Brian Topp: "What awaits the NDP in 2019?"

65 posts / 0 new

Wed, 2019-01-23 20:50

Geoff

JeffWells wrote:

Anyway, back to the question: What awaits the NDP?

New poll tracker has a projected seat range for the NDP that includes a low of one seat. But rearrange the deck chairs while you can. Soon there may be only one left.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/poll-tracker-federal-poll-averages-and-...

If the Liberals and the Conservatives end up with close seat numbers, the NDP caucus, however meager, will likely hold the balance of power. The party will have to decide on its priorities, should we end up with a minority government.

Wed, 2019-01-23 20:57

#53

WWWTT

@montgomery

For someone who says they’re not into religion, you really like to derail threads into religious religions debate hey?

There's a word for that.

Wed, 2019-01-23 21:49

(Reply to #53) #54

Sean in Ottawa

Geoff wrote:

JeffWells wrote:

Anyway, back to the question: What awaits the NDP?

New poll tracker has a projected seat range for the NDP that includes a low of one seat. But rearrange the deck chairs while you can. Soon there may be only one left.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/poll-tracker-federal-poll-averages-and-...

If the Liberals and the Conservatives end up with close seat numbers, the NDP caucus, however meager, will likely hold the balance of power. The party will have to decide on its priorities, should we end up with a minority government.

This is one scenario although I think it is a long shot for two reasons:

It is frequent that two parties are very close until the election period when one makes gains on the other. The fact they are close in polling now, and we do not know which one will take off, does not mean they will land close on election day. Usually a campaign has a clarifying effect that allows one party to advance and others to fall back. Expect nothign different.

The NDP is in rough shape. It is polling in a range that could produce hardly any seats and a near tie between the first two parties may not leave the balance of power to the NDP which may or may not remain third. I suspect that the Greens might pass the NDP in the coming election -- perhaps not in votes but due to concentration they could do it in seats.

The NDP could lose a lot of seats and then what could really suck woudl be to see the Greens actually hold the balance of power with the NDP not a factor.

The first step for the NDP is to recognize this possibility and stop thinking it can be saved by the bell here. The NDP if it wants to avoid a very long rebuilding period will have to put forward an incredibly well thought out platform and communicate it equally well. There is no sign of either right now. All the wishful thinking the party has (the only thing it seems sure of) will not avoid the potential for catastrophe.

Being exited by Singh's half baked, detail-less brain fart on rent subsidies is not encouraging. It is not enough to have a policy that is so full of holes that it lacks any believability. It looks like a policy built for sale not use. Frankly it looks like the NDP does not have a clue about the details. It it did there would be better plans -- regional cost of living supports could work but the concept of support for an arbitrary percentage cut-off for rent is a policy without a plan. It is not effective communications to advance an idea without any clue as to how you might make it work.

Sadly, it is an indication that the NDP is being unambitious about anything other than over-marketing. If the party had any guts it would run on basic income, indexed to soem regional cost of living. This might be controversial but it is easy to come up with rules and systems to make it work. The rent plan either has someone decide what kind of place you need to rent or is nothing to do with a subsidy for percentage rent you pay and more to do with a percentage of some rent you are deemed to need to pay based on what soemone decides you need. Will this be affected by the number of dependents? someone determining where you should live? Some silly average that does not consider either? Singh is not yet saying.

This is a ticket to losing party status.

Wed, 2019-01-23 22:35

(Reply to #54) #55

montgomery

kropotkin1951 wrote:

Besides a quick look at demographic data says that Russia has only 13% self identified atheists in its population.

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

You went and asked the wrong question so you could cook the books. In truth, 13% atheists is huge! Only 2.4% of Americans say they are atheists.

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

I'll pursue this with you til it falls off the rails, but I'm not sure what's going to be proven?

Wed, 2019-01-23 22:46

#56

JeffWells

Well reasoned as always, Sean.

The presumption that the NDP would hold the balance of power, even if much reduced in seats, is groundless grasping at straws. And should the Conservatives actually pose a reasonable risk of forming government I expect the NDP dam will collapse and bleed perhaps a third of its remaining support to the Liberals. The party is not in a good place when its chief distinction from the Liberals is that it's bound to lose.

Wed, 2019-01-23 23:45

(Reply to #56) #57

montgomery

WWWTT wrote:

@montgomery

For someone who says they’re not into religion, you really like to derail threads into religious religions debate hey?

There's a word for that.

The word is 'troll'. You should already know that if you're going to appoint yourself the captain of the 'Ban the Liberal' team.

Get real, the conversation turned to religion and several of us quite legitimately pursued some questions and answers which I will refer to as 'free choice' and 'freedom of speech'. I'm absolutely sure that's right for the party!

Wed, 2019-01-23 23:51

#58

Aristotleded24

The real issue with Singh announcing rent assistance is that it doesn't get to the core of the problem. It in effect subsidizes high rents in the private market and low wages in the business sector because, hey, these people have the government helping them out. Personally, I think that someone with a job should be able on their own to pay rent, without me having to subsidize that through my taxes. The real issues boil down to low wages, high rents, gentrification, income inequality, and lack of quality affordable housing, which if you addressed, you wouldn't even need to subsidize people in that way.

Rent subsidies for people who pay rent? That is in effect using renters as an intermediary through which to channel money that ends up in private hands. Why not just leave the renters out and cut the cheque directly to their landlords?

Thu, 2019-01-24 13:00

(Reply to #58) #59

montgomery

Aristotleded24 wrote:

The real issues boil down to low wages, high rents, gentrification, income inequality, and lack of quality affordable housing, ...................

You nailed it! So at the risk of deviating a little off-topic I'll just say:

What happens in the US has a huge influence on Canada quite quickly. The Americans demonstrated a discontent in their last pres election for the establishment system. They didn't get a chance to choose Bernie because the party hijacked that hope. But they chose Trump because he was going to buck the system and be the renegade candidate that would fulfill the people's dreams. [b]He lied [/b] but they haven't got that figured out yet.

There is a real possibility that the people are going to try again in a peaceful way in the US. Revolution can't come easy and that's too much to hope for.

And when the people stand up they are going to be asking for nearly exactly that which you have suggested. Then Canada's politicians will be able to get the balls to follow suit.

That's how I think it's going to happen, if indeed anything happens. That's when we need to have a P.M. in Canada who's smart enough to follow suit!

I wouldn't remind everybody of Tommy's dream because we've all got it planted in the back of our heads, except that there's a real possibility of the Americans breaking through the establishment wall next time.

Thu, 2019-01-24 13:43

(Reply to #59) #60

kropotkin1951

montgomery wrote:

kropotkin1951 wrote:

Besides a quick look at demographic data says that Russia has only 13% self identified atheists in its population.

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

You went and asked the wrong question so you could cook the books. In truth, 13% atheists is huge! Only 2.4% of Americans say they are atheists.

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

I'll pursue this with you til it falls off the rails, but I'm not sure what's going to be proven?

i have no idea what your are trying to prove. I am just trying to make sure that we are talking about facts not misinformed suppositions. Canada by the way has 24% of the population that claims no religious affiliation. The Lower Mainland has nearly 50% of the population that claims no religious affiliation.

So now that we know those facts what is the point you are making?

Thu, 2019-01-24 14:05

(Reply to #60) #61

montgomery

kropotkin1951 wrote:

montgomery wrote:

kropotkin1951 wrote:

Besides a quick look at demographic data says that Russia has only 13% self identified atheists in its population.

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

You went and asked the wrong question so you could cook the books. In truth, 13% atheists is huge! Only 2.4% of Americans say they are atheists.

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

I'll pursue this with you til it falls off the rails, but I'm not sure what's going to be proven?

i have no idea what your are trying to prove. I am just trying to make sure that we are talking about facts not misinformed suppositions. Canada by the way has 24% of the population that claims no religious affiliation. The Lower Mainland has nearly 50% of the population that claims no religious affiliation.

So now that we know those facts what is the point you are making?

I'm a little wary of answering you here because the 'Ban the Liberal' cops are at work again. But I'll try anyway as we go off-topic. Very naughty, but relatively safe for me when you are promoting the off-topic stuff! You set a very bad tone in the beginning between us but maybe we can work through that?

I surmised that Russia and China would be among the least religious of the modern first world countries. I could be wrong about Russia and I can accept that if I'm proven wrong. But I don't accept statistical evidence which doesn't prove your point. Quoting a likely biased study on the number of atheists in certain countries just doesn't do it for me. So if you choose to pursue the question then statistics on how many attend church on Sunday or the number of churches or something of that nature would be convincing. Anyway, my statement on China isn't contested.

Remind me why this became an issue? Or better still, I'll concede you Russia if you're giving me China.

Thu, 2019-01-24 14:15

(Reply to #61) #62

kropotkin1951

montgomery wrote:

I surmised that Russia and China would be among the least religious of the modern first world countries. I could be wrong about Russia and I can accept that if I'm proven wrong. But I don't accept statistical evidence which doesn't prove your point.

I am trying to point out to you that Canada is one of the least religious places on the planet and BC is the least religious place in Canada. I still have not got a clue what point you are trying to make about China and Russia and religion but since it started from a factual premise that is incorrect I felt that I had something to contribute to the thread. I like most people on this site prefer to discuss topics on the basis of facts not surmises.

Here is a link to some raw data that clearly shows that 41% of people in Metro Vancouver in the 2011 census claimed they had no religious affiliation. I don't really understand why you want to argue that facts are not facts.

http://www.metrovancouver.org/services/regional-planning/PlanningPublica...

Thu, 2019-01-24 14:22

#63

kropotkin1951

The Chinese numbers are way harder to interpret depending on how one views their ancestor worship. If it is a religion then the Chinese have many religious people but if it is not then it has one of the least percentages. The Chinese themselves do not seem to think it is a religion when they are asked so about 90% of Chinese would be non-religious. Given China's history that is not a modern event but is the historic Han spirituality. The Metro Vancouver numbers on the other hand show a very strong modern trend to being non-religious from being predominantly Christian.

Thu, 2019-01-24 15:21

#64

Sean in Ottawa

As I mentionned before -- the real problem is income. When it comes to affordable housing you have the problem that if you support income or housing -- as others have pointed out -- it becomes a wage subsidy for low wage people. Just one more subsidy to business.

Not that finding support for income cannot be done but the details matter. Making employers pay more of a living wage cannot be left out of the equation.

Thu, 2019-01-24 15:23

(Reply to #64) #65

montgomery

kropotkin1951 wrote:

The Chinese numbers are way harder to interpret depending on how one views their ancestor worship. If it is a religion then the Chinese have many religious people but if it is not then it has one of the least percentages. The Chinese themselves do not seem to think it is a religion when they are asked so about 90% of Chinese would be non-religious. Given China's history that is not a modern event but is the historic Han spirituality. The Metro Vancouver numbers on the other hand show a very strong modern trend to being non-religious from being predominantly Christian.

The way in which religious persuasion or lack of, pertains to political persuasion could become a topic of interest. I think there's already a thread that is asking the question. I'm nor going to get into my own personal feelings on that because I don't want to unnecessarily alienate anyone. Unless a religious believer kicks the sleeping dog, it's probaably best to let him lay.

Brian Topp: "What awaits the NDP in 2019?"

Pages