Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Freda Davies on April 9, 2011 at 1:07am

Is there a compelling reason to cut off the Kenora dicussion on April 10? Isn't it possible the leaders' debate on April 12 could make a difference to projections? I checked out the threehundredeight.com Apr 8 projection for Kenora: Con-44.2%, Lib-31.9%, NDP-20.0%. That seems to put the Liberals well ahead of the NDP, and it appears that Eric at this site has a well-tested carefully weighted method for his projections. Another site, hillandknowlton.ca sounds less accurate, but in any case, its "election predictor" on the evening of April 8 gave the following for Kenora: Con-41.5%, Lib-35.4%, NDP-20.5%. For the three main parties, all the same candidates are running this time as in the last election. The results that time were: Con-40.5%, Lib-31.6%, NDP-23.2%. All those figures seem to indicate the wise choice for Catch22 endorsement would be the Liberal, Roger Valley. Also, maybe it's worth noting there has been a long history of Liberal representation in this riding.

Another informative set of data is the Kenora poll-by-poll results from the 2008 election at http://www.elections.ca/scripts/OVR2008/31/7375.html

Permalink Reply by Helene McKenzie on April 9, 2011 at 9:16am

I will give the following reasons for the Liberal candidate winning:

 

1) Roger Valley is the former mayor of Dryden. He was also the former MP for the region during the local economic downturn (which had little to do with the global one) when the mill was in its final lay-off process. What I mean is that people know him, they know what he can do, and they are comfortable with him.

 

2) Until the last election there had never been a Conservative elected in the region. I believe that people had made a decision to elect a member of the national leading party in hopes that it would help our region recover jobs and economic stability. (Un)fortunately that has not happened. 

 

3) The one "gift" received from the federal government was a $22+ million tax break. And again, (un)fortunately it went to the local mill, while local businesses are going bankrupt. This is not sitting well with some people. 

 

4) Roger Valley has also been taking his campaign to the northern regions (which doesn't happen often), visiting many of the communities there. These communities are primarily First Nation reserves, and with the understanding that the First Nations population is the fastest growing one in Canada, it is suspected that he will garner many votes from these communities. 

 

5) The NDP candidate, while more than adequate for the job, has little experience in federal politics. If the race was only between Ms. Cameron and Mr. Rickford, I would hazard that Ms. Cameron would stand a good chance of winning. But with Mr. Valley running well it is doubtful Ms. Cameron will be voted in.

 

Anyway, those are my reasons for picking Roger Valley. I will add that I am not affiliated with any party, and grew up in Saskatchewan where one always voted NDP. The reasons stated above have been garnered from speaking to people about the issues. 

Permalink Reply by Catch 22 on April 9, 2011 at 10:03am

Freda,

Some good food for thought on the debates. Thanks for kicking off the overall discussion.

We wanted to get wrap up the candidate recommendation process so that we can finalize the advertising plan. I'll run your suggestion by our team and see what people think about extending until mid-week.

Gary

Permalink Reply by CPP on April 9, 2011 at 10:28pm

I live in Red Lake, and so far it's been Rickford all over our local newspaper - with the chief of Fort Severn writing a glowing letter the week before the election was called, an article that could have been penned by Harper about how the opposition forced an election on the budget (!), and then a lengthy letter from Tony Clement. Rickford signs went up all over town the day after the election (his sister lives in town) and Valley isn't running a really snappy campaign, as far as I can tell.

Permalink Reply by Freda Davies on April 10, 2011 at 11:53am

Don't get discouraged by all the Con's signs or the level of support they seem to be getting. Remember they have tons of funding. (In fact that's another whole question: Is there anything preventing them from having money coming in from American tea party types?)

We have to stick with the question of who is the most likely candidate to possibly beat Greg Rickford. Is is Roger Valley or Tania Cameron?

Permalink Reply by CPP on April 10, 2011 at 4:01pm

Roger, based on this being a federally Liberal riding for years, and the fact that he has been an MP in the past, and has a higher profile through out the riding than Tania

Permalink Reply by Catch 22 on April 11, 2011 at 2:28am

@ Freda - you make a good point and we are taking your advice to extend the discussion until after the debates are over and a clearer picture might emerge.

http://www.mintzberg.org/B

Permalink Reply by Freda Davies on April 11, 2011 at 12:13pm

Thanks. I hope some more useful information comes forward.

This bit from the "Canada Votes" section of the Apr 9 Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal is supportive though not big on evidence.

-------------------------------------------------

Don’t split your vote
Here in Minnesota, attempts to start a third party called the Independence Party (aka Jesse Ventura’s party) have caused vote-splitting with the Democrats. This has benefited Conservative-like Republicans including Tim Pawlenty, Michele Bachmann and Chip Cravaack who defeated Jim Oberstar who represented the Minnesota side of the Canadian-U.S. border.
Don’t let that happen in Canada by vote-splitting. Conservative-like Republicans with the majority in present-day Wisconsin and during the George W. Bush presidency cut millions of dollars from pensioners and took away the rights of public workers.
Canada has a great multiple-party system, so use it. I urge Liberals to support John Rafferty and Bruce Hyer in the Thunder Bay ridings and NDP voters to support Roger Valley in Kenora. In short, instead of voting with your conscience, accept reality and vote with your head.
Will Labovitch
Saint Paul, Minn.

Permalink Reply by Freda Davies on April 16, 2011 at 8:34pm

Maybe it's time for Catch 22 to endorse a candidate for Kenora. Project Democracy http://www.projectdemocracy.ca/kenora has picked Liberal, Roger Valley. The support for Tania Cameron (NDP) seems to be trending downward if threehundredeight.com can be relied upon at least a bit. Here are 3 sets of figures from 308's site:

April  8:   Con 44.2%, Lib 31.9%, NDP 20.0%

April 13:  Con 44.1%, Lib 32.3%, NDP 19.8%

April 15:  Con 43..8%, Lib 32.3%, NDP 19.5%

The independent candidate seems to be stealing a few votes from Con and NDP.

I heard a bit of the candidates' debate from Dryden. Tania Cameron sounded like a really good person, someone I'd probably vote for if I lived in that riding and under other circumstances, that is if we had a fair representation system or if we didn't have such a bunch of masterful con artists to deal with as we have in Harper's Conservatives. But I think Roger Valley is the one most likely to beat the Conservative incumbent if anybody can.