So the results are in and the PQ under Pauline Marois has won. ( Currently PQ-56 LIB-48 CAV-19 QS-2
Sure they have replaced Jean Charest and his government but only by the slimmest of margins ( Charest himself lost his seat)
Marois becomes the first female Premier of Quebec.
However the numbers of tonight are no resounding endorsement of the PQ, nor are they a mandate for a referendum.
That idea is pretty much dead.
With the CAQ winning 18 seats and pledging not to discuss referendums or federalism for 10 years coupled with the Liberal Party snapping at her heels, Marois’s wings have been clipped.
Tonight’s result is simply a statement by the people of Quebec that it’s time for a change.
With the two opposition parties in a position to topple the new government, Marois will have to stay in line.
I think the CAQ are the big winners and actually hold the balance of power with their 18-20 seats depending upon final numbers.
They have the most to gain from any Marois shenanigans if the folks in Quebec choose to dial-up real change the next time. They will have to be at the top of their game to look like a government in waiting.
By my count ( I have history watching over me) the PQ government should last about 2.5 years giving the Liberal Party a short time to find a new leader. Given Charest’s loss of his seat and the hunt for his replacement, I would expect no BS from them either. ( This is a tough assignment for the Liberals given that there seems to be no heir apparent waiting in the wings.
Unless..is this where the savior Trudeau will step up to the plate?
Rumors are that he will run federally but will this give him cause for thought and a graceful way to bow out of federal politics?
What do you think of the results out of Quebec tonight?
Marois: Get your dukes up Harper I am coming to get you!
Recent polls the weekend before the Quebec election show the Pauline Marois led PQ on their way to a slim majority. We can hope upon hope that like Alberta ( No Christy you are toasts,nothing can save you or the Liberal brand) that they are wrong like they were in Alberta.
We can also hope that Quebecers waken from the nightmare that is their summer election and vote a little common sense rather than an expensive referendum.
There has been no beating around the bush in this campaign from Marois, if she gets elected she is taking the fight to Ottawa immediately.
Marois and her party will do anything to create the dreaded “winning conditions” that will send her province and the country into the great separatist divide.
At a time when the whole world is not only reporting economic turmoil but the potential for war, Canada can ill afford to get side tracked by this nonsense.
I hope though that Prime Minister Harper is ready with his dukes up should the need arise.
Canada cannot give into any separatist demands. This is not the time.
But it’s not too late and hopefully “money and the ethnic vote” are standing by ready to send the separatists packing again.
What do you think will be the outcome of the Quebec election?
Shocking news today; Geoffrey Cowper released his report on the justice system and it said what we already knew namely that the legal system in BC needs a major overhaul.
Inept Premier Clark created this one man commission to review a justice system that is both prone to meddling from premiers( remember Clark tried to get the hockey riot trials televised) and open to slicing and dicing from political parties when they are looking to save a buck.( remember it was the BC Liberals who cut back on judges and closed court houses earlier on)
I am going to spend time with my family now so that when I take off to Ottawa in a couple of years they will remember who I am!
Kevin Falcon announced this morning that he was stepping down from his ministerial positions effective immediately,serving out his term and leaving politics to spend time with his family and the new-born expected in February.
Admirable to be sure.
Also a definite shot at the Christy Clark leadership.
It could also be paving the way for a run at a Federal Conservative seat in 2015.( The newborn will be 2 by then)
Where will he run? The in the process of being created new federal seat in the soon to be called Electoral District Association of Surrey Cloverdale, that’s where.
By leaving now he escapes the slaughter that will be known as the May 2013 provincial election where the BC Liberals will almost certainly be wiped out.
What do you think, Is Kevin Falcon preparing for loftier goals?
A little different twist today. I have borrowed this from a family friend and thought I would share it with all of you. You could easily interchange BC and Clark for Ontario and get the same result!
What do you think?
ONTARIO
The Premier of Ontario is jogging with his dog along a nature trail.
A coyote jumps out and attacks the Premier’s dog, then bites the Premier.
The Premier starts to intervene, but reflects upon the movie “Bambi” and then realizes he should stop because the coyote is only doing what is natural.
He calls animal control .. Animal Control captures the coyote and bills the Province $200 testing it for diseases and $500 for relocating it.
The Premier goes to hospital and spends $3,500 getting checked for diseases from the coyote and on getting his bite wound bandaged.
The running trail gets shut down for 6 months while Fish & Game conducts a $100,000 survey to make sure the area is now free of dangerous animals.
The Premier spends $50,000 in Provincial funds implementing a “coyote awareness program” for residents of the area.
The Provincial Legislature spends $2 million to study how to better treat rabies and how to permanently eradicate the disease throughout the world.
The Premier’s security agent is fired for not stopping the attack.
The Province spends $150,000 to hire and train a new agent with additional special training re: the nature of coyotes.
PETA protests the coyote’s relocation and files a $5 million suit against the Province. ALBERTA
Premier Alison Redford is jogging with her dog along a nature trail. A Coyote jumps out and attacks the dog.
The Premier’s security agent shoots the coyote and keeps jogging. The Premier has spent $0.50 on a .45 ACP hollow point cartridge.
The Crows eat the dead coyote.
And that, my friends, is why ONTARIO is broke and ALBERTA is not.
Mr. Money and the Ethnic vote himself has stuck his foot in the mess that is the Quebec election.
Today, Mr.Parizeau, a racist and a bigot that Pauline Marois tried to one up beofre she went scurrying back to her hole, stepped into the limelight and endorsed Jean-Martin Aussant of the party Option Nationale.
Not only that but he put his money where his filthy mouth is and kicked in $200 to Aussant’s campaign.
Martyn Brown has a point and I will help him make it!
In the last provincial election according to both statistics and the mainstream media, 50% of the people did not vote.
I have said for a long time that is not true. I believe most people are voting when they don’t show up at the polls. I think they are voting in a way most people are not accustomed to. They are voting with their feet!
That means by not showing up at the polls and voting with a pencil they are voting in a different way saying that politics doesn’t matter because the way politicians and people in the backrooms conduct business and themselves is not relevant and is a waste of their time.
Martyn Browns new book reaffirms what I have felt for a while.
Brown’s excellent book, Towards a New Government in British Columbia, could just as easily be entitled Towards a New Government in any Province. To wit: just look at the gong show that is known as an election in Quebec.
There are no platforms revealed and it is basically 3 parties at war with each other while 1 of those parties is also taking on the country.
I am surprised the polls show anybody will vote.
In our province,BC, the Conservatives and the Liberals are at war with each other while the BC NDP hasn’t said much of anything other than they will have something to say when the election is on relative to their platform.
I am also surprised the polls show anybody will vote.
I have been involved in backroom discussion at municipal, provincial, federal and the board level. I can tell you the discussion revolves around 3 questions. They are: How do we get young people involved, how do we get women involved and how do we reach the 50% of the people who don’t vote.
I can also tell you from discussions with friends in all parties they are the same questions they all ask.
The answer, as Brown clearly says and he is right is this: If you keep going the way you are you can’t and won’t.
Why would they?
Elections and governments always go the same way. One side wins,hangs on for a few terms and gets booted out either by scandal or for not doing the few things they pledged to do during the election.
What about the favorite expression coined in the media around North America. That would be ” It’s the first year of their mandate, they are doing the hard things now so they don’t have to do them near election time” or some similar coined phrase.
What about politicians who run on this’ we are here to do politics differently’ and then they don’t.
We elect politicians and governments for 4 year terms and expect them to carry out the work for the whole four years not one and buy my vote for the other three.
I have argued for term limits on these pages and that would be a start but even with a limited term there would still be time for shenanigans.
We, the voting public, need to hold governments and wanna be governments to account.
It is no longer good enough to wait until the election to reveal a platform.
It is no longer good enough to vote for faux change.
We need term limits and tough recall laws.
What we need most, however, are politicians who are not afraid to lay it on the line. People who will talk out loud about what they will do,why they will do it and then stick to the course and not break our hearts.
We need the backrooms and the parties to stop going to war.
It’s no longer good enough to go to the polls and vote for more of the same.
Something drastic has to happen.
For until it does, this former backroom guy, will join the 50 % and vote with my feet.
Obviously this is a Conservative blog as those who have read it know.
Today I want to change it up a bit and say thank you to Denise Savoie a politician who always represented her profession and her party well.
I met Denise in the offices of Shaw cable back when she was a city councilor in Victoria in the days when Victoria city politics was more rough and tumble than it is now.
We were both at the TV studios for the filming of the candidate bios that Shaw does so well in the run up to the municipal elections. She was a candidate and I was a campaign manager with a nervous candidate.
We were in the waiting room waiting our turn and had time for a small chat. Denise knew her issues and was very nice to me, something that wasn’t common amongst all people politic in Victoria at the time.
She has represented Victoria well and I wanted to say thanks and good luck in the future.
Tom Mulcair will have a hard time recruiting somebody to ably fill your shoes.
I hope this expensive waste of time to score political points is going to be paid out of BCNDP funds because it duplicates the cost of the federal study already financed on the backs of the taxpayer.
One study, that’s fine and needed but two gimme a break.
Your federal cousin/brother Tom Mulcair already said this issue is dead in the water.
If that is so Mr.Dix why would you want to throw good money after bad?
This is no doubt the first in a series of increased taxes ( that’s what reviews are) that the NDP will announce in the run up to the election.
Question for Mr.Dix: Has this been costed and included as part of your platform?
If so what price tag do you put on this taxpayer funded review?
