On my previous post; is an NDP majority a joke?

I've had friends suggest my last post was a joke, or otherwise simply not serious. I want to detail why this is not the case.

First of all, take a look at this fresh poll https://www.scribd.com/document/377750375/Mainstreet-Ontario-Apr30 (as in it came out 30 minutes prior to my starting to write this post)

Go to page 6, and look at second choices.

54.2% of Tories have no second choice. Of those who do, nearly two thirds, 64.6%, (raw 29.5%) back the NDP as their second option. The Liberals see a similar two thirds, or 69.2% in this case (raw 45.3%) considering the NDP the second option.

Additionally, NDPers are the most likely to change their mind. Normally the media will tell you this means they will do poorly, but in the elections I've seen in the past decade, more often than not, parties with low 'very certain' numbers are actually the ones that 'swing voters' are rushing to. This does not indicate that the core NDP voter is debating voting Liberal, it indicates that the core NDP voter is being swamped by people who are swinging to the NDP for this election and, perhaps, this election alone.

Horwath has as many positives as Ford does, but half the negatives.

This is just from one poll that came out under an hour ago. Other polls show similar numbers. What I'd like to remind everyone in terms of context is this

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alberta_general_election,_2015#Opinion_polls

Take a look at NDP numbers, especially in the months leading up to the election call. In March Mainstreet had them at 18. February saw 17, December was 18, November was 16. Notice what happened as the election got closer. Insights had them at 22 in March, and ThinkHQ had them at 26.

On April 7th the writ was dropped. Polls showed them at 26 and 28. Once polling got into full swing, the party never dropped below 30.

The party nearly doubled its vote totals, according to the polls, in a very short period of time before, during and just after the writ being dropped.

Now take a look at this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontario_general_election,_2018#Opinion_polls

Notice how for months polls have had the NDP at a roughly stable level at or below 24. Any poll showing them above 24 was quite distant from any other showing them above 24.

In March this started to change a bit, and now, as we look at the second half of April, we see the NDP on the rise.

The 5 most recent polls have them at 26, 27, 21.3, 28, and 20.7. More importantly is they show all the signs of being able to potentially grow, whereas both the PC Party and Liberals show signs of potentially being closer to the top end of what they can achieve, with voters picking one due to hate of the other as opposed to actual support of their option.

I also caution against the 2 month average wikipedia provides. One reason why I have historically consistently outperformed other bloggers like 308.com is the fact that I use much smaller poll averages, of 5, or at most, 10 polls. This allows me to pick up swings and trends and momentum. Consider that a 2 month average, a week prior to the call of the 2015 Alberta election, would have had the NDP under 20 points.

Ontario - Projection (if trends continue)

If the current trends continue, the NDP is set for a Majority.

64 - NDP
53 - PC
7 - LIB

Upcoming Mexican Election and a Personal Note

Just a quick and short post that I'm in a bit of a mini transition in my persona life at the moment and that this has thrown my schedule out of whack. I still do plan for the longer posts for the upcoming elections.

In terms of the coming Mexican election, I wanted to provide some context to prepare for; all signs are pointing to a massive and easy victory for Obrador. Some context on who that is and what that means will be coming in a much larger post.

Quick note on the Ontario Election and my feeling about it

At this time my current thinking is there is a good 48% or so chance of an NDP victory, with a 46% or so chance of a large PC Majority, and all other results combined being the remainder.

What's going to really nail it down is what the polls do by, say, May 19th. If by then the NDP is not a strong second and growing, then we are looking at a huge PC Majority. I simply suspect the NDP will, by May 19th, likely, be at 30% and increasing. 

Should the NDP not take off, we are all but certain to have a very large PC majority, with the Liberals likely to be reduced to a dozen MPPs or less.

Also, yes the other previously mentioned blogposts are coming. May will be a much more full month with many posts. I've been dealing with more personal drama which has mostly wrapped up.

Post timeline

Note that I will be making a few posts between the 22nd and 30th, but will likely not have time for any prior to this.

Hungarian Election Results

Lets get right into the results

133 - Firesz - National Conservative - Obran (+-0)
26 - Jobbik - Hard Nationalist (+3)
20 - MSZP - Socialist (-5)
9 - DK - Progressive Liberal (+5)
8 - LMP - Green (+3)
3 - Others (1 independent technocrat, 1 liberal, 1 german minority)

There is some talk of MSZP, DK, and possibly even LMP forming a coalition in opposition to prevent the lead opposition role from going to Jobbik, but weather or not this materalizes remains to be seen.

In short, this is in line with what was expected, and as such, there's not much to say that's not been said already elsewhere.


Expect posts soon on the upcoming election in Mexico, and a post explaining how and why politics now is different from what it was in, say, the 1980s.

Wynne's Challenge

Kathleen Wynne has two major challenges to re-election which I'd like to detail.


CHANGE

The first challenge is that of change, people may simply have decided they've had too much of the Liberals and want some change. Doug Ford is actually an excellent brand ambassador for "Change". He is a populist, and is from Toronto, and area the Tories are seen as being weak in. He is an "outsider" who is viewed by most as understanding some of the issues that those who may not be seen as 'normal' tories have - IE he is "in touch" with "the common man"

This is not to say any of these things about Ford are true, or that they are false, but rather, that this is how people see him. Ford is a real threat to the Liberals and could easily win the election if the variables are right. He is not to be under-estimated as the driver of change, and this, is widely seen as a change election.

Ford is in the drivers seat, but he has a huge threat that I don't know if he realizes, one that even the Liberals may be under-estimating.


TRUST

On the flip side is the question of who people can trust. The Liberals have put themselves in a dangerous position; they've adopted what many view as "NDP policies" and stolen what many see as "NDP ideas". The most recent budget could easily be painted as an "NDP budget" and a lot of the things Wynne has proposed in the past few weeks feel to many voters as being very "NDP"

Again, this is not to say that these are actually "NDP" ideas, or that they are not; just that this is how people view them. This, however, opens up the Liberals to a very dangerous line of attack. If you want NDP ideas, why vote Liberal when you can simply and directly vote NDP?

The problem is Bob Rae and his governments major failings. Being a trust issue, a lot of this will depend on if Ontario voters have forgiven the NDP for Bob Rae, and if they can overlook other supposed failings within the party in other jurisdictions. If they can, all of the multitude of proposals coming out of the Liberals become useless as the NDP simply "does it better" in a way, and this becomes a race between the NDP and the Tories.



This coming provincial election will have two phases that will run alongside one another but impact each other deeply. The first will be who the progressive voter views as the champion of progressive values, and the second will be who change voters view as party they want to be the vehicle for that change. In this way, the fight is similar to the 2015 federal election, but with different players who start in different positions.

In the end, this still anybody's game.