Calgary Centre Federal By-election - Nov 26 (UPDATE - Crockatt wins for CPC)

[Slava]

Originally Posted by Cowboy89

Looks to me like there's a group of people pretty devoted to Chris Turner that's hi-jacked this process. Hard to see how in a formerally solid conservative riding that there's enough votes for both his campaign and Locke's that still has one of them standing on top at the end.

I've read Turner's campaign materials and it seems he's really trying to downplay his party while promoting himself. He obviously thinks an association with Elizabeth May isn't a winning one for Calgary and on that front I probably agree.

Well his latest piece that I saw (which could be his only?) doesn't even mention the party. Its really odd. That's why I said earlier that he might as well be running as an independent.

Originally Posted by Bunk

One thing that became clear in the Cities Matter forum is that each of the three 'progressive' candidates have far more in common than not.

Each though thinks that voters should coalesce around them. Each have a valid argument one way or another. The problem is that if it doesn't actually happen, none will win.

I say, rock-paper-scissors. I'm only half-joking.

They definitely agree on a lot. That's partly why the centrists are so bloody annoying. They all think that their own brand of being in the middle is better than the others. That or the "we're smarter than those other centrists" attitude that comes out. I probably hate that the most really. It would be so nice to see some pragmatism mixed in with the arrogance and "me first" attitude at times.

[PoliSciStudent]

My issue with voting for Chris Turner is that he will rarely get a chance to speak during Question Period, maybe once every few weeks, and to my knowledge will not be able to join committees. This won't be the case however with Harvey Locke. With Turner not belonging to an official party I don't think he will be able to represent the riding as strongly.

The Greens are also a bit to radical in some areas. As well while I do like Turner he comes off a bit more like someone running for city council as opposed to the House of Commons. While we can agree we want someone fighting for the city, I also want to see someone who is a strong voice for national and international issues.

[Bunk]

Originally Posted by PoliSciStudent

The Greens are also a bit to radical in some areas. As well while I do like Turner he comes off a bit more like someone running for city council as opposed to the House of Commons. While we can agree we want someone fighting for the city, I also want to see someone who is a strong voice for national and international issues.

Perhaps, that said - it might be nice to have few more MPs that are true advocates of urban issues. There's very few right now - Olivia Chow comes to mind, but not many others. Almost half Canada's population lives in the 6 largest metro areas. Locke also demonstrated a very good understanding of Calgary's needs, but would probably not be as focused or fervent in his advocacy.

[MelBridgeman]

Originally Posted by PoliSciStudent

My issue with voting for Chris Turner is that he will rarely get a chance to speak during Question Period, maybe once every few weeks, and to my knowledge will not be able to join committees. This won't be the case however with Harvey Locke. With Turner not belonging to an official party I don't think he will be able to represent the riding as strongly.

The Greens are also a bit to radical in some areas. As well while I do like Turner he comes off a bit more like someone running for city council as opposed to the House of Commons. While we can agree we want someone fighting for the city, I also want to see someone who is a strong voice for national and international issues.

a vote for the greens is a vote for the cons - bottom line.

[Tinordi]

https://www.forumresearch.com/forms/...(20121117).pdf

Very interesting to see such a strong hold for Crockatt among age group 18-34. I wonder if that will melt away in a week's time.

Turner is resonating with older Calgarians (astonishingly) those 45-54.

Most interesting is that Locke is leading up to 70% among those who didn't vote last federal election... How resolved this vote will be to even show up is in question. I would say that this should actually move Locke Turner closer together.

What's crucial is momentum into this last week to lock down the protest votes.

[Jacks]

According to that poll it looks like the Libs and ND's have stayed about the same and 13% of the CPC vote has bled off to the GRN. Normally I would say it's not that simple but in this case I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case.

"IF" this is CPC voters doing a protest vote then it makes it interesting. Assuming that the CPC voters don't go back to the fold when facing a threat from the left then the ND's can pretty much play kingmaker. The Libs and GRN's have no reason to work with the other parties since both of them have a decent chance to win. The ND"s have no chance to win but we'll have to see what is stronger, the love of their own party or their hatred of the CPC.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by Tinordi

https://www.forumresearch.com/forms/...(20121117).pdf

Very interesting to see such a strong hold for Crockatt among age group 18-34. I wonder if that will melt away in a week's time.

Turner is resonating with older Calgarians (astonishingly) those 45-54.

Most interesting is that Locke is leading up to 70% among those who didn't vote last federal election... How resolved this vote will be to even show up is in question. I would say that this should actually move Locke Turner closer together.

What's crucial is momentum into this last week to lock down the protest votes.

The subsections of that poll are nearly meaningless to base anything on. Out of 374 they found 22 people who didn't vote last time and 15 said they're voting for Locke. Will they show up? I don't know. Lets be honest though, to extrapolate that percentage to the entire riding would be foolish.

Its borderline whether the poll is even accurate. It could well be that Crockatt is sitting at 40%, Turner at 20% and Harvey somewhere in between. That's for the most accurate part of the poll! Once you get down to these little sub-samples where the sample size is less than 30 you have many more sample errors and variances in general.

[Tinordi]

Originally Posted by Slava

The subsections of that poll are nearly meaningless to base anything on. Out of 374 they found 22 people who didn't vote last time and 15 said they're voting for Locke. Will they show up? I don't know. Lets be honest though, to extrapolate that percentage to the entire riding would be foolish.

Its borderline whether the poll is even accurate. It could well be that Crockatt is sitting at 40%, Turner at 20% and Harvey somewhere in between. That's for the most accurate part of the poll! Once you get down to these little sub-samples where the sample size is less than 30 you have many more sample errors and variances in general.

This is all true but it's all we have to go with. So it's either you disregard all of the findings or you try to interpret them however flawed. You chose the former I chose the latter.

[PoliSciStudent]

Originally Posted by Bunk

Perhaps, that said - it might be nice to have few more MPs that are true advocates of urban issues. There's very few right now - Olivia Chow comes to mind, but not many others. Almost half Canada's population lives in the 6 largest metro areas. Locke also demonstrated a very good understanding of Calgary's needs, but would probably not be as focused or fervent in his advocacy.

I agree but he seems to be more Calgary focused, but I guess he's just trying to win over his constituency.

[jtfrogger]

Based on what I see, the debate on public broadcasting went something like this tonight:

• Meades: CBC is essential for the cultural fabric of Canada
• Turner: CBC is essential for the cultural fabric of Canada
• Locke: CBC is essential for the cultural fabric of Canada
• Turner: The Conservative Party is cutting funding for the CBC
• Locke: The Conservative Party is cutting funding for the CBC
• Meades: The Conservative Party is cutting funding for the CBC
• Locke: The polls prove that I am the only one that can beat Crockett because I am the only progressive candidate with the lead over the others
• Turner: The polls prove that I am the only one that can beat Crockett because I am the only progressive candidate with momentum
• Meades: The polls prove that I am the only one that can beat Crockett because I am the only progressive candidate whose party is the official opposition

Did I miss anything?

[taco.vidal]

There's a lot of good, rational discussion of the issues in this thread. However, for a lot of voters it will come down to voting for a party and not the candidate.
The reality is that not much is going to change for those in this riding regardless of the outcome. If anything, a Conservative loss may see the government treat the riding less favourably. The Green and Liberal candidates have a lot of great ideas and talk a good game but if elected, they wont have the ability to do anything of consequence. I think a lot of voters realize that and think that way. Why would you want to vote Liberal, have them win the seat, and give the Liberals a rallying point for the next general election. As much as voters would want to punish the Conservatives or a poor Conservative candidate, I think voters may see the overall picture isnt better with a Liberal or Green win.

With Nenshi, voters saw an opportunity for change that was there for the taking. The situation isnt the same here. I think it will be tough to pull an upset here especially with the vote on the left being split between two decent candidates.

[PoliSciStudent]

I don't see how when you are in an urban riding, in a city that has many ridings, that people think they will be punished for not voting with the government. I highly doubt the whole city will get punished for one riding voting Liberal or Green, especially when the PM is from the city and several ministers. It is not like being in a vast rural riding where you are looking for federal funding, if federal funding happens in Calgary West as opposed to Calgary Centre it still benefits the whole city.

Calgary and Alberta will likely get more attention if there was more competition. Some Conservative MPs barely campaign during elections because it's a waste of time and other parties just forget the province.

[SebC]

Yeah, the Conservatives take Calgary for granted, and that results in stuff like our Rec Centres losing their funding.

[Tinordi]

Eric Grenier (our Nate Silver) weighs in on the Forum Research Poll:

http://www.threehundredeight.com/201....html?spref=fb

But this poll is not completely beyond questioning. Though I highlighted Forum's recent successes in riding polls last week, there are a few points to consider. Firstly, the poll was conducted on a Saturday, generally a bad day to do a poll.

Secondly, the findings in the report on how respondents voted in the last federal election do not match up entirely with the real results. The totals for the Tories and Greens are within the MOE, but it seems possible that the sample is slightly (maybe by a point or two) over-sampling Liberals and under-sampling New Democrats (by two or three points). This can be due to lapses in memory or a changing population (2% said they voted for the Bloc, so they are either displaced Quebecers or fibbers), and is probably not enough to cause a major problem. We also don't know how Forum weighs these responses, if it all. If they don't, there is the possibility that Crockatt's lead is slightly under-estimated.

But it is hard to tell with sample sizes of about 400 people or less in each of the polls Forum has conducted during the by-election campaign. It is actually theoretically possible that the poll is gauging things correctly within the margin of error and Crockatt's support has not dipped below 37% over the last few weeks, or that Locke's has never been higher than 25% since the campaign began.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by Tinordi

Eric Grenier (our Nate Silver) weighs in on the Forum Research Poll:

http://www.threehundredeight.com/201....html?spref=fb

LOL. Our Nate Silver? How did Grenier fare during the last federal campaign or provincial campaign here in Alberta? He wasn't close.

I read Grenier all the time, and its a nice place to see what the polls themselves are showing and such, but he hasn't been close when it comes to predicting anything. I know that you're a Turner guy and you want to read this poll like it somehow shows him as on the road to winning, but be realistic about this.

Frankly speaking I still find it hard to believe that so many people are jumping on the bandwagon for a party that has explicitly said it will halt any oil sands expansion as though that was just no big deal. At the same time there is Dan Meades in the single digits, largely for that same kind of sentiment. I suppose that gives you a good reason why his literature doesn't say that he is running for the Greens though....its somewhat disingenuous.

[GP_Matt]

Originally Posted by Slava

In general the byelection has me frustrated though. All of the progressives can agree on so many things. The one thing they can't agree on though is just to take a common-sense view and unite behind one guy so that they can advance all of their interests. Its so pathetic to watch from point of view.

Do you feel the same way about the national election or just for by-elections?
I agree that electing someone other than the Conservatives would send a message to Ottawa and probably force them to pay more attention to Alberta.
But extending your view of the candidates getting together to unite behind one of them means that the Liberal party should drop out of the next election to give the NDP the best chance of defeating the Conservatives. It won't happen on a national level so why would anyone expect it to happen on a local level?

[Tinordi]

LOL. Our Nate Silver? How did Grenier fare during the last federal campaign or provincial campaign here in Alberta? He wasn't close.

I read Grenier all the time, and its a nice place to see what the polls themselves are showing and such, but he hasn't been close when it comes to predicting anything. I know that you're a Turner guy and you want to read this poll like it somehow shows him as on the road to winning, but be realistic about this.

Frankly speaking I still find it hard to believe that so many people are jumping on the bandwagon for a party that has explicitly said it will halt any oil sands expansion as though that was just no big deal. At the same time there is Dan Meades in the single digits, largely for that same kind of sentiment. I suppose that gives you a good reason why his literature doesn't say that he is running for the Greens though....its somewhat disingenuous.

Jeez louise, pipe down.

Grenier is as close as you get to a Canadian Nate Silver. Not saying that he's perfect or anything, just that he's an avid Canadian poll watcher.

I'm also not getting into some partisan debate with you, just reporting on the developments in the race. Sure I'd like to see Turner win, that doesn't make me treasonous.

[Rathji]

Originally Posted by PoliSciStudent

I don't see how when you are in an urban riding, in a city that has many ridings, that people think they will be punished for not voting with the government. I highly doubt the whole city will get punished for one riding voting Liberal or Green, especially when the PM is from the city and several ministers. It is not like being in a vast rural riding where you are looking for federal funding, if federal funding happens in Calgary West as opposed to Calgary Centre it still benefits the whole city.

Calgary and Alberta will likely get more attention if there was more competition. Some Conservative MPs barely campaign during elections because it's a waste of time and other parties just forget the province.

I think it is funny that the Liberal party has someone signed up for CP solely to help push their cause in this election and no one has thought to call them on it.

I guess we are getting soft in our old age.

[GP_Matt]

I think the reason that Crockett is skipping the debates is because she has identified door knocking as the best way to id voters. In a by-election turnout is already low so it only takes a few voters to make the difference. Door knocking allows you to identify your supporters and obtain their information so that on election day you can call them and remind them to vote. Debating carries the risk of a blunder but does not allow you to identify your supporters. The most that can be gained from a debate is to sway the minds of the people who show up to listen. I don't know the numbers, but out of 100 attendees I would be surprised if ten of them change their mind at the debate. Most of the attendees are already supporters or politically engaged enough to read platforms in advance and have already made up their mind.

You may not agree with it but I think it is a calculated decision.

[Rathji]

I think we all understand that it is a calculated decision and that's the problem.

She decided to do these things because she feels that participating in these debate can only lose her votes, for some reason that I won't speculate on. Whatever the possible reasons are, none of them look very good on her as a candidate.

I have never voted for anyone but Conservative/Reform/etc party in a federal election, but if my candidate pulled that, I would be putting my vote elsewhere.