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Tuesday, January 24, 2006

daveberta: reflections on the elections.

With the exception of recounts, Election 2006 has ended.

The results of this LONG election has left us with some thoughts and comments... here they are...

1. Edmonton Strathcona - A strong second for NDP candidate Linda Duncan. She did amazingly well for a federal NDP candidate in Alberta and her 17,142 were only eclipsed by Conservative Rahim Jaffer's 21,956.

Here are the results...

Rahim Jaffer, Conservative - 21,956
Linda Duncan, NDP - 17,142
Andy Hladyshevsky, Liberal - 9385
Cameron Wakefield, Green - 3,128
Mike Fedeyko, PC – 604
Dave Dowling, MP – 455
Kevan Hunter, ML - 106

Mr. Jaffer has accomplished what seemed nearly impossible for an incumbent Conservative candidate in Alberta during this election; he received less than 50% of the popular vote. Congratulations on bumping the trend, Mr. Jaffer.

2. Edmonton Centre - Well, we're disappointed that Anne McLellan was defeated, though we're not at all surprised (we wouldn't have been surprised either way).

As we've mentioned before we don't think it's in the best interests of Albertans to send 28 Tory MP's to Ottawa, just as we believed it wasn't in the best interests of Ontarians to send 100 Liberal MP's to Ottawa throughout the 1990's.

It was interesting to see that as the Liberal vote across the province collapsed, Anne McLellan was able to hold nearly the same 22,000 votes she received in 2004. But alas, more voters turned out and voted for Conservative Laurie Hawn.

We must say that after watching the victory and concession speeches of both McLellan and Hawn, that they were both very classy and gracious. We'll miss you, Anne.

Congrats to the hard working campaign teams on both sides of this battle royal. You've both proved that a thing called "electoral competition" can really exist in Alberta.

3. Peace River - Independent candidate Bill Given garnerd over 20% of the vote against rookie Tory candidate Chris Warkentin.

4. Minority Government - As we mentioned in our previous post, we are pleased with the set up of the next parliament. Though the possible coalition combinations are interesting, we're hoping that this Parliament won't end up being a bickerfest like the previous one.

Plus, it will do the Liberal Party of Canada wonders to spend some time in opposition.

5. Stephen Harper - The first thing we think of when we look at him is "cold oatmeal."

Prime Minister Oatmeal.

6. Surprises to us... - 10 Tory MP's from Quebec!?! What? Liberal MP Reg Alcock losing his seat? Peggy Nash in Parkdale-High Park? Keith Martin re-elected? Jean Lapierre re-elected? The Tories getting spanked in BC? Tony Clement actually winning?!?! what?

7. Liberal Leadership - Paul Martin's resignation... wow, we were giving him until Friday to do it, but geez... we're not really impressed with the list of potential candidates. So far, it looks like a group of "has-beens:" Joe Volpe, Maurizo Bevilacqua, John Manley, Frank McKenna... Michael Ignatieff looks interesting, but the jury is still out.

Though lately we've heard a rumour of an awesome Alberta candidate...

At the Liberal caucus is meeting this week, will they decide to appoint an Interim Leader? If so, who? We like Stephane Dion. :-)

8. Us. Uh, yes, us. It's been an interesting election to comment on and we had some interesting oppurtunities to do so... whether it was arguing/debating with c-lo every morning at work, commenting on the CityTV political panel, or writing commentary on the BBC website, it was fun. Hopefully they'll be another one of these in 18 months...

This is all we have now, but we'll post more thoughts as they pop into our collective minds...

12 comments:

Hasty said...

The indepenant in Peace River who got 20% had run in the CPC nomination against Chris Warketin. His was a sour grapes campaign, nothing more.

Unknown said...

It's really a shame that Linda didn't beat Rahim Jaffer. I really thought that she had a chance. That would have been great if Anne McClelland lost her seat and Linda Duncan became the lone non-Conservative Albertan MP.

-Socialist Swine

Mark Richard Francis said...

"Peggy Nash in Parkdale-High Park"

This is literally the riding on the other side of the tracks from me. I eat in Davenport, buy my food in Parkdale.

Peggy was runnign against Sam Bulte. Bulte, you may recall, was up to her neck in corporate money re: copyright law changes. It really hurt her.

I mentioned to a local activist that perhaps we shoudl go by her campaign office (my former bank branch) and throw pennies.

Tony Clement is in a mandatory recount. There's still hope Mr. 'Kyoto is DEAD people'(*) will still lose.

(*) as seen on Toronto's City TV, 2004 election.

A.L. said...

Prime Minister Oatmeal!

That's genius!

Well done.

A.L.

lastcanadianexit.blogspot.com

WillBlog said...

Anne McLellan ran a great campaign - her team deserves credit for her strong showing.

Anne was very gracious in defeat, and I commend her for her dignity.

The Invisible Hand said...

Prime Minister Oatmeal

It's rather boring and not very popular with young people, but it's good for you.

CFAC Library said...

For the lowdown on the Bulte fiasco, I recommend a visit to the website of Michael Geist, internets lawyer extraordinaire.

Raymaker said...

Overall, a good analysis. But I submit this Duncan woman did well in Strathcona this election compared to 2004 because the insane jew-baiter Malcolm Azania wasn't representing the NDP this time.

Art said...

Raymaker,

Putting aside your false characterization of Azania, I will conceed that the media attention around his old usenet posts likely did dampen the NDP vote in 2004.

But Duncan didn't just do well compared to Azania. She did well compared to all Strathcona NDP candidates ever.

I did a little research and looked at the results for the riding going back to the early seventies.

Duncan had the highest NDP result by percentage of the vote (32.5% - next best was 1988 with 25%) and by raw vote (over 17,000 compared to 13,700 in 1988). The NDP was closer to victory in 1988, even though it's vote was lower, because the vote was split four ways (PC, Reform, NDP and Liberal).

Looking at the NDP vote over all the elections since 1998 is very revealing:

1993: 5%
1997: 14.5%
2000: 14.8%
2004: 23.8%
2006: 32.5%

I'd say Linda Duncan can be pretty happy with the results and confident the NDP can give Rahim a run for his money next time.

Raymaker said...

Nobody would like to see Jaffer sent back to jerking espressos more than I, but 33% is as good as its ever going to get for the Dippers in the 'chuk. If there was an election where they should have scored an MP, this was it. Canadians are growing weary of the 'stache that talks too much. Gawd, I know I am.

And my characterization of Azania is 100% accurate. What was even more revealing is how Layton let him carry on as a candidate in 2004 after discovering Azania's racist views. A man of high principle indeed.

daveberta said...

Derek - Living in Edmonton Strathcona, my analysis is that if the NDP can stop the vote spliting here in the next election by running Linda Duncan again, there is a chance Rahim could be collecting his severance cheques...

Though, with a new leader, the Libs may gain some of their support back in Alberta, whereas they completely bombed out here last time. Though Linda Duncan does have a good case against the continued splitting the vote from her performance this week.

Raymaker said...

Dude, how many times I gotta tell ya...the Dippers ain't the answer to anything. Let these twits control CUPE and the social work faculties. I'm pretty sure now that John Bethel ain't going to be running things in Edmonton any more that you'll be able to find a fine upstanding Grit candidate and kick Rahim's Ralph Lauren little ass.

And Jim, Darryl is my old man, and a poet and a warrior to boot.