On 2024-09-05 7:51 PM, The Horny Goat wrote:
On Wed, 4 Sep 2024 15:05:34 -0400, Rhino
<no_offline_contact@example.com> wrote:
The key prop that has been holding up the Liberal government of Justin
Trudeau is a "supply-and-confidence" agreement between the Liberals and
the "progressive" NDP. The NDP, lead by Jagmeet Singh, agreed to vote
along with the Liberals in any confidence motion provided the Liberals
act on several of the NDP's "progressive" wish list. The deal was agreed
in March 2022 and set to run out in June 2025 but either party was free
to cancel it any time. Without this agreement, the Liberal minority
government could have been defeated at any confidence motion if enough
members of the other parties opposed the legislation at hand.
Jagmeet Singh has announced that the deal is over, apparently effective
immediately.
This does NOT mean we are about to have an election! The Liberals
previous minority government had no such agreement with another party
yet it still managed to govern. For each bill, it found one or more of
the other parties willing to back it to prevent a successful motion of
confidence and preclude an election. Trudeau can - and presumably will -
revert to this approach to try to get to the fixed election date in
October 2025.
However, if the opposition parties work together, they COULD potentially
vote against the Liberals in a confidence motion and defeat it, thereby
forcing an early election.
The leader of the Conservative Party, Pierre Poilievre, is already
challenging Singh to join him in such an effort. Whether that will
happen is questionable - especially before Singh qualifies for his
pension next spring - but at least it's POSSIBLE. Of course, they'd also
require the support of all or most of the Bloc Quebecois, the other
significant party in Parliament. That might not be easy.
This may also increase the pressure on Trudeau from within the Liberal
Party to step down so that they can choose a new leader. Trudeau has
resisted previous calls to do that from within his party, claiming only
he can "save Canada" from the Conservatives in his typical narcissistic
way. Maybe this will be the straw that broke the camel's back and
convinces him to move on to some other job. (I'm sure snowboard teachers
are still needed somewhere; that and teaching drama are the only jobs on
his resume before entering Parliament.)
While I agree with you the NDP war chest is close to flat broke and financially his party is in no position to fight an election. If >I<
know that Poilievre surely does too.
One thing for sure - the eventual Canadian election will be won or
lost in the 416/905 area codes (translation: Toronto and more
especially Metro Toronto - e.g. Toronto's burbs) nearly all of which
were won by Justin last time but could easily flip nearly 100% but to
whom?
The byelection in June flipped Toronto-St. Paul from a safe Liberal seat
to a Conservative seat. That would seem to suggest a possible harbinger.
But it might be a leap to assume that everyone will desert the Liberals
for the Conservatives alone. The votes could split with the more diehard "progressives" voting Green, NDP, and Liberal and only ridings with
large numbers of fiscal conservatives voting for Poilievre. [At the last federal election, Kitchener Center's incumbent Liberal was accused of
sexual improprieties and he stepped down ("to clear his name") so voters
chose the Green Party candidate to replace him.] The smaller cities like Kitchener-Waterloo, London, and other already have some NDP MPs where previously there were only Liberals or Conservatives.
I'm hoping for a massive house-cleaning with very few Liberals (or NDP!)
getting re-elected. They all propped up the current buffoon so they
all deserve to be punished. Let them go into the wilderness for a few
election cycles and try to find some sensible middle ground instead of embracing their current far Left platform.
--
Rhino
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