAQ)ndpq

Progressive nationalists for whom social justice was/is the reason for separation. (QS)ndpq

Regressive nationalists for whom separation is about protection from outsiders that would change the face of Quebec. (PQ, CAQ)

* federalists in Quebec are more non-separatist than federalist. Federalist sounds too supportive of the federal government or thinking that the federal government should have more control than the provincial government. 

The primary reason the Liberals are losing is that this is a change election. The primary reason CAQ is winning is because they appear to be the only other "non-sovereignist" party in the sense that they will neither have a referendum nor push the topic. 

This is a nightmare. CAQ is replacing the PQ as the default party when the Liberals need a time out. 

I can only pray they don't get a majority and can be defeated before they do too much damage. 

..i don't agree. caq will act like it has a mandate.

Mr. Magoo wrote:

What is the point in supporting a party that promises to do something you don't want, solely because for the time being they're in no position to fulfil that promise?  I'm not asking this because I want QS to fail, nor because I want their electoral opponents to succeed, but it's just not making sense.

It's like saying "vote Conservative for now, because they're on the ropes, but if they start to build momentum (as a result of your vote!) and might be able to roll back reproductive rights, stop supporting them THEN.

Well, actaully, if you were a pro-choice right-winger who gambled in 2006 that you could vote for Harper because he'd be unlikely to restrict abortion, you could probably now look back at it and say that your gamble was worth the risk: Harper did nothing to limit abortion(apart from foreign aid, which many right-wingers don't care about anyway), and he's probably paid handsome dividends on many other policies that you do care about.

Mind you, I don't think Harper was ever that forthright about promising to restrict abortion, whereas, if I'm recalling correctly, Quebec Solidaire has explicitly said that they'd hold a referendum if elected. So maybe a better comparison to make your case would be something like a pipleline-hating Albertan voting for Notley's NDP, on the assumption that, despite their promises, they'll never actually do anything to promote Kinder Morgan. Yeah, that guy would have gotten burned pretty badly on his decision. (And it would be entirely his fault.)

Ken Burch wrote:

Why are folks in this thread now acting as though a CAQ victory is assured?  The last polls I'd seen had it as essentially a dead heat between CAQ and the PLQ, with the PLQ on the rise.

Historically the Liberals are at a structural disadvantage in Quebec. They manage to rack up large totals in Montreal and the Ottawa Valley, whereas there opponents have their support more evenly spread out. In other words, a vote efficiency problem where they cannot get their votes where they need them. In the 1998 provincial election and the 2000 federal election, despite having won the most votes, the Liberals in each case had fewer seats than the Parti Quebecois and the Bloc Quebecois respectively.

Mind you, it's hard do see how a party with support in the low-to-mid thirties can get a majority. Perhaps there's a parallel contest between the PQ and QS that isn't impacting the main race. Looking at this, and considering how politics is in flux these days, we can guess, but we really don't know. All there is to do now is sit back, wait for the results to come in, and we'll know with more certainty what we're dealing with.

Ken Burch wrote:

Does anyone know if any last polls came out today?  Somebody up thread said Forum had called him...leads you to wonder if they were going to release any public polls before Election Day I'm not sure when the no polls period would have begun).

Yup.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_Quebec_general_ele...

Of course, Forum suddenly starts to resemble the other pollsters' results at the very end (cowards.) Surprised there isn't one from CROP today.

Forum had them with bigger leads earlier.  They're trying to make themselves looks as not as much of an outlier.

bekayne wrote:

josh wrote:

Forum had them with bigger leads earlier.  They're trying to make themselves looks as not as much of an outlier.

As high as 20%

 

That was the one where they had the PLQ in THIRD place.

alan smithee wrote:

Anyone believing the PLQ is in THIRD place should stop sniffing glue.

Apparently, Forum is now in rehab.

Pondering wrote:

You could be right, but CAQ could do a lot of damage in 4 years. CAQ is not Harper Conservatives. More a slicker Trump or Ford.

I think the Trump comparisons are overstated. Trump was an economic interventionist and geopolitical isolationist, who in office has largely maintained his populist economics, while farming out foreign-policy to the standing establishment. From my admittedly distant vantage point, I'm not really seeing how any of that applies to the CAQ, or even to Quebec politics generally.

I guess there is also immigration, on which Legault seems to overlap somewhat with Trump, but even then, there are Canadian antecedents for that as well, without having to look south of the border, eg. the Reform Party.

Fuck the polls. They are full of shit anyway. (The PLQ at third place,nuff said) The real poll will happen tonight after all the votes are read. I'm thinking the race is too tight to worry about a CAQ majority .. I'm being highly optimistic.

Ever since the Federal Liberals pulled a huge one out their ass the last election (vaulting from third place and irrelevancy) anything can happen on election night. But if CAQ can win at least one seat in Montreal, game over. I think that could only happen if gullible anglophones vote for a sovereignist and an English community hater (why the PLQ didn't bury Legault with his own words is sad) thinking they rerpresent change. Oh,you'll get change all right. Have any change in your pocket?

alan smithee wrote:

Fuck the polls. They are full of shit anyway. (The PLQ at third place,nuff said) The real poll will happen tonight after all the votes are read. I'm thinking the race is too tight to worry about a CAQ majority .. I'm being highly optimistic.

Ever since the Federal Liberals pulled a huge one out their ass the last election (vaulting from third place and irrelevancy) anything can happen on election night. But if CAQ can win at least one seat in Montreal, game over. I think that could only happen if gullible anglophones vote for a sovereignist and an English community hater (why the PLQ didn't bury Legault with his own words is sad) thinking they rerpresent change. Oh,you'll get change all right. Have any change in your pocket?

Which ridings are at the greatest risk of this?  Are there that many "Westmount Rhodesians" still breathing?

Aristotleded24 wrote:

Mind you, it's hard do see how a party with support in the low-to-mid thirties can get a majority. Perhaps there's a parallel contest between the PQ and QS that isn't impacting the main race. 

The contest was PQ versus QS/CAQ. QS pealed off the most progressive support; CAQ peeled off the right wing. What's left is the conservative traditionalists. 

CBC has already called it, a CAQ victory, not saying if it will be minority or majority. We are 20 minutes into the results.

QS is doing great and the CBC is projecting majority government for the CAQ. 

Pundit is saying it's because they are not far off from the Libs. 

CAQ majority.  Looks like undecided voters moved to them in the end.

CAQ is doing well in a few seats on massive splits with QS not far behind. Looks like the road ahead is starting to come into focus a bit. Especially if QS members can take seats the CAQ won either in a by-election or in 2022.

CAQ wins majority. Where do we go from here?

I don't get that comment. Obviously both those rightwing parties are reactionary, and ecocidal.

The only anglophone street name people are agitating to change is Amherst, and the impetus is from Indigenous people and Indigenous solidarity groups.

alan smithee wrote:

CAQ wins majority. Where do we go from here?

Did your riding stay safely PLQ?  

As to the road ahead...I think this may the end for the PQ.   They hadn't been truly sovereigntist since the mid-Nineties.  The haven't been left-of-center(the other pillar of pequiste identity) since 1980 or so.  They weren't able to out-xenophobe the caquistes and won't ever manage that.  My guess is a good chunk of the remaining PQ rump faction will defect to the caquistes, any remaining left-pequistes may cross over to QS or to sit as pro-QS independents.  NPD-Q was an outright failure.  The PLQ's only hope for the future is to actually become small-l liberals again, but their corporate backers will never allow them to do that.

Ken Burch wrote:

NPD-Q was an outright failure.

So was the CCF in Saskatchewan in the 1930s. The truth is, the left has been rallying around Quebec Solidaire and its predecessor parties for at least a decade, and long before Thomas Mulcair took Outrement for the NDP in 2007. When it comes to left-wing organizing, QS has a huge structural advantage over the NPD-Q. That might change. It was the economic and social policies that attracted people to QS, and as Pondering said upthread, most likely people gravitated towards QS in spite of the sovereignty issue, not because of it. I heard Masse recommit her efforts to the sovereigntist project. If she continues on this track, and if support for sovereignty remains as low as it is, this represents a major opening for the NPD-Q.

Aristotleded24 wrote:

Ken Burch wrote:

NPD-Q was an outright failure.

So was the CCF in Saskatchewan in the 1930s. The truth is, the left has been rallying around Quebec Solidaire and its predecessor parties for at least a decade, and long before Thomas Mulcair took Outrement for the NDP in 2007. When it comes to left-wing organizing, QS has a huge structural advantage over the NPD-Q. That might change. It was the economic and social policies that attracted people to QS, and as Pondering said upthread, most likely people gravitated towards QS in spite of the sovereignty issue, not because of it. I heard Masse recommit her efforts to the sovereigntist project. If she continues on this track, and if support for sovereignty remains as low as it is, this represents a major opening for the NPD-Q.

If NPD-Q is to seize that moment, it will need to make a clear break with the strategy it used this time:  that is, the strategy of not only standing as federalists in contrasts to QS left-sovereigntism(something I think QS may rethink now, but I'll get into that more downthread) but make a point of standing as a fussily "center-left" non-radical party.   In Quebec, the Third Way has no electoral support, and while there probably are allophones and some working-class francophones who would have preferred a non-sovereigntist alternative to QS, they were not going to turn out for a party who's message was "we have no truck with all that left-wing socialist nonsense".  They new a party like that would govern as Romanow did in Saskatchewan if it ever came to power.  To gain electoral purchase, an NPD-Q needs to be just as anti-austerity, pro-worker, pro-student and pro-activist as QS.