[wpgflamesfan]

Originally Posted by octothorp

I'm not sure that forcing an election is as good a strategy as Conservative supporters think it is. All it would take is for the Liberals and NDP to formalize their coalition as extending to the election, and Conservative gains become very difficult: if the Liberals were to run no candidates in ridings with NDP incumbents and vice versa, and they were to run only one candidate between them in other ridings, the conservatives could actually not only fail to gain seats but actually lose seats.

Certainly it would make all the Liberal-incumbent seats safe. In the NDP incumbent seats, it's a matter of whether more Liberal voters would go to the NDP/Liberal coalition, or CPC? Some seats will go one way, some will go the other. But there would also be the possibility of losing seats that a Conservative now holds with less than 42% of the vote. Using BC as a microcosm, I see three seats that the Conservatives could conceivably acquire, and three they could lose to a coalition candidate.

If the Conservatives are backed into a corner, calling an election is a fair gamble since they have nothing to lose, but the outcome of such an election is far from a sure thing.

How can you claim that all the Liberal-incumbent seats would be safe?