Thursday, March 22, 2018

this is something approaching reliable polling, and the first thing i've seen in months - although it appears to have been taken over march break, which no doubt exaggerates the inherent pc bias in phone polling.

but, this is what the poll says:

cons - 40.7
libs - 22.2
undecided - 15.6
ndp - 15.1
greens - 5.3

correcting for the bias puts the conservatives a few points under 40, but it's not clear where it goes.

in our spectrum, conservatives tend to have a very hard time gaining undecided voters and as hard a time keeping leaning voters. their base is solid, but they don't usually move far out of it; the undecideds tend to lean heavily to the left. you can't distribute undecideds in canada. but, i'm willing to take this as the first valid snap shot in months.

and, what it suggests is that traditional liberal voters are currently disengaged. if they swing hard to the ndp, they could win a surprise victory - but, again, it's hard to understand what's taking them so long. if they vote liberal in the end, she has a chance. and, if they split, or stay home, then the conservatives win.

this is not dissimilar to what we saw in the last federal election, where the conservatives polled ahead until the last weeks, when the undecideds finally decided in favour of the liberals. i'm not convinced that we'll see the same end, but it's the same set-up: mass apathy across the spectrum, with two broad camps - the hardcore conservative base, and everybody else (which remains broadly abc in mindset).

https://www.mainstreetresearch.ca/ford-pcs-21-point-lead-wynne-liberals/