mo-litia said:
...
... The real question to be asked here is just how complacent the Ontario voters are the next time we get a chance to go yo the polls. (Soon...vote of non-confidence, anyone? ;D) I know Ontario is generally happy to wallow at the Liberal trough, but even the most die hard Fiberal must feel some anger at the way our tax dollars have been stolen from us.
...
There was an interesting little bit in the
Economist a week or two back about so called
dog whistle issues: those
messages which are aimed at a well defined group and reach them without offending or even being much noticed by others.
One huge
dog whistle issue in Ontario has been, for over 100 years but especially for the past 40 (Laurendau/Dunton, in '65, etc), that
only the Liberals can manage Québec (a.k.a.
keep Québec in its place). Ontarians, despite the best efforts of Premier
Dim Dalton McGuinty, are probably the lest 'regional' Canadians: most see themselves as unhyphenated Canadians, first, and Ontarians third or fourth. Notwithstanding the fact that Québec no longer has much impact on Ontario's prosperity (it was Ontario's biggest market until the end of the '60s when Ontario
morphed into what Prof. Tom Courchene (Queens) - http://www.queensu.ca/sps/faculty_and_fellows/faculty.htm - calls a
North American Regional State), Ontarians still, quietly, almost silently, worry that Québec must be kept 'happy' and 'in' Canada. Ontarians are willing to forgive the Liberals
almost anything so long as Québec is an issue. The Liberals must, as Trudeau did, actively persuade Ontarians that they (the Liberals) are in need of a rest
and have lost control of Québec before Ontarians will vote them out.
If Québecers can convince that English
national media, including the Toronto Star, that the Liberals have lost control of Québec then Ontarians will return something like 65 Tories, 20+/- NDPers and a bare 20 Liberals. With 65 seats in Ontario, 70 in the West and 10 in Atlantic Canada the Tories can form a minority government.
A Tory minority will have to court support from one of:
"¢ A
breakaway faction of fiscally conservative Liberals - a highly unlikely circumstance; Liberal Party discipline will remain strong;
"¢ The BQ - which is a
leftish, pro-Kyoto, anti-military group;
"¢ The NDP and Greens - if they can develop and implement a strong
green agenda; or
"¢ A Liberal Party which is too frightened to face the electorate again, for a while.
In any event, I think a Conservative government would affirm and maybe even expand the Liberal's $12.5 Billion/5,000 + 3,000 promise but I would not look for anything like $25 Billion and 15,000 + 5,000 which would be more realistic.
) Or, if the new government that we will likely soon get is SERIOUS about national unity, we'll have some badly needed electoral and senate reforms that will keep the majority of disgruntled Westerners reasonably happy with Confederation.
