This was the election that was the referendum on Stephen Harper.
It was dubbed as the Anybody but Harper campaign.
It ended badly for Mr.Harper we know that now.
The Conservatives, on the other hand will live another day.
The NDP might not be so fortunate.
Before the election was dubbed the “Anybody but Harper Campaign” the discussion centered around whether the left could exist as two bodies and defeat the Conservatives without splitting the vote.
That was put to the test in this election and from where I sat and watched only one survived.
As soon as Tom Mulcair said the NDP stood for balanced budgets they became Harper lite.
Justin Trudeau and the Liberals pounced and said they would run deficits creating a clear choice in the voting public’s mind. Would they vote for Harper and the Conservatives ( Which the NDP was now lumped) or would they vote for Liberal deficits and spending.
While the voters where mulling that over, Thomas Mulcair put what I think was the final nail in his and the NDP coffin.
It wasn’t the niqab ( although that didn’t help him ).
At the September 28 debate Thomes Mulcair shot him and his party squarely in the foot.
Mulcair invoked the death of Justin Trudeau’s father, Pierre Elliot Trudeau.
Trudeau made a passionate defense of his father as would I of mine.
Trudeau took full control from that moment on and made the voters choice easy, a compassionate party with a left leaning economic vision versus two balanced budget parties that were mean.
In my mind the election was over that night.
At the same time the Trudeau Liberals swallowed up the NDP and gave those progressive voters a home they could win on.
And win they did.
Next election the economy will still be the topic ( It always is) but the NDP wont have much to say in the outcome.
It will be tax and spend of the Liberals versus the Conservatives fiscal economic planning.
The Conservatives will have a new leader who will have gotten the message from last night.
There will be no Anybody But Harper Campaign. The fight will be for those new voters who came out this time.
The NDP? There is no longer room for them, they had their chance.
They blew it.
They will not recover.
Jack Layton must be rolling in his grave!
