TTM

Yes, unless the numbers change, I'm see massive vote splitting in Ontario, benefiting the Conservatives.

Will never happen. Promising natives anything angers their base even more than promising Quebec anything.

Chretien. And Harper has never actually won an election.

As it stands now I think that unless the Conservative vote collapses significantly in Ontario over the next couple of days, that they will likely pick up seats there due to vote splitting. But it looks like these gains will be offset by losses elsewhere. It's amusing that a surging Liberal party would have little effect in the Conservative heartland (AL, SK), since the NDP are for the most part the second choice party here. But with a surging NDP there is a chance of prying a few (perhaps as many as 5 or 6) seats from the Tories in these provinces. I'm curious to see what happens on election day. I recently had a colleague who views himself as a staunch Conservative indicate that he was going to vote NDP this time around. I wonder what the effect of the very large advanced poll turnout will have on the "Orange surge". It will be interesting to see the results from the advanced polls compared to those who vote on election night.

This will be a long post, but bear with me. Some of this was posted on another thread, some of it is new: There are several problems with the FPTP system, many of which are fundimental. The main one is that some votes are "worth" more than others. Here are some statistics from the 2008 election: Party____Votes_______Seats Cons____5,209,069___143 Lib______3,633,185____77 BQ______1,379,991____49 NDP_____2,515,288____37 Green_____937,613_____0 From the parties perspective, to gain 1 seat, they need Party_____Votes Cons_____36,427.06 Lib_______47,184.22 BQ_______28,163.08 NDP______67,980.76 Green_____infinite From the voters perspective, 1,000,0000 votes gains you Party_____Seats Cons_____27.45 Lib_______21.19 BQ_______35.51 NDP______14.71 Green_____0 Clearly, in that election, a BQ vote was "worth' more than a Conservative vote, which was "worth" more than a Liberal vote, and so on. If all votes were equal, then parliament would have looked like this (ignoring independents, parties with fractional seats): Party_____Seats Cons_____117 Lib________82 BQ________31 NDP_______57 Green______21 When electing a representative, each vote is counted equally, one at a time. The problem is that once one candidate reaches a plurality (not a majority), the wishes of the remaining voters (often a majority) is discarded; they provide no input into the makeup of the government. Stated another way, in FPTP, all votes contribute equally to the process, however all votes do not contribute equally to the results. In a truly democratic system, both must be true. The second flaw of FPTP stems from the first. In order to elect a candidate nationally, a party must concentrate the vote regionally. Take the BQ. All of their support is concentrated in Quebec, and therefore they are able to achieve very high seat counts, compared to their national popularity. The NDP has the opposite problem, in that it has a fairly broad national support, which is generally not concentrated in any one region. They are consistently underrepresented. Or take Reform/PC, before the two parties merged. In spite of achieving almost identical support (~19%) in the 1997 election, the regional Reform Party was rewarded with 60 seats, while the national PC party was rewarded with 20 seats. A national electoral system should not reward the regionallization of party policy or support. A third problem with FPTP, or any riding system, is that the arbitrary political boundaries of the ridings can skew the results. Take for example Saskatchewan. SK for the last several elections, has voted in entirely right wing (Reform/Alliance/Conservative) representatives, with one notable exception. While right wing support is indeed very strong (~50% last election), the reason for this continuing (near) sweep is due to riding gerrymandering: the strong left wing support in the cities is diluted by splitting the large cities into multiple ridings, and then adding a sizable chunk of (right wing supporting) rural population. This is nominally done to keep the ridings down to a "manageable" size, but it effectively puts the left wing candidates at a significant disadvantage. Simply redistributing the ridings would consistently increase the number of seats that the left wing parties win in SK. The results of voting should not be affected by arbitrary political boundaries. This distorts voter representation. In addition, (and somewhat off topic) it is difficult for the elected MP to effectively represent the often very different concerns of the two groups. A fourth problem with FPTP is that you are forced to cast a single vote for two often conflicting issues: which candidate will best represents my riding, and its specific issues, and which party's platform most closely aligns with my views for the country as a whole. People are forced to vote for a local candidate which they do not respect, in order to show their support for the national party, or conversely vote for a good local candidate, despite not supporting their party affiliation (I find myself in this boat). If this occurs, then no matter how you vote, it does not fully represent your wishes. It also leads to an number of other issues: If you only vote mainly based on party affiliation (which I suspect the vast majority of voters do), then if your preferred party has next to no chance of representing your district, you are forced to either (a) not vote, ( "waste" your vote by voting for that candidate; that vote will be tossed, and will not contribute to the makeup of the Government, or ( c) vote for one of the candidates who does have a chance of winning. Included in this is the idea of strategically voting for the candidate most likely to defeat the front-runner. Any system which encourages you to vote against your actual wishes distorts the actual will of the population. If a riding tends to vote mainly based on party affiliation, then local representatives tend not to actually represent their constituency, and simply become mouthpieces of the party they represent. It is difficult to run as an independent, because the party candidate has the party machinery, party money, and party exposure at a national level. Any candidate (or sitting MP) that attempts to voice an independent opinion faces the possible loss of party membership, and the difficulties of an independent campaign. Obviously no system beyond a Direct Democracy can entirely cure these flaws, but FPTP is pretty much the bottom of the barrel when it comes to electoral systems.

Despite trends in recent poles, the two reasons I don't think a Liberal win are likely is the unpopularity of the Provincial Liberal governments in the two provinces which matter the most, and the shortness of the campaign. The first is likely to shave a couple of points off of the Liberal vote, no matter how different the Provincial and Federal wings may be, and the second does not leave much time for the trailing party to build enough momentum to carry the day. Being from out West, I don't follow Quebec politics very closely, but it appears that the Liberal Charest gov't is on its way out, with the very likely possibility of a new separatist provincial gov't. If this occurs, I wonder what the mood there is towards another Referendum? I ask because I ask because this whole "evil coalition" seems, in addition to being disingenuous and intentionally divisive, entirely short-sighted as well. While a Conservative gov't would likely get some credit for the things it did in its first term (Distinct Nation, etc) when it was trying to woo Quebec voters, as far as I'm aware it has done little to shore up support since then (to say nothing of the various gaffes on that file), and it has gone out of its way to demonize the BQ, a party that gets its support not only from separatists, but many soft nationalists as well, i.e. people who do not want to separate, but see the BQ as obviously the strongest voice for Quebec interests on the federal scene. It would appear to me to be awkward for the current Conservative government to successfully federalism in a referendum (should one occur), based on dismissing their (meaning the swing voters, soft nationalists) democratic representatives since at least 2008. But on the other hand, has enough time passed and enough changed occurred for Quebecers to forgive the Liberal party?

Right, these votes are counted one at a time, until one candidate reaches a plurality (not a majority). The wishes of the remaining voters (often a majority) is discarded; they provide no input into the makeup of the government. Every individuals vote should have some input, no matter how small, into the makeup of government. Anything else is flawed. I live in Saskatchewan. We elect, with one exception, Conservatives. While Conservative support is strong (~50% last election), the reason for this continuing near complete dominance is due to riding gerrymandering: the strong NDP/Liberal support in the cities is diluted by breaking the large cities into multiple ridings that contain an even larger rural populations. Simply redistributing the ridings would consistently reduce the number of seats that the Conservatives win in SK. The results of voting should not be affected by arbitrary political boundaries. This distorts voter representation. In my own riding, the candidate representing the party I would like to vote for is 3rd, by a fair margin (note they represent one of the three major parties). If I vote for this person it is effectively the same as not voting. So I can either waste a vote or vote strategically for one of the two candidates who have a shot. Any system in which a voter is discouraged from voting for who their preferred choice is flawed. Obviously no system beyond a Direct Democracy can entirely cure these flaws, but FPTP is pretty much the bottom of the barrel when it comes to electoral systems. Sure, all votes contribute equally to the process, however all votes do not contribute equally to the results. In a fair system, both must be true. As far as local politics, I prefer a mixed system, with voters voting for both a party and a local candidate. The local candidate wins FPTP style, but a number of seats are reserved and candidates are chosen from a party list to fill the reserved seats, so that the proportions of parties in parliament roughly represent the popular percentages of the parties (based on the party vote). As far as local representation, we get near 0 representation from our MP. This is true of the entire Conservative contingent from this province. The local media tends to call them the "Missing 13", amongst other things. They will probably be re-elected. A tree stump could be re-elected for the Conservative party in some ridings.

Yes the costs of other fighters are known, within a certain range. The exact cost to supply the specific needs of the Canadian Military would not be known unless there was a tender. Competition, or lack thereof would also have some effect on price. But my main point was the unknown cost of the F-35 vs the known prices of its competition. That and the further unknowns on the delivery timeline. We did this once already. We still have no helicopters. There is no excuse to not have an open tender.

This thread suddenly has all sorts of speculation about the costs of alternate fighters compared to the F-35. But thats all it is...speculation. Unless an actual tender process is carried out we will never know how the costs compare. And what other reason is there for not following that process? And at least with the alternate fighters, we have some idea of what they are actually capable of and when they could actually be delivered. We still don't have our choppers. As for the G8/G20, I believe we volunteered for at least one or both of those galas. And it was not the choice of the RCMP to hold one in downtown Toronto.

Ignoring fractions of a seat. My bad.

Straight proportional does (not that I favour it). No representative system can though. Pretty much any proportional type system can be tweeked by adding a threshold below which you don't get any seats.

The last election: Party____Votes_______Seats Cons____5,209,069___143 Lib______3,633,185____77 BQ______1,379,991____49 NDP_____2,515,288____37 Green_____937,613_____0 From the parties perspective, to gain 1 seat, they need Party_____Votes Cons_____36,427.06 Lib_______47,184.22 BQ_______28,163.08 NDP______67,980.76 Green_____infinite From the voters perspective, 1,000,0000 votes gains you Party_____Seats Cons_____27.45 Lib_______21.19 BQ_______35.51 NDP______14.71 Green_____0 Clearly, in that election, a BQ vote was worth more than a Conservative vote, which was worth more than a Liberal vote, and so on. If all votes were equal, then parliament would have looked like this (ignoring independents, parties with fractional seats): Party_____Seats Cons_____117 Lib________82 BQ________31 NDP_______57 Green______21

This isn't some sort of game, even though it's often played like one. It is our government. Unfair for the parties reflects unfair for the voters. All votes should be given equal weight. As the system is currently instituted, some votes are worth more than others, and some votes are entirely wasted. Representation in parliament should reflect the will of the people, not the gaming of the system by political parties.

The Conservative Party never received more than 5,374,071 votes (2006 election) and yet they supposedly represent about 10 million Canadians. How many of those votes were in protest against the Liberals? Does that invalidate their government?

Goes to show the limits of tax policy Everybody around him seemed to know. His opponents seemed to know. Most economists seemed to know. For a supposed economist himself, it doesn't speak well to his competence. No I criticize him for taking credit for policy that wasn't his. And for weakening the governments finances for populist tax gimmicks.

Agreed. I wasn't certain of my memory of that one, and it was late. That's why it was 0 rather than 1. I will remove it. So you don't think governments should run surpluses and pay off debt during the "good" times? When should they perform these actions? Are they to be barred by law from running debts during recessions? I don't see anything invalid with the comment. So I did. Also good policy. Doesn't help me as I have a tax-free savings vehicle attached to a UL policy from before the introduction of the TFSA. When it is poor economic policy. Government provides a number of fundamental services. Money isn't always worth more in the citizens hand rather than the govt's. There is a cost/benefit to any taxation decision. This one was mostly cost to little benefit. Any tax decision is requires a cost/benefit analysis. It is also a complex problem, and I don't claim to know what the right taxation rate is 18%, 15.5.%, 50%, 2%. So I come at the problem from basic logic. If lowering the rate has a significant effect, then either it isn't competitive, or you've lowered it so far that you hope to win a race to the bottom. Also, the tax rate isn't the only thing companies look at when investing in Canada. To think that a percentage or two plus or minus is going to have companies flocking to or leaving in droves is unrealistic. It might nudge them one way or another, but I doubt in most cases it is the deal maker or breaker. Unless the rate is uncompetitive. Perhaps because they said definitively they would not tax the trusts, thereby effectively signaling open season. I didn't say companies didn't like lower taxes. I said done wrongly, tax breaks are expensive and inefficient. The fact that the Conservatives closed that loophole proves me right. Government spending/revenues are best viewed by whatever terms makes your party look good or the other party look bad And yet we now have debt levels higher than the US. Mostly due to increased house purchasing. Mostly due to low interest rates and relaxed lending rules. Nope So he you agree he was wrong not to introduce a package, and the opposition was right to force him into it? I did, and I am. But that's not what he meant. He was trying to tell Canadians there would be no crash, their money was safe. Blowing smoke up our collective asses is not helpful. The Liberals are entirely to blame for the choppers (unless you know something I don't). The jet deal has all the hallmarks of that definition of insanity... (or if you prefer, those who do not study history...) Says every government that runs up a deficit. How are Greece and Ireland doing? and the rest of the PIGS. How much interest are we paying on the debt? Should the Liberals form a minority, they can govern just as the Conservatives have. And the Conservatives will be placed in the same position as the Liberals have for the last 5 years. It is entirely possible that a number of the spendthrift promises would be jettisoned on the alter of "compromise" with the Conservatives. It makes the Liberals look fiscally competent, and yet most of the blame for broken promises is deflected onto the Conservatives. Also, you really shouldn't mention Trudeau, without counterbalancing Mulroney and Cretien.

I'm sure they take campaigning very seriously. They're just not that successful at it. If the rules in place are fundamentally flawed, and I agree they are, then they not only have a right, but a responsibility to speak out. The situation with the Green party points out the perversity and the underlying flaws in our system. They already have a broad-based low level support across the country. While not enough to elect a member in any individual riding under the FPTP system, in total they represent approximately 1.5 million Canadians. And yet despite all this support, they have absolutely no voice on the national political scene. In order to have a voice nationally they have to somehow concentrate this support regionally. This fact is bizarre. I repeat: in order for a party with a platform that apparently resonates nationally to get a seat in the national government, they must change the focus of the party so that it can be electable by a majority in some small and narrow region of the country. And even if they do somehow achieve this in one or two ridings, there representation in parliament will still lag far below their actual support nationally. The same issue has traditionally hurt the NDP. The reverse is the reason that the BQ have such disproportionate power, even serving as Her Majesty's Official Opposition. If you're a Liberal, Conservative, or BQ partisan, then I could see why you wouldn't want the system to change. Those who benefit from a systems unfairness rarely desire to improve it. However if you care at all about having a democratic system in which the people and parties in power accurately reflect the will of the electorate, then you have to be at the very least sympathetic to the plight of the Greens.

Directed at me or directed at the Greens, the sentiment is the same. A comment antagonistic to the rights to opinion, speech, and dissent. Cheers comrade

Let me parse it for you: "Learn to work within it like everyone else" = "put up" "Stop fighting the system we've got" = "shut up" (this is a forum, and I can contribute my speech) Put up or shut up. QED. Or would you prefer in Russian?

And yet most of my beefs with Harper are with his policies on the run-up to the recession, which I saw as short-sited, and his lack of a plan for how to get out of debt now.

Yeah, I thought she did well enough in last years debate, and the few other times I've seen her speak. I still don't agree with big chunks of her platform, and running against MacKay was (capital R)etarded, especially when she got a free pass from the Liberals, and the party was near its peak in popularity.

No doubt. But she still represents 1 in 20 voters. True, but it also means (in theory, if perhaps not in practice), that partys can attract and elect talent that would not necessarily have the inclination to run in an election, or simply be unfortunate enough to lose to an even better candidate (because the winner is always the best candidate in the riding. By definition.)

To tell me to not question the system, to "put up or shut up" (to paraphrase), seemed like a fairly totalitarian comment. Hence the appropriateness of the reply.

I didn't say it was helpful. I said it was appropriate.

Agreed. But the major parties have had morons for leaders, and we try not to hold it against them (unless its someone else's parties leader, and then we let them have it) Both options are a better alternative than what we have. Pretty much anything is better than what we have. Counting on the voting system by itself to eliminate the party apparatchiks is likely bound to failure. First-past-the-post in theory should be as about as immune as the two forms you suggested, but witness the current gov't.