Vancouver King

Yes, very mysterious - even more so now that the campaign has switched from Duffy/PMO corruption. to the economy. Maybe Tory Central won't trot him out of the closet for fear he will suggest Harper's granddaughter can pay for Conservative's latest recession.

June numbers are not a quarter and recessions are defined by quarters.

But until the numbers indicate otherwise in 6-7 months, Canada officially remains in recession. Refer to the Balanced Budget Act thread and read Harpers own definition of a recession's conclusion.

How do you know we are out of recession? According to Harper's own legislation, following an official recession, there must be two consecutive quarters of growth to declare the recession over.

Most Conservatives here refer to our latest recession in the past tense. According to the above, until Stats Can reports in 6-7 months, Canada remains in recession.

Then why is it only Canada in recession among the G7?

I can't imagine political circumstances less conducive to re-election: double recessions, uninterrupted deficits, multiple scandals. If Conservatives can generate a majority from the current mess let's just proclaim Harper emperor and save the expense of elections and parliament.

That's easy, Pik. Now that Stats Can has confirmed multiple recessions on Harper's watch, choosing Trudeau or Mulcair becomes an economy-saving civic duty.

Now that our second recession on Harper's watch has been confirmed by Stats Can, does it mean all future discussion involving Canada's recessions should be prefaced with the question, "which one?"

Abacus' latest has it a 3-way tie within the margin of error: NDP - 31 CPC - 30 Libs - 28 Grn - 7 Blq - 3 Ontario regional numbers are interesting: Libs - 34 CPC - 33 NDP - 26 NDP must improve dramatically in Ontario if they hope to form majority gov't.

Yes, it is easy to document Conservative and Liberal corruption. We are fortunate to have a third option, the NDP.

These "likeability" readings are close to job approval numbers. Latest EKOS sees it this way: Disapprove/Approve Harper - 67 / 33 Mulcair- 36 / 64 Trudeau-48 / 52 Only 1 in 3 voters approve Harper's job performance.

Say it ain't so...willing to go after offshore tax havens ....the horror, the horror.

Could be. Lord knows, Conservatives could use a double dose of positive economic news.

Only to be eclipsed very soon with confirmation of our current recession.

I will be surprised if the NDP finishes in BC with less than 25 MPs. Liberals should be second and Conservatives will be left a half dozen Okanagan/North East seats. Elizabeth May will, of course, come away with her own constituency.

Why unbelievable? All pollsters and pundits assumed the Duffy trial would have negative implications for Tories - well, here they are in spades. The Ontario regional numbers are particularly tough for Conservatives. In the region that must form the nucleus of a winning effort the once-thought invincible party core now shows signs of crumbling. Twenty-three per cent nationally is possible third party status - an unthinkable step down for this gov't. Conservatives have 8 weeks to stop the bleeding and turn this race around. It might be too late. .

Angus Reid just released their latest poll and it's not great news for Liberals: NDP - 36 CPC - 32 Libs - 23 Green- 4 Bloq - 4 Highlights: Conservative supporters are unshakeable in their party support but in answer to the question, "do you have a very favorable view of Stephen Harper?", only 15% answered in the affirmative. Is this another way of Tory supporters saying, in effect, we support the Conservative party despite Stephen Harper's leadership? Recent regional Quebec numbers showing complete NDP dominance (NDP - 47, Liberals - 20) are now confirmed by a third source as Angus Reid has it NDP - 51, Liberals 17. Let me be the first to say it: The Quebec regional race is over - put 60 seats in the NDP column. The all-important Ontario race is anything but over. Angus Reid has it: CPC - 35 NDP - 33 Libs - 28 Add in Nanos' strange numbers (CPC-40,Liberals-32,NDP-21) and your guess appears as solid as anybody else's.

So you contend this is a margin of error issue based on the small Ontario sample. What are the chances of two consecutive polls showing essentially the same result when both polls, apparently, have prohibitively high margins of error? I'm guessing the chances are unlikely. If there is a third consecutive Nanos sounding with similar numbers, there must be another factor involved.

Then why, as Waldo just pointed out, do the latest Nanos numbers show a moderate increase for Liberals. If Wynne was a negative factor for Liberals, we should expect a decrease in Liberal support.

Let's ask seniors on GIS who can no longer afford their prescriptions what they think of tax credits; let's ask northern indigenous citizens sifting garbage dumps for food what they think of tax credits, let's ask hundreds of thousands of young job seekers unable to find meaningful work what they think of tax credits. Why must every measure proposed by this gov't be directed at those who really don't need them?

The newest Nanos poll released today contains information of positive interest to Conservatives. A week ago Nanos released these numbers for the Ontario region battleground: CPC - 42 Lib - 29 NDP - 23 No one here believed these figures due to Nanos' unusual methodology (4 week rolling average) and small weekly sample size (250). It was deemed an outlier and every other poll from Forum to Abacus seemed to confirm it's rogue nature. Now consider this week's Ontario numbers from Nanos: CPC - 40 Libs - 32 NDP - 21 Far from being a one-time anomaly, Nanos again has Conservatives comfortably in front in all important Ontario. What does Nanos see that other polling firms do not?

That's the rationale of attack ads - a kernel of truth stretched of any semblance to reality, shown relentlessly, leaving an impression, a negative perception of it's victim. Evidence suggests such Tory ads are working, for the third consecutive time, to define Liberal leaders. This time around, however, political circumstances like bad economic numbers, Duffy/PMO scandal, corruption related issues, have all conspired to leave voters with a perception of incompetence and wrong-doing by Conservatives - a perception likely to sink their re-election chances.

Or join a forum like this one and post your counter views. In just a few weeks this site will be near over-run with voters engaged in a 4 year cycle of familiarizing themselves with the election issues. Why not have your views read?

Eyeball: You are probably correct, though it is interesting speculation. I've probably made some CSIS list titled "political dissidents" or otherwise contravened some section of C-51.