Federal Tories-Grits Statistically Tied - Tory Turbulence in Quebec

I actually did see a couple of posts referred to on a couple of the Blogging Tories blogs about previously posted items that mysteriously disappeared during the 12 hours or so immediately after his booting, where he was writing about what was discussed within caucus. I believe Stephen Taylor (might be wrong about it being his blog) even had snapshots of the exact same post "before" and "after". It was a few weeks ago, so i can't recall the details now, but there were clearly items that were removed during those 12 hours... I guess he was trying to hide the offending posts that discussed caucus? There's also been reports that he censors out any comments in the blog that are critical of him. One final note on this topic, he wasn't booted by the party leaders, it was his fellow elected Ontario MPs who wanted him out.

Back to your point, there's been a decay in support, yes, but it's better that it be now than a few months from now during an election. I've doubted Harper before on multiple occasions, and have even campaigned against him during the 2004 leadership race (going into the merger as an ex-Progressive Conservative and supporting Tony Clement), and he has amazed me with his political wits and strategy every single time, such that I no longer doubt his strategy. The drop may have been largely because of the Income Trust thing, when this poll was taken in the aftermath of, but that will blow over once the majority of people who actually have a properly diversified portfolio (i.e. not those idiots they were interviewing on TV that put in 80% of their assets into income trusts, when financial advisors had been warning for ages not to put in more than 10%), see that their total portfolio value has actually gone up on their next statements. On foreign policy - also may be an impact, but historically, nobody votes on foreign policy, for the majority of voters, it's what is best for their pocketbook. What's important is that a leader shows they're willing to make a tough decision that's right even if politically unpopular, and they stick and defend it (i.e. be the opposite of Paul Martin). On income trusts, it was clearly bad policy for Canada to keep it the way it was (and not even the Liberals are denying that), so he changed it and accepted the short-term pain.

Just from my own personal observations: 1) from friends I've talked to in the past month or two... 3 former die-hard Libs. (and I mean die-hard) when they were in school, same demographic as myself: all early 30s, 905ers or outer 416ers, university-educated, visible minorities, and 2nd gen. Cdns, have told me that they've switched over to the Tories as the Liberals have swung too far to the left for them in the past two years, and Harper's style has impressed them. 2) The increase in support and pride in the military is also something that I've noticed since January. That is something that the Liberals will never be able to claim credit for. Did those people just come out of nowhere? Items like these make me doubt the sudden drop in poll numbers... quite frankly, in all my years of following politics, polls in between election campaigns rarely actually mean anything, as they will widely swing when a campaign is actually called. Just for historical perspective, in Jan. 1988, Mulroney's PCs were polling in third behind the Liberals, and Ed Broadbent's NDP was at an all-time high, something like 38%. A few months later, Mulroney won his 2nd majority government, and the NDP didn't even win official opposition. Kim Campbell was also leading the polls 3 months prior to the 1993 election... I don't think I need to mention what happened to her.

I should mention that the "12 hours" that I was referring to in my reply is the 12 hours right after Garth was booted when Garth Turner's Website blog immediately went completely offline, for those not familiar with his site.

Hi alfeee,

While I don't necessarily agree with your general conclusions, I do appreciate your comments.

We can debate the individual issues until the end of time (which I'm not tempted to get into here), but you raise an interesting point about promises (kept and broken).

As I watch the Liberal leadership convention and ponder the upcoming election, I can't help but notice how candidates and parties go out of their way to make bold promises about this or that. Inevitably, either because conditions change, or because opposition members don't have all the facts when they make the promises, such promises are broken.

The income trust is such an example where, had the conservatives probably had more data, they would never have made a promise they would later realise is faulty. So I forgive them, because their decision was the right one. Similarly, I have to forgive Chretien for breaking his promise on the GST, for roughly the same reasons (let's assume).

My point is, we should select a party based on ideology and general policies, but not on specific promises. Once in power, they should stay true to that ideology and those general policies, but they should be given a certain leeway in terms of how they implement those policies.

Quite frankly, I couldn't care less that the conservatives kept their promise on the GST cut. In fact I would have been happier if they had broken that one. Ditto for the $100 daycare cheque that I receive each month (and since not a single new daycare spot has been created, I'm forced to spend the $100 on beer and popcorn!!!). Should stupid promises be kept? I don't think so, and Mr. Harper proved it on income trusts. Should he be skewered or cheered?