I know, I know — you’re all so very, very tired of polls, which don’t mean anything except on election day, and it’s all within the margin of error, and why does ITQ continue to torment you like this? Why? Because she’s a monster, that’s why. But since she’s not without a sliver of sympathy for the overly-poll-put-upon amongst you, she’ll keep her off the cuff observations on today’s results securely confined behind the jump.
Anyway, we’ve got the latest numbers from Nanos out today, which show … pretty much the same thing as every other poll we’ve seen over the last few months — a virtual tie between the Liberals and the Conservatives. It’s worth noting, I suppose, that support for both parties appears to have lessened over the past month or so, at least as far as the Nanos-o-matic graphics: the Conservatives are down by less than a percentage point, but the Liberals have fallen by more than two percent. What’s interesting is that, as far as ITQ can recall, this is the first poll in ages to show the NDP creeping out of the mid-teen doldrums; a quick look at the regional breakdown suggests that this is largely due to increased support in Ontario and Quebec, although oddly, the party seems to have experienced a not unsubstantial drop in Atlantic Canada, which would suggest that the orange wave that carried Darrell Dexter to power in Nova Scotia may be ebbing away.
Meanwhile, on the leadership front, both leaders are down slightly, although interestingly, those numbers show a slightly more significant slide for the Conservatives than the Liberals, which is the reverse of what we saw in the party preference results. Jack Layton, meanwhile, is up slightly, mostly because of a minisurge in Quebec. (Insert standard disclaimer about even vaster margins of error in the regional breakdowns here.)
This month’s survey also finds that the economy is continuing to fade away as the dominant national issue, with health care poised to resume its traditional spot atop the list of things that worry away at the Canadians political psyche. While mulling over the numbers, ITQ suggested to a fellow poll-watching obsessive that this resurgence could be due to the ongoing debate south of the border over health care, Canadian-style or otherwise — or possibly by growing apprehension over H1N1, or the isotope shortage — only to be told, in no uncertain terms, that nobody out there sees any of those things as “health care”. That’ll teach her to draw conclusions! ((Later, FPWO clarified that they agreed that the increased coverage of the Canadian health care system by the American media may be nudging it back to the centre of our collective political consciousness.)
Anyway, feel free to chat about that, or anything else that occurs to you after checking out today’s Nanos numbers, in the comments.
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People are clearly getting excited over the possibility that the NDP may change their name.
Well, yes, because (let's face it) neither the Grits nor the Tories have really done anything to engage the voter's interest during this particular summer. No genuine news, in other words.
This is the prime opportunity for the NDP to get some genuine, whoa-maybe-we-should-keep-an-eye-on-this media attention. If they have a good follow-up strategy, they'll become playas again.
I think it's possible that the drift from the economy to health care as the a top of mind issue could also be helping the NDP, and puts the Liberals — and especially their leader — in a tricky position, since they made a conscious decision to make that the number one — and, for a while there, the one and only — issue on which to go after the government, and left his critics to hold down the fort on stuff like isotopes, flu preparation, drug costs and other health-related issues.
Agreed. While the economy may not do much more than coast for a few more years, it doesn't seem like much of an emergency these days. Even EI reform is too late for the bulk of job losses, so I don't see that as much of a vote winner for the Libs.
There's still the matter of cleaning up the deficit mess from that massive stimulus bender we went on. But I predict Harper will beat the crap out of Iggy by framing the Libs as the taxation party. It'll work, because Canadians don't like to hear the truth about those sorts of things. (And then Harper will turn around and raise taxes after he wins another minority or majority!).
It doesn't matter what their follow-up strategy is, the corporate media will never give the NDP some genuine, whoa-maybe-we-should-keep-an-eye-on-this attention as long as the NDP is viewed as a threat to the interests of the corporate robber barons.
Corporate robber barons, hmmm, do they fly around in Fokker triplanes instead of the corporate jet?
"Hey , look at the bunch of Fokkers, they need to be taken down!"
Thanks for the trip down memory lane Robert, I thought that vocabulary died out in 1989. No fuzzy third way thinking necessary, Karl would be proud.
Yup. But then consider that the vocabulary may have been euthanized at the hands
of " the robber barons ".
Nah. Couldn't happen. Not with our media subject to the tender mercies of Conny,
Izzy, and the CEO worshipers at the Globe…… silly me.
Now that's a sensible and nuanced response to a valid point.
How about sharing with us how "Unions used to have a place, but have overstepped their bounds now." or maybe "I support equality for women, but these feminists want too much."
Oh, by the way Bob …. do you worry about Jack Layton's Canadian birth certificate – is it real?
"support for both parties appears to have lessened over the past month or so"
I find this interesting. Generally speaking, the government of the day sees its numbers go up while parliament is in recess. It appears that Canadians are having a 'pox on both your houses' moment.
Also found the increase of concern for health care interesting. I would attribute it to the health care debate going in America rather than anything happening here. And the greenies can't be too happy about where concern for environment is at the moment.
I'm betting you're right about the American debate causing Canadians to think about our own system more. I'm not sure why, but I find that deeply depressing.
I, too, find it depressing because it would be nice to live in a country where debates happen. Here in Canada our pols and msm don't really do much at all to stir up thought or controversy on significant issues, they focus on the minutiae instead.
Debates on significant issues in a five party Canada , are near in possible.
Plus, the Premiers then chime in taking one side or another…
Even tho Canadians were hoping that these minority governments would produce good debate, all we have seen is non-stop election fever since Paul Martin stepped down.
First mandate PMSH made everything a confidence vote. Second mandate, the Libs did the same with the 'report card' thing.
Parliament needs to change a few rules, and put an end to selective 'confidence' matters.
Then maybe the debates will happen, maybe.
I dunno, the Greens are on a bit of an upward swing as well — in fact, they've gone up by slightly more than the NDP as far as national support, mostly (or at least apparently) thanks to increased support in Ontario and the Prairies. I'd suggest that even with the environment staying flat, as far as an issue, growing concern over, or even simply focus on health care could actually help the Greens. (That said, there's no indication that they've managed to turn that into a more efficient vote.
Whenever I see an upward swing for the Greens in polls between elections, I often interpret this swing as an increase in "undecided voters" rather than an increase in "Green voters".
Whenever I see an upward swing for the Greens in polls between elections, I interpret the swing as an increase in "undecided voters" rather than an increase in "Green voters".
That's a very fair point, and it's worth noting that, before the Greens became a regular addition to the list of options, the NDP would quite often reap the somewhat ephemeral benefit of being the default party for the undecided, which didn't tend to make it to the ballot box. With both the Greens and the NDP going up in this poll, and the undecided, as Commenter A Reader points out, going down, that might suggest that the left-of-centre vote is somewhat adrift.
In the last couple of missives from Castle Nanos, we see the NDP slowly moving up while the LPC slowly slides down. Entirely within the MOE, of course. But the trendline is there.
Imagine how that trendline will react if Ignatieff is forced to back down on EI — or any other confidence vote — that comes up this fall.
And the citizens are too self-absorbed, lazy, and parochial to pay attention to anything of substance.
"And the citizens are too self-absorbed, lazy, and parochial to pay attention to anything of substance."
Maybe. I use to think this way but my opinion changed when the socialists and separatists tried to usurp power and how engaged people were then. A liberal consensus has emerged for our chattering classes and there is nothing really to debate, at least according to them.
"A liberal consensus has emerged for our chattering classes and there is nothing really to debate, at least according to them."
That is extremely unfair. Take someone like Jeff Simpson in the Globe: for years he's produced substantive policy proposals and discussions, on a whole range of untouchable issues from the deficit (as it then was) to productivity to health care to internal trade; take Paul Wells, who does the same thing on other issues (Afghanistan, NATO, inter alia); take Andrew Coyne, who is not exactly an intellectual conformist; etc. etc. And what journalists do in public, i.e. think freely on unpopular subjects, others do in private. If these people don't represent "the chattering classes" (minus the pejorative sense) I have no idea who "the chattering classes" are. On the contrary, jwl, it's the politicians and the ordinary voters who are resistant to change of any kind, or even to talking about change, because by now practically everybody in this country has a vested interest in the status quo, or feel they do.
Also, just by way of a jibe for a jibe, a lot of people were engaged when the Tories tried to usurp power and overthrow the 800-year-old constitution.
the Tories tried to usurp power and overthrow the 800-year-old constitution.
The Tories tried to overthrow the Magna Carta? Those bastards!
Indeed, when the most powerful man in the country decides that his authority is legitimate not because of the law but because he thinks it is, we are pre-King John. Thankfully the GG stepped in and authorised him, but there is little doubt that Harper and his supporters think that their legitimacy has little to do with constitutional law.
"I’m actually not a conservative — either in name, or in any other way. If forced to describe myself, I’d say I’m a socialist, because by any usual or sensible definition, I would be. I favour public pensions, public health care, public education, public unemployment insurance. I favour a whole battery of things involving the state function." Andrew Coyne, April 2009
Can't stand Simpson but Wells and Coyne are my two favourite Canadian opinion writers. Do you think any of the three writers you mention would disagree with Coyne's statement? All three agree that government is good and all they do is argue details.
Big debates don't really happen here because there is widespread agreement that government is good and all that needs to be discussed is the minutiae. A perfect example is the EI 'debate' that we are having now and will likely last into the autumn. All the major parties support EI as program, they are just squabbling over details.
I agree that ordinary voters are resistant to change and prefer status-quo, but that's a human trait not specific to Canadians, but pols are cowards because it is their job to improve things.
All serious people agree that some government, in some form, is good — yourself included, I ween. The intellectual paralysis I was talking about concerned the failure to have a debate, on the political level, about the actual issues — like health care — that need debating, in the details as in the big picture. Of course it would extra nice if we could actually have philosophical debates about the purpose of government, society, human life, etc., but that will surely never happen: in a democracy, big concepts are just rhetorical tools for advertising specific policy options. I'll settle for politicians who provide more than just rhetoric, and I hope we will soon get some. It's too bad that the only major policy proposal of the last ten years, the Green Shift, was promoted by someone so inept as Dion and could thus be "refuted" with mere rhetoric.
As to Coyne's positions, sure, our pundits tend to agree with them, but so do 95% of Canadians. My problem is that a considerable number of Canadians would be happy having a debate about the details and minutiae of our government programs and institutions, but, as you say, the momentum is all on the side of moral inertia.
All serious people agree that some government, in some form, is good — yourself included, I ween. The intellectual paralysis I was talking about concerned the failure to have a debate, on the political level, about the actual issues — like health care — that need debating, in the details as in the big picture. Of course it would extra nice if we could actually have philosophical debates about the purpose of government, society, human life, etc., but that will surely never happen: in a democracy, big concepts are just rhetorical tools for advertising specific policy options. I'll settle for politicians who provide more than just rhetoric, and I hope we will soon get some. It's too bad that the only major policy proposal of the last ten years, the Green Shift, was promoted by someone so inept as Dion and could thus be "refuted" with mere rhetoric.
As to Coyne's positions, sure, our pundits tend to agree with them, but so do 95% of Canadians. My problem is that a considerable number of Canadians would be happy having a debate about the details and minutiae of our government programs and institutions, but, as you say, the political momentum is all on the side of moral inertia.
Please let them change the name to the New New Democratic Party.
Please?
How do you feel about the 'Post-New Democratic Party'?
I'm sure they will like that better than Neo-New Democratic Party.
The only problem with those two (new and neo) is that the party itself hasn't done anything new-ish. So how about the Vintage New Democratic Party? Vintage, as a word, is ever so popular in the style department.
I've decided to lobby for Cooperative Commonwealth Revival. The convention theme songs would rock. And who doesn't like CCR?
The trendline I find interesting is how the big drop in the undecideds between the two periods … across every region, so I guess we can assume it's robust … coincides with the increase in NDP support.
It is as if the emergence of and initial media honeymoon with Ignatieff put some NDP supporters into the undecided camp; but the end of session performance and Iggy's relatively low profile this summer, compared with Layton's pretty active travel schedule and now a bit of coverage on the name change story and US healthcare debates, may have been the tonic those folks needed to firm up their intentions again.
In Ontario the decided support seems to be coming more from Conservatives than Liberals (although a bit from both), which suggests to me that some of the Conservative southwestern Ontario seats are more in play for the NDP again. In Quebec, the gain is at the expense of the Bloc, which could simply reflect the fact that the Bloc took the month of July off.
Anyways, the Iggy honeymoon's been over for awhile, and now we'll have a much better sense of how competitive the parties really are against one another. And just in time for the by-elections, too!
I don't mean to be a stickler for detail, but the results–properly rounded–are actually 34-Liberals, 31-Conservatives, 19-NDP, 9-Bloc and 7-Green.
I always worry that rounding will lead to an entire subthreadful of accusations of bias, so I just chopped everyone off at the decimal point. Which probably isn't really fair, you're right.
Yes, it's not really fair. And it's not mathematically accurate either. But I can understand your wariness of starting a sub-thread of commenter conspiracy theories.
Well, rounding is a new national trend. Either that, or the seats on the subway are getting smaller…
I think Iggy is safe, as the script has already been written for the EI-360 showdown. Something like: Iggy's Sep 28th non-confidence motion proposes a temporary EI-360, lasting only until the recession ends. Jack and Gilles balk at the temporary aspect, thus refusing to back Iggy.
Everybody saves face (more or less), armed with talking points to take to a skeptical media. Even Harper plays along, wanting to maintain his narrative that "Canadians don't want an election, Parliament should focus on the economy, blah blah." Maybe with a subtle reminder that It wasn't HIM that took Canadins to the edge of the election cliff, it was those power-hungry Coalition amigos
you know something that's not bad and who knows might just be the way out for jack and gilles after all there is no way Iggy and the MP's are going to let the CPC go by and support it next confidence motion not if he wants to remain leader … hmmm .. well done
My entry for the rename-this-article contest:
Corporate Kady the Pollstergeist.
The thing that jumps out at me with the Nanos polls is the very significant spiking before and after each election. To me that suggest there is something wrong with their methodology.
Yes, that is the problem. Most of us are poor predictors of how we'd behave in a hypothetical situation (i.e. "If an election were held today …). The further away we are from an actual election, the more hypothetical the hypothetical becomes, if you'll allow me to abuse the language a bit. And come August, hypothetical elections are even harder to conceive than any other time.
The more dependable pollsters have ways of compensating. Unfortunately, the pollster that has best responded, Rasmussen, doesn't operate in Canada.
But what about ITQ? Is it ONLY the robber barons that control the language? Or is ITQ really 'Corporate Kady'?
Maybe there is a mind control chamber all the media are summoned to, at regular intervals. Who would do the mind-penetrating voice-over – gotta be James Earl Jones, right? And we need someone much more sinister than Iggy, or even Conny, to play the villian.
But what about ITQ? Is it ONLY the robber barons that control the language? Or is ITQ really 'Corporate Kady'?
Maybe there is a mind control chamber all the media are summoned to, at regular intervals. Who would do the mind-penetrating voice-over – gotta be James Earl Jones, right? And we need someone much more sinister than Iggy, or even Conny, to play the villian mastermind.