Yesteryear’s Men
November 30, 2011
Is Bob Rae gearing up for the Liberal leadership? Warren Kinsella thinks so.
Can Newt Gingrich actually be president? It’s looking more and more possible.
The Newt Gingrich surge has moved him to the top of the polls in Iowa, big gains in New Hampshire and now a two-point edge over President Obama in a hypothetical general election match-up.
A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey of Likely Voters finds Gingrich attracting 45% of the vote while President Obama earns support from 43%. Six percent (6%) prefer some other candidate, and six percent (6%) are undecided.
Go figure.
Categories: I am Canadian!, Political prognostication, USA! USA! USA!
The Knutster would be both a better election candidate and also more easy to attack for the Dems. I say vote Gnoot.
I’m voting for Mitt.
Your title says it all; I don’t see Gingrich happening. His presidential run will be the second coming of Bob Dole—if Bob Dole had been fined 300K by the House of Representatives for unethical activity, and had a penchant for trading in his old, busted wives for younger models, like car leases.
I can’t see how he would sway independents to flee from Obama.
Regarding Rae, I don’t think he would be a big winner in the federal arena. He’s not a poor politician, but in competing with the boring low-key managerial-ism that is Stephen Harper, where is the big selling point? You can have right-of-centre boring and competent, or you can have left-of-centre boring and (let’s be kind, Ontario did not vanish from the face of the earth) competent.
The Grits need someone exciting and competent; or like Obama, exciting and incompetent, with a thin veener of presumed competence. That’s not Bob Rae in either event.
What Rae would do is revive the coalition threat: if Harper doesn’t get a second majority, Rae will pull together something to replace him before the first Throne Speech.
Ah. That makes some sense.
That, and rebuild the party so that it retakes second place from the Dippers.
The next election is an existential one for the Liberals: either they come back into contention, or end up like the British Liberals.
I might be in the minority here, but for the Grits I think second place all but guaranteed.
I don’t see the NDP retaining their current level of support in Quebec, unless they can manage to squeeze out more federal dollars for that province’s benefit. It’s not like the Québécois sat down with the party platform, reviewed it detail, and then decided—after discussing it with friends and family members—that this was the least worst option.
They took a total flyer on the Dippers based largely on Jack Layton’s personal popularity, and elected representatives they had never personally met nor evaluated at the local all-candidates debate. Which is why fresh-faced college kids with marginal French are now halfway to a gold-plated MP’s pension.
Barring a leadership convention miracle, I can’t see the Dippers being anything other than a disappointment for Quebec. In the next election cycle, I would expect to see the resurrection of the Bloc and the Liberals, as the province moves back toward parties that have successful track record in extortion/pork-barrelling.
Just enough of a revival for a nice vote-split in 2015? Possible…