Tories and Liberals even in CP Harris Decima poll.

Ignatieff is not likely to try and force an election now. He will act just as Dion did and prop up the Harper government unless he can be assured that an opposition party will help out Harper. The slim lead that Ignatieff had after people were angry at Harper for proroguing parliament has evaporated. However, the Olympics does not seem to have done much to boost Harper's ratings. No party seems to be gaining any real traction. We will now be treated to a lot of political posturing about the budget. Of course perhaps Harper will try something stupid again and provoke the opposition into forcing an election!

Political deadlock continues as Tories-Liberals both stalled: poll

By: John Ward, THE CANADIAN PRESS

OTTAWA, Ont. - The return of Parliament on Wednesday offers a series of confidence votes, but new polling data suggests that neither the Tories nor the Liberals would want to hazard a quick trip to the voting booths.

The two-week survey of political support conducted Feb. 18-28 by The Canadian Press Harris-Decima suggests the Tories and Liberals are dead even at 31 per cent.

The NDP had support from 16 per cent of respondents, the Greens had 12 and the Bloc Quebecois was at eight.

A brief spike in Liberal support, widely attributed to anger over Prime Minister Stephen Harper's decision to prorogue Parliament, seems to have evaporated.

The Conservatives haven't been able to cash in on their deft handling of the Haiti earthquake crisis or public euphoria over the Olympics.

"For all the hyperventilating about leads and declines, it appears that the so-called 'new normal' in Canadian politics is a statistical tie between the two main parties," said pollster Allan Gregg.

"Neither one has been able to capture the federalist vote in Quebec; the Conservatives continue to be locked out of the major metropolitan centres, while the same can be said for the Liberals in the Prairies and in most parts of rural Canada."

What about a spring election?

"There's absolutely no reason to have an election in this kind of 'new normal'," Gregg said. "None at all. Zero."

In his years of watching national politics, he said he's never seen a situation where the status quo equals deadlock.

He said only British Columbia remains a competitive region, with the Tories, Liberals and New Democrats essentially deadlocked there.

"Since 2005 there has been really very, very, little change," Gregg said.

Tories and Liberals both have pockets of solid support and solid resistance.

Ignatieff seems unable to find traction as a prime minister in waiting.

Harper seems to have gained little from the Olympic excitement. The tail end of the polling was done through the final days of the Games, when Canada was racking up its record haul of gold medals.

"I think what it is, is that the doubts about both the alternatives outweigh any kind of momentary enthusiasm that voters may have for either of their performances or personalities," said Gregg.

The stalemate will be in the political calculations as Parliament considers the throne speech, which comes Wednesday, and the budget a day later.

Gregg says he sees little chance of a major change soon. Ignatieff hasn't found a way to grab the public. And Harper has been around long enough that people's opinions of him have solidified for good or bad.

"How likely is it that there's going to be some kind of wholesale reassessment of the option he presents?"

The poll contacted 2,035 people as part of an omnibus telephone survey and is considered accurate to within plus or minus 2.2 percentage points, 19 times in 20.

Harper takes a holiday to pack Senate.

Harper is the most imaginative piece of crookedness we have seen in some time. In spite of his humdrum appearance he is great at using all the tricks available to advance his agenda. He saved himself from defeat last Xmas and now for no good reason except his political agenda Harper shuts down parliament. He will take the time to pack the Senate with Conservatives--this the great campaigner for a reformed Senate! I suppose he must regard the packing of the Senate with appointed Conservatives is a great leap forward. Meanwhile Ignatieff can be left to fume and fuss and try to hire some new help to put his Humpty Dumpty image back together again. This is from the Star. This is Harper's New Year's message. I am the same old Harper as last year. Happy New Year everyone.

Back to Commons shut down, opposition furious
Les Whittington



OTTAWA–Furious opposition MPs accused Prime Minister Stephen Harper of muzzling the House of Commons after he moved for the second time in a little more than a year to suspend Parliament.

Mired in controversy over an alleged cover-up on the torture of Afghan prisoners and eager to increase the Conservatives' power in the Senate, the government is closing down Parliament until March 3, the Prime Minister's Office said Wednesday.

The decision is "about one thing and one thing only – avoiding the scrutiny of Parliament at a time when this government is facing tough questions about their conduct in covering up the detainee scandal," Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff said in a statement.

"Mr. Harper is showing his disregard for the democratic institutions of our country."

Harper spoke Wednesday by telephone with Governor-General Michaëlle Jean, who agreed to the suspension, a PMO spokesperson told the media in a hastily arranged telephone news conference. The Prime Minister did not comment publicly.


The prorogation of Parliament until after the Winter Olympics in Vancouver will likely scuttle dozens of pieces of legislation, and give the Tories a chance to increase their representation on Senate committees.

Instead of coming back to Ottawa on Jan. 25, MPs will return on March 3 to hear a throne speech setting out the government's new political agenda, followed the next day by the 2010 budget statement.

The government has been on the defensive for weeks over allegations it failed to act on information that prisoners being passed to Afghan authorities by Canadian soldiers were at risk of being tortured. But the Commons committee holding hearings on the detainee issue is being disbanded as a result of Parliament's suspension.

"Harper is showing that his first impulse when he is in trouble is to shut down Parliament," Ignatieff said.

Harper spokesman Dimitri Soudas flatly denied the government is suspending Parliament to slow investigations into the Afghan prisoner controversy. "The answer is no," he told reporters. "The (Commons) committee ... has found absolutely no evidence of wrongdoing by Canadian soldiers, diplomats and the Armed Forces."

It was just over a year ago – on Dec. 4, 2008 – that Harper went to Jean to have Parliament suspended, or prorogued, to avoid the defeat of his minority government by the opposition parties, which claimed Harper's lacklustre response to the economic crisis had destroyed their confidence in his ability to govern.

While it is within the power of the Prime Minister – with permission of the Governor-General – to wrap up a session of Parliament, the opposition said Harper is manipulating the rules to favour his own political needs at the expense of the rights of elected MPs.

"This kind of thing can't happen in the U.S. or most other parliaments – it's the kind of thing you hear of in dictatorships," NDP Leader Jack Layton said in an interview.

"It's a slap in the face and it's a denial of the democratic process. He has absolutely no good reason to prorogue the House."

Layton said urgent action is needed on the pension crisis, the Afghan detainee issue, the high jobless rate and Canada's follow-up to the Copenhagen climate-change summit.

The government is halfway through a two-year plan to combat the economic recession and needs to look ahead, Soudas said.

Sources said Harper would like to make suspending Parliament before the annual budget a regular practice so the government can bring in a throne speech to give the economic message a wider context.

Soudas told the media Harper will use the break to undo what his party sees as a Liberal logjam in the Senate. By filling five vacancies with Conservatives, Harper's party will hold more seats than the Liberals in the 105-seat Upper Chamber and can strengthen its position on Senate committees.

Ignatieff: Canadians do not want an election.

Translation: The Liberals do not want an election. We will be back to playing Dion II with Ignatieff supporting Conservative legislation at least whenever he thinks the opposition might not support it. Ignatieff says: "somehow we got stuck with the idea that we want an election at any price". I thought that was his idea an idea the popped into his mind because he finally decided he didn't want to any longer support the Conservative government at any price. Ignatieff had better hope the Canadians do not see him as he really is before the next election since they are not likely to elect an incompetent leader.


Canadians don't want election, Ignatieff says




CTV.ca News Staff

Updated: Mon. Dec. 28 2009 5:41 PM ET

Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff says that Canadians want an "alternative" to the Harper government but is backing off from earlier tough talk of forcing an election.

"What Canadians want is an alternative to the Harper government, and they want to believe that I can be a good prime minister and give them an alternative government," Ignatieff told CTV's Question Period in an interview that aired Sunday.

But when asked what his biggest mistake of 2009 was, Ignatieff responded that what "(Canadians) didn't want is someone talking about an election. And somehow we got stuck with the idea that we want an election at any price."

It was a tough year for a Liberal leader who took over his party with the weight of high expectations. Instead of rebounding after the much-maligned performance of former leader Stephane Dion, the Liberal party watched its poll numbers rise briefly under Ignatieff, then drop to the same historic lows of Dion's.

Still, Ignatieff said, "It's been an interesting year, but I'm feeling good."

In the late fall, pollster Peter Donolo took over as Ignatieff's chief of staff and quickly jettisoned most of the leader's inner circle for a new team.

"If things aren't working you need to make changes. I'm unafraid to make the changes we have to make," Ignatieff said of the move.

Looking towards 2010, the Liberal leader says his priorities are holding the government to task on the economy and on the environment.

"We've got a $56 billion deficit. We've got a million-and-a-half Canadians out of work. We've had four years where they had a chance to do something about climate change and the environment and (the Harper government has) done nothing," he said.

The Liberal party is holding a conference in Montreal in March to address such policy challenges as "meeting the climate change challenge without ... harming the economy, getting pension security for Canadians, making sure we get the economy growing again," he added.

Staying put

Ignatieff bluntly addressed rumours and some media speculation that he was considering a return to academia, saying, "I'm here to stay."

"The idea that I'm just passing through is more of that Conservative propaganda. I love my country. I've come back to serve. And I want to be a good prime minister," he said.

As they did with Dion, the Conservatives used attack ads against Ignatieff that most analysts have said have effectively branded him to many Canadians.

Ignatieff admitted as much.

"The other guys have spent many millions of dollars trying to rough me up. So a lot of Canadians only know me through the frame of the other guys," he said.

"It's my challenge in 2010 to get Canadians to see me the way they really are -- see that the things I care about are the things they care about."




© 2009 All Rights Reserved.

A Year to forget for Liberals

Actually Ignatieff's challenge to Harper was not entirely reckless. Ignatieff was in danger of falling into the same trap as DIon who constantly propped up the Harper government. This time Ignatieff was rescued by the NDP so he was fortunate that he did not actually have to pull the plug and probably lose the election. Surely to characterise Ignatieff's action as opportunist is rather strange since the polls were not that favorable to the Liberals and quickly turned back down. What was the opportunity that Ignatieff was taking advantage of?
The so-called age of aquiescence has to do only with poll numbers. If the poll numbers change back in favor of the Liberals the age will be history!


Monday, December 14, 2009

Presented by

A year to forget for the Liberals
Don Martin, National Post

Chris Wattie, Reuters
It didn't quite work out the way he intended, but a reckless one-sentence ultimatum from Michael Ignatieff defined the person, the party and ultimately his popularity for the entire fall session of Parliament.

"After four years of drift, four years of denial, four years of division and discord-- Mr. Harper, your time is up," the Liberal leader harrumphed on Sept. 1. After four months of discussion, rarely has a political statement proven to be so laughingly wrong.

By making the declaration without the approval of his MPs, he was shown to be a self-absorbed leader. By sending the country careening toward its second election in less than a year, Mr. Ignatieff defined himself as a shameless opportunist.

By not advancing a compelling reason to justify a snap vote, Mr. Ignatieff portrayed himself as an empty alternative.

The public response was not surprising. Since he had disappeared for the entire summer, their first impression of Mr. Ignatieff was entirely negative. His polling numbers went into a free fall from an approximate tie with the Conservatives to a basement below the approval level for hapless former leader Stephane Dion.

That's when the wheels really started falling off.

After taking it on the chin with a blitzkrieg of attack ads paid for by the Conservatives, Mr. Ignatieff limply responded with his own commercials, portraying himself as a policy wonk in casual clothes against a forest backdrop that turned out to be located in Metro Toronto.

Stung by the media-christened nickname of Iffy, he played leadership hardball in arbitrating a Quebec riding nomination decision, only to lose Quebec lieutenant Denis Coderre in a reactionary huff, who went down while declaring his leader brainwashed by too many Torontonians.

After denying any such thing, Mr. Ignatieff cleaned out all the loyalists who brought him back from his nomadic globe-trotting and they all returned to, um, Toronto.

Amplifying the damage caused by those developments, Mr. Ignatieff endured a scathing Facebook-posted analysis of his party's fickle behaviour by Mr. Dion's spouse. There was talk of defections, the mutter of mutiny and a series of discouraging by-election results to shrug off.

At any point Mr. Ignatieff could have been forgiven for writing off the Liberal leadership as a failed academic exercise and returning to the ivory tower. He has wisely decided to surrender instead.

The undeniable ascendency of Prime Minister Stephen Harper is more than just a matter of enhanced personal popularity played out to the tinkle of piano keys while singing a Beatles classic.

This is the dawning of the age of acquiescence, a de facto majority rule by a minority government that wants an election but can't persuade all three opposition parties to accomplish the mission. So they will govern by whim and iron will until they are taken down.

Peter Donolo, Mr. Ignatieff's new chief of staff, has decreed that the Official Opposition will no longer serve as an election-threatening Conservative antagonist. Unless the polling numbers rebound, it seems likely the Liberals won't even vote down Stephen Harper in next spring's budget.

But Mr. Harper's majority-flirting popularity level is even more surprising because the government has been whacked by a series of issues effectively raised by the Liberal bench.

The Official Opposition's research showed irregularities in the government's stimulus spending habits.

There were many signs -- and not just the ones hoisted on signposts by the federal government -- that the handouts were selectively targeted at Conservative ridings. That sense of tax-dollar entitlement was best illustrated by oversized publicity cheques for infrastructure projects sporting Conservative logos or MP signatures that are now under an ethics probe. Even so, the public yawned it off the radar screen.

The government's readiness for the H1N1 pandemic had the potential to fill a Conservative body bag or two in the next election. The Liberals furiously denounced the late order for vaccines from a single source and warned hospitals were overflowing as the rollout ran into production slowdowns.

But the pandemic appears to have fizzled, hospitals have not filled with life-threatened flu victims, the vaccination clinics are starting to close due to lack of interest. There hasn't been a lead question on swine flu in the Commons for weeks now.

Now comes the detainee abuse kerfuffle. This is not an attack on soldier behaviour, as the Conservatives allege. It's about the government's secretive, obstructionist conduct with key ministers using the soldiers as cover from Opposition fire.

But the government tactic seems to be working and the issue will languish now that the Christmas recess has sent MPs scurrying back to reality for six more weeks.

Like everything else this year, every break has gone the Conservatives' way. Even Liberals admit they have recorded their second annus horribilis in a row this year. Their only comfort is that 2010 can't possibly get much worse.

© 2009 The National Post Company. All rights reserved. Unauthorized distribution, transmission or republication strictly prohibited.

Khadr to face US military commission.

The Obama administration is in many respects just a continuation of the abomination administration of George W Bush. Although some changes have been made to the military tribunals they are still capable of relying upon hearsay evidence plus evidence may be used which was obtained by coercion. Ignatieff has spoken out earliers about Khadr. Will he speak out again?



Khadr to face U.S. military commission
Decision 'devastating and shocking,' lawyer says

A U.S. military commission will resume hearing the case against Omar Khadr, the U.S. Department of Justice announced Friday, the same day the Supreme Court of Canada heard a federal government appeal in his case.

It is unclear when or where the 23-year-old inmate will face charges, but he is one of 10 high-profile detainees to be sent to the U.S. to face justice.

Five of those inmates, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, alleged mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, will be on trial in a federal civilian court in New York City.

Five others, including Khadr, will be tried in military commissions on a variety of terrorism charges.

Earlier, there were reports that Khadr would be transferred out of Guantanamo Bay to face justice in the United States. But the U.S. Justice Department confirmed to CBC News that no decision has been made as to where the commission will take place.

Khadr's civilian lawyer, Barry Coburn, said the U.S. government's decision to proceed with Khadr's case in a military commission was "devastating and shocking" and that he had expected more from the Obama administration.

"We thought that the incoming Obama administration signalled a new day with respect to these cases, a new respect for civil liberties, an abhorrence of torture, a respect for the time-honoured legal procedures and protections that are mandated by the constitution and enforced by the federal courts," he said.

News of Khadr's hearing came on the same day that the Canadian government pleaded its appeal in the Supreme Court on Khadr's latest case.

Ottawa asked the top court to overturn a Federal Appeal Court decision to uphold a lower-court ruling that required Ottawa to try to repatriate Khadr, the only Western citizen still being held at the U.S. military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

On Friday, Conservative MP Pierre Poilievre told reporters that "any decision to ask for Mr. Khadr’s return to Canada is a decision for the democratically elected government of Canada and not for the courts.”

Asked whether that meant the government would ignore the Supreme Court's decision if it rules against it, Poilievre repeated that Khadr's fate should be decided by an elected government and not the courts.

As for the U.S. decision to try Khadr in a military commission, Poilievre said that “we believe the U.S legal process announced today should run its course.”

Toronto-born Khadr was captured by U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan in 2002, when he was 15, and has been held at Guantanamo for seven years. The U.S. accuses him of throwing the grenade that killed Sgt. Christopher Speer, a medic with the U.S. army, but leaked documents have called into question the Pentagon's murder case against Khadr.

Rights breached, court rules
In a 2-1 judgment in August, the Federal Appeal Court agreed with a Federal Court judge's ruling that Khadr's rights under Section 7 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms — the rights to life, liberty and security of person — had been breached when Canadian officials interviewed him at the prison in Guantanamo in 2003 and shared the resulting information with U.S. authorities.

In early September, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the federal government's appeal.

Ottawa's position is that Khadr should remain in U.S. custody so the U.S. can try him, and that the court order to attempt to bring him home is meddling in foreign policy.

"In my respectful submission, we're in the realm of diplomacy here," government lawyer Robert Frater told the Supreme Court.

He denied the allegation that the government had ignored calls to bring Khadr back to Canada: "Mr. Khadr's voice has been heard repeatedly."
Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin said while there's no doubt Khadr had "suffered greatly," she wondered how repatriating him would fix what's now in the past.

Whitling said Khadr's predicament amounted to "a unique case."

Khadr has been stuck in legal limbo since the swearing in of U.S. President Barack Obama, who vowed to close Guantanamo and repatriate all but its most serious prisoners.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder was asked during a news conference whether a Supreme Court of Canada directive to the Canadian government to request Khadr's transfer back to Canada would trump the military commission process.

"We'll look at that matter," Holder said. "At this point, it's one of the cases designated for commission proceeding.

"We will, as that case proceeds, see how it should be ultimately treated."



But Nathan Whitling, counsel for Khadr, argued Friday that returning his client to Canada would help "lessen the harm" he has suffered.

Conservative continue to lead Liberals by wide margin

Although the Conservatives are only increasing their lead marginally the NDP improved a couple of percentage points. Among leaders Layton has the best showing with Ignatieff far the worst. The Liberal party must be starting to wonder how much better off they are for having dumped Dion! Ignatieff unceremoniously dumped the Green Shift now in the face of the polls he has dumped the dump Harper policy. Maybe the Liberals will bring out the knives and begin a dump Ignatieff campaign.

Conservatives keep lead in poll
CBC News
Prime Minister Stephen Harper's Conservatives are polling nearly enough support for a majority government, according to the latest EKOS numbers. (Adrian Wyld/Canadian Press)
Support for the Conservative Party continued to hold last week, according to the latest poll results from EKOS.

Among decided respondents, the Conservatives drew 38.4 per cent support, followed by the Liberals at 26.8 per cent and the New Democratic Party at 16.7 per cent.

The Green Party had the support of 9.9 per cent of decided respondents, while the Bloc Québécois had 8.2 per cent support, according to the EKOS poll, which was released exclusively to CBC.

Last week, the Conservatives stood at 38.3 per cent support, followed by the Liberals at 27.1 per cent, the NDP at 14.5 per cent, the Green Party at 11 per cent, and the BQ at nine per cent.

Respondents in the automated telephone survey are asked: "If an election were held tomorrow, which party would you vote for?" The poll reached 3,220 respondents between Oct. 21 and Oct. 27. The results carry a margin of error of plus or minus 1.7 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

EKOS also asked Canadians their thoughts on the leadership of Stephen Harper, Michael Ignatieff and Jack Layton, asking if any of the three should be removed immediately as leader of their respective party.

On Jack Layton, 51 per cent of respondents indicated they thought Layton should remain at the helm of the NDP, while 25 per cent said he should be replaced.

Layton had the high-water mark of support among the three leaders. On Harper, 45 per cent said he should stay, while 40 per cent said he should be replaced.

Michael Ignatieff's support was the weakest: 31 per cent of respondents said he should stay, while 46 per cent said he should go.

Ignatieff made changes in his inner circle this week. Late Tuesday, Ignatieff announced that Peter Donolo was taking over as the Liberal leader's chief of staff. Donolo left his post at the Strategic Counsel, a Toronto polling firm, to replace Ian Davey, a longtime Ignatieff supporter.

Donolo was a communications director for former Liberal prime minister Jean Chrétien.

Ignatieff: Harper government on "life support".

As Ignatieff notes it is the Liberals who have kept the Conservatives on life support. I guess the Liberals with their soft hearts could not bear to see the Conservative government die. Will they really be so hard-hearted as to let it die this fall? We will see. It is surprising that Ignatieff is so hawkish when the polls would seem to indicate that he has not much chance of winning a minority let alone a majority. Perhaps he realises that the Liberals look to be perpetual life supporters as far as the Conservative government is concerned. Or maybe he thinks that he can safely challenge the Conservatives because the NDP will take its turn at providing life support! But that seems risky and for the most part the Liberals have been risk averse for some time.

Ignatieff: Harper government on 'life support'
Updated Tue. Sep. 1 2009 8:27 AM ET
CTV.ca News Staff
Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff's main task today: turn the doves in his caucus into hawks, and set forth a plan to take down the Tory government in the fall.
"We've kept this government on life support for 10 months," Ignatieff said during a summer caucus retreat in Sudbury, Ont. on Monday, noting his party supported the Tories' recession budget last January despite major reservations.
"But in June I made it clear that in a whole number of areas, the government's performance was letting Canada down and it hasn't got better over the summer."
CTV parliamentary correspondent Roger Smith, reporting from Sudbury, said tempering the leader's hawkish tone in caucus are Liberals who are pleading for a more cautious approach.
They're saying, "'It's only been a year since the last election; the polls show us in a dead heat, at best; the economy is starting to turn around ...What exactly is our message going to be?'" Smith said Tuesday morning on Canada AM.
The hawks, meanwhile, are telling their leader they can no longer prop up the Tory government, saying: "'This is as good a time as any, and we don't know what the situation will be down the road'."
The Liberals also find themselves in a far better financial situation than at the start of the previous election.
"They raised more money than the Tories in the second quarter. They've got ads ready to go," Smith added. "Ignatieff seems to be leading them to pull down the government in late September."
On Monday, the Conservatives said talk of a fall election could risk derailing the nation's fledgling economic recovery.
On the cusp of Parliament's resumption, Transport Minister John Baird said economic stimulus spending could be threatened if Canadians are forced back to the polls by a non-confidence vote in the coming weeks.
Ignatieff called Baird's statement a "load of nonsense."
The big question mark is how Ignatieff intends to sell Canadians on yet another election, especially in light of new data showing signs of life in the economy for the first time in almost a year.
Smith said according to the hawks, the main issue that triggers a non-confidence vote may be failure by the government to provide the changes the Liberals want on unemployment insurance -- an issue that Harper and Ignatieff locked horns over when Parliament ended in June.
While the leaders held a series of meetings on the issue over the summer, Ignatieff said the Tories balked at his efforts to build bridges on EI reform.
"Those meetings have turned into a bit of a charade," Ignatieff said.
Another issue could be the Liberals' dissatisfaction with the Conservatives' update on stimulus spending.
"They need one solid message, said Smith, and "we're told we're going to get a little clearer on what that is today when Ignatieff addresses caucus."
"But the basic line is going to be: 'Look, the Conservatives are a bad government, Canadians deserve better and we can give better."
The government seems to be taking the opposition leader's threats seriously.
On Monday, Conservative campaign director and newly-appointed senator Doug Finley sent out a fundraising email, warning that the Liberals are expected to launch a massive advertising campaign after Labour Day.
According to the Canadian Press, Finley wrote: "I have no doubt that the Liberals will go to the wall with this campaign," and sought funds to help the Conservative party "fight back."
"They are desperate to regain power and they will do anything to win," said Finley.
The Liberal caucus retreat ends Wednesday. The fall sitting of Parliament resumes Sept. 14, and Smith said opposition's first chance for a non-confidence vote will be September 30 -- "which could mean an election the first or second week of November."
With files from The Canadian Press

Ignatieff lags Harper in approval rating: poll

What seems to be more significant is that both have negative ratings! Even though more approve Harper than Ignatieff, Harper's total score is minus 11 versus minus 9 for Ignatieff. Of course the article fails to mention that Layton has the best overal score of all at plus 1! This is just an example of the way articles frame issues as if only the two main parties count. Apparently it was not even thought important to ask about the Greens or the Bloc leaders.
The pollsters did think it was important to ask about Obama who is obviously a very important Canadian politician! It is all entertainment with Obama being a global celebrity so his Canadian rating is important.


Ignatieff lags Harper in approval rating: poll

CBC News
Prime Minister Stephen Harper scores a higher job approval rating than his political rival, Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff, according to a new poll, but both had more negative than positive evaluations from Canadians who were asked about their performance.
Although a larger proportion of people disapprove of Harper's job performance compared with Ignatieff's, Harper’s disapproval ratings have slowly declined since January, while Ignatieff’s have shot up.
The EKOS poll, commissioned by the CBC and released Thursday, asked Canadians if they approve or disapprove of the way Harper, Ignatieff and NDP Leader Jack Layton are handling their jobs.
Harper received a 36 per cent approval rating, followed by Layton (34 per cent) and Ignatieff (29 per cent). Conversely, 47 per cent said they disapprove of Harper’s job performance, with Ignatieff getting a 38 per cent disapproval rating and Layton 33 per cent.
That means the net positive scores are worse for Harper (-11) than for Ignatieff (-9).
However, Ignatieff’s disapproval rating has gone from 20 per cent in January, to almost 40 per cent in August, basically doubling in seven months.
In the electoral battleground province of Ontario, where Ignatieff is hoping to recapture seats, the poll showed Harper’s approval rating is 38 per cent, compared with Ignatieff (32 per cent). But Harper’s disapproval rate is also higher than Ignatieff (46 per cent versus 38 per cent)
In Quebec, Harper’s disapproval rating is higher than in any other region, standing at 58 per cent with an approval rating of 21 per cent. Ignatieff fares better, but his disapproval rating (32 per cent) is still higher than his approval rating (29 per cent) in the province.
One political leader, however, soars above all the rest in the opinion of Canadian poll respondents: U.S. President Barack Obama.

Liberal fundraising and the Ignatieff effect...

This is from the CBC.
Perhaps it is the Harper effect. Many are fed up with Harper and see Ignatieff as a safe and reactionary enough alternative. After all someone who supports the Oil Sands Development can't be that bad for business. Who knows maybe the Liberals will win a seat or so in Edmonton or Calgary. Once polls perk up and money gushes Ignatieff may invest in a fall election and hope for a gusher of votes that will give him a majority.


The Ignatieff effect?

The federal Liberal party doesn't appear to be suffering from the global economic crisis.

Newly released fundraising figures show the Grits raked it in this past spring.

The party raised almost $3.9-million dollars in the the second quarter of 2009. That is more than four times the amount it brought in during the same period a year ago.

The Liberals aren't being shy about what's making the difference either: One party official calls it the "Ignatieff effect."


James Fitz-Morris
Last year, of course, Stéphane Dion was the Liberal leader and many Grits weren't exactly rallying to the cause.

Another factor this year is that the party has paid much more attention to the process of fundraising and to trying to enlarge their base of support.

This time last year the Liberals had about 9,000 or so contributors. This year there are closer to 19,000.

Ignatieff shafts the Green Shift

The Liberal Party must never again run against such potential contributors to the party funds as the Alberta oil industry. No doubt Ignatieff will be able to hammer out some wonderful compromise on environmental issues with the Conservative party.

This is from the Calgary Herald.

The Liberal leader used his stump-style speech to tout the economic virtues and reach of Alberta's oilsands, urging Canadians to take pride in the mammoth industrial development, which has touched off international environmental opposition.
......
The one instinct I've had from the beginning about the industry at the heart of this economy is this is a national industry--a national industry in which all Canadians should take pride," Ignatieff told about 600 Grit supporters at the zoo. "The Liberal Party of Canada must never, ever, ever run against that industry or against Alberta."

Post-Dion Liberals flush with cash, new members.

This is from the Star.

All the Liberals need now are some better polls. Nothing is said about debt. Perhaps that is all paid off although I somehow doubt it. I guess Ignatieff is close enough to the Conservatives now that he is an acceptable alternative.
Come the fall and the next chance to turf Harper, if Ignatieff has very good polls he might actually try to bring down the Conservatives. However, there is no guarantee the Bloc and the NDP will necessarily help Ignatieff out.


Post-Dion Liberals flush with cash, new members TheStar.com - Canada - Post-Dion Liberals flush with cash, new members
June 30, 2009 Susan DelacourtOTTAWA BUREAU
OTTAWA – Federal Liberals, with newly doubled membership numbers, have raised almost as much in the first half of this year as they did in all of 2008, according to the party's national director, Rocco Rossi.
Almost $5 million has flowed into Liberal coffers since January, when Michael Ignatieff assumed the leadership after the departure of Stéphane Dion.
As well, Rossi said, party membership has swelled from about 40,000 at the outset of the year to 90,000 today on the way to a goal of 100,000 members by Labour Day.
It's better news than the bleak set of figures the Liberals are due to file to Elections Canada today.
The new party president, Alf Apps, has said the Liberals took in only $5.9 million in 2008 – almost $1 million less than the year before.
Rossi said the 2008 report will show "relatively low fundraising, an election and therefore a lot of debt loaded on."
Better numbers are to be found in the Liberals' more recent past, Rossi argues. Everything the Liberals raise from here on in this year can be poured into the war chest for an election that could come as soon as September, he said.

Ignatieff says he'll compromise to fix EI.

So Iggy in supporting the Conservatives is a pragmatic kind of guy whereas Dion was a wimp. How do you tell the difference? Is it because Iggy does better in the polls or that the Liberals want Iggy to wait until the party has a better war chest to fight an election.
Iggy will compromise on EI because he must to keep the coalition with the Conservatives alive and well. Of course not much will happen until the Fall. That will sure help those out of work now!


Ignatieff says he'll compromise to fix EI


By Mark Kennedy, Canwest News ServiceJune 20, 2009



OTTAWA - Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff says he's prepared to put some "water in my wine" to reach a compromise with the government this summer over reforms to Canada's employment insurance program.
In an interview Friday with Canwest News Service and Global National, Ignatieff also said he hopes Finance Minister Jim Flaherty's contention that an economic recovery will eventually pull the federal budget out of deficit is correct, because Ignatieff doesn't want to introduce tax hikes if the Liberals win the next election.
Ignatieff sat down for the interview in his Parliament Hill office immediately after a vote in the House of Commons on Friday that averted a summer election. He defended his decision to support the government's budgetary spending estimates in return for the creation of a joint working group of Conservatives and Liberals MPs that will study EI this summer.
``I'm a pragmatic kind of guy on this issue,'' said Ignatieff. He said a key turning point in this week's political drama occurred when Prime Minister Stephen Harper acknowledged the flaw in how the EI system's existing eligibility rules are linked to the unemployment rate in 58 different regions.
That means workers across the country have to put in different numbers of hours, depending on where they live, before qualifying for EI benefits.
Harper has said he is willing to look at reducing the number of regions.
Premiers of Canada's western provinces and territories this week proposed basing the number of hours workers must put in before qualifying for EI on three different regional divisions: urban, rural and remote.
The Liberals have been pressing for a uniform eligibility standard and had initially been advocating a system in which anyone who works 360 hours would qualify for EI.
Now, Ignatieff has indicated that as long as the reform provides some fairness and equity, he's willing to negotiate with the governing Tories as they strive to reach a deal before Parliament returns in late September.
``We've got to get to a more sensible standard,'' he said, adding it should be set at a level that is ``fiscally responsible.''
``I'm going to try in good faith to get us to substantive employment insurance reform by the third week in September. I'm prepared to put some water in my wine, but not too much, because I think the country does need national standards here for the sake of fairness.''
In late September, the government will issue another economic update or report card. The Liberals will then be given the chance to put forward a non- confidence motion two days later, but Ignatieff steered clear of saying this will automatically lead to a defeat of the government and a fall election campaign.
``I've tried consistently since I've been leader of the Opposition to make this Parliament work, to play the hand the Canadian people dealt me. And I think this week we showed that if you're tough and firm you can get results. You can get the prime minister to move. I'm willing to move a bit. And then we work together through the summer,'' he said.
``I'm not going to predict what the autumn means, but I made it very clear to the prime minister - I make it very clear to Canadians - I'm holding him to account. This thing isn't over. We've got to get results for the Canadian people. If we can't get results for the Canadian people, then we're going to have to take other decisions. But I'm not there.''
Ignatieff carefully answered questions about whether he agrees with Flaherty's opinion that the federal budget will naturally return to surplus when the economy recovers and increased revenues begin to flow back into the coffers.
Parliamentary budget officer Kevin Page disputes that prediction, saying that tax hikes or deep spending cuts are the only way to get the finances back to a surplus position. Earlier this spring, Ignatieff drew fire from the Conservatives after musing about whether it might some day be necessary to raise taxes to control the growing debt.
Asked Friday if he thinks a growing economy can produce a budgetary surplus, Ignatieff said it's hard to say because he doesn't have access to the Finance Department's records.
``Let me phrase it carefully. I believe it can. I sure hope it can because we are in a very tough situation. My instincts all along have been I don't want to increase the burden on Canadians.''
Ignatieff said a tax hike during a recession would place a burden on people, including small businesses ``struggling to get by.''
``So that is the last thing I want to do - to increase taxes, in other words, in a recession. I don't want to increase taxes after the recession. It's just after you've come through this hard time, you don't want someone hitting you over the head with a mallet. So I'm hoping recovery will allow our public finances to slowly get back to balance. But I'm in opposition. I'm not in government. So what I'm doing is saying, `Show me how you're going to do it.' ''
© Copyright (c) Canwest News Service

NDP: Window for defeating Harper minority government closing

Ignatieff was very cool on the coalition in any event so if, as the NDP suggests, Harper puts enough in the budget that Ignatieff can support it, both Conservatives and Liberals will be happy to say goodbye to the coalition. Ignatieff uses the idea of a coalition simply as a rather limp club to cudgel Harper into concessions. Ignatieff will be glad to have time to rebuild and refinance the Liberal party before the next election is called.
This is from the Canadian Press.

Window for defeating Harper minority government closing, says NDP
21 hours ago
OTTAWA — The NDP is warning the Liberals they likely have at most a few months to defeat the minority Conservative government and replace it with a coalition that would make Opposition Leader Michael Ignatieff prime minister.
And MP Thomas Mulcair, the NDP finance critic, held out a veiled threat to Ignatieff that his party may not be willing to topple the government at a later, more conducive time for the Liberals.
Speaking Tuesday before handing Finance Minister Jim Flaherty his party's wish list for the Jan. 27 budget, Mulcair appeared as intent on sending a message to the Liberals as he was the Harper Conservatives about his party's position on the budget.
Last November, then Liberal leader Stephane Dion and NDP Leader Jack Layton formed a coalition, with Bloc Quebecois backing, to topple the government in the hopes Gov. Gen. Michaelle Jean would turn to the coalition rather than call another election on the heels of the October vote.
But that hope was dashed when Jean agreed to suspend Parliament until Jan. 26. Since then Ignatieff replaced Dion and has been decidedly cooler to the coalition prospect, saying he would support a budget that met his party's demands to stimulate the economy.
Mulcair suggested the Conservatives are laying a trap and will spike the budget with enough concessions to opposition demands to secure survival beyond the point where the Governor General would call on a Liberal-NDP coalition to form the government.
"They are simply trying to get themselves beyond the date after which the Governor General rather than giving the other parties a chance to govern, would (agree) to an election," he said.
Mulcair said the consensus among experts is that if the government survives six months from the Oct. 14 election, Jean is unlikely to turn to a coalition in case of a non-confidence vote.
On the NDP's part, it would take "a miracle" for Flaherty to get his party's support on the budget, he said.
The miracle would be a document that proposes about $32 billion in stimulus spending with a massive infusion of infrastructure spending, direct aid to at-risk sectors such as forestry, increased employment insurance benefits and help for families.
He said the NDP would not support an across-the-board cut to corporate taxes, describing previous reductions in the rate as a big mistake that favoured the resources and financial sectors that were doing well, while abandoning manufacturing and forestry, two battered sectors of the economy.
But the biggest problem, he said, is that Harper and Flaherty don't believe in government intervention in the economy.
Following the near-death experience of his November economic update, Flaherty has repeatedly said he would spend billions of dollars to stimulate the economy, as well as cut back taxes to spur spending.
"We're trying to do the right thing," the finance minister told a news conference Monday. "This is unprecedented. This budget is about ensuring that Canada has actions taken that Canada needs . . . to get through the consequences in Canada of a synchronized global recession."
More signs that Canada has entered into a significant recession appeared Tuesday with a report showing Canada's trade surplus with the world fell to $1.3 billion in November, the smallest surplus in more than a decade. Making matters worse, Statistics Canada revised the October surplus down to $2.3 billion from the previously-stated $3.8 billion.
While many governments are raising spending massively, U.S. Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke had some sobering news for those thinking fiscal stimulus will cure the world's economist malaise.
"Fiscal actions are unlikely to promote a lasting recovery unless they are accompanied by strong measures to further stabilize and strengthen the financial system. History demonstrates conclusively that a modern economy cannot grow if its financial system is not operating effectively," he said.
TD Bank chief economist Don Drummond said that logic applied to Canada's economy as well, saying the Flaherty and Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney must find a way to free up lending so Canadians and businesses can borrow, spend and invest.
Drummond said the most important issue for bank lending is the cost of five-year funding. He said today's costs to banks of securing medium term financing is 2.8 percentage points above the Government of Canada five-year bond rate, compared to just a 0.14 of a point above before the financial and credit crunch hit.
"If you've got no interbank lending, you've got the corporate spreads as wide as they are and you have the bank cost of funds as high as they are, there's no way you can sustain a growing economy," he said.
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