Quote:
Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch
the last poll that I saw which was in August had the merged UCP at nearly 60% of the vote, while the NDP had about 27% of the vote and the alberta party at about 9%.
Now I know we can't trust polls anymore, but I don't think there's a tremendous level of support for the NDP. Its gone beyond the point right now of the NDP being able to use negative attacks on the UCP to win an election, they need to find a huge political win that might not be out there for them.
The old saying is that I don't think Notley can talk her way back into office for another term.
I think that after the results of this leadership election, the UCP is going to get another boost no matter what leader goes in and they'll be able to go after the NDP with one voice.
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I think the UCP has already hit it's high mark with the 60% poll in August and it'll start losing support as time goes on. The problem for the UCP is that it's been a blank slate for a lot of people. For example if you support Doug Schweitzer and think the UCP will be the #newblue you'd probably vote that way, if you think it should be more socially conservative then Jason's your man and you'd vote UCP. If you love Brian Jean and think he's the man of the people than the UCP is your party.
But that blank slate ends on Saturday and with a leader officially in the driver's seat it's going to start having an identity and a lot of that will be who wins it. I don't for a second doubt that the UCP will be Jason Kenney's and the party will have to wear the baggage he brings to the party and cash some of the cheques his campaign has been writing to get support during these leadership races.
Don't get me wrong, Kenney has been a machine at motivating his base and is an amazing campaigner for leaderships, but what motivates his base isn't the same thing that motivates a vast majority of voting Albertans and he'll have to prove that he can attract many Albertans who haven't been paying attention and provide a platform that's better than "NDP BAD!". Kenney is also incredibly awkward when it comes to answering media questions outside of his bubble of support.
I think over the next few months you'll see the gap between the UCP and NDP starting to shrink and probably the amount of undecideds starting to rise.