Chris nicely highlights the Cons’ stunningly quick resort to back-to-work legislation after a mere day of Air Canada’s CAW strike, at a point where there’s been little if any impact on anybody. But it’s worth noting as well how it is that such legislat…
Continue readingAuthor: Greg Fingas
Accidental Deliberations: Tuesday Night Cat Blogging
Cats on the ledge.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Juxtaposition
Lorne Gunter desperately tries to pretend that nothing has changed in the NDP’s reach outside of Quebec:Outside Quebec the party is relevant in 60 or 70 ridings, with most of those concentrated in Toronto, Vancouver and the North. There was no NDP surg…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Parliament In Review: June 13, 2011
As I’d suspected, there looks to be plenty of material for a review post from just a day’s worth of events in the House of Commons. So here’s an inaugural daily review of what you may have missed in Ottawa yesterday – with a few themes I’ll be developi…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading.- I’ll agree with Barbara Yaffe that one of the most important tasks for the Cons as a majority government will be to avoid having their heads inflated to dangerous levels. But I’m not sure how Yaffe could possibl…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Up for debate
The NDP has released a first look at the prioritized resolutions from this weekend’s #vancon2011 (PDF). And while most of them may not come as too much surprise (or appear particularly controversial), there are a few which look highly noteworthy in dev…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: A week in review
I’ve figured for quite some time that the goings-on in the House of Commons probably deserve plenty more focus than they receive – and have highlighted at least some of them on this blog. But with the combination of the NDP wave and a Question Period w…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week.- Rhys Kesselman rightly points out how the populist message that propelled the Cons to power has given way to elitist policy-making:Once the federal budget is balanced, the Conservatives plan to double the TFS…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Not yet satisfied
Eric highlights Environics’ polling as to how happy supporters of various parties are with last month’s federal election results. And the findings look to bode about as well as possible for the NDP’s prospects of expanding its reach over the next few years:
Conservative supporters felt very positively about the election result – and why not. Their party won a majority. Fully 82% are quite happy.But New Democratic voters aren’t as pleased as you might expect. Their party made a historic breakthrough in Quebec, won the most seats and votes in their history, and are now the Official Opposition. But only 27% of their voters are happy with the results.Though it is somewhat surprising it is as high as it is, 13% of Liberal voters and 10% of Bloc voters feel positively about what happened on May 2nd. Thirty percent of non-voters are also pleased with the result.As for having negative feelings about the election result, only 2% of Conservative voters have some regrets. That is miniscule. Surprisingly, only 21% of non-voters feel the same way (36% are, understandably, indifferent).Despite their historic outcome, fully 42% of NDP voters feel sad or fearful about the election results. And despite being reduced to third party status, only 54% of Liberal voters feel negatively. It is a majority, but you’d expect Liberals to be a little more upset, along the lines of the 73% of Bloc voters.
Now, it’s important enough that a substantial number of NDP voters were hoping for more rather than expressing satisfaction with the party’s position. After it’s surely easier to build a movement when supporters are concerned about the direction of the country and motivated to change it, rather than seeing reason to get complacent.But the level of satisfaction with the election result among the opposition parties is especially significant when paired with the NDP’s post-election polling boost. In effect, it looks like a number of the Lib voters who already looked like promising NDP targets have already made the jump – and are apparently finding a landing pad which fits their own attitudes about the election.[Edit: fixed quote.]
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: For and against
Not surprisingly, the Cons are working feverishly to pretend that the message which won them a bare majority of seats in the House of Commons is of absolutely no consequence now that they hold them. So let’s set the record straight as to why it’s funda…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On ripple effects
I’ve noted before that the main advantage for incumbents – and thus the main obstacle to substantial change – is the perception on the part of potential challengers that it’s not worth mounting the effort to compete. But it would seem to follow that wh…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
A variety of content for your weekend reading.- The Lethbridge Herald nicely points out who figures to have a problem with Stephen Harper’s decision to have the Canadian public pay tens of thousands of dollars to send him to Game 4 of the Stanley Cup F…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Exciting Crowdsourcing Opportunity!
With some people rightly wondering whether there’s time to conduct a full and proper review of the Cons’ budgetary plans before Parliament rises for the summer, now would figure to be an ideal time for some crowdsourcing work in digging through the Con…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: You may not have noticed, but…
…the first vote on budgetary policy in Canada’s new Parliament took place on Wednesday, with the parties taking their positions on the Libs’ budget subamendment. And it may make for an interesting signal as to who’s willing to work together in provid…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On shocking transformations
I suspect it’ll be quite some time before we see an end to stories about how the NDP’s Quebec breakthrough means that it’ll have to radically change direction. But let’s put the spin in perspective.In their first opportunity to introduce bills as Offic…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading.- Gerald Caplan has a modest suggestion to ensure the Senate doesn’t do any more avoidable harm to Canada’s democracy:That we have no need for a second house of Parliament of any kind is the first proposition h…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Musical interlude
BT feat. Jes – Every Other Way (Armin Van Buuren Radio Edit)
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Afternoon Links
Assorted content to end your week.- When Paul Wells tears into a story, you can be assured of results that are both entertaining and frustrating. This week, he’s been hard at work pointing the complete lack of transparency and credibility in cuts which…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Worth discussing
One of the few times when the NDP has always been able to count on pundit attention in the past has been its policy conventions, when commentators often churn out an easy column or post by gleefully mocking some of the resolutions put forward for debat…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On incomplete reporting
Yes, it’s a problem if the Cons are giving different answers about climate-change policy to different audiences. But I’m not sure how the difference between federal action making next to no difference and its making even less than that makes for a more…
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