Québec Provincial Election

[De Lorimier]

This province is experiencing technical difficulties.


I feel your pain Oda. What can a progressive person think of when we see the results we had last night? The big bad AdQ wins 41 seats in the National Assembly... ouch. The Québec electorate is one strange beast. 2/3 insatisfaction for the Liberal government, yet the polls showed that Charest was always seen as the one more qualified to act as pm, and in the end he barely won his own county. Make up your mind people! The polls showed a deisre for change, for a strong AdQ presence throughout the whole campaign, yet Ducon was dubbed as "not ready" by most people. Then they still elected him along with forty morons to serve as the official opposition missing on the chance to back up their claims by screwing up completly if elected. Finally, polls for independance always give around 45% support for sovereignty, yet the PQ received a measly 28.32% of the votes.

It all goes back to what Foglia was saying in that column that pissed one poster (who doesn't even care for this thread) that I quoted after the debate. Dumont is winning because of the apolitical portion of the electorate. Talk to AdQ voters. Why did you vote for Ducon? "He wants to cut in the bureaucracy!" What should he cut? "The buraucracy! You know, fonctionnaires!" What else? "And cut the damn bs too! (welfare)" Allright, what do you think should be done? Send more Boubou Macoutes like Bourassa did in the early 90'S? "What? I don't know what you're talking about. I just like it when Ducon talks about lazy people needing to work and stop living off my hard earned tax dollars!!" On the constitutional issue, it's visceral emptiness. "Autonomy within Canada". Yeah sure. That hasn't been tried before either. Are you people fukcing clueless? There's no arguments, there's no understanding of what has to be done beside cut cut cut as if no one even did that before.

And that's just like half his voters, the regular apolitical people who like it when Ducon speaks, when he uses his good old magical thinking. It makes them happy. Fine. The scary ones are the few real conservatives within this province. The Hérouxville-esque crowd, the homophobic crowd, the Jeff Fillion worshipping "Xs", the regressive (because that's what a real conservative is, a person characterized by backward reasoning) crowd. The real AdQ base.


But don't move out just yet. Like the good loser that I am today, I decided to look at the numbers to try and make some sense of this all.

Only 71.21 of the people in age to vote went out and did it yesterday. That's a little over the four million mark. After the 2003 elections, this has been the lowest turnout since '76. When ten percent of the electorate voted by antcipation last sunday, we were expecting bigger numbers. What does it mean? Here are the new fixed numbers:

Liberals go from 33.08% to 23.55% of the electorate
AdQ goes from 30.80% to 21.93% of the electorate
PQ goes from 28.32% to 20.16% of the electorate

Of the +/- 22% who voted for the AdQ, we can't come up with a really big number when it comes to their "scary", or more likely "******ed" base. So yeah, don't move out just yet.


The Greens and Québec Solidaire had decent numbers for fringe parties in Québec with 3.89% and 3.65% respectively. Now is more than ever the time to talk about proportionnal representation in the National Assembly. Using yesterday's numbers and giving each parties seats according to the % of the votes, the new portrait would look like this:

The Libs would have 41 seats instead of 48
The AdQ would have 39 seats instead of 41
The PQ would have 35 seats instead of 36
The Greens would have 5 seats instead of 0
Québec Solidaire would have 5 seats instead of 0

I'm all for an assembly like that where everybody is represented (even if this means a bigger part of the pie for the AdQ in this election).

As for the results and my appreciation of the whole thing. I'm just glad it's over. My theories explained in my earlier big post still stands even if I expected better results for the PQ. The Libs received about 20% of the francophones votes. Jeffrey Simpson agress with me this morning:

Globe and Mail

Spoiler :

The Quebec election results - a feeble Liberal minority - illustrate the continuing disengagement of the province’s francophones from Canada. Where this will lead is unknown, but this disengagement will intensify demands for more power and money for Quebec.

The results also show, quite predictably, how little federalists were helped by Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s "solution" to the so-called fiscal imbalance and other measures designed to curry favour for federalism in Quebec.

The Prime Minister’s overt strategy of catering to Quebec will help his own party in the next federal election. Last night, at best, it might have slowed slightly the marked decline in the provincial Liberal vote. Chances are, the Harper strategy did not even accomplish that modest objective.

Jean Charest’s Liberals, the so-called strong federalists, got fewer francophone votes yesterday than the Parti Québécois, the party backing secession, and the Action Démocratique, the party proposing the oxymoronic policy of Quebec "autonomy" within Canada.

Even the francophones who voted Liberal were supporting a party whose leader spent the campaign promising to "defend Quebec’s interests." Mr. Charest defined this need as further expanding Quebec jurisdiction within Canada and abroad, and curbing the federal spending power. Without a majority, he argued, Quebec would be "weakened before Ottawa and the rest of Canada," as if people elsewhere were planning an assault on the province.

The Liberals attracted less than a third of the francophone vote, while capturing the lion’s share of the non-francophones. Most francophones, then, voted for parties with no interest in Canada (the PQ) or almost no interest (the ADQ), except as a matter of convenience.

The ADQ opposes another referendum, as do the Liberals. Thanks be for that, although two separate countries would be better than the constitutional monstrosity of the ADQ’s "autonomous Quebec" within Canada. Federal politics has witnessed something of the same pattern since the creation of the Bloc Québécois after the collapse of the Meech Lake accord. In every subsequent federal election, the Bloc has won the largest number of francophone votes.

By definition, the Bloc cannot be part of the governance of Canada ; indeed, the party is not interested in that governance, except for what it does for or to Quebec. A Bloc vote can mean many things - but it cannot mean participating in the governance of Canada.

Such is the state of federalism in Quebec that the Liberals can only command the support of about a quarter of francophones. Mr. Harper might have thought that delivering on his election promise to resolve the mythical "fiscal imbalance" would help Mr. Charest. So would the other manifestations of "open" federalism. The results demonstrated that these efforts flopped.

Quebeckers had already psychologically pocketed the "fiscal imbalance" cash, as could have been predicted. Bloc Leader Gilles Duceppe brilliantly captured that attitude in saying : "It’s our money."

Of course, the money was not, but no matter. Quebeckers pay about 20 per cent of total federal revenues. Thus, about 20 per cent of the equalization money pot comes from Quebec. The province will be getting more than $7-billion in additional payments in coming years, meaning that, by definition, about $5.5-billion will be transferred from elsewhere, mostly from Ontario. Quebeckers had been conditioned to believe, including by the Prime Minister, that the federal system "owed" them money. Solving the "fiscal imbalance" was thus viewed as debt repayment, not something to inspire gratitude.

Mr. Harper will now deal with a Quebec government even more nationalist and determined to extract additional power and money from Ottawa.

For Mr. Charest, Mr. Harper’s "open" federalism meant open chequebooks, because the Prime Minister had a Mulroneyesque grand strategy to build the Conservative Party in Quebec and sway nationalist Quebeckers toward federalism. Presumably, the grand strategy remains in place, despite its setback last night.

Quebeckers are brilliant. They have a more nationalist government in Quebec City to press their interests against Ottawa. They have their own official opposition, the Bloc, to press their interests in Ottawa.

And they have a PM whose "open" federalism has been like pushing against an open door.

Disappointing results. Work to get proportionnal representation needs to start now. Fun times ahead. Don't leave us Oda, we need mind like yours more than ever!

 

[De Lorimier]

One of yesterday's good news is Alexis Wawanoloath. Mr.Wawanoloath is a Métis of Abenakis origins and he beat the Liberal Natural Ressources minister Pierre Corbeil in Abitibi-Témiscamingue. He's the first Métis to win a seat in the National Assembly.

http://www.radio-canada.ca/nouvelles/electionsQc2007/2007/03/27/020-reax-autochtones.shtml

 

[Mulholland]

There is one truism in Quebec politics. A liberal will never vote PQ and a Pquiste will never vote Liberal. Charest lost his votes from the previous election because of ineptitiude in fulfilling his promises. Boisclair lost many of his votes from the previous election because of an unfortunate truism pointed out by repulsive shock jock louis Champagne.
"factory workers in the Saguenay would never vote for a "tapette,"
"Champagne asked Cloutier whether the PQ had become a "fag club."

There was only one viable alternative party left, the ADQ. Not too right, not too left, not too gay, and not too Charest. Votes from both sides went to Dumont.

As I see it, unless the ADQ really steps up as opposition party they will be doomed to shrink again. They will lose thier support in the next election, as the PQ will push Boisclair out, and balance will return.

 

[Raisin Bran]

Why does everybody see a downfall of the ADQ coming?

You know Mario Dumont could end-up doing a great job and we might be seeing more of his face.

Give the guy a chance. All we hear is that he sucks, but quite honestly did anyone ever give him a chance at proving himself and his party?

 

[De Lorimier]

On a side note, factory workers in Saguenay elected that "tapette" yesterday in Jonquière.

 

[Mulholland]

Why does everybody see a downfall of the ADQ coming?

You know Mario Dumont could end-up doing a great job and we might be seeing more of his face.

Give the guy a chance. All we hear is that he sucks, but quite honestly did anyone ever give him a chance at proving himself and his party?

We'll see how he does. Like I said unless he steps up as opposition he will lose his current standing. That said, I think as soon as the PQ gets a new, non-gay, white, francophone leader thier support will shoot up again. The liberals on the other hand might not be so lucky.

 

[Babbler]

Why does everybody see a downfall of the ADQ coming?

Because it very weak organizationally, and a lot of vote was out of protest. It could evaporate next time around.

You know Mario Dumont could end-up doing a great job and we might be seeing more of his face.

Give the guy a chance. All we hear is that he sucks, but quite honestly did anyone ever give him a chance at proving himself and his party?

Maybe; I say the same thing about Boisclair.

As I see it, unless the ADQ really steps up as opposition party they will be doomed to shrink again. They will lose thier support in the next election, as the PQ will push Boisclair out, and balance will return.

It can go either way. Either the PQ or ADQ can fade away the next time around (my money is on the PQ). Regardless, even if the PQ get back in opposition or government, things will not return back they way they were. The biggest effect of any third party candidate is ultimately shifting the political spectrum towards their platform.

 

[Mulholland]

It can go either way. Either the PQ or ADQ can fade away the next time around (my money is on the PQ). Regardless, even if the PQ get back in opposition or government, things will not return back they way they were. The biggest effect of any third party candidate is ultimately shifting the political spectrum towards their platform.

Which would be true if this vote were about idealogy. But alot of this vote was about who you hated least.

 

[Goonie]

Don't panic Oda. An ADQ government would be such a weak minority I seriously doubt that they could do too much damage.

Question, if the Libs don't have a late come from behind win, think Charest will step down? Perhaps he may run for the federal libs.

BTW rent and condos in Toronto are cheap right now. Buying a house on the other hand is massively expensive.

Charest is a Tory.

 

[Raisin Bran]

Charest is a Tory.

Charest is a ex-tory

 

[sysyphus]

Charest was a Progressive Conservative, a party which no longer exists.
Because one was a PC doesn't mean they're a fit for the new Conservative party, just ask Scott Brison.

Red Tories like Charest fit better with the Liberals.

 

[Babbler]

I think he would fit with Harper's Conservatives.

 

[sysyphus]

On what basis?

If anybody is Harper's buddy, it's Dumont.

 

[Goonie]

Charest was a Progressive Conservative, a party which no longer exists.
Because one was a PC doesn't mean they're a fit for the new Conservative party, just ask Scott Brison.

Red Tories like Charest fit better with the Liberals.

I don't think Charest was ever known as a red Tory--not in the same degree as Joe Clark at least.

I stand by my statement: Charest is a Tory.

edit: kept reading. Obviously it is impossible to know precisely where he stands now as he is not vocal about it, but Harper was not banking on a Dumont win. His hopes were most assuredly in a Charest win over the péquistes. The 3 billion dollars that Harper sent to Quebec was more of an attempt to endear federalism upon Quebec and thus help Charest in the election.

Dumont is also good for Harper. But there is no way Harper expected him to do this well.

 

[Evie]

And then Idiot Charest went and took that 3 billion fiscal imbalance payment *coughbribecough* we've been asking for so that we could pay for our healthcare...

...and went and tried to bribe the electors with a promise of tax drops.

I'd say it's safe to say Harper does NOT like Charest all that much as of now.

 

[Goonie]

Harper doesn't care what Charest spends it on.

That's the whole point. Haper does not come of as pushing for a strong central government since he appears to let the provinces do what they want with the money.

 

[pboily]

How long do we think this government will hold office?

 

[De Lorimier]

How long do we think this government will hold office?

The Libs and the PQ have some things to work out first. the Libs won't call an election for a while and the PQ won't make the government fall if they're not ready for a campaign. Will the PQ save the Libs ass sometime in the future?

 

[Evie]

Harper doesn't care what Charest spends it on.

That's the whole point. Haper does not come of as pushing for a strong central government since he appears to let the provinces do what they want with the money.

Harper doesn't like Charest because last I heard the ROC newspapers are howling for (Charest) blood :-D.

Of course I may be wrong.

 

[Rhymes]

EDIT: Oops, Am I too late for this. Thought it was a recap. Should have read the dates. Enjoy anyhow


I live in the riding of Laurier-Dorion in Montréal. So I'll just copy paste RB
In L-D, it's pretty simple, 90% of people living on St-Denis and to the east vote PQ, 90% of people living west of St-Denis vote Libs, and a few red neck rebels like me vote ADQ.

The candidates are:

Elsie Lefebvre (Incumbent)

I agree I'de give her a ride any days. Even though I'm anti PQ she could probably convince me with the right arguments


Gerry Sklavounos
The large immigrant community of Parc-extension see themselves in him I guess. 10% of Laurier-Dorion citizen are greeks, nuff said.


Sabrina Dugay
Got my vote this year, even though he's the candidate I know the less about. She was in the riding of Nelligan in 2003. Thats about it.

Ruba Ghazal
Communist freak.

Sébastien Chagnon-Jean
Great guy, very brilliant imo. He could get my vote if the ADQ doesn't satisfy me untill the next elections. If he stays in L-D.

This is it for laurier-Dorion.