Canada's Gov General allows Liberal-NDP coalition to take power

Last December Canada's Governor General Michelle Jean was forced to decide whether to keep Steven Harper's Conservatives in power by shutting down Parliament or allow the Liberals to form a coalition overnment. She decided to shut down Parliament until Jan 27...

If she had allowed the Liberal-NDP to form a coalition government, Canada's 2,500 troops would have left Afghanistan by February seriously putting greater risk of Taliban taking back more territory and creating a bigger headache for newly inaugurated President Obama...

As a Conservative first I'd be very upset, and then I'd be laughing my ass off.
The coalition would not last long, the blue Liberals wouldn't like the NDP enforced laws and revolt after a few months. The following election would be a bloodbath.
Liberals: Having to get the BQ's continual supprt, they would be seen as kowtowing to the BQ to get the necessary support, which would turn off the few voters still in the West including Vancouver, and sour or destroy their approval in Ontario and the Maritimes.
For the more right of center party members they would see such a union of Liberal and NDP members as a betrayal and go to the Conservatives in droves. Most of Ontario except the heart of Toronto would look blue.
Due to the disregard of tradition (not law, but tradition) many voters would feel that the Liberals cheated their way into power. They would want to punish the Liberals who masterminded it. This would cost them more voters throughout Canada.
In Quebec, many voters who voted Liberal to defeat the BQ would feel betrayed due to the backroom deal made with the BQ. They'd go to the only party that seems opposed to the BQ, the Conservatives.

NDP: The NDP might do a little better if they had good PR. If they could probably keep their constituants happy by saying they opposed the Conservatives so much they took the least bad option. They might win a few more seats in Vancouver and Toronto even. But thats about it.

BQ: The BQ does worse. With the Liberals likely breaking apart in Quebec as members go to the only party that can say they oppose the Seperatists, the vote splitting in some ridings will end.
And due to the breaking of tradition some weak seperatists may join the Conservatives, but this probably wouldn't change too much.

Conservatives: WIN The Conservatives will be seen as the most nationalistic party in Canada. They will be seen by a fair number of people as being wronged due to a bad decision made by the Governer General. They can say they stuck to their beliefs while all the other parties sold theirs for power. And they can say the will of the people who voted for them to be a minority government was subverted by backdoor bargainings.
As the Liberals collapse the Conservatives gain most of the voters.

The only way to stop this would be if the Liberal-NDP with major BQ assistance government actually did some good stuff. Considering the parties the members in the parties, and their ideologies. I don't see that happening but it may.

Or when the recession is in full force the Coalition goes full-throttle with a different "Economic Action Plan" or something and it works maybe slightly better, giving them a higher approval as the NDP is lambasted for suggesting we leave the War on Terror before 2011. The NDP quietly sits up and shuts down () with their place as the junior, more respected party in the coalition. The BQ tries to get a lot of the Stimulus poured into Quebec, and why not? It has a huge amount of population so people ignore their nationalist bent because they served their electorate and the Quebec Economy jumps instead of slides thanks to the coalition. The liberals however, take full advantage of the Conservatives opposition to the stimulus and paint them as crazy right wingers, opposed to spending anything that could be remotely used to help people in Canada and instead spending huge amounts of money to get the US to stay happy. So do the Liberals, though they aren't as vocal about that; Canadian Soldiers will be reinforced to show that the coalition is not 'soft' and it might be more troops than what Canada sent already. Of course all the conservatives on the board will call this totally implausible, but that's just the way it goes.

mmmeee0 said:

Or when the recession is in full force the Coalition goes full-throttle with a different "Economic Action Plan" or something and it works maybe slightly better, giving them a higher approval as the NDP is lambasted for suggesting we leave the War on Terror before 2011. The NDP quietly sits up and shuts down () with their place as the junior, more respected party in the coalition. The BQ tries to get a lot of the Stimulus poured into Quebec, and why not? It has a huge amount of population so people ignore their nationalist bent because they served their electorate and the Quebec Economy jumps instead of slides thanks to the coalition. The liberals however, take full advantage of the Conservatives opposition to the stimulus and paint them as crazy right wingers, opposed to spending anything that could be remotely used to help people in Canada and instead spending huge amounts of money to get the US to stay happy. So do the Liberals, though they aren't as vocal about that; Canadian Soldiers will be reinforced to show that the coalition is not 'soft' and it might be more troops than what Canada sent already. Of course all the conservatives on the board will call this totally implausible, but that's just the way it goes.

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Its not totally implausable, I said it may happen in my post, I just think its unlikely.
The NDP wouldn't support ANY reinforcements in Afghanistan. Dion was hellbent on going green which would Likely hurt the economy even more, and the BQ by demanding incentives for Quebec would anger the rest of Canada.
Now I could be wrong, but I believe that the three parties were too far apart on key issues such as Afghanistan, the environment, and a host of minor issues to last very long. Many people inside the Liberal party wanted Dion gone. This was his last chance to regain control, but its likely that the NDP would demand a controlling voice. That would not sit well with Iggy and the other centre right members of the Liberals.
Also with the coalition taking power in an unprecedented move, faith in the Canadian economy would fall. This would make the recession start sooner and unless the Coalition acted promptly and appropriately it would be worse.
It may be able to work, but the odds are against it doing well enough to please Canadians.

If that happened, Stephen Harper would be ousted by his own caucus, as strange as that sounds to non-Canucks. IOTL the party, from us at the grassroots to reportedly his own senior Cabinet ministers were incensed at such brinksmanship. Unlike Mulroney's "roll of the dice", Harper won, but barely. This has had no precedent in Canadian history- a minority government replaced by an opposition coalition, particularly when that government had just been reelected with an increased plurality.

mmmeee0 said:

Or when the recession is in full force the Coalition goes full-throttle with a different "Economic Action Plan" or something and it works maybe slightly better, giving them a higher approval as the NDP is lambasted for suggesting we leave the War on Terror before 2011. The NDP quietly sits up and shuts down () with their place as the junior, more respected party in the coalition. The BQ tries to get a lot of the Stimulus poured into Quebec, and why not? It has a huge amount of population so people ignore their nationalist bent because they served their electorate and the Quebec Economy jumps instead of slides thanks to the coalition. The liberals however, take full advantage of the Conservatives opposition to the stimulus and paint them as crazy right wingers, opposed to spending anything that could be remotely used to help people in Canada and instead spending huge amounts of money to get the US to stay happy. So do the Liberals, though they aren't as vocal about that; Canadian Soldiers will be reinforced to show that the coalition is not 'soft' and it might be more troops than what Canada sent already. Of course all the conservatives on the board will call this totally implausible, but that's just the way it goes.

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Although I'm no expert in political science, I would say it's a fair bet that Alberta (and likely Saskatchewan) would be incensed because of how big the energy sector is. But the real question is: would Alberta be incensed enough to threaten secession?

Re secession: Absolutely not. That movement is a fringe, particularly with an Albertan in the PMO and heavy Western representation in the Tory caucus. Though the sclerotic provincial PC dynasty might not live to celebrate its 40th anniversary in power come 2011 due to the rise of the Wildrose Alliance. In Alberta, they go for a dynasty for two generations, then brutally murder them at the polls. First the Liberals (1900s-1920s), then the United Farmers (1920s-1940s), then the Socreds (1940s-1970s), and now the PCs (1971-). Danielle Smith is by no means Rene Levesque, but she might be Robert Bourassa (being nationalist-federalist).

RogueBeaver said:

If that happened, Stephen Harper would be ousted by his own caucus, as strange as that sounds to non-Canucks. IOTL the party, from us at the grassroots to reportedly his own senior Cabinet ministers were incensed at such brinksmanship. Unlike Mulroney's "roll of the dice", Harper won, but barely. This has had no precedent in Canadian history- a minority government replaced by an opposition coalition, particularly when that government had just been reelected with an increased plurality.

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You beat me to it. Harper in addition to that had at that point failed twice to get a Conservative majority despite endless Liberal fuckups. He'd be toast for sure if he couldn't stop the Liberal-NDP-BQ coalition. Now, that coalition would do wonders for the Conservatives' popularity in the West, but I'm not sure it would help them much in Ontario, simply Ontario already has a big division between the 416/905 ridings and the rural areas. The rural areas vote Conservative, the 416 goes almost entirely to Liberals (Jack Layton and his wife excepted, of course) and the 905 could go either way, with some ridings going to any of the three parties.

Ontario is trending Blue, and the PM is even raiding the suburbs for immigrant votes. However the road to a Tory majority is in 905 and 450, which means the Liberal MTV fortress (thanks to Kenney, their last bastion) can be bypassed if some Tory strategists are not so ham-fisted on French-Canadian cultural liberalism next time around. Trust me, when my Francophone friends expressed their opinions on that, I knew our chances of 155 were finished.

RogueBeaver said:

Ontario is trending Blue, and the PM is even raiding the suburbs for immigrant votes. However the road to a Tory majority is in 905 and 450, which means the Liberal MTV fortress (thanks to Kenney, their last bastion) can be bypassed if some Tory strategists are not so ham-fisted on French-Canadian cultural liberalism next time around. Trust me, when my Francophone friends expressed their opinions on that, I knew our chances of 155 were finished.

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But is that Blue gonna be Harper blue or will it be his successor? I don't have much confidence that he can control his party to any serious degree, and I know his bent for secrecy is annoying the hell out of both people in his own party and the opposition. The Richard Colvin affair and their coverups of it IMO have shit-canned their chances of a majority of the 905, because in many areas there is too many immigrants. You can bypass that, but bypassing an area where there is 82 seats (the combined total of the 905 and 416 areas) is just not smart.

TM: I agree. What worries me is that our party is very much Harper's creation. Not a personality cult, but very dependent on Harper to maintain ideological coherence. Ironically, like the PQ during its adolescence in the Levesque government. If you knew how much Levesque ordered Dr. Laurin to excise from loi 101, it resembles how Harper has muzzled the social Palins in the caucus that cost him the 2004 election.What happened to the PQ, as I'm seeing now, is that there's no second leadership generation. Right now I see a Kenney-Mackay fight when the PM retires (hopefully not too soon). In the interim, Colvin might or might not subside over the holidays.

TheMann said:

But is that Blue gonna be Harper blue or will it be his successor? I don't have much confidence that he can control his party to any serious degree, and I know his bent for secrecy is annoying the hell out of both people in his own party and the opposition. The Richard Colvin affair and their coverups of it IMO have shit-canned their chances of a majority of the 905, because in many areas there is too many immigrants. You can bypass that, but bypassing an area where there is 82 seats (the combined total of the 905 and 416 areas) is just not smart.

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There is a chance Harper may survive politically. Was there any real challenger at this point? Most of the big ones from early on had screwed up and made themselves a little less to a lot less popular.
But you are right. People could agree with his heavy handedness as long as he got results, in this situation he would lose most of that support. If Harper acted very carefully, and no one managed to rally the crowd, he could survive on a much shorter leash. As long as the Coalition screws up or at least doesn't shine he has a good chance of recovering. But he would have to at least act contrite until he wins the election.
If he can do that I don't know. I like the guy and I don't think he can show the proper emotions very well. It would be interesting to watch though.

Only precedent for an opposition coalition was when Mackenzie King, following a 115-100 "loss" in the 1925 election, refused to resign the Prime Ministership (reportedly angering the GG) and cobbled together a coalition with the Progressives (1920s version of Reform) for 10 months, then regained a majority. Harper is King's closest Rovian competitor, but I doubt such a thing would be allowed today.

well I know alot of people would have lost faith in democracy and stopped supporting it as it stands now. I could also see the right wing in canada being like ok fuck this even if we win we lose we have to beat all 3 parties so why fight in a losing battle this methods. We shall fight with other methods.

I say this as a canadian from Canada who watched people call it an attempted coup

The coalition had no precedent in Canadian history, and it would have destroyed all the parties except the Bloc.

Tories: I've explained why in detail.

Liberals: If they get in bed with Gilles Duceppe, they'll have conceded every non-Anglophone Quebec seat (55 of 75) to the Bloc without a fight and will destroy their (admittedly barnacled) reputation as the national federalist party. If they get in bed with Jack Layton, their base will be furious as hell. As it was, the party's operators didn't like Dion trying to make the Grits an NDP-lite party.

NDP: Even recently, there were signs protesting Layton's agreement not to topple the Harper government over EI. His base would be furious if he joined the Liberals in power, because they fiercely compete for urban votes come election time.

This is kind of a crapshoot but my guess is Harper stays on as Leader, and leads the Conservative to a landslide in the next election (the Coalition was massively unpopular in every Province minus Quebec, and with the Government getting into bed with the Bloc, the attack ads just write themselves). The Bloc becomes Official Opposition once again because the Liberals and the NDP do just so badly.

You do realize this thread is nine years old right?

anarcho_liberal said:

You do realize this thread is nine years old right?

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And the OP is Banned besides.