Breaking News: Louise Thibault resigns from the Bloc Quebecois Caucus!

Louise Thibault, as found out by macleans, has just said she is going to leave the Bloc Quebecois caucus, this is quite surprising considering that she was a bit of a social conservative, it is quite possible she might have left do to social issues but currently, we don't know anything.

In Defense of Belinda Stronach

I was upset with the news that Belinda Stronach is leaving politics today, she was a very interesting woman and I was glad to see someone with her magnitude (no pun intended) in the house of commons. However, Magna has just purchased Chrysler and she feels her skills could be better used in the business world. First of all, there is one thing I think of when describing Belinda Stronach. Courageous and above all she had balls (in the courageous sense I mean). When she crossed over to the Liberal Party she took many knocks and even after that period of discontent people bashed her with sexist comments and you know what, she could have cried, she could have ran off into a corner. But she didn't, she stood there and she took everything that people said about her and didn't pay attention to it. To me she is courageous for taking the stands she did and being true to herself. I know she's a controversial figure, but anybody who can still stand on their two feet and ignore those kinds of hateful comments is a great person in my book.

SES Poll Out: This is a big one.

Well the most accurate polling company in Canada has published it's polling results and if you look at last years election they pretty much called it within one percentage point, these are the most accurate pollsters in Canada.

First the Good

*The Conservatives after throwing all the money they could at Quebec have suceeded in that region as many thought, however it appears their budget outside of Quebec connected with nobody. It also appears the Conservatives still have not gotten past their last Election numbers with 36 percent.

Taking these numbers into Professor Antweiler's Projection project it predicts something very odd.

The Seat Total if an election was held today would be

Lib-123(+20)
CPC-117 (-7)
BQ-48 (-3)
NDP-19(-10)
IND-1

Of Course I can't believe those numbers because it fails to take into account Quebec.
If I Insert the Quebec Numbers I get this

BQ-40 (-11)
CPC-17 (+7)
LIB-17 (+4)
IND-1

The Conservatives would gain off the bloc and despite the liberals dropping they actually gain seats off the bloc's lost popular vote. The Conservatives would pretty much win in most of the same places the ADQ one like Trois Rivieres and the Gaspe area, the Liberals would gain four federalist seats.

In the Atlantic the seat count would be

LIB-21 (+1)
CPC-6 (-3)
NDP-5 (+2)

The Liberals would win back Tobique-Mactaquac and the Conservatives would lose both Peter MacKay and Gerald Keddy to the NDP. However, the poll fails to take into account Elizabeth May in Peter MacKay's riding so we don't know what that means.

Ontario's seat count is even stranger

LIB-53 (-1)
CPC-48 (+8)
NDP-5 (-7)

The NDP would be decimated and only would hold on to Layton's seat, the two windsor seats, Christopherson's seat and Angus. What's really intersting is the seats the Conservatives will pick up.

Ottawa Centre
Hamilton Mountain
London-Fanshawe
Kenora
London West
Brant
Huron-Bruce
Oakville
Halton

Most of these areas is exactly where the conservatives are targeting kind of odd, but really neat none the less.

Then we go into the west and here it the machine spits something weird out

CPC-36 (-12)
LIB-13 (+8)
NDP-7 (+4)

so it's more like

CPC-39 (-9)
LIB-11 (+6)
NDP-6 (+3)

Okay first I'm calling BS on a few ridings because I personally think the liberals will not win a thing in Alberta, not in this climate, because it predicts they win Edmonton East and Centre and while I personally think it's possible, I have to take into account BC region is offset by this poll. Liberals will not win two edmonton seats NDP is not going to win Selkirk because they don't have Schreyer this time. I'm keeping the one NDP seat in strathcona because i think Duncan can win and there were some seats in SK that switched hands.

Now we go into BC. Which again is going to be fixed as well

CPC-21 (+4)
LIB-15 (+6)
NDP-0 (-10)

First of all this is rediculous because there are two seats I know the NDP is not going to lose no matter how bad it does and that is BC Southern Interior and Vancouver East. But I think they do have the possibility to lost the rest of those. We'll put that at

CPC-21 (+4)
LIB-13 (+4)
NDP-2 (-8)

Territories

We have no polling info on the territories but I will say that we have a retention

2 LIB
1 NDP

TOTAL COUNT
CPC-131 (+7)
LIB-117 (+14)
BQ-40 (-11)
NDP-19 (-10)
IND-1

Well this seems like a very realistic result, the Conservatives will win more seats because of the publics Idea that Stephen Harper is doing a good job even though I don't believe it, The Liberals will win seats in small areas around the country despite the fact they do lose a few to the tories in Ontario, The Bloc gets spanked and the NDP is dejected. So yes we end up with another minority government led by Harper which I personally think will be the end result.

A Welcome to Garth Turner

I was pretty excited when Garth Turner decided to move to the liberal party. I won't call this crossing the floor because he was booted out and then changed his affiliation, he really didn't cross any floor he was in fact on the liberal side of the aisle if you take a look at it. Hypocritical? I know people were going to shout this at him and that's quite fine, I expected it. Look Crossing the floor is party of Politics, let me point out I did not go after Wajid Khan after what he did because that wasn't blatant opportunism, he was enticed by Stephen Harper and appropriately he took the bait and went over to him. However in David Emerson's case what he did was purely disgusting, If he had done it later but not two weeks after an election I might have been a little easier on him but because he did something that was so unbelievably odd and essentially in my opinion, backstabbing that I was really upset when he did it. He acted arrogant and holier-than-thou, so yes I was angry. However, Garth Turner's affiliation switch was interesting. I don't expect Garth Turner to change, he was always his own man and that's how he will operate. However, because of him Switching he absolutely stole the thunder from Harper's Speech, so that was a good thing for him moving his affiliation.

Khaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!

My friends, there is no reason to flip out over Wajid Khan's defection. While this is pretty upsetting it doesn't even compare to David Emerson and what he did. Wajid served time as a liberal member of parliament and this is all part of politics. It wasn't a shock to me that Khan crossed over. Clearly he wanted to work with Stephen Harper and Stephane Dion questioned how someone could be an advisor to a prime minister while being a member of the opposite party. So quite frankly Wajid is in the right place and I'm not extremely angry. That being said I think that he is in a different situation then David Emerson. I am almost 100% certain that Emerson is going to be defeated as for Khan he might not be, But again it is very distressing to see him next to Stephen Harper. This is a man who flip flopped on who he thought was best for the country 4 times. First he thought Volpe was the best, then he thought Rae was the best, then he thinks Dion is the best and now Lo and behold, he thinks Harper is the best. This defection doesn't prove anything, it doesn't mean the liberals are in trouble, it means that there is a man who was opportunistic and fool-hardy to try and balance both things at the same time.

The New Conservative/NDP Attack Lines

I just read this, and I almost fell out of my chair laughing at how pathetic the Conservative and NDP attempts to discredit Dion are.

According to that Wisdom-Lover that is John Baird

He's one of those ... Cabinet ministers from Quebec who sat through the sponsorship scandal and claimed not to know a thing that went on while millions of dollars were stolen

John please, really, who in God's name is going to believe Dion was in anyway involved in the Sponsorship Scandal, this is just a desperate attempt to throw anything and see if it sticks. Mr. Dion was in Government, of course, but who honestly is going to believe other then Hardcore Tory Partisans that Dion actually had something to do with the Sponsorship scandal? Is Mr. Baird actually serious about this? Is there an assumption that if your from Quebec and you were a cabinet minister in Quebec during that time your a crook? This attack just won't fly and if this is seriously the best the Tories can come up with at the moment, they are really in trouble.

Next, I want to turn to the baseless and rediculous attempt by those bastions of integrity, the NDP. I want to tell you that I just want to say I used to have a lot of respect for Jack Layton before he just completely lost his mind. The NDP today is a party that is so out of touch with Canada's priorities, they do nothing but scream, shout and protest, but they really don't have any agenda except to throw softball questions to Cabinet Ministers.

So this is what the NDP said

Stephane Dion is an out of touch academic who spent 10 years in a scandal-ridden cabinet.

....

Can I actually dignify this attack with a response? I'm pretty much speechless, really this attack just doesn't hold any water. You know what I'm just going to say that I'm not even going to dignify this drivel with a response if Mr. Layton wants to actually talk about the issues then fine I'll disprove him but this stupid baseless attack just isn't worth my time.

Liberals have yet to address the elephant in the room

While I am happy Stephane Dion has won, I believe that the Liberals have really got to prepare to put out a strong platform that Canadians can vote for in the next election, We need to make meaningful promises to Canadians and not 20,000 different promises. The Liberal party needs a hell of a lot more work then just a fresh coat of paint, we need to dismantle the whole car and start building are platform from the bottom up. We have a Leader who thankfully displays that he does care about the environment and that he is passionate about it.

I want to tell everyone in the Liberal Party that they cannot let the NDP and the Conservatives peddle falsehoods on Stephane Dion, we have to let Stephane Dion define himself to his audience and we need him to speak the truth before the NDP and the Conservatives try to discredit him. Dion needs to prove he is a strong leader and he needs to inflict some serious harm on Stephen Harper.

While I've heard a lot of things from opponents, I say to people who voted for Ignatieff, that there is definitely room in this party for you, for the first time in a long time the Liberal Party has been united and we are going to work towards victory. Michael Ignatieff was a gracious man and he has a bright future ahead of him. As for Gerard Kennedy, Mr. Kennedy made a difficult decision but he did the right thing for the Liberal Party and I know that Mr. Kennedy will definitely have a great future ahead for him and he will definitely be in a better position next time.

We are all Liberals, we have a role to play in helping us win the next election, But I'm going to tell you the truth, we will not win if we cut corners to try and win the election, we need to work long and hard at this and come up with an agenda that the people of Canada can attach themselves for. Simply put, just being anti-Stephen Harper is not an agenda, and this has been I think one of the weaknesses of left of center parties, they are more able to oppose something then get behind something. I hope Dion uses the environment issue to flog Harper over the head, it is an issue that he used to great effect and he will likely continue to do it.

Final Ballot Results and Thoughts

Oh who cares about the Numbers, Dion has won, Let me tell you I am proud as a Canadian and as a Liberal to be watching the Next Prime Minister of Canada about to speak.

Chretien Put Harper in His Place

I admit that I had problems with Chretien previously, but he gave a fantastic speech and he layed the smackdown on Harper well. I'm glad that he also mentioned he voted for Paul Martin, Sr. It's very nice of him to mention that and it shows it seems that Mr. Chretien and Mr. Martin have decided to bury the hatchet and I am proud of him for being a gentlemen and finally making peace with Mr. Martin, albeit the apology came a long time.

Congratulations to Gerard Kennedy

He ran a strong campaign and he proved many of his doubters wrong. I am now happy to announce I am switching my support to Stephane Dion and hope that he is the next leader of this Party. Mr. Kennedy made a smart decision and he has earned my respect.