Wednesday, October 20, 2010

A Tale Of Two Cities: Toronto Shifting Right, Calgary Shifting Left

With the election of mayor Nenshi in Calgary, I have heard pundits arguing whether or not Calgary is shifting to the left; while the emergence Rob Ford in Toronto is evidence that city is shifting to the right. Whether or not the political landscape is changing in Liberal/Tory strongholds, the most important talking point is that in 2008 67% of greater Calgary voted Tory, while 12% of Calgarians voted Liberal. In greater Toronto 39% voted Liberal and 36% voted Conservative. The GTA has 38 seats to the GCA's 11.

I don't know how you'd like to spin this record, but if the story is true that Toronto is shifting right while Calgary is shifting left, the Tories unquestionably have to most to gain and the least to lose. If the Tories lose 1 in 10 voters in Calgary to the Liberals, they stand to lose zero seats. If 1 in 10 Liberals instead vote Tory in Toronto, the Libs stand to lose 5 seats. If a full 1/4 of federal Conservative voters in Calgary defected to the Liberals, the Tories would lose...wait for it...zero seats. If 25% of Toronto Liberals shift Tory, the Liberals would lose...wait for it...19 seats in a large Tory majority.

You could peel off a quarter of Tory Calgary votes and give them to the Liberals and no seats would change hands. Do the opposite in Toronto and the Liberals would lose a quarter of their caucus! That's the math. So who has the most to lose if this narrative is true? The Tories aren't far behind the Liberals in Toronto, where the Liberals have virtually zero chance of winning any seats federally in Calgary. Somehow I doubt that Jane Taber will bring that up. There are more Conservatives in Toronto than some people would have you believe.

14 comments:

  1. And that is why you see the Liberals sending in the likes of Justin Trudeau to back Geroge Smitherman - the Liberals are petrified. And they SHOULD be. :D

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  2. Calgary elects a Liberal mayor...and you think that is godd for the Tories? I think you take the Alberta voters for granted. It is assumed Albertans will always elect Conservatives but that is cracking. i think the Conservatives should stop ignoring Alberta and start to give this province a little attention.

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  3. Oh Nonny, take it easy, no one is taking you and Alberta voters for granted. He didn't say that it was "good for the Tories" that Calgary elected a Liberal mayor (if that is even what he is). What he said was that it is far more damaging to Liberals in Toronto if Toronto shifts a little to the right than it would be for the Tories if Calgary were to shift a little to the left.

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  4. As to Calgary shifting to the left, I've noticed that the Calgary Herald editorials have moved a few degrees leftward, moving closer to the Edmonton Journal. They got rid of one of their best right-wing columnists, Nigel Hannaford, and have been publishing more letters from Calgarians afflicted with Harper Derangement Syndrome.

    The "progressives" in this City can only succeed electorally when they coalesce around one candidate. That happened in 2000 with Joe Clark in Calgary Centre. And amazingly, it happened now with this realtive unknown, Nenshi.

    So the huge, almost insurmountable problem for Iggy in a place like Calgary is that he has to somehow recruit a high profile candidate, willing to work hard, motivate many volunteers to help him, and who can convince all the lunatic lefties to coalesce around him. It's such a huge challenge, Iggy won't even try, especially when incumbent CPC MPs keep working hard.

    Look at the problems Iggy & Donolo had in finding someone for Vaughan, to see how incompetent he is in this aspect of politics.

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  5. A very provocative post backed up with helpful stats.

    As regions Calgary become “established” they might start losing their entrepreneurial spirit and prefer the status quo, according to a plan, which is what Liberals are all about. Liberals are actually conservative in the sense that they don’t want change; particularly if it means competing for power. On the other hand conservatives are pro capitalism which means constant change if not outright chaos from time to time but we have faith that we’ll eventually adapt.

    New Canadians are 50% of the Toronto population. They literally have “get up and go” and are often conservative but don’t know it. They are starting to realize that and the tides are shifting with immigrants showing up in more numbers at Conservative riding associations. However, it is the “established” Bay St Lawyers like Alf Apps who brought Iggy back to Canada to be the Liberal Messiah who would resurrect the embalmed Trudeaupia image. But Iggy is looking more and more like Count Dracula every time the sun shines on him.


    nomdebolg

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  6. Baloney. Spinners will spin. I voted Nenshi because he had the best campaign and he sure does come across as brilliant. I value that. My vote has to be earned and Nenshi earned it. Simple as that. I'm not shifting left and if its all just the usual liberal double talk then I won't just vote against him next time around, I'll work to make sure as many people as possible throw him out.

    That said, the last guy stunk on ice and he ran for the grits. Nothing is changing... but spinners will spin.

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  7. This was Ric McIver's election, going into the last few months. He lost because he couldn't articulate a vision for Calgary which encompassed needed spending. Nor could he satisfactorily explain why he voted to fire the embarrassing auditor and then voted to have the firm already do the external audit do the forensic one as well.

    Naheed Nenshi was able to articulate a balanced vision for Calgary, as well as indicating he knew beaurocratic ploys and wouldn't be taken in (which included criticism of both the police chief and the chief librarian). It wasn't just the Twitter crowd who voted him in; there were many professionals and older folk who decided he was the best candidate.

    As for Ms Higgins: to quote an old ad 'Where's the beef?' She just didn't have the substance to translate her celebrity into enough votes.

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  8. Ralph klein was a liberal but had the mind of conservativism. He promoted Calgary to the outside world. He stood together with us to battle the recession in our province not to mention the 'cuts' he made to help kill Alberta's debt left behind by Getty.
    Can you see Dalton doing what Ralph did -not a chance.

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  9. Iceman just o/t, is soomething with BLY site; I can't enter. Check it out for me. thanks.

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  10. I meant to say something 'wrong'

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  11. Dave Bronconnier was the last mayor of Calgary and was a known Liberal. He ran for the federal Liberals against Rob Anders and was crushed like a bug.

    This new mayor is going to be bad news for Calgary. I would venture that he’ll be a lot further left than Bronconnier ever was. He’ll be attempting to funnel as much money as possible to his leftist supporters and pass on the bill to everyone.

    But he is a real modern guy, right down to his being 38 years old and still living with Mom and Dad.

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  12. Jen said...

    Iceman just o/t, is soomething with BLY site; I can't enter. Check it out for me. thanks.


    Jen,I can't get in to BLY either.

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  13. Thanks frmgrl. I was wondering if I was the only on one. Now we know.

    BC, Ralph Klein, David Rutherford etc will keep a close watch on ths new mayor. Any mishaps of our city's money going to OBAMA or to the fed liberals, the calgarians will hear of it.

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  14. the worst thing about these left right shifts is that we never seem to fix the things screwed up by the left.

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