Why Stephen Harper Won

[Mowich]

[FONT=&quot]Here’s why Stephen Harper really won - The Globe and Mail[/FONT]
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[FONT=&quot]“In fact, the Conservatives won because they did the sorts of things the Liberals used to do. They built broad coalitions among disparate groups. Take the so-called ethnic vote. When the Liberals courted new Canadians, it was smart. When the Conservatives do it, it’s sleazy. During the campaign, the CBC assembled countless panels of ethnic people to express their disgust at this condescending and divisive tactic. Amazingly, however, ethnic voters seemed glad to have important cabinet ministers show up in their ridings. They liked the focus on stability and a strong economy. Besides, the Liberals hadn’t been around for years.[/FONT]"
[FONT=&quot]
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[FONT=&quot]"The Conservatives’ years of efforts paid off spectacularly. To get results like that, you need a long-term strategy, passion, and someone willing to drink 15,000 cups of tea. The Liberals no longer have any of those things.[/FONT]"
[FONT=&quot]
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[FONT=&quot]The Conservatives profited from vote splits. But they were also able to get out the vote where it mattered. They were focused and had ground troops who worked hard. For this, they’re being accused of running a soulless and technocratic campaign. (When Liberals ran things this way, they were called “professional.”)[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
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[FONT=&quot]"As for those attack ads, it was Jack Layton, not Stephen Harper, who dealt the crucial blow when he brought up Mr. Ignatieff’s miserable attendance record in Parliament during the leaders debates. “If you are going to apply for a promotion, you at least ought to show up for the job,” he cracked. It stuck. Iggy never recovered.”[/FONT]

 

[mentalfloss]

"As for those attack ads, it was Jack Layton, not Stephen Harper, who dealt the crucial blow when he brought up Mr. Ignatieff’s miserable attendance record in Parliament during the leaders debates. “If you are going to apply for a promotion, you at least ought to show up for the job,” he cracked. It stuck. Iggy never recovered.”[/FONT]

A successful debate argument = 'attack ad' now?

Hey, by the way.. speaking of attack ads, I was watching the Canucks game and they clobbered Nashville.

Wait, what?!?

 

[The Old Medic]

It also helped that the Liberals made such a blatant grab for power, which turned off everyone, including their base.

Ignatieff was willing to compromise ANY principle, make ANY concession with the other parties, just so long as he could become P.M.

The Liberals went along with his blind ambition, and they paid the horrible price. People just got turned off by their naked power grab, the three elections they have forced the country into (and each time they did WORSE) and especially by Ignatieff himself.

They deserve what happened to them. They were willing to work with a party who's sole aim is the destroy Canada, just so they could gain power. Look what happened to the two parties that supposedly stood for something other than what the NDP and the Conservatives promote. Because they showed that they really stand for nothing but power, they both lost BIG TIME.

The NDP had better enjoy it's little gasp of being the "opposition". The next election, they will slide right back into obscurity. The ONLY reason they got the votes that they did was that they stood by their principles, and all of the normal Liberal and Bloc voters went to them to punish their own parties for their duplicity.

 

[damngrumpy]

If you sift through the ballot counts in Ontario in once powerful Liberal Riding's there is a story
that is not so comforting for the Conservatives. If the Liberal vote had gone down by another
five to six percent all those riding's would have gone orange through vote splitting. That is a
problem for the victorious Tories. If the Liberals shrink anymore and its likely they will as the
truth bears witness to reality, the NDP will pick up those seats next time round.
The Liberal Party will take ten to fifteen years to come together again and that is a long time in
politics. That does not mean the Conservatives won't have some benefit they will, the right
wing of the Liberal Party may well join the Conservatives. That is good and bad because once
these people pay their money for membership they will set about changing the conservative
agenda and will eventually change it to their own image and likeness, just like Reform hijacked
the Progressive Conservative movement.
The NDP on the other hand will be the voice of Quebec for some time to come the Quebecois
tend to shower their leaders with a few chances before moving on in the case of the Bloc it was
two decades. The left of the Liberals and more important all those progressive educated youth
are now part of the Orange Machine for the future.
It is not this election that is the most exciting its the next two, for if the pattern of Canadian
governance holds true the official opposition usually gets the chance to govern but we will see.
Both parties may well have to compromise to secure their existence on the national stage as it is
in both their interest to ensure the Liberals don't gain traction any time soon

 

[Machjo]

The reason harper won is because he got the plurality of votes in his riding. Same reason Layton and May won by the way. Ang Harper's vote is worth no more nor less than theirs.

If you sift through the ballot counts in Ontario in once powerful Liberal Riding's there is a story
that is not so comforting for the Conservatives. If the Liberal vote had gone down by another
five to six percent all those riding's would have gone orange through vote splitting. That is a
problem for the victorious Tories. If the Liberals shrink anymore and its likely they will as the
truth bears witness to reality, the NDP will pick up those seats next time round.
The Liberal Party will take ten to fifteen years to come together again and that is a long time in
politics. That does not mean the Conservatives won't have some benefit they will, the right
wing of the Liberal Party may well join the Conservatives. That is good and bad because once
these people pay their money for membership they will set about changing the conservative
agenda and will eventually change it to their own image and likeness, just like Reform hijacked
the Progressive Conservative movement.
The NDP on the other hand will be the voice of Quebec for some time to come the Quebecois
tend to shower their leaders with a few chances before moving on in the case of the Bloc it was
two decades. The left of the Liberals and more important all those progressive educated youth
are now part of the Orange Machine for the future.
It is not this election that is the most exciting its the next two, for if the pattern of Canadian
governance holds true the official opposition usually gets the chance to govern but we will see.
Both parties may well have to compromise to secure their existence on the national stage as it is
in both their interest to ensure the Liberals don't gain traction any time soon

consider too that harper will have sovereignty hanging over his head. Should the Block rise up come next election, or should there be a sovereignty referendum under his watch, questions will abound whether he's at fault.

Granted the NDP could blow it too. Should the electorate switch from NDP back to bloc for instance. Again, it's in both Harper's and Layton's interest to promote federalism successfully, otherwise they'll both be held accountable most likely.

 

[Colpy]

If you sift through the ballot counts in Ontario in once powerful Liberal Riding's there is a story
that is not so comforting for the Conservatives. If the Liberal vote had gone down by another
five to six percent all those riding's would have gone orange through vote splitting. That is a
problem for the victorious Tories. If the Liberals shrink anymore and its likely they will as the
truth bears witness to reality, the NDP will pick up those seats next time round.
The Liberal Party will take ten to fifteen years to come together again and that is a long time in
politics. That does not mean the Conservatives won't have some benefit they will, the right
wing of the Liberal Party may well join the Conservatives. That is good and bad because once
these people pay their money for membership they will set about changing the conservative
agenda and will eventually change it to their own image and likeness, just like Reform hijacked
the Progressive Conservative movement.
The NDP on the other hand will be the voice of Quebec for some time to come the Quebecois
tend to shower their leaders with a few chances before moving on in the case of the Bloc it was
two decades. The left of the Liberals and more important all those progressive educated youth
are now part of the Orange Machine for the future.
It is not this election that is the most exciting its the next two, for if the pattern of Canadian
governance holds true the official opposition usually gets the chance to govern but we will see.
Both parties may well have to compromise to secure their existence on the national stage as it is
in both their interest to ensure the Liberals don't gain traction any time soon

If the last couple of days are any indication, the NDP will be back to their usual 'insignificant" rating in 4 and one half years, after people begin to realize what a bunch of wing-nuts they really are.........

The Liberal Party will come back, I think.......I actually hope.

Right now there is only one party I could possibly vote for......the Conservatives. I personally hope the Liberals find a decent leader, one not trying to out-care the NDP, one truly centre-of-the-road, one not addicted to the Nanny-state psychology.....so I have an alternative to vote for.

The next four years are going to actually be fun............Serious Steve versus Loopy Layton.....oh my.

 

[Machjo]

I would love to see a liberal conservative party running next election, maybe along the lines of Poland's Civic platform. I can't imagine such a party winning many votes, but it would be nice to have it on the ballot for the principled vote.

 

[mentalfloss]

If the last couple of days are any indication, the NDP will be back to their usual 'insignificant" rating in 4 and one half years, after people begin to realize what a bunch of wing-nuts they really are.........

The Liberal Party will come back, I think.......I actually hope.

Right now there is only one party I could possibly vote for......the Conservatives. I personally hope the Liberals find a decent leader, one not trying to out-care the NDP, one truly centre-of-the-road, one not addicted to the Nanny-state psychology.....so I have an alternative to vote for.

The next four years are going to actually be fun............Serious Steve versus Loopy Layton.....oh my.

Ezra clone alert.

 

[PoliticalNick]

I just love watching people praise Harpo for his leadership on the economy. Talk about blind faith. His whole platform was how our economy had done better than our major comparitive nations during the crisis but you have to reflect upon the facts that those nations we out-performed were basically bankrupt and our economy is still in the tank and not recovering anywhere near the rate it needs to just to get us, in the next decade, back to where we were in 2007. If you remove the oil sands factor our economy would be just as bad as the USA or Greece and be declining still instead of holding some small modecum of stability. The claims of job creation are a farce also. Harpo claimed to have created 200,000 jobs but if you discect the truth we lost almost 800,000 jobs, over half of which were jobs with considerable wages and benefits and 150,000 of those created are all minimum wage/no benefit jobs. This is hardly a record of great financial leadership. Even his policy of corporate tax cuts are fallacious. All they will accomplish is some more profitable corporations, not enough consumers have any disposable income to increase demand to levels significant enough to warrant job creation at any noticable level.

 

[cranky]

Well, I think the voters have spoken, and it is the Liberals that they think are sleazy.

 

[Mowich]

If the Liberal vote had gone down by another five to six percent all those riding's would have gone orange through vote splitting.

The point being that it didn't go down and the Conservatives took the seats.

That is a problem for the victorious Tories. If the Liberals shrink anymore and its likely they will as the truth bears witness to reality, the NDP will pick up those seats next time round.

That's some crystal ball you have, DG. There is no guarantee that the NDP will pick up those seats, just as there is no guarantee that the Conservatives would - they are up for grabs, possibly and only time will tell which party gets them in the next election.

 

[YukonJack]

Stephen Harper won a majority, because Canadians - albeit only a pathetic 61% of them - decided that he was the best man for the job.

End of story.

 

[cranky]

Stephen Harper won a majority, because he was the best man for the job.

End of story.

Fixed it for you!

 

[mentalfloss]

Stephen Harper won a majority, because he was George Bush's best man.

End of story.

Fixed again.

 

[cranky]

Haha.

The left wing church of hate believes that they can win any debate by merely bringing up the usa and or GWB, no matter what the topic is.

 

[mentalfloss]

Eees just a joke mang.

 

[YukonJack]

mentalflubs, once again - with plaigerizing my post - proved to the world that it already knew: You are a lying idiot.

 

[mentalfloss]

Somebody call the waaambulance.