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NDP rebounding in Manitoba and wins by-election by crushing opponents
April 30, 2015 - 11:44pm
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NDP's Amanda Lathlin wins The Pas byelection
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/ndp-s-amanda-lathlin-wins-the-pas...
Isn't that the safest NDP seat in Manitoba?
Yeah maybe, but this is the first time the NDP has taken it not just by the usual secret ballot process, but by "crushing opponents", as per the thread title. Not sure that's legal, but hey, whatever works!
Orange Crushing them just like the Orange Chinook that's about to hit Calgary!
Good for the Mantioba NDP. I don't like how Selinger handled the leadership race, but honestly I still don't understand why Mantiobans are so pissed at the NDP, I mean Manitoba has a low unemployment rate amoung other things, yes the raise the sales tax, which was the wrong tax to raise, but other then that what's the NDP doing wrong in Manitoba?
20% voter turn out was not very reassuring in this victory. As much as I try to highlight how horrible a Palister and a PC victory would be with colleagues and friends who are convinced that the NDP are dead, they all seem pretty convinced that the NDP deserve to be booted. I honestly don't get it other than the media playing up this hype and the stupid implosion that occured a few months ago. This knee-jerk reaction to punishing ruling parties is what got Harper into power for the last decade.
I don't know, winning a by-election on one of the safest seats in the province on a very low turnout isn't exactly a whole lot of evidence that the NDP is rebounding. What goes on in the northern seats isn't always indicative of what people are feeling in Winnipeg and southern Manitoba where most of the seats are. Also, it should be noted that Amanda Lathlin's 57% of the vote is down from the 75%ish that Frank Whitehead won in 2007 and 2011, and going down by 18% is hardly a rebound.
I think the sales tax was a bad idea rolled out very poorly. But more than simply the annoyance of having to pay an extra 1%, I think is also the trust issue. The NDP said they wouldn't raise the sales tax in 2011 and did it anyways. They also keep pushing back their deficit reduction targets (not that deficit financing to avert a deep recession is a bad idea, though maybe it is time to start bringing it back down again).
The leadership campaign probably didn't help either, but I expect that to do more damage internally than externally, with the disarray caused by people fleeing to Alberta.
Manitoba NDP turmoil sees some key staff members head for Alberta
The Canadian Press
May 26, 2015
The rise of Alberta's New Democrats is prompting a growing number of Manitoba Premier Greg Selinger's key staff members to head west.
It's a study in contrasts — the ascendant Alberta NDP making history, compared to a Manitoba NDP government that has suffered from infighting and low polling numbers after 15 years in power.
Selinger started losing top advisers last December, after five senior cabinet ministers challenged his leadership in a contest he ended up winning by the narrowest of margins.
His chief of staff, his caucus director, his communications chief and more parted ways with the premier in the ensuing months.
Some ended up in Alberta, where the NDP won power for the first time earlier this month.
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More:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/manitoba-ndp-turmoil-sees-some-ke...
Hmm. When is the next Manitoba election?
2016 I think.
2016 I think.
New Probe Research poll
http://www.probe-research.com/documents/150703%20Provincial%20Voting%20I...
March numbers in brackets
PC 46 (44) +2
NDP 29 (29)
Lib 19 (20) -1
Gre 5 ( 7) -2
Left-leaning Brandon councillor to run for the Liberals in a supposedly safe NDP seat:
Manitoba has a Liberal party? I had to look it up - and sure enough, they have one seat in the legislature!
Interesting.
1988 was the last time the Liberals came in second as NDP voters ran from the hated Pawley government. That 35% showing and the resulting battle between the two parties led to 11 years of Filmon's Conservatives. The odds are in the next election the Liberal vote will go above last election's historic low of 7%.
I just looked up the federal numbers and the Liberals improved from 16% in 2011 to 44% this election. While the NDP went from 26% to 14%.
The hated Conservatives dropped to 37% from 54%. Methinks the Manitoba NDP is in for a rough ride in this election cycle.
Yes, it's interesting that the Trudeau Liberals won Manitoba this year.
I have no idea what it means for the Provincial scene, though.
It may not have much effect.
Just to show how last millenium the Manitoba NDP really is here is it's take on legalizing pot. It echoes the the message of the federal party that needed to study the drug because they had heard from the RCMP about how dangerous it was.
The party is going down hard in the next election. But don't worry all is not lost yet, I hear that the federal party has some great campaigners available who pushed the same message about going slow on the dangerous herb. They are available since none of them made it into their dream PMO jobs.
http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/Pot-is-highly-addictive-Selinger-...
Even when the federal NDP were at their height in popularity, they weren't polling too well in Manitoba. So, doesn't bode well for the MNDP.
Not necessarily. Conventional wisdom says that should be the case, but the PC leader is too close to Harper and has a tendancy to say stupid things like infidel atheist and criticizing Hallowe'en and his recent counter-throne speech was heavy on adding doctors and nurses (inviting the NDP to throw the PC cuts of the 1990s back at them) while cutting spending and enhancing our front-line services while rolling the PST back to 7% is not going to give him the traction he needs.
Having said that, you're right in a sense that the political scene here is very discouraging. I firmly believe that the next election will be the nastiest election ever fought in Manitoba between the parties, and anybody who won't jump off a cliff when their party says won't notice or care about the election. Which in a sense is a shame because if the NDP wins in Manitoba, that will only continue to send the wrong message to the federal party about how to treat the opinions and feedback of members.
They need to hear from the LeDain Commision first
I am sure I heard the party during the campaign promise to update the LeDain Commission because it was so old and the herb was way more potent and dangerous. This from a party led by a Montreal'er from a generation whose cannabis users loved black hash. No wonder the youth vote went to the Liberals. Tom came across to GenX'ers who came out to vote for the first time as their strict, uncool uncle whose youth was spent with a stick up his ass.
Selinger seems to be trying to double down on the same persona. For many people Rana Bokhari, the Liberal leader, might just be the antidote to the two right of centre white male boomers. She is a young and dynamic 38 year old with a thin resume but good people skills.
Let's see how the NDP has defended the interests of the working classes it claims to speak for:
Disgusting. I can think of fewer things that have harmed the NDP's reputation as an advocate for the working class than the Manitoba and Saskatchewan sections allowing so many of their citizens to languish in poverty for so long.
The moribund Manitoba Liberals could certainly benefit from an injection of new life & generational change.
I don't know whether it will happen, but it's certainly time for them to do something different to resonate with the people in Manitoba if they ever want to make an impact.
We'll see if Rana Bokhari can tap into some of the success of her Federal counterpart Justin Trudeau, and build on the success of the Liberals in sweeping Winnipeg in October.
It won't be easy to break the NDP-Conservative hold on MB, but it's worth a shot.
The Liberals have had their own infighting here as well. Remember that the NDP also has the advantage of control of the public purse, so they can still shore up some support with initiatives like more child care spaces and the increased rent subsidies which just went into effect. And since Trudeau has promised marijuana legalization and that this is a federal responsibility, I can't imagine it playing a huge role in the next election.
Dissident MLA loses nomination:
This feels like a purge is going on. Let's recap: Struthers, Swan, Selby, Howard, and Oswald held the press conference to try and force out Selinger, and Pettersen openly criticized him. Since then: Struthers and Oswald have announced that they will not run in the next election. Selby was convinced to run federally and then hired by the UFCW, and Petterson has lost the nomination. Plus, Liberal leader Rana Bokhari will run against Howard, and I fully expect the party to divert resources away from that riding (the officila line will be that the party has to defend marginal seats and will thus be concentrating its resources where needed).
So this really is Greg Selinger's NDP, and Selinger is one of the most unpopular premiers in Canada. I fear because the voters will have the chance to do what the NDP could not. No questioning of the party, just realize that it is the greatest thing since sliced bread and vote accordingly. What's really unfortunate is that this arrogance is going a long way to undermine the more positive aspects of this government's legacy.
I read that it wasn't quite so simple in Flin Flon - Selinger's people were not involved at all - on the contrary the union locals there are controlled by loyalists to Steve Ashton and they wanted to punish the MLA because he supprted Oswald and not Ashton.
That is one thing about the NDP out West, some of the unions still know how to stack a nomination meeting. So are you saying that Tom Davies led the coup?
I love your use of language. "Controlled by" and "punish", implies that union locals are not democratic bodies and that the people who control them should be able to punish sitting MLA's. I get the way you see power dynamics in organizations. It is simliar to the reality that I have seen in some unions but not in the best. You seem okay with this type of backroom manipulation of the New DEMOCRATIC Party while I find it quite disgusting. Ken Georgetti was another Steelworker that knew how to work the backrooms and with Moe Sihota working GOTV in the South Asian community they dominated the BC NDP nomination process for a decade. Of course the NDP didn't win despite the fact that the control freaks influenced many close nomination battles.
Just so people understand it is not trade unionist that are the problem just certain union people. So it isn't the Steelworkers it is people like Georgetti. Other Steelworkers like Art Kube or Leo Gerard are not the problem. So Stockholm is it Davies or some other individuals that you believe stacked the meeting? Or do you want to smear all the union leadership in Flin Flon with the label of control freaks.
..the government has recently sent out letters saying that the calculating of income will be done differently and that rent subsidies might go down. well i tested it on the estimater and the subsidy went down $20 per month.
I don't know ANYONE in northern Manitoba - I'm just saying that in the press reports on the Flin Flon nomination battle - it was noted that this turned into a proxy war between people who had backed Ashton for the leadership against those who had backed Oswald and that Selinger had no horse in this contest...some say that two-time loser Ashton is going to try to win the leadership yet again after the election and is already trying to line things up for himself...though I hear that Kevin Chief is widely expected to seek the leadership post-Selinger and would be incalculably more appealing than a washed up hack like Ashton.