Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Patrick Connor on April 29, 2011 at 11:30pm

My concern with the Project Democracy poll is its accuracy. Given that our riding covers a broad area with such a diverse population having very regional centric concerns, I'm wondering how they determined the polling sample of 400 intended voters to represent the 79 000 in our riding. Not to say that accuracy would be impossible but it would require a detailed knowledge of this riding. I'm just curious about their methodology for drawing the sample. Catch22 has still not made a recommendation for our riding and I wonder if they will. The strategic vote is becoming increasingly mysterious. Trying  to predict how our riding will vote based on anecdotal evidence and polls that may or may not apply to us is tricky to say the least. There is also the power of belief that should never be discounted though it too can distort reality. Maybe ultimately, one way or another, you do end up voting with your heart.

Permalink Reply by Pierre Bélisle on April 29, 2011 at 11:35pm

Heart is good ! So is trusting your instincts if they have not been dulled by fear.

Permalink Reply by Toby Stewart on April 30, 2011 at 2:10pm

Has anyone gotten a link to any poll in the past 1-2 days (or one upcoming tomorrow -- Sunday) that has actually touched directly upon Pontiac voters?

 

If so, could you please share the link?

 

(As an aside, the CPAC profile of this riding, aired yesterday and was both overweighted toward the CRAP coalition candidate, and very poorly translated (if my lip-reading skill is still intact)...and if it repeats, don't waste your 1/2 hour to watch it.)

Permalink Reply by 2diatgcsxxytx on April 30, 2011 at 2:18pm

Hi Toby,

This one came out, yesterday - just click on the New Riding Specific Polls link:

http://www.oraclepoll.com/Recent_Polls_and_News.html

 And here's an article about a riding poll that came out yesterday, commissed by CROP-La Presse:

http://www.cyberpresse.ca/actualites/elections-federales/201104/30/...

 

Both look very promising for the NDP.

 

Hope this helps.

Cheers,

Alexia

 

Permalink Reply by Toby Stewart on May 3, 2011 at 9:58am

Thanks Alexia (and to all who contributed to this civil group discussion);

 

Pontiac certainly was a shock to me...(and I’d like to check the individual poll results to see from where the surge came to put Mathieu so far over the top)...the good news being that we’re no longer “Cannon-fodder”. 

 

However the overall picture is very depressing for the next 4-5 years, and that should be long enough for the CRAP coalition to significantly cripple the nation’s cherished social fabric, and to compromise any potential for recovery in the decades following (through Harpernomics)...which I guess will be the statistical remainder of my lifetime.  I’m sure there are some small positives (eg. Liz May), but these don’t offset the dismal broad prospects for everyone save the very rich and the larger corporate/business sector.  And of course, the biggest loser last night was the Earth...

 

I look forward to meeting everyone face-à-face à l'avenir.

Cheers all!

Toby

Permalink Reply by 2diatgcsxxytx on May 3, 2011 at 11:35am

Toby, here are my thoughts about this:

 

http://www.facebook.com/notes/alexia-naidoo/our-future-is-bright-an...

 

Cheers,

Alexia

Permalink Reply by Toby Stewart on May 3, 2011 at 5:13pm

Thanks for your facebook posting Alexia -- below are my considered thoughts as a counter-balance: 

 

I admire people who can find lots of semi-positives in what I assess, based upon my almost 7 decades of life on this small planet, as mostly negatives -- or (in the case of this election), as the beginning of a much more negative series of decisions/actions/aggressions against the programs/values/principles and outcomes that most Canadians say we value. 

 

By 'most Canadians', I mean the 60% of us who voted yesterday for other parties, plus the 40% who didn't vote for anyone but especially not for the CRAP coalition -- which means the CRAP "won" their absolute majority of seats with only about 27% of the total potential electorate having cast a ballot for them to govern in accordance with their stated (and clearly demonstrated) ideology/principles, comtemptable political tactics and strategies.

 

I do agree that there are many other fronts on which to wage progressive counter-measures, and I accept that looking through certain micro-lens can give us pictures that look more positive (than if we step back to look at what's happening broadly)...and we all need to do this from time to time to maintain sanity in an insane world.

 

I just think that for big-picture, long-term parallels of the impacts this 'new' administration is likely to have on our global environment, and on the people who live and work in this country, and on our future 'wellness/happiness index',

we don't have to look too much further than the Regan (or Bush II, or Thatcher, or other similar western conservative idealogues' administrations) to see how easy it will be for the CRAP to bankrupt the federal treasury, privatize many qunitessential Canadian social programs (medicare et al), subsidize the profits of the military-industrial sector with our taxes and with younger Canadian lives, de-regulate the resource extraction and other corporate sectors, etc., etc.,

-- and thereby make almost impossible any return to the quality/level of services from their government that Canadians who continue to need these services had enjoyed over the past two generations...even assuming that the CRAP only hold onto this majority for one term.  No successor government will have the resources necessary to rectify much of the government and civil society dismantling that I suspect will soon begin to unfold here (as it had similarly unfolded elsewhere).

 

That's enough of my ranting for now -- let's all enjoy the small positives while we can.

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