Floor Crossings?

[August1991]

I strongly recommend reading John Crosbie's book No Holds Barred, and his account of the Newfoundland election of 1971.

Winston Churchill apparently crossed twice.

 

[ExFlyer]

Crossing the floor is not new and certainly not a rare thing. 

"Switching parties between elections is a controversial practice. Still, more than 300 members of Parliament have changed parties while in office since 1867."

"Library of Parliament data shows that over the last 25 years, 80 MPs have changed their party affiliation between elections"

https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/article/switching-sides-a-brief-history-of-floor-crossing-in-canada/

So, the conservatives demonizing Ma should be an embarrassment to the morals of the entire party.

Edited December 13, 2025 by ExFlyer

[Shady]

There should be by elections for any member that wants to switch parties.  Otherwise it usurps the will of voters and opens up back room bargaining as a method to obtain more power, without having to go to the ballot box which is the way it’s supposed to work.

[August1991]

On 12/13/2025 at 11:29 AM, Shady said:

There should be by elections for any member that wants to switch parties.  Otherwise it usurps the will of voters and opens up back room bargaining as a method to obtain more power, without having to go to the ballot box which is the way it’s supposed to work.

Disagree - but good question.

Shady, do voters choose a "party" or "a person"?

[Shady]

16 hours ago, August1991 said:

Disagree - but good question.

Shady, do voters choose a "party" or "a person"?

I think it depends on the voter.  Some choose person, some choose party.

[eyeball]

7 hours ago, Shady said:

I think it depends on the voter.  Some choose person, some choose party.

Why is even more important especially if you also want to take strategic voting or the raw fundamental ideology of the voter and direction society is leaning into account.

[CdnFox]

On 12/13/2025 at 6:51 AM, ExFlyer said:

Crossing the floor is not new and certainly not a rare thing. 

"Switching parties between elections is a controversial practice. Still, more than 300 members of Parliament have changed parties while in office since 1867."

"Library of Parliament data shows that over the last 25 years, 80 MPs have changed their party affiliation between elections"

https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/article/switching-sides-a-brief-history-of-floor-crossing-in-canada/

So, the conservatives demonizing Ma should be an embarrassment to the morals of the entire party.

Ma is a special case and he deserves to be spat on like the disingenuous lying opportunistic tard he is. 

No wonder you like him  

[CdnFox]

8 hours ago, Shady said:

I think it depends on the voter.  Some choose person, some choose party.

I think generally overall though we can see quite clearly that the person running in the riding  plays a huge role.

If people just voted for the party then you could run literally anyone and the party would win. But we see that that isn't true

There's no doubt in my mind that the party plays a significant role for many voters though.

I'm not sure you can easily separate the two. I think that people make assumptions about the person based on the party they belong to. It creates a kind of a baseline of expected policy support and position. At the same time I don't think that conservative supporters will just support any old person regardless

I would support the idea that a person leaving their party has to citizen independent and then run for the other party if they wish but honestly it doesn't make as much of a difference as you might think considering that they can still vote with the other party anyway. It would just limit the number of things that the other party could promise them to lure them over

[suds]

On 12/12/2025 at 10:14 PM, August1991 said:

Winston Churchill apparently crossed twice.

You're not serious are you??????

[August1991]

1 minute ago, suds said:

You're not serious are you??????

Winston Churchill crossed twice.

His phrase, "To cross twice, is a double rat."

=====

Mark Carney is a weak leader. But he has smart federal Liberal politicos trying to support him.

 

[CdnFox]

31 minutes ago, suds said:

You're not serious are you??????

Yeah he was famous for it.

Funny enough he crossed from the conservatives to the libs the first time over tariffs and free trade. The conservative policy was tariffs and the libs at the time favoured free trade and he believed in free trade. 15 or 20 years later he went back to the conservatives to manage the country's finances and get them on track, which he did. 

[suds]

17 hours ago, CdnFox said:

Yeah he was famous for it.

Funny enough he crossed from the conservatives to the libs the first time over tariffs and free trade. The conservative policy was tariffs and the libs at the time favoured free trade and he believed in free trade. 15 or 20 years later he went back to the conservatives to manage the country's finances and get them on track, which he did. 

I'm not saying it didn't happen. Only that when one takes into account his leadership, accomplishments, and dedication to country, which spanned over a lifetime.... there are few equals. If one wishes to make a comparison, I would advise them not to do it with someone who is incomparable. 

[CdnFox]

28 minutes ago, suds said:

I'm not saying it didn't happen. Only that when one takes into account his leadership, accomplishments, and dedication to country, which spanned over a lifetime.... there are few equals. If one wishes to make a comparison, I would advise them not to do it with someone who is incomparable. 

Not sure, and it's also important to recognize in both cases he did it for very specific reasons and once he had floor crossed he stood by those reasons. It was genuinely more interested in doing what was right for the country that loyalty to a political party and it deserves a hot tip. That cannot be compared to this loser who decided he was a liberal all of a sudden after a 20 minute conversation with a known liar

There have been noble floor crossers in Canada. Consider David Emerson under harper. He was recruited by the liberals specifically because he was an expert in softwood lumber and well-respected on both sides of the border and he was told he would head up the softwood lumber treating negotiations because he was the best there was. This was all public, none of it was ever contested or questionable

But the conservatives won. And harper went to the guy and said you became a politician to do one job. Would you be willing to cross the floor and come do it for us? I will make you in charge of this.

And because he honestly believed that he was the best choice for the country to negotiate the softwood lumber agreement emerson crossed the floor for that specific purpose. And once the deal was done he never ran for politics again.

It's hard to fault someone like that or say that what they did was wrong. If it went the other way and he crossed the liberals under similar circumstances.

Ma is a completely different story. He's scum. 

[John Stone]

On 12/29/2025 at 9:25 PM, August1991 said:

Winston Churchill crossed twice.

His phrase, "To cross twice, is a double rat."

=====

Mark Carney is a weak leader. But he has smart federal Liberal politicos trying to support him.

 

They say the proof of the cooking is in the eating ............. well '26 will be the proof of the cooking or not.

Carney has something that Poilievre does not - international stature.

Canada has been forced to recognize the fact that they can't rely in the future on their historical  economic benefactor - the U.S. - Canada MUST diversify its international markets and international recognition helps in that a great deal. 

Common sense has prevailed a great deal with the Left - Trudeau / Singh are history and so are a lot of the Lefts planks - specifically environmental and social issues - basically Carney has acknowledged they were the stuff of idealists. 

The political picture federally could change very quickly - Poilievre is facing a leadership revue - not just a matter of leading the party into the next election - but leading the party for the decade- another defection now would seal his fate. Bringing down the government  and forcing an election would likely result in a Liberal majority. 

The truth is that while the electorate is warm to Conservative policy - they're generally cold to Poilievre - he is an excellent hack but he is increasingly a day late and a dollar short on the 'sell'.  The upcoming leadership  review might be his swan song. 

The next year will be unity or bust for  Canada - (2) separatists vote of some description will likely be on the docket. 

Poilievre based his campaign on Trudeau ........... that well dried up! 

 

 

[Shady]

On 12/12/2025 at 10:14 PM, August1991 said:

Winston Churchill apparently crossed twice.

 

Irrelevant.

Edited December 31, 2025 by Shady

[Legato]

1 hour ago, John Stone said:

They say the proof of the cooking is in the eating ............. well '26 will be the proof of the cooking or not.

Carney has something that Poilievre does not - international stature.

Canada has been forced to recognize the fact that they can't rely in the future on their historical  economic benefactor - the U.S. - Canada MUST diversify its international markets and international recognition helps in that a great deal. 

Common sense has prevailed a great deal with the Left - Trudeau / Singh are history and so are a lot of the Lefts planks - specifically environmental and social issues - basically Carney has acknowledged they were the stuff of idealists. 

The political picture federally could change very quickly - Poilievre is facing a leadership revue - not just a matter of leading the party into the next election - but leading the party for the decade- another defection now would seal his fate. Bringing down the government  and forcing an election would likely result in a Liberal majority. 

The truth is that while the electorate is warm to Conservative policy - they're generally cold to Poilievre - he is an excellent hack but he is increasingly a day late and a dollar short on the 'sell'.  The upcoming leadership  review might be his swan song. 

The next year will be unity or bust for  Canada - (2) separatists vote of some description will likely be on the docket. 

Poilievre based his campaign on Trudeau ........... that well dried up! 

 

 

The Carny's international stature is often viewed as being an "out of touch global elite" especially with his "who cares" comment.

[John Stone]

2 hours ago, Legato said:

The Carny's international stature is often viewed as being an "out of touch global elite" especially with his "who cares" comment.

............ the many flavors of global 'elite' determine the course of the globe.............. knowing which lever to pull, being  familiar and gaining access is an advantage.