Sunday, January 22, 2006

Conservatives + Bloc = Government

Remember -- the magic number is 156 (including the Speaker).
Jason Cherniak has got a much better handle than I have on what is happening in the ridings across the country. Here is his best-case/worst-case scenario, which provides us with the likely range of results:
. . . in the best case scenario, a Liberal loss of 13 in Atlantic and Quebec, a Tory gain of 10 in Atlantic and Quebec and a BQ gain of 3 in Quebec . . .
Lib - 120
Con - 108
BQ - 56
NDP - 24
At worst for the Liberals, they lose 8 in Atlantic, 10 in Quebec and 20 in Ontario. That would give approximate numbers of:
Con - 130
Lib - 94
BQ - 56
NDP - 28

This prediction is also quite close to the Canadian Election Project numbers, which presently predict:
Con - 108
Lib - 93
NDP - 23
BQ - 58
Other - 1
Too close to call - 25
So the question of the day is - what happens next?
Only in the Cherniak best case scenario is there a chance that Martin remains as Prime Minister, and even then he would need NDP support plus some of the Bloc or Conservatives to vote with him.
In either of Cherniak's scenarios, if the Conservativea and the Bloc form an alliance then Harper would be Prime Minister. So does anyone think Harper wouldn't do exactly this -- work out a deal with Duceppe so that Harper can be PM and Quebec can be de facto independent?
Is this the government that Canada actually wants?
Well, if you vote Conservative on Monday, this is the government you will get.

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