further demonstrating harper's dishonesty is spitting on a fish. it's been clear he's a pathological liar since at least 2008.

72% say it doesn't matter because that's the swing vote on the left. you can take that down further by ignoring conservative base supporters.

the best-case estimates for the liberals are that there's about a 10% red tory swing vote, mostly in the suburbs, that will be irritated enough about it that they think harper's lost the "moral authority" to govern, or something.

but, for the vast majority of voters, it doesn't matter because they'd never vote for the conservatives, anyways.

that won't stop the media from confirming it's own irrelevancy when the conservatives are at least reduced in october. but, the harsh truth is that it's just another subplot in what has been a fantasy media narrative for many years, now.

www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-election-2015-grenier-duffy-aug21-1.3199132

i mean, what do you want, exactly? for people to vote for some other party twice?

it's like suggesting that 70% of people don't consider hitler's perspective on cartels important in supporting the aims of the second world war. a difference of scale, sure. but the basic idea is what the polling is measuring - that this is minor, in comparison to philosophical differences in *policy*.

ad scam did not lead to liberal party collapse - that's the same imaginary media narrative. if that was true, the swing would have moved right. it actually swung left. the fall in liberal voters at the time was correlated with an increase in ndp support and stagnation in conservative numbers. and, the reason was that people didn't want to vote for paul martin because they opposed his budget cuts and general reputation as a fiscal conservative [which is only half fair].

that doesn't suggest voter ignorance, so much as it reflects an ability for voters to prioritize issues properly as they matter to them.

people arguing that this ought to be an issue are the same people that remain confused by canada's complete rejection of ignatieff. they think he was a brilliant philosopher; most canadians saw him as a war crimes collaborator, and not a particularly deep thinker, either. it's this class of people that think they're brilliant, but that in truth are really quite dense.

so, when 72% say that it's not going to affect their vote, that doesn't mean 72% don't care at all. that's a logical fallacy in reasoning. it just means that 72% prioritize actual issues, rather than media circuses and what are essentially protestant accusations of moral impiety. this evil-doer rhetoric doesn't fly here. we're a broadly secular country.

it's a right-wing strategy to sway a very significantly left-leaning electorate.

but, whatever, i've been banging my head against the wall since 2004, warning liberals that the ndp are going to steal all their votes if they don't change their strategy. nobody's listened. but, hey - take a look at the polls, eh?

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Kit's Kat
After what we have seen this week about the Harper PMO in action, I am not sure why anyone would vote for Harper and the Conservative candidates.

Jessica Murray
this is another talking point that's of no use in convincing anybody.

there's a handful of issues that are unpopular in urban canada but command a majority in rural canada - opposition to abortion (which, if you think is not an issue, you should think again), a certain type of support for the military that makes liberals cringe, vengeance-based crime policy (including capital punishment), etc. a lot of this is off the radar, but it's still driving voters because there remains this perception that the conservatives will carry through with it - it's irrational projection, but it's real. and mark my words: if the conservatives end up having to deal with a long term scorched earth policy in the urban centres, you can expect them to hail mary on some of this stuff, as they fall back into their reform roots. the blunt reality is that you can't convince an anti-abortion voter with much of anything, if you continue to support abortion.

it's an ideological gulf. there's no way to break through it. and, it's been cemented in canadian politics for at least 80 years.

the conservative polling numbers right now ought to be seen as an absolute best case scenario for the liberals & ndp. remember: they haven't polled under 29% since world war two, and the only time they polled under 30% was when joe clark endorsed the liberals. it's astounding that they're consistently polling in the 20s. this is a historic shift unto itself that liberals should be jumping at glee over. don't get greedy....

i remain exceedingly skeptical that they'll finish under 30% in the general. it's just demographically infeasible. and if they land at 27% or lower, *it will be the worst showing for the conservative party since confederation*.

nothere4ueither
@Jessica Murray Good observations. There seems to be a belief in a lot of supposed Canadian laws and traditions that never really did exist.

Jessica Murray
borden swept bc in the 1911 election under the slogan "a white canada", getting 60% of the vote and all 7 seats. it's a little more complicated today than it was then. but, the rejection of pearsonian multiculturalism remains a vote driver on the rural right.

i think the long term trend suggests that the conservative party is moving into the space that the socreds used to occupy - a sort of fringe western right-wing party. whomever replaces harper is likely to be a lot more right-wing on social issues. it's kind of "phase 2", from what i can gather. and, they're kind of stuck. they only pretend to hug the middle for so long before the strategy seems pointless, and unable to bear fruitful results (from their perspective). and, it's consequently only so long before the party heads have to make a choice between carrying through on these projections and watching the party collapse again. i suspect they won't let it collapse a second time.

but, if we're optimistic, we can look at 25% as an absolute minimum floor, for this election. and, that extra cut is going to come mostly in ridings where they're not particularly competitive in the first place.

this is rock bottom for the conservative party. people need to deal with that.