New Canadian Politics Thread

[UWHabs]

Pollara is not a good polling firm.

Pollara's one of the big ones, and one of the few who still do phone surveys (most of the rest are IVR or online only). Mainstreet has it 39-34 PC, so they're basically all agreeing. Abacus is the only polling firm showing the NDP up, but they've had the Liberals at 23 for basically the whole election so something different is going on there that none of the other firms are seeing (everyone else has the Libs 18-20).

 

[zeke]

http://onpulse.ca/blog/ndp-holds-onto-lead-over-pcs-as-outcome-is-uncertain-at-this-point

PCs lead among those who have already voted, 34 percent for PC, 30 for NDP, 27 percent for liberals.

those are unexpected numbers for all 3 parties. interesting.

 

[worm]

Ya, sure, until people saw the platform and realized it wasn't that much of a draw.

Sure. But as a strategy for how I vote I prefer that.

Currently in AB we have the "vote for me because something something oil"

 

[zeke]

I'm not speculating anything. Early voting helps the PC's. I'm not doing the research for you.

well you might want to show that research.

because in terms of political axioms, high turnout usually means bad news for a) incumbents, and b) conservatives.


what's interesting here is the Trump factor - i.e. that a canditate like trump, who ford wants to be, has seemed to gin up the types of voters who haven't voted much in the past.

 

[Altair]

those are unexpected numbers for all 3 parties. interesting.

Depressing. 57 percent of votes for a center left party, Doug Ford as Premier. :nono

 

[Wayward DP]

Depressing. 57 percent of votes for a center left party, Doug Ford as Premier. :nono

FPTP in all its glory

 

[Altair]

FPTP in all its glory

FPTP works just fine when people know how to vote strategically.

I don't know what liberal voters are thinking right now.

 

[Wayward DP]

FPTP works just fine when people know how to vote strategically.

I don't know what liberal voters are thinking right now.

it's not that simple. strategic voting is brilliant in theory, sketchy in practice. anytime you base your vote off of assumptions regarding what other voters are doing / will do, you are setting yourself up for trouble.

 

[MindzEye]

I would like to see FPTP left in the dustbin of history at some point, yeah. It might work "fine" under certain circumstances, but I'd like to think that we can do better than "fine" in representing the will of the populace.

 

[Wayward DP]

MMP is the way to go

 

[CaptainBolduke]

well you might want to show that research.

because in terms of political axioms, high turnout usually means bad news for a) incumbents, and b) conservatives.


what's interesting here is the Trump factor - i.e. that a canditate like trump, who ford wants to be, has seemed to gin up the types of voters who haven't voted much in the past.

Altair posted the results for you. Early voting helps the PC's. You could have found it yourself rather than lashing out.

 

[CaptainBolduke]

MMP is the way to go

Gotta love Chretien

http://nationalpost.com/news/politi...r-unelectable-apparatchiks-jean-chretien-says

 

[UWHabs]

FPTP works just fine when people know how to vote strategically.

I don't know what liberal voters are thinking right now.

The problem is that you only see the national/provincial numbers, and people don't think about how things shift locally.

So take my old riding of Willowdale. The Liberals won that seat with like 55% last time. If you take the provincial swing, the riding basically ends up being 40% PC, 30% each for Liberal and NDP. So yeah, you can say "vote strategically", but you probably have the NDP people thinking the Liberals should vote NDP, and the Liberals thinking the NDP should vote Liberal.

Basically, each side has a reason for their thinking. The overall shifts are not enough to move the riding close to the NDP - basically the riding is not left-wing enough to naturally elect the NDP. But with the Liberal vote cratering everywhere else, they're losing enough there that they can't retain that riding.

And you're going to see similar things in Markham, Richmond Hill, Vaughan, and other areas. Sure, some of those ones will have a strong enough PC vote that it won't make a difference, but there's a decent number of ridings which basically don't have enough left wing support to shift over to that side, where the Liberals have enough to keep 2nd place, but have lost too much to win the ridings. It's just too hard to coordinate 5k-10k people to all en masse move their votes when you don't really know which party is actually going to have the general support.

 

[LeafGm]

MMP is garbage.

I can't stand the idea of a system where you have "elected" officials getting their jobs not on the basis of anyone voting directly for them, but because they're on a party list.

Ranked balloting has always seemed like the best option to me. Everyone still gets directly elected by the voting public, and it makes "strategic voting" obsolete.

 

[Altair]

The problem is that you only see the national/provincial numbers, and people don't think about how things shift locally.

So take my old riding of Willowdale. The Liberals won that seat with like 55% last time. If you take the provincial swing, the riding basically ends up being 40% PC, 30% each for Liberal and NDP. So yeah, you can say "vote strategically", but you probably have the NDP people thinking the Liberals should vote NDP, and the Liberals thinking the NDP should vote Liberal.

Basically, each side has a reason for their thinking. The overall shifts are not enough to move the riding close to the NDP - basically the riding is not left-wing enough to naturally elect the NDP. But with the Liberal vote cratering everywhere else, they're losing enough there that they can't retain that riding.

And you're going to see similar things in Markham, Richmond Hill, Vaughan, and other areas. Sure, some of those ones will have a strong enough PC vote that it won't make a difference, but there's a decent number of ridings which basically don't have enough left wing support to shift over to that side, where the Liberals have enough to keep 2nd place, but have lost too much to win the ridings. It's just too hard to coordinate 5k-10k people to all en masse move their votes when you don't really know which party is actually going to have the general support.

Canada, on a whole, did it during the 2015 election.

The NDP and Liberals were tied or close throughout the entire election. Then the NDP broke in Quebec, their numbers started to drop and then the trend started to happen nationally once the Liberals looked like the only party capable of beating the Conservatives.

The shift started a week and a half ago in Ontario, the same message should have been received from the electorate. NDP the only ones who can beat ford, the Liberal vote should have collapsed to 12-15 percent, the NDP should have been up around 42, enough to eke out a win. But for some reason they have stalled in the mid 30s and will lose out baring a drastic shift in the next 48 hours.

FPTP should have worked here to keep ford out same way it worked in 2015 to get harper out, but for some reason, it isn't. And it's not like there is significantly less information about individual ridings now than in 2015. There is simply less movement.

 

[zeke]

Altair posted the results for you. Early voting helps the PC's. You could have found it yourself rather than lashing out.

heh.

it's fine that you don't have any research. but don't pretend you do.

just state your opinion and move on.

 

[MindzEye]

Gotta love Chretien

http://nationalpost.com/news/politi...r-unelectable-apparatchiks-jean-chretien-says

I wouldn't expect him to feel any other way about this, but the introduction of new parties and new ideas is good for democracy. Power sharing agreements are good for democracy, but bad for legacy parties.

 

[Wayward DP]

Canada, on a whole, did it during the 2015 election.

The NDP and Liberals were tied or close throughout the entire election. Then the NDP broke in Quebec, their numbers started to drop and then the trend started to happen nationally once the Liberals looked like the only party capable of beating the Conservatives.

The shift started a week and a half ago in Ontario, the same message should have been received from the electorate. NDP the only ones who can beat ford, the Liberal vote should have collapsed to 12-15 percent, the NDP should have been up around 42, enough to eke out a win. But for some reason they have stalled in the mid 30s and will lose out baring a drastic shift in the next 48 hours.

FPTP should have worked here to keep ford out same way it worked in 2015 to get harper out, but for some reason, it isn't. And it's not like there is significantly less information about individual ridings now than in 2015. There is simply less movement.

Horwath may have something to do with this

 

[BeLeafer]

Pollara's one of the big ones, and one of the few who still do phone surveys (most of the rest are IVR or online only). Mainstreet has it 39-34 PC, so they're basically all agreeing. Abacus is the only polling firm showing the NDP up, but they've had the Liberals at 23 for basically the whole election so something different is going on there that none of the other firms are seeing (everyone else has the Libs 18-20).

Live telephone polling is not great methodology for political polls these days. First, the quality of interviewers is garbage because no one will pay for good interviewers. It also increases social desirability bias a good deal, as people are much less likely to be honest about their voting intention with a live person if they think it's not socially acceptable (this is why, all firms using live interviewers got the Rob Ford election way wrong).

I'm not arguing for other firms or polls. I think most of them are garbage. The live phone polling likely has the advantage of at least being probability-based, although I wouldn't be surprised if Pollara reuses bought lists for sample.

 

[Altair]

MMP is garbage.

I can't stand the idea of a system where you have "elected" officials getting their jobs not on the basis of anyone voting directly for them, but because they're on a party list.

Ranked balloting has always seemed like the best option to me. Everyone still gets directly elected by the voting public, and it makes "strategic voting" obsolete.

Yeah, I like ranked ballot as well, but you know that it would kill the conservative party for a election cycle or two which will lead to those angry individuals being disillusioned with the electorate system