Happy (late) anniversary! That's great.

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Are you folks voting today? What's at stake? Who should I be rooting for?

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It's next Monday Jon. (Though I am voting today, b/c I will be out of town next week.)

What's at stake: Well the centrist, but in power forever, and generally quite annoying Liberal Party are in a battle for power with the right leaning Conservatives. The Conservative Party are an amalgamation of two right of centre parties, the socially centrist but fiscally conservative Progressive Conservative Party and the right wing in all things Alliance Party. Right now, it's hard to say who will win, but it seems like it might be either a Conservative or Liberal miniority gov't. Though some are saying that the Conservatives might just form a majority.

The Conservatives are an unknown factor. Former Aliance memebers seem to hold more power in the new coalition party, and while they claim that they will honour the more centrist "red Tories" in social programs, their party has been in the past, for Canada joining the Iraq war, against gun control, anti abortion, anti bilingualism, anti immgrant, anti same sex marriage, big on tax cuts... I believe that Reagan was a big influence on their leader, Stephen Harper. They have toned down their rightness for the campaign, but a lot of people fear that if they get in power, they'll push the right wing agenda back to the fore.

The Liberals, though with a new leader, Paul Martin, are tainted by the scandals of the former term in power. They've been in power for about 12 (?) years now and I think everyone is sick of them. It bodes poorly for their campaign that lately they seem to be running on "we're better than those awful Conservatives." Two provincial Liberal gov'ts in BC and Ontario have been pissing the electorate off lately, which probably hadn't been helping the federal Liberals in their campaign.

In Quebec the fight is between the Bloc Quebecois (a national Quebec seperatist party) and the Liberals. (The Bloc will probably win a majority of the QC votes.) The prairie Provinces are most likely to vote Conservative, with pockets of New Democratic Party (the left leaning party) in Saskatchewan and Manitoba. Atlantic Canada will probably largely vote Liberal. BC flip flops all over the place. Ontario is the real battleground in this election--they have gone Liberal and Conservative in the past, and hold the most seats in the House of Commons, but the question is: how much do they trust Harper to keep Canada'a social programs in place, or are they so sick of the Liberals that they are willing to give the New Conservatives a chance.

There are also a splinter of Conseratives running on a red tory ticket, but I don't think they have many chances of being elected, and the Green Party are, for the first time, running candidates in every riding and having a presence in the election, which means that they will likely split the left vote with the NDP.

A lot of people who might be inclined to vote Green or NDP are seriously considering holding their nose and voting Liberal to keep the Conservatives from power.

It's very hard to sum this up in a nutshell, I'm sure others can fill in what I've missed.

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Excellent summary, Sue.

This:

They have toned down their rightness for the campaign, but a lot of people fear that if they get in power, they'll push the right wing agenda back to the fore.

This is my concern, having lived through that same lie here in Ontario.

A lot of people who might be inclined to vote Green or NDP are seriously considering holding their nose and voting Liberal to keep the Conservatives from power.

Yes, please ask everyone you know to consider this policy, this time around. The Canada we know is at stake. We're going to be digging out for years from the Reform agenda inflicted on Ontario. Irreparable damage will be done.

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The Greens are potentially splitting the Left vote? Why that could never happen here! Oh wait.

Thanks for the summary. Very helpful. I'm meeting a Canadian friend for coffee after work today so now I can sound all edjumacated.

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For the last couple of elections, the Alliance and the Progressive Conservatives have been splitting the right vote, it's how the liberals have been in power for so long. (Oh, and the stink of Brian Mulroney lasted long...)

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But now the Alliance and the Progressive Conservatives have united, is that it? So they're not competing against each other?

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But now the Alliance and the Progressive Conservatives have united

Yes, although I'd be inclined to phrase it as "the Alliance has usurped the Progressive Conservative party". The (ex)leader of the PCs promised during his campaign (for party leader) not to merge the parties but immediately did so. A very large number of Alliance party members seem to have joined the PCs then specifically to vote (as PC) for the merger. This has really pissed some people off (including me).

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NB: this is very close to what happened in Ontario. The Reform were too late to file party creation documents for the 1995 election, so large numbers of them got Progressive Conservative memberships and essentially staged a coup from within and steered the party far to the right. Significant chaos resulted when the program slashing began.

The parallels with the Harris era in Ontario are the reasons why I am convinced that Harper is running the same shell game from within F/r/e/d, uh the "New" Conservative party.

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JohnSweden, I totally agree. I don't believe for a minute that the oh-sorry-we-don't-have-it-yet platform of the Conservative Party is anything like that of the PCs. I'm expecting Alliance/CRAP/Reform agenda all the way.

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