Among Canada's middle class, elections are a sport whose popularity -- as we are now seeing -- surpasses even hockey. (Which is good since Calgary has always been my team back in Canada, whereas Tampa is the local team.) This is why blog activity is down among Canadians at St. Blog, except to comment on the election slated for the end of June. Anyway, since everyone else has weighed in with their predictions, I thought I should do the same.
First off, I think Stephen Harper will pull off a bare majority, hovering at the 160 seat range. Basically, I see the Conservative Party of Canada sweeping the Prairies, doing well in BC, holding their own Ontario (taking about fifty seats), establishing a beach-head in Quebec (5-10 seats), and probably scoring about a third of the seats in the Atlantic provinces. Of all the major party leaders, Harper has run the best campaign thus far, keeping expectations low, snipping problems in the bud before the other parties can capitalize on them, and not deviating from the script.
While he comes across as somewhat dull, this is good given that the initial game-plan of his opponents was to paint him as a right-wing extremist. In short, Canadians find him boring, but not scary. Neverless, this continues to keep expectations low, and to maintain the slow and steady upward momentum, Harper only needs to hold his own in the English debate and avoid any major stumbles in the French. Since he's a phenomenal debater, he should exceed expectations and boost his momentum going into the election.
Secondly, the Bloc will form the Official Opposition. Duceppe actually seems to have learned from his previous elections and is running a solid campaign. If he can avoid the temptation to cross from soft separatist to hard, he should have no problem winning 60 of Quebec's 75 seats.
In third place, I see the Liberals squeaking just behind the Bloc. The West will shut them out completely. Ontario will yield about 30 to 40 seats, meaning that Ontario will continue to give the Liberals the bulk of their seats, however, both the seat count and support base in Ontario will be greatly reduced. With a renewed Conservative Party, I doubt Quebec will cough up any more than 5-10 seats. The only region I see the Liberals winning is the Atlantic provinces. That being said, I think Martin sending out his Ministers of State to crash Harper's campaign events backfired into a defining "kitten-eating-alien" moment.
So this leaves Jack Layton and the socialist NDP in fourth. Jack looked good going into this campaign, having renewed the NDP and pushed their momentum upward. For our American readers, a strong performance from the socialists generally helps the conservative in national elections since the socialists draw their vote from the Liberals. In other words, think Ralph Nader syphoning off 10-20% of the Democrat vote. However, and this is the only thing the Liberals have said during this campaign with which I agree, Jack couldn't resist shooting off his mouth and becoming the Howard Dean of Canadian politics.
It remains to be seen whether his ludicrous accusations against Martin concerning the death of a number of homeless in Toronto will prove to be Layton's "Dean Scream" moment. While Layton hasn't yet crashed as a result of those comments, people were turned off, his momentum has reversed, and he's now lost a couple points in the polls. But I still think he will hold enough support together to retain official party status. I give Layton 15-20 seats, but not his own. Mills is one of the few Liberals running a good campaign, so I don't see Layton knocking him off. Nevertheless, Layton can then pass the socialist leadership off to his wife unless Broadbent wins in Ottawa.
Okay, some of you noticed are now thinking the math falls a little short since there are still a few seats I have not accounted for. This brings me to a prediction many will no doubt find surprising. I think this will be a breakout election for the Green Party. Although many would have thought this impossible, Harris has actually done a credible job of fleshing out the Green Party platform and moving the party closer to the center.
As a small businessman, he may not be as exciting as previous Green leaders, but his dull blue suits and moderated tone are breaking down the anarchist-enviro-wacko-tree-hugger stereotype common to Green Party activists. He's also building a strong youth following, which will help the party in the future. So in many ways, albeit on a smaller scale, he's proving himself to be a Stephen Harper of the left. I don't think Harris can win Official Party Status this time around, but with the angry political mood among Canadians and Jack Layton running a reckless campaign, I can see the Green Party establishing a beach-head in Parliament with up to five seats. These will likely come from BC and the territories. Additionally, if Martin loses the election and control over the Liberal party reverts to the left, I wouldn't be surprised if the Green Party displaces the NDP within the next ten years as Canada's third major party
