Alberta Politics & Government Thread 3.0

[Ozy_Flame]

If this is Mortal Kombat, there will be no flawless victory for Baraka Danielle.

[Iowa_Flames_Fan]

Originally Posted by Slava

I guess what I think is there is a lot of diversity across the city. So 2000 people gives the idea of a bunch of close races (I’m assuming), but near downtown those ridings are heavy NDP. In the suburbs it’s heavy UCP, and “in the middle” it probably is more of a toss-up. I don’t know how accurate you could predict say Calgary Glenmore based on a city-wide poll at this point?

There is, but the demographic trends at the riding level (and how they affect vote preference) are relatively well known and predictable. And the overall vote share is reflective of trends that are present in the sample and reflected (though with a higher error usually) in sub samples, such as from a single riding.

The trend is what should be pretty alarming for the UCP. Most of the polling suggests we will see a double digit drop in UCP support province-wide. If we assume that drop is distributed evenly, that means your average vote share will drop by around that amount for each UCP candidate at the riding level, which is very bad news for some UCP incumbents, who barely won election last time around. Nicholas Milliken, Calgary Currie’s MLA, would be in big trouble in that case—he won by 191 votes in 2019, so an across-the-board drop in UCP support will mean that he is in deep trouble and quite likely to lose re-election.

Of course, that double digit drop is in fact not distributed evenly across Alberta, so we can’t draw hasty conclusions like that. However, the fact that it is not an even distribution is actually bad news for the UCP in my view—because to me the likely explanation is that the UCP remains extremely strong in rural areas where it was going to win anyway and that disproportionately the voters who may abandon the party (as many as 40% of prior UCP voters based on some polling) are disproportionately found in Edmonton and Calgary, and maybe Lethbridge and Red Deer too.

If so, things are a bit bleak for urban UCP MLAs who won close elections in 2019, and even worse for UCP candidates running against incumbent NDP candidates.

Again, this is just interpretation of the data that we have; you’re of course correct that we don’t have data at the riding level—I’m just saying that does not mean you can’t look at the data we have and make some predictions—you just have to recognize that those predictions can be wrong. And this one could be wrong too: Milliken could win in a landslide, the UCP could sweep Calgary and the NDP vote could be inefficiently concentrated in Edmonton, and not here.

But ask yourself this: the parties likely have more data than we do both at the riding level and in terms of internal polling. Not necessarily better data, but almost certainly more data.

Given that… are Danielle Smith and the UCP behaving like a party that thinks it’s winning? To me, their behaviour smacks of a party trying to change the narrative and reverse a trend that is alarming them.

And have you noticed that the blame game is already starting? We saw a post in this very thread which suggested Smith is being treated unfairly in the media, quoting a tweet from one of her known proxies.

The UCP can obviously still win—it has a significant structural advantage in teams of vote distribution, and that will be hard for the NDP to overcome. And the election, I suspect, is going to be very close and probably more interesting than any of us would like.

But these aren’t the behaviours of a party that thinks it is winning right now.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by Iowa_Flames_Fan

There is, but the demographic trends at the riding level (and how they affect vote preference) are relatively well known and predictable. And the overall vote share is reflective of trends that are present in the sample and reflected (though with a higher error usually) in sub samples, such as from a single riding.

The trend is what should be pretty alarming for the UCP. Most of the polling suggests we will see a double digit drop in UCP support province-wide. If we assume that drop is distributed evenly, that means your average vote share will drop by around that amount for each UCP candidate at the riding level, which is very bad news for some UCP incumbents, who barely won election last time around. Nicholas Milliken, Calgary Currie’s MLA, would be in big trouble in that case—he won by 191 votes in 2019, so an across-the-board drop in UCP support will mean that he is in deep trouble and quite likely to lose re-election.

Of course, that double digit drop is in fact not distributed evenly across Alberta, so we can’t draw hasty conclusions like that. However, the fact that it is not an even distribution is actually bad news for the UCP in my view—because to me the likely explanation is that the UCP remains extremely strong in rural areas where it was going to win anyway and that disproportionately the voters who may abandon the party (as many as 40% of prior UCP voters based on some polling) are disproportionately found in Edmonton and Calgary, and maybe Lethbridge and Red Deer too.

If so, things are a bit bleak for urban UCP MLAs who won close elections in 2019, and even worse for UCP candidates running against incumbent NDP candidates.

Again, this is just interpretation of the data that we have; you’re of course correct that we don’t have data at the riding level—I’m just saying that does not mean you can’t look at the data we have and make some predictions—you just have to recognize that those predictions can be wrong. And this one could be wrong too: Milliken could win in a landslide, the UCP could sweep Calgary and the NDP vote could be inefficiently concentrated in Edmonton, and not here.

But ask yourself this: the parties likely have more data than we do both at the riding level and in terms of internal polling. Not necessarily better data, but almost certainly more data.

Given that… are Danielle Smith and the UCP behaving like a party that thinks it’s winning? To me, their behaviour smacks of a party trying to change the narrative and reverse a trend that is alarming them.

And have you noticed that the blame game is already starting? We saw a post in this very thread which suggested Smith is being treated unfairly in the media, quoting a tweet from one of her known proxies.

The UCP can obviously still win—it has a significant structural advantage in teams of vote distribution, and that will be hard for the NDP to overcome. And the election, I suspect, is going to be very close and probably more interesting than any of us would like.

But these aren’t the behaviours of a party that thinks it is winning right now.

I completely agree. I actually think that the UCP knows full well that they're in trouble, and it's just one thing after another for them at this point. There was a Globe and Mail article today about Take Back Alberta and their inroads into the party. The issue for the UCP is that would-be voters for them stay home or vote for other parties (say an Alberta Party vote just to vote, but not actually expect the Alberta Party to win).

I do wonder about that structural advantage though. If the province is roughly 50/50 and the UCP is winning the rural seats by a crushing margin, then the cities have to be tilted in favour of the NDP, Calgary included?

[Looch City]

Originally Posted by Yoho

Charity starts at home. Once in a while the people that actually pay the taxes can benefit as well as the never ending hands out from ground zero.

Couldn't agree more. Pull yourself up by your bootstraps!

We should just abolish all social services. What a giant waste of money.

Didn't someone once have an idea to use the homeless are tires for our cars? Anymore research go into that? Seemed pretty credible.

[Iowa_Flames_Fan]

Originally Posted by Slava

I completely agree. I actually think that the UCP knows full well that they're in trouble, and it's just one thing after another for them at this point. There was a Globe and Mail article today about Take Back Alberta and their inroads into the party. The issue for the UCP is that would-be voters for them stay home or vote for other parties (say an Alberta Party vote just to vote, but not actually expect the Alberta Party to win).

I do wonder about that structural advantage though. If the province is roughly 50/50 and the UCP is winning the rural seats by a crushing margin, then the cities have to be tilted in favour of the NDP, Calgary included?

That stands to reason. What the data seems to show is the UCP way ahead in rural areas, the NDP way ahead in Edmonton and Calgary overall much closer with a slight UCP lead from the latest data that I’ve seen. Now—subsamples have more inherent error, so don’t bet the farm on it— but that same poll showed 19% undecided in Calgary. That could mean anything but it struck me as a weirdly high number. Could those be shy Tories or maybe even shy NDP voters? Or are they actually just… disaffected voters who don’t love either choice and truly have not made up their minds?

If it’s the latter I would think it’s unlikely they break for the incumbent but you never know. They’ve had tons of time to get to know Danielle Smith and to me if you haven’t already decided to vote for her, odds are you’re not going to in the next three weeks. But again, that’s based on a subsample from a single poll, so…. Probably getting dangerously into speculation here.

[Hemi-Cuda]

Originally Posted by Yoho

I like it, enough spending money on drop in centres.

Let’s give the people that actually pay taxes stuff they like to use.

And the facade drops. It's not about any kind of fiscal responsibility, your only concern is that Smith and the UCP are hurting the "right" people. Gotta make sure those "undesirables" know their place right? What an ugly excuse for a human being

[Yoho]

Originally Posted by Hemi-Cuda

And the facade drops. It's not about any kind of fiscal responsibility, your only concern is that Smith and the UCP are hurting the "right" people. Gotta make sure those "undesirables" know their place right? What an ugly excuse for a human being

What facade?
All I’m saying is we can have both, appeal to the ne’er-do-wells, and the people that actually pay for it.

[FormerPresJamesTaylor]

Remember guys, genius troll.

[Wormius]

“ne’er-do-wells”. Is Yoho 90 yrs old?

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Yoho

What facade?
All I’m saying is we can have both, appeal to the ne’er-do-wells, and the people that actually pay for it.

Dig_up_stupid.jpg

[Wormius]

I wonder how much money was spent of drop-in centres vs this arena deal.

Also, if the City was receiving any revenue at all, I can guarantee that would have been disclosed.

It is a certainty that Calgary gets nothing besides rent.

[Iowa_Flames_Fan]

Yoho, you might be interested to know that the same Innovative research poll that you suggested was good news for the UCP shows the ANDP leading by eight points in Calgary. If that’s true the election is going to be very ugly for the UCP.

https://innovativeresearch.ca/wp-con...SE-VERSION.pdf

Luckily it’s an online panel poll and not methodologically comparable to the other surveys available, plus that’s a subsample—so feel free to now distance yourself from this data having previously said it was great for your team.

In all seriousness the data in aggregate suggests to me that this is going to be a close race. I don’t want to get too bold with predictions beyond that as there’s always the risk of being hilariously wrong about this sort of thing if you prognosticate too much too soon.

[Yoho]

https://twitter.com/user/status/1652394995121369096

[Wormius]

That projection is based on…?

[Iowa_Flames_Fan]

Originally Posted by Wormius

That projection is based on…?

338 is a poll aggregator. As a popular vote measure it’s probably not terrible but I wouldn’t put much stock into the seat projections, as there just isn’t that kind of granular data available.

[Iowa_Flames_Fan]

I mean, the other reality is the poll aggregators have a better history in the US than they do here simply because they have enough recent data to make the older (and frankly useless) data fall out of the average. 338’s model now includes 3 recent polls, which if you take a simple average of just those three would show an NDP lead of about 0.5% (so basically tied).

The problem is 338’s model ALSO includes some extremely old data in the set, like (as just one example) an Angus Reid poll from last September showing the UCP leading by 5.

To me that’s a huge problem with the model, but the issue is probably that if you drop all the old data out of the set, you’re left with not very much to go on.

[Slava]

I think it’s good. The UCP should run this as through they’re up in the race and just have to coast to victory.

[chedder]

From Livingstone-Macleod candidate, Chelsae Petrovic:

Preemptive, 'I am a piece of s$%t who has repeatedly made moronic, racist, homophobic etc. comments over the course of my adult life and more of them are about to resurface...

[looooob]

haha yikes. ok no intention of seeking public office, but you were a nurse for apparently around the last 13 years according to your bio. adulting can be hard though I get it

[Fuzz]

You only do that if you know you have some pretty reprehensible #### in your post history.