Suddenly the election that apparently nobody wanted and would waste a bunch of money and change very little is, well, if you believe the polls, anyway, a potential game-changer.
Wow.
Now if you’ve read this space before you know I’m not a huge fan of polls, you can’t trust them and they have way too much influence on the media and the campaign and governing and pretty much everything else, but obviously something is happening out there and it’s not necessarily good for the two traditional ruling parties.
Plus, people may tell pollsters they’re going to vote a certain way but when they go into the booth they may second-guess changing lifelong party preferences, or even rethink the ramifications of marking an X for orange over red, or blue, or even green.
I mean we may think we’d rather go for a beer with Jack Layton over Stephen Harper and Michael Ignatieff, actually that’s probably a no-brainer for most of us. He’s got the most charm and personality by a country kilometre, but then the competition for drinking partner isn’t that stiff (to use a drinking term).
But does that mean handing over the keys to the throne to a party that has never ruled before, may or may not have a spending problem if it actually got the right to throw money around for real, and may or may not jeopardize a fragile economic recovery? Maybe. Maybe not.
However, the power surge from the left is mainly due to the lack of electricity from the right side of the political spectrum during this campaign.
Harper continually and annoyingly stays on message – election unnecessary, coalition dangerous, trust me not them – why didn’t they just clone him 10 times, play the same tape over and over again, and be done with the campaign?
Heck, they could have made a game out of it. How can he be in all 10 provinces at once? Which one is the real Stephen Harper?
Of course the problem for the Conservatives is the right answer just might be none of them. It’s difficult to rally around a robot.
That might be a bit harsh and only part of the reason why the Tories’ bid for a majority may come up short yet again. They couldn’t have predicted the NDP’s potential success in Quebec. But then again Harper did give up on Quebec years ago, leaving room for a left-leaning party like the NDP to potentially take over from the left-leaning Bloc. And, hey, who out West is going to shed any tears for a separatist party losing seats?
And then there’s Iggy. Like Harper, the only time the Liberal leader got passionate was when he was slamming the other guy. Way too negative. What kind of alternative vision does that provide for voters? Bringing out Jean Chretien in the end was kind of cool but a bit desperate and I’m sure left some Liberals pining for the good ol’ days when the Grits ruled the roost thanks to charismatic leadership.
It’s not even that Layton is that telegenic but he’s got enough moxie to allow enough people to think that maybe door No. 3 is a decent alternative to the usual fare behind the traditional door No. 1 and door No. 2.
Like I said earlier, maybe, maybe not.
A lot can change between now and then, even though it’s just 24 hours away.
Momentum shifts can work both ways and Harper, ironically, still may get his treasured majority and at least we won’t be stuck with yet another minority government situation.
However, that’s far from a done deal and it seems anything is in the mix now, including coalitions that nobody thought possible when the dreaded ‘c’ word was brought up by the Tories at the beginning of this campaign.
It’s ironic that Layton may ultimately gain the most from this campaign because going in he had the most to lose by gambling on its outcome. Now the bright spotlight is on the other two and what was thought to be just another election in a string of mean-nothing elections could be a turning point in Canadian political history. Or not.
At least it’s now worth watching Monday night.
—Glenn Mitchell is the managing editor of The Morning Star.
