{"id":2267,"date":"2009-05-13T18:57:00","date_gmt":"2009-05-13T22:57:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/?p=2267"},"modified":"2009-05-13T18:57:00","modified_gmt":"2009-05-13T22:57:00","slug":"decisive-decision","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/?p=2267","title":{"rendered":"Decisive Decision"},"content":{"rendered":"

Despite BC’s<\/span> reputation for wild west politics, Tuesday’s election stayed on script, with Gordon Campbell easily winning a third straight majority government:<\/p>\n

Liberals<\/strong>: 49 seats, 46%
NDP<\/span><\/strong>: 36 seats, 42%<\/p>\n

So, no change in the popular vote from 2006, and the parties each gained 3 new seats. How thrilling.<\/p>\n

So what does it all mean?<\/p>\n

1. Gordon Campbell becomes a rare three-time winner and one of the elder statesmen of the provincial premiers. Presumably, there will be a lot of speculation as to whether or not he goes for a fourth term…either way, the unofficial leadership race is on.<\/p>\n

2. Campbell also gets to play host for the Olympics next year.<\/p>\n

3. While the carbon tax may not have been the<\/strong> issue of the campaign, Campbell showed that carbon pricing is not necessarily electoral suicide. I doubt anyone will be running on a carbon tax anytime soon but, at the very least, a gutsy Premier in the safe confines of a majority could give it a try.<\/p>\n

4. And while I might align politically more with the BC NDP<\/span> than the BC Liberals, I did take some pleasure in watching Carole James go down in a blaze of carbon emitting flames. Not only did James rail against the carbon tax, but she also opposed a series of conservation measures brought in by the Liberals. I’m all for a pragmatic NDP<\/span>, but the party completely betrayed their principles and deserved to lose.<\/p>\n

5. But, like I said, the carbon tax may not have been the issue – it was probably a question of who voters wanted to lead them through a recession. With that in mind, the front runner in Nova Scotia’s<\/span> election, NDP<\/span> leader Darrell Dexter, must be a tad worried at seeing these results. Tory times may be tough times, but the Dippers would be a disaster in the eyes of many voters.<\/p>\n

6. Since the economy went south, Stephen Harper, Jean Charest<\/span>, and Gordon Campbell have all won re-election. So much for the claim that incumbents can’t survive a recession, eh?<\/p>\n

And given my rather superficial understanding of BC politics (I saw a few lawn signs when I was there last weekend…that’s about it), that’s all I’ll say on this topic. But any commentators from BC should feel free to add their two cents.<\/p>\n

Now, as for STV<\/span>, it was a crushing defeat. After coming oh so close in 2005, voters decisively rejected the system – only 39% supported the change, and it passed in just 7 ridings<\/span>. Clearly STV<\/span> is dead and, on the heels of Ontarians rejecting MMP<\/span> in 2007, you have to think drastic electoral reform will be shuffled to the back-burner in Canada for at least a decade. Sure, there’s some tinkering that can be done with finance reforms, fixed election dates, preferential ballots, and other incremental changes, but whether poli<\/span>-sci grads like it or not, most Canadians have shown that they’re OK with first past the post.<\/p>\n

As for what went wrong, Paul Wells offers a good run-down here<\/a>. [UPDATE] <\/em><\/strong>Other possibilities (which I posted in the comments before deciding to add them here):<\/p>\n

1. The question was framed as FPTP<\/span> vs. STV<\/span> this time, whereas last time it just asked if people wanted to change the system. I’m not sure why that would change things, but support for STV<\/span> in polls varied<\/span> wildly depending on how the question was framed.<\/p>\n

2. People were certainly a lot more informed this time. Maybe the more they learned about STV<\/span>, the less they liked about it.<\/p>\n

3. The general appetite for change may just have been less now. Given the election results, voters may just have been looking for stability during uncertain economic times.<\/p>\n

4. In 2005, the most recent election (2001) had produced a very skewed legislature – 77 seats to 2. This time around, the most recent election (2005) produced a fairly representative and functional legislature. Why fix it, if it’s ain’t broke?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Despite BC’s reputation for wild west politics, Tuesday’s election stayed on script, with Gordon Campbell easily winning a third straight majority government: Liberals: 49 seats, 46%NDP: 36 seats, 42% So, no change in the popular vote from 2006, and the parties each gained 3 new seats. How thrilling. So what does it all mean? 1. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2267"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2267"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2267\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}