Posc Student

An Ipsos Reid poll says that Ignatieff came in second, slightly ahead of Layton. The poll also showed that respondents thought Ignatieff acted and sounded most like a Prime Minister and that he would be better able to handle the economy and taxes then Harper. http://www.ipsos-na.com/news-polls/pressrelease.aspx?id=5205

Halifax is supposedly booming but it's not showing up in the province's gdp growth at all. If Halifax is doing "VERY VERY well" then the state of the rest of the province is VERY VERY bad. The NDP raised taxes in Nova Scotia, which seems to be the reason for the surplus. I also heard something about how they didn't include the 2010/2011 university funding in the budget because they put it in their first budget. The governmenr is also back in deficits for the coming year. Newfoundland and Labrador's government cut taxes, and I think Saskatchwan's may have too, and both are running surpluses.

Who cares if she's a Canadian citizen or not, are we not suppose to marry people from outside the country now?

Ahahahahahaha Harper is nothing but a big liar!

Seeing I'm not from Ontario but hear a good bit about Finance Minister Dwight Duncan how well is he liked in his province? Not really just your own personal view of him but overall, is he fairly popular or not? I've heard him mentioned as the likely successor to Dalton McGuinty but an article I read today also said that some think he may head to Ottawa, could he be the federal Liberal leader?

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I hope there is no test involved for party members or candidates.

The summer numbers showed they could win 100+ seats or so, that would be very good for Ignatieff. He'd still need to leave but at least he wouldn't be totally embaressed.

The Liberals still have a good oppertunity to do well in this election. Harper's record is far from perfect and there is a lot to critisize him on. The attack ads have been what has really runied Ignatieff, though he doesn't have much political smarts, when he first became leader the party did well in the polls and when Harper has screwed up they caught up. The Liberals did well during this summer's tour and with positive press and solid policy ideas the party may surprise in the election. While their polling numbers may not look to great right now there are still a lot of Canadians who would be willing to vote for the Liberals. Forming a government is unlikely but pulling strong numbers in eastern Canada is a likely possibility and who knows the election of Christy Clark in BC may also help them.

Nice to see everyone is staying on topic. He's had cancer, he just had hip surgery, he's nearly 61 years old, there's a likely chance the party will lose seats in the election and unlike some parties they have people who are mentioned as likely successors. Layton has been leader since 2003 and could retire with a good pension. I don't see why he'd be putting himself through all this when there's no need.

If there is one leader who will definitly be gone after this election it's Jack Layton, his health isn't great, he's not young, he's been leader a long time and now it seems he will be facing pressure within the party to leave. I don't know a whole lot about the NDP but I'm wondering who others think will be the next leader or who will run for the position. Right now it seems as though Thomas Mulcair would be the front-runner. I don't know a whole lot about him so I don't know where he stands on policy issues or what the caucus thinks of him but he seems popular and being a Quebecker I would think would help the NDP in his province. So is Mulcair the next leader of the party? Would he be able to easily sweep the race? Or will he even get re-elected in the next elecion?

One poll obviously shows them doing well and another shows them not doing to well, not strange at all.

I meant Canada as a whole and not a regional level. A poll last week showed them at only 20% in Quebec City which is bad.

A poll last week showed the Conservative were only at 20% in Quebec City and that they would lose seats there. Some polls have showed them with higher numbers in Quebec, though Ekols had them at 15%, but just like in Canada if their support is more spread out throughout the province instead of being concentrated in certains regions it won't help them.

I wish Canada had a PC Party, I don't like any of our parties or their leaders. As for Dion, when you look at what he spoke about when he ran for the Liberal leadership he had some great ideas and he seemed like he had potential, poor communication and a Green Shift that was too much too soon screwed him.

Cyntia Downey in Newfoundland and Labrador has spoken out against this saying that she wasn't aware of what was going on. She thought the money deposited in her account was for her to use and that because it was taken it caused her to lose the election.

So it's fine for Harper to not to go because he's Prime Minister but it's not fine for Ignatieff who is trying to become Prime Minister?

Harper's not to fond of showing up for votes either.

The Alberta PCs have a good chance of electing a female leader as well, that's more of what I was getting at then Danielle Smith.

Why does the Yukon hardly count? How is that any different then in the 10 provinces? The next year will be an interesting one for women in Canadian politics. Kathy Dunderdale will lead her party to victory in October, Christy Clark will likely lead her party to victory if they have an election relatively soon, Alberta may possibly have a female premier by September, over the next year there will be an election in Quebec which as it looks right now will lead them to electing their first female premier. PEI is also having an election soon, their opposition leader is a woman though the current government is very popular so she probably won't become premier.

Regional results do matter when you have a party that garners huge numbers in several provinces like the Conservatives do. The Conservatives would likely win every seat in Alberta if they were at 50% so being at 64% only inflates their national number. Pollsters have said that they need about 42% to win a majority government.

I understand the statistics behind it and the margin of error but you cannot just cast aside the regional results when trying to predict one party getingt a majority or not. If you have two polls that give the Conservatives 42% it doesn't mean that both will result in the same majority government or if it will result in a minority government.

He was at the helm but what did he do? Canada already had a strong banking system in place, which he did not agree with, and he wasn't planning on using stimulous money till he was forced into it. The only reason I'm not a Conservative supporter is because of Harper. If you cannot look at the regional numbers then how can you look at the national numbers and think they are correct?

Oh no I made a mistake typing. What has Harper done in the last 5 years that is of any significance you tool?

They will get no more then 2 in Newfoundland and Labrador.