Thursday, August 28, 2014

Stephen Harper and the Deep Not So Blue Ontario Sea



It was so beautiful and warm yesterday I wish I could have spent the whole day sunning myself on the beach, or swimming in Lake Ontario.

Because when I saw the lifeguard boys racing for home at the end of their shifts, I was reminded that summer will soon be following them.

Which was a really depressing thought eh?

Until I thought that maybe they were just racing to save Stephen Harper.

Because when it comes to the province of Ontario, he's definitely going under. 

The province that handed Stephen Harper’s Conservatives a majority government in 2011 may be about to take it away, as Ontarians move from the governing Tories back towards Justin Trudeau’s Liberals.

The Conservatives won 73 seats in Ontario in the 2011 federal election, the best performance of the party and its predecessors in raw seat count since 1917 and the First World War.


But Ontario is not immune from the drop in support the Conservatives have experienced nationwide. In polls conducted in 2014, the Tories have averaged only 34 per cent in Ontario. That would be the party’s worst performance since 2004, when the Liberals under Paul Martin were re-elected with a minority government.


Because if you thought his recent trip to the Arctic was bad. Or desperate...



The latest seat predictions are WORSE.

For if Lord Harp thought that those new electoral boundaries would save him, or act as a life preserver, he better get ready to swim all the way back to Alberta.

Elections Canada has reported that the new electoral boundaries that will be in effect for the next election would have delivered 188 seats to the Conservatives in 2011, 83 of them in Ontario. But on current trends in 2014, the Conservatives are on track to win just 48 seats in the province. 

That loss of 35 seats alone is enough to reduce the Conservatives well below the mark needed to form another majority government. The party could win every seat it did in the last election outside Ontario – it could even increase that haul by 15 – and still fall short of a majority without an improvement in the country’s largest province.


Because when you take a close look at that latest EKOS poll again...



You can see that he's treading water, or trailing the Liberals and the NDP, everywhere but in Alberta and Saskatchewan.

And unless he's a really good swimmer, or Jesus can make him walk on water, he'll soon be swimming with the fishes.

Or whoever...



Because he's not the Great Leader he once was.

Glug.Glug.Glug.

Yup. You know I've got to be honest eh?

I'd rather sail than row...



And of course I can't predict the future.

But I what I would say is this:

Enjoy these last precious days of summer people. 

Because the wind is in our sails.

The monster is going down. 

And we're definitely heading for better days....

Please click here to recommend this post at Progressive Bloggers.

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well, I guess EKOS proved me wrong. Even here in the former stronghold of the CONS, the used-to-be ultra supporters of stevie slime's criminal cabal have had their asses handed to them enough that they and the newcomers (so much for the ethnic vote) and probably even some of the old, almost-braindead of my generation will actually vote in their self-preservation mode and get harpie and his convicted cabal the fuck out of office where they never belonged (let alone earning the position honestly) in the first place. I am very leary of Justin and his con-lite mentality but I am even more afraid of what the next 4 years could bring under another pseudo-reich majority.

susansmith said...

After death of socialism, the Left went off to fight culture wars & embrace identity politics. Worried more about the use of language than economics. Identity politics by exclusively focusing on the person rather than the politics/economics ends up electing the system of power one adhors. Just saying there Simon by constantly focusing on Harper the individual leaves out of focus the system and analysis of economics/power that produces such. We will end up with the system and the economic gap will continue to widen.

Anonymous said...

So, let me get this straight. harpie and his crime cabal are doing badly (praise Jesus!) in the Provinces where literacy is considered a good thing and yet Chow is falling off the face of the planet leaving the Toronto mayoral race up to Fric and Frac, the two asslick brothers? I don't understand.
Simon . . . you got some 'splainen to do!

Anonymous said...

a year in politics may as well be 1000 years. This isnt a "sure thing" for the Libs.

Unknown said...

janfromthebruce
When we have an authoritarian like Harper, who wants to turn Canada into a dictatorship then you do focus on the individual and that individual happens to be Harper, the PM of our country. Much of what you say has litttle meaning and not because it's complex, but I think because it's pseudo-intellectual meant to try and impress. I wasn't aware that socialism was dead.

Anonymous said...

Harper had campaigned very hard for Ford as, he has a huge number of Conservative voters. Harper does not mind alcoholics and crack Cocaine users but, don`t you ever get caught smoking pot. Ford has been banned as a volunteer football coach, being drunk and for many other unsavory reasons.

Same as Harper rips at Putin for, annexing the Crimea. However, Harper says nothing regarding Communist China, menacing and provoking other countries around the globe. Harper invites China to set up shop, right upon our Canadian soil and giving them the resource jobs as well.

With the horrendous damage Harper has inflicted upon Canada, I doubt this country can survive Harper. The everyday Canadians will never survive Harper, that is for sure. Harper as a fascist sociopath is only capable of caring about Harper.

Harper`s campaign is the same old, same old dreary name calling tactics, he always uses.

e.a.f. said...

he isn't gone yet. he has no plans to leave. of course the Premier of P.E.I. had a great line about Harper's unwillingness to call for an enquiry into the missing/murdered First Nations women. He suggested, if the P.M. didn't want one, we could get another P.M., we had an election coming. Gotta like that.

Harper is looking for an issue to campaign on. Most likely he'll portray himself as the great defender of Canada against Putin. On the other hand, all the other parties have to do is remind the voting public of how Harper treated the Veterans, First Nations, and sold our country via free trade agreements to every two bit dictatorship he could find.

Simon said...

hi anon...yes the EKOS poll was a pleasant read, but it only really confirmed a long trend. His support has been sliding for more than a year. People dislike him for one reason or the other, but his biggest liability is that he has been in power too long. If he was a nice guy he might have some staying power, but he isn't so he's done...

Simon said...

hi jan...I know what you're saying. And it's true that political personalities are usually just tools of the system they sustain. But I think Stephen Harper is the most toxic politician this country has ever seen. I believe that his personality has actually turned his party into something resembling a cult. So I think that it is imperative to defeat him. And since politics in this age is fixated on personality, I do focus on Harper and portray him as I believe he deserves. It's also important to focus on things we have in common if you are going to build a coalition. After we have got rid of him we can focus on fixing the system...

Simon said...

hi anonymous....look the Olivia Chow situation is a complex one. I could probably only express it in a post. But remember Tory and Olivia despite their different backgrounds are not that different politically. Certainly not in this campaign. But if you put the Tory vote and the Chow vote together they get almost seventy per cent of the total vote. Progressives, Liberals, NDPers, are not as different as they would have us imagine. And as long as they divide the vote anything can happen. I think the Chow campaign was one of the worst I have ever seen, but as long as Ford loses I don't really care...

Simon said...

hi anon...nothing is sure in politics. If Trudeau manages to keep floating above it all he will almost certainly will be Prime Minister. If he flounders Tom Mulcair will stand a chance. Because people do want to get rid of Harper, and in the end they will vote for the candidate that they feel can best beat him. I should also like to remind the Liberals and the NDP that they will most likely be called pun to form a coalition government, so they should be too nasty to each other....

Simon said...

hi anon...don't worry this country will survive Harper. It will take years to repair the damage he has done, but a new generation will soon take over and life will go on....

Simon said...

hi e.a.f...yes it's pretty clear that Harper is seeking to take advantage of the state the world is in, and campaign as a Great Strong Leader. But I don't think it will work. His aggressiveness on the world stage only reminds people of how he has governed at home. And as I can't emphasize enough, he has been in power too long, he is started to irritate people, and when that happens sooner or later he will be forced to go, or he will be defeated...