Dispelling the Myth of the 60% Against Harper

We've heard it before. It's nothing new. Supporters of the NDP and the also-ran parties are once again claiming that, while the Conservatives achieved a majority, a clear majority of 60 percent of Canadians voted against the Conservatives.

Mindless, uneducated nonsense.

The only way to claim that the majority were voting against the Conservatives is if there was a virtual guarantee that either the Conservatives, a) could not have polled higher than they did on election day, or b) could in no way have hit 50 percent of the vote.

Running up to the election, polls had the Conservatives as high as 43 percent or as low as 36 percent with the Conservatives most of the time hovering in the 39 percent region.

However, Compass appears to be one of the few companies that asked the all-important question that the "Anything But Conservative" equation absolutely depends upon: voter's second intentions.

And that is a telling story indeed.

According to the real world numbers, the Conservatives were the second choice for 11 percent of the population. So, the idea that the majority of voters were voting against the Harper Conservatives has no basis in reality.

In fact, if the Conservatives kept their steady base of 39 percent and everybody who would have voted for the Conservatives with their second choice in fact did vote for their second choice, the Conservatives would have unquestionably cracked the majority marker.

But I'm not arguing against reality the way that the whining, sore-losers are. The reality is that 39 percent of the population voted for the Conservatives. And knowing that the Conservatives were the second choice of enough voters to put them into absolute majority territory, suggesting that 60 percent of Canadians voted against the Conservatives only holds true if you also say that:

1. 69% of voters voted against the NDP
2. 81% of voters voted against the Liberals
3. 94% of voters voted against the Bloc
4. 96% of voters voted against the Green Party

Now, can we put this sore-loser nonsense to bed once and for all?

** UPDATE **

And one other point I wanted to mention. The idea of an "Anything But Conservative" majority has one other major detractor. We already know how much support Canadians had in the past with an "Anything But Conservative" situation. And only 4 out of 10 Canadians supported it.

Anything? Sorry, but it looks like that 60 percent number is actually the opposite: 60 percent of Canadians are against "ANYTHING But Conservative".

** SECOND UPDATE **

In the comments, Oxygentax linked his list of significant decisions/programs made by parties who obtained a majority of the house without achieving a majority of the votes. Considering the snail's pace of significant government decisions/programs one sees in minority governments (such as the past 5 years) I imagine that you could easily count a good two-thirds of that list as gone. (h/t to Oxygentax)

And on a related note, imagine how exaggerated that kind of problem would be in a multi-party proportional representation system. Actually, you don't even have to imagine...

A vote for Iggy is a vote for... Jack?

How often have we heard the Liberals cry that a vote for the NDP is a vote for the Conservatives? That scare tactic is most certainly about to die a horrific death.

Polls are showing NDP support clearly blazing upwards. We have two polls (LaPresse and Ekos) both stating the NDP have taken first place in Quebec with Nanos' latest numbers showing the NDP surging not only in Quebec but also in a three-way dead heat in Atlantic Canada and overtaking the Liberals in both the Prairies and BC.

Nobody can downplay or understate the significance of this turn of events.

I cannot see the Liberals old-school scare tactic used against NDP supporters working this time around. Only die-hard Liberals (and not even all of them) are impressed by Michael Ignatieff. NDP supporters certainly aren't impressed with Ignatieff's support of the invasion of Iraq and his right-winger in a left-winger cloak fakery.

With the Liberal Party's numbers clearly shifting downwards right across the country (with the exception of Ontario so far) there is no chance regionally speaking that NDP supporters are going to switch over to the Liberals now to "stop Harper" as it were. They most certainly are going to be buoyed at the prospect of Jack Layton finally getting the traction they have all longed to see for years.

The NDP need only rise 4.6% in the national polling to overtake the Liberals. And considering that there are ten days to the election and the NDP have clearly risen more than that amount in the past five days, all bets are off.

Jack Layton has had no qualms discussing his desire for a coalition government. If the NDP are able to sap away enough Liberal seats, that would put the NDP in the power position as the official Opposition party. In a coalition government, that would mean one thing: Prime Minister Jack Layton.

Can you think of any other title in the world that would be as likely to scare the pants off of every blue Liberal in Canada? I think not.

It's still a long shot. And we all know that with ten days left in this election anything can happen. But if the NDP continues it's upwards trajectory across the map, the Liberals are most certainly going to become the also-ran in the coalition dream. And blue Liberals don't hate Stephen Harper enough to risk a socialist government with a separatist party holding the strings.

Could it be that we'll soon be hearing the phrase, "A vote for Ignatieff is a vote for Layton?"

Hypocrisy: Leftie's on Gun Registry VS Leftie's on Prisons

I was recently debating the necessity of the gun registry with a bunch of very left leaning individuals today who were decrying the Tories wanting to dismantle the long-gun registry. Their argument is that the registry helps with regards to violent crimes.

I did some research to back up some of my arguments and came across a great little page on the Statistics Canada website. They have a collection of statistical data concerning gun crime in Canada.

What was really curious was the rate of decline in homicides by rifles and shotguns:

The long gun registry went into effect in 2001. However, if you look at the stats, rifle and shotgun murders were already in a steep decline leading up to the registry being enacted. In fact the drop is far more significant in the years preceding.

And yet the Lefties want us to believe that the registry is important and money should be spent on it even if the rate of decline in long gun murder has slowed down ever since.

Now compare this to the Lefties and their attack on the Harper government's plans to spend more money on prisons. Of course they're using every chance they can to play the US boogeyman card. But their main bone of contention is that crime is decreasing, so why spend more money on prisons?

It's interesting to watch the hypocrisy of saying we should spend more money on long gun registration during a time when long gun murder was already rapidly declining while saying that because the crime rate appears to be going down (though it's not even close to levels from 40 to 50 years ago) spending money on prisons is pointless.

Play With Fire, Get Burned

By now, we are all aware of the leaking of the Auditor General's report on G8/G20 spending. We of course have the blowhards on both sides crying foul.

The lefties are convinced this report is a damning picture of what the Harper government is about and just another scandal proving so. Not that they ever needed proof of this; they've swallowed every faux scandal that has been thrown out since Harper took power, practically all of which proved to be false.

The righties are saying this report is completely worthless. As a draft report, it is not the final findings of the Auditor General and thus cannot be taken at face value. Mind you, even the Auditor General Sheila Fraser herself has cautioned the public against accepting this report and should wait until the real report is presented in Parliament.

Now, this whole brouhaha doesn't change my opinion of who to vote for. The timing and means of this release (along with the AG's warnings) tells me this is at best dirty politics by the Opposition and at worst outrightly criminal. That kind of move just affirms my opinion of Ignatieff as nothing more than an opportunist and Layton as the pompous hypocrite he is. After all, while the Contempt of Parliament finding by the Opposition causing this election is questionable, the releasing of an AG report outside of Parliament is by legislation a reason for a charge of Contempt.

But the truth of the matter is actually much more simple: if you play with fire, you're going to get burned.

Many Canadians -- including a slew of bloggers in the Blogging Tories blogroll -- were unimpressed at the scope of spending for the G8/G20 summit. The largesse was unfathomable and quite simply reckless. If you don't think so, just look at how many Blogging Tories are screaming from their roofs over Michael Ignatieff and Jack Layton's spending promises.

As any true fiscal conservative knows, the bigger the government initiative, the greater chance for waste and/or error. And also the bigger the chance for pork-belly spending. Whether or not this erroneously leaked report -- I won't call it the AG's report since it was not released by and is not being endorsed by her -- turns out to be a true representation of her findings, the simple fact is that this is simply a matter of the chickens coming home to roost.

Maybe Harper should use this as a lesson and take a long look in the mirror asking himself what he really believes in regarding government spending.

But I -- and I'm sure many people who warned about the G8/G20 spending -- also can't help but say... I told you so.

Where's ACTRA on the censoring of Sun TV?

Last year the arts community -- especially ACTRA, the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists -- came down hard on Stephen Harper's government Bill C-10 which would in part effectively cut funding to artistic endeavors that were contrary to public interests. Some, such as director David Cronenberg, went so far as to call this censorship.

Bill C-10 in no way would prevent artists from creating, displaying or performing their works. It was simply telling them that they would have to get support from other sources. That is not censorship. If it was censorship then the government would effectively have a responsibility to fund all artists on demand.

I'm an artist. And I get it.

But where is ACTRA and all these arts community figures now that Sun TV (erroneously called "Fox News North") is under attack by the media on all sides? Where is the arts community when we have so many people calling for this private, non-public funded news outlet to be prevented access to the airwaves?

From Wikipedia: "Censorship is the suppression of speech or other communication which may be considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or inconvenient to the general body of people as determined by a government, media outlet, or other controlling body."

Censorship is not the denial of funding from one source. It is suppression. No artist was being suppressed from performing or creating under Bill C-10. Sure they would have to find alternate sources to create their artistic works at the level of expense that would be optimum. But that's not suppression.

Suppression is when we have the media demanding a voice to be silenced. Suppression is when we have politicians wanting voices to be silenced.

And what has the arts community said against these expressions of desired censorship? Well, I'm more likely to hear the birds chirping outside ACTRA's downtown headquarters while standing beside one of Emirates A-380's when taking off on a runway at Toronto's Pearson airport than hear one of their representatives on TV defending Sun TV's free expression.

Why? Because they aren't the champions against censorship they claim to be.

Hypocrites.

The Left's guilt in the burning of the Quran

It has been impossible to read the news this week and not come across the asinine antics of Rev. Terry Jones from Florida and his plans to burn copies of the Quran on the anniversary of 9/11. Thankfully most people -- including our PM Stephen Harper -- have spoken out against it as both intolerant and just plain stupid when one considers what the obvious reaction of the Muslim world will be.

And of course the left will try and portray this as just another example of how dangerous and bigoted the right is in general.

But let's not hold any illusions here: the left is responsible for this cavalier attitude towards religious symbols in the West.

It wasn't very long ago that artist Andres Serrano introduced the world to his Piss Christ, a picture of a crucifix submerged in his urine, or Chris Ofili rolled out his The Holy Virgin Mary, a mixture of the Virgin Mary, blaxploitation and female genitalia pictures and dung. And some of the more well-known figures in the left-wing community -- such as actress Susan Sarandon -- actually staged protests in defense of this desecration.

Sorry. My mistake. The left calls it art.

But where were the vast numbers of editorials deploring these exhibits? I do remember it being reported. Vilified in the editorials? A handful maybe. Vast amounts of media personalities endlessly talking about how shameful and bigoted an act it was? Not even close.

The media had ample opportunity to show principle in calling out bigots. They had ample opportunity to stand up and say that desecrating sacred articles is not only uncalled for but simply repulsive and inflammatory. Instead, they chose silence. Even though there was an outcry from the Christian community, they remained silent.

And we all know... As you sow so shall you reap.

The actions of Rev Terry Jones are in no doubt deplorable. But make no mistake. This could have been avoided if the political left had done the right thing all along and stood up against bigotry in all forms. The left could have stood with the right in saying that they will not stand for sacred symbols to be treated with disrespect.

For them to point fingers now is a little rich.

To become President Sarah Palin

First off, I am not endorsing Sarah Palin here. That is not what this post is about. This is about strategy.

Sarah Palin is a lightning rod for the American left. Every time her name comes up, venom. Every time she appears, venom. Every time it is suggested she could run for president, there is a storm of fire and brimstone of biblical proportions from the left-wing media.

And it is for this very reason that Sarah Palin should not run for President in 2012.

Which begs the question, what am I talking about in terms of Sarah Palin actually being President?

It's simple: the long game.

Stephen Harper has shown how sometimes it is not the short game that guarantees victory but rather a long, strategic chess game that runs your opponents into the ground via their own efforts. Harper has been a master in giving the Liberals enough rope to hang themselves. As such, Sarah Palin may in fact be the perfect game changer from the same fold.

There is little doubt anywhere that November is going to be bad for the Democrats. They are polling worse than has ever been seen for midterms. The pulse of the American public is that Barack Obama has not only sold them a bill of goods but has done so by enacting policies that are so far-left as to be contrary to everything that the USA is built upon.

As such, Sarah Palin -- the only name that appears relevant in US Presidential politics -- has become the target. The Democrats are after her. The media is after her. They are using up all their powder to destroy her. And yet she has changed the outcomes of every US electoral race since 2008. She is a voice that people listen to. And the left-wingers know it.

My opinion is that her best strategy is to let the left use up their powder on her. Let them focus on her. Let them drive all their efforts towards her... and then not run in 2012. This will give her all the attention of the American public as the media will have driven the public attention to her in droves and she will have humbled herself by not running. And humility is a virtue that Americans respect.

This will give her the ability to shape the entire 2012 Presidential race and influence voters to vote for whomever she feels would be the best candidate. The media will have little credibility in launching an attack against somebody who isn't even running and it will dilute the message of their Obama-favored agenda. And if Obama is replaced by her choice for President, the US will respect her more than they are willing to listen to the media.

In 2020 when her choice for the US President finishes his/her term, Sarah Palin will be in the absolute surefire winning position of being able to run with little ability of the media to tarnish her even a little bit. Their powder for attacking her will be spent in 2012 and she will have used the focus on her to completely change the US perception of her.

And her winning the Presidency will be a walk in the park.

Of course, this is all conjecture. I'm not a political strategist. But from what I have seen in how Stephen Harper has gained more and more of the approval of the Canadian public in the face of widespread media and political attacks, all the while being Prime Minister... Sarah Palin using the media microscope to dilute their effectiveness all the while not vying for the top prize will destroy their agenda from the inside out.

This will give her the time to redefine the US public opinion of her the way Harper has amongst Canadians. That's the only thing standing between her and being POTUS.

The evil Harper government acting in secret? Oh... it's just McGuinty...

Seriously... it's amazing that the Toronto Star even reported the fact that the McGuinty Liberals have been holding secret talks with the unions in an effort to make a deal with them that would help the Ontario government get out of the massive hole they spent themselves into. Would it be too much for us to ask them to hold Dalton McGuinty to the same standard they hold the Harper government (mostly in a paranoid fantasy sense) to?

Of course it's too much!

Anybody want to bet that McGuinty was hoping this whole thing would stay under wraps so that he could make it look like he pulled some magic rabbit out of a hat to fix Ontario's problems? I am not even going to pretend like he had any intention of letting the Ontario public (you know, his bosses?) in on the game until it was too late to know what concessions were made. I bet he would even have found some way to ensure confidentiality in whatever deals he made.

Because he's just like that.

And all those people who complain that Stephen Harper's government is the most secretive, deceptive and unaccountable government out there? I doubt they'll even bat an eyelash over this one.

The Echo Chamber Repeats the Echo Chamber Repeat

"The only thing more expensive than education is ignorance." - Benjamin Franklin

If there is any one argument for the creation of Sun TV -- a.k.a. in Canada "FOX News North" -- it is the one-message pipeline that is the Canadian media. There have been endless incidents of North American news items the Canadian media has reported on without either context or clarity.

One simply need look at the reporting of the proposed Arizona immigration law that would allow Arizona police to request proof of citizenship. The Canadian media has reported much of the accusations of racism and have echoed the left-wing propaganda that this offers Arizona police carte-blanche to stop anybody for any minor offense and grill them on their race... er, sorry... nationality.

And yet those who do not simply swallow what the Canadian news or the left-wing mainstream media forces down our throats know that the Arizona law is in fact less arbitrary than the federal law that has been in place for decades.

But have we heard a single Canadian news organization speak of this more than in passing? Are you kidding?

And in Canada it is no different. In fact, I'm quite inclined to believe that the journolist fiasco that is brewing in the USA is probably already a well established entity in Canadian media circles. After all, how many times have we read an article that criticizes the Harper government for some small, insignificant and not particularly note-worthy issue only to find that the same day you could throw a stone and hit a dozen other media figures who just happened to be touting the same nothing story?

If anything, an alternative source for news that skews the left-leaning mainstream media in this country should be welcomed by all Canadians. After all, we can only better ourselves by challenging our beliefs, no matter how well-informed we believe we are. Because without a view from the other side, one simply cannot be well-informed at all.

One can only be ignorant.