This may mean participation in missile defence is off the table.

As Liberal leader Paul Martin pointed out during the campaign, it means missile defense happens without us.

Would the Rae premiership in Ontario be a good precedent for what might happen federally?

Tom: Sadly, it might.

Though there was one happy side effect of Rae's term... it will be a very long time before Ontario even thinks about electing an NDP government again.

Having said all that, I do have a certain level of personal respect for Mr. Bob Rae.

It will be interesting as the Liberal/NDP are one short of a majority and then they need a speaker.... I predict a short lifespan and a new election in about 8-9 months.

Joe,

The Toronto Star (www.thestar.com, "What next? Government by uncertainty") lists the outcome as 135 Liberal, 97 Conservative, 54 Bloc Quebecois, and 21 NDP (presumably also 1 Independent, to round out the 308). Any idea why they have the NDP +2 ridings and the Conservatives -2 compared with your numbers?

Also, if your numbers are correct, a Liberal/NDP coalition would have 154 members, which is 50% exactly of 308--NOT a majority. What would this mean? (If the Star's numbers are right, the coalition would have 156 members, which would be a majority.)

Sam,

No idea. All I know is what I see at Elections Canada's official web site.

Oops. I guess elections.ca would be the official results. Duh. I guess the Toronto Star just ran with too-early numbers that turned out to be inaccurate.

My 154-is-half-of-308 question remains, though. =)

It's also possible that www.elections.ca is not 100% up to the minute.

Unless there are some changes through recounts, it would appear that the Lib 135, Con 99, BQ 54 and NDP 19 numbers are going to hold, meaning a LIB/NDP coalition government would not have an outright majority. I also have no idea what a "tie" vote would mean.

Unless I'm wrong, however, most votes are not confidence votes anyway unless the government chooses to designate them as such. This means that the government can pass legislation by simply horse trading with the other three parties until they can get enough votes to win on any particular bill. If they can't get the votes, they can withdraw the legislation or let it go down in flames. Either way they continue on governing.

Where it gets interesting is with the big ones -- the confidence votes, where losing means a new election. There probably won't be one of those until the next budget is tabled, most likely in Spring 2005.

At that point, with no majority coalition, the question becomes: who do you try to get onside? Some combination of the NDP and the BQ or CONs -- or just the CONs or BQ? Depending on what kind of budget they want to table, practically anything could happen. The CONs might side with them on a fiscally conservative budget, while the BQ / NDP will be looking for lots of social spending.

I don't think any of the parties are all that interested in going into another campaign very soon -- the BQ and NDP would most likely lose seats, the CONs need time to put an actual platform together and get Harper better known in the east, and the LIBs need time to "prove" just how much better they're going to be than the last government. So, I don't see a confidence vote failure for another 12-18 months, at least.

In the meantime, what I'd like to ask our Ontario readers (I'm a proud Albertan) is this: just how sleazy do the Liberals have to be before you'll stop voting for them? Cuz I gotta say, $200 million funneled off to their cronies was plenty enough for most of us in the rest of the country. Are you guys crazy, or what?

BooPear,

"[H]ow sleazy do the Liberals have to be before you'll stop voting for them?"

That's an interesting question. In a legitimate political system, criminal investigations would have occured and charges brought against those Liberal politicians and their cronies who stole tax money. Paul Martin and the other Liberal thieves would be on trial for fraud instead of governing. Since I'm not sure how idiotic one has to be to vote for a party that openly stole $200 million from the electorate, I can't answer your question.

Perhaps the answer lies in something like political "battered wife syndrome", where an abused spouse (the Canadian electorate) keeps coming back to the abuser (the Liberals) even though they know it's bad. It's a sickness.

Me, I just hug my 1972 Summit Series DVD, rock back and forth and mutter "Krusty is coming. Krusty is coming."

The numbers BooPear reports are correct, as far as I know, except for one thing - one independent was elected, too. If that person lines up with the Liberals and the NDP, they'll have 155 seats, which becomes 154 when they choose a Speaker of the House. The Conservatives and the Bloc together have 153.

I would guess about 12 to 18 months, too, for the life of this government. And BooPear, why Ontario voted Liberal (don't blame me - I didn't) I have no idea, unless it was because of the 24/7 thrashing the CBC, the Globe & Mail, and the Star gave the Conservatives throughout. But what is more important now is, how will the Conservatives respond? If they show some maturity, act like a government in waiting, they'll get their shot next time. If they start stabbing each other in the back and bitching about who did what to whom and whose fault it all is, they'll be sent back to kindergarten next election.

For the country's sake, I sure hope the Conservative caucus chooses to be mature in the next 12-18 months.

Damian Penny at Daimnation! notes that the Independent is Chuck Cadman, who is essentially a Conservative. Also, the recounts could shake up the totals...so we may have to wait and see how it all washes out.

In other news, the infamous Robert McClelland won Colby Cosh's pool for most accurate pre-election prediction of the result. Words fail me.

http://www.damianpenny.com/archived/002872.html

The only really good news out of this election is that these days the Conservatives really are conservatives. Their leader (Harper,from Alberta) is a 45-year old economist with significant training in the Austrian school of economics (basically libertarian approach, see Hayek, Rothbard, Mises and others).

In that respect it mirrors somewhat the changes in composition of the US Senate over the last 16 years or so. In 1988 there were only about 40 Republican Senators, and fully 15 of them were RINOs (republican in name only). Republicans now hold 52 seats in the Senate, but more importantly only four (maybe 5) of them are RINOs (Collins and Snow from Maine, Chafee from Rhode Island, and Specter from Pennsylvania, give or take John McCain). So in 16 years the 'real' Republicans have gone from 25 Senators to 47 or 48.

That's significant. So is the Conservative performance in Canada when you realise that in 1993 they were reduced to /two/ seats in Parliament, both of them Progressive conservatives. That, however, is about all the good news there is to find in that election.

The Liberal government has been (and remains) phenomenally corrupt. Canadians /know/ this, but especially outside the West were enticed to vote their FEAR ahead of their ANGER. Canadians in general, particularly Ontario and eastwards /like/ government, the more the better. They want it familiar and smooth, even if it is corrupt and self-serving. Canadians from Winnipeg east have proven once again that they fear change and they fear competition.

Canadians east of Winnipeg especially fear changes that might require them to become more competitive. The Liberals were able to convince voters that the Tories would reduce government programs that make it far easier for Canadians to avoid the consequences of non-competitiveness. For example, the economy in the Atlantic provinces has been unproductive and nearly useless for two generations. Alberta, British Columbia and Ontario are taxed more heavily and the money sent to Atlantic Canada for numerous subsidies, welfare programs, useless government make-work jobs, and the like. Ontario is then bought off with its own bunch of programs so it doesn't complain about the "equalization payments" headed east. Don't worry, be happy.

If you have read any of Michael Barone's work on "Hard America, Soft America" you will understand that nearly all of Canada is 'soft' and likes it that way ('soft' meaning that you rarely have to experience consequences for your choices, actions, or lack of effort -- the best American example being academia).

In essence, the Liberal Party of Canada has become indistinguishable from the massive Canadian bureaucracy. Parliament has been reduced to a largely theatrical role, except for the formality of choosing the government executive team (Prime Minister and Cabinet). Once chosen, the government governs primarily through the bureaucracy and the courts, both of which it controls. Corruption is a natural result. The bureaucracy has become vast, unaccountable, self-absorbed, and arrogant. As long as the programs keep coming, most Canadians (outside the west) don't care.

Most interestingly, foreign affairs were not even discussed in this election, except for the Liberals saying that the Conservatives would suck up to the hated George Bush and catch his dangerous ideas about things like welfare reform, abortion, homosexuality, and economic competition. What this says to me is that Canada has become completely irrelevant on the world stage. The UN has replaced Britain as the imperial power and Canada goes along with whatever France wants at the UN. The current Prime Minister, Paul Martin, is yet another in the virtually constant stream of PMs from Quebec for the last 40 years.

As Ottawa Citizen columnist David Warren pointed out, Canadians have decided that if they hide their head in the sand, no one can see them. The more effort the US puts into its own security--and the /less/ Canada does in this regard--the more attractive Canada becomes for a symbolic blow against the West. Can't get at Australia? Bomb Bali.

Back to the minority government. The NDP will no doubt exact a steep price for supporting the Liberals. The last Liberal-NDP government (1972-74) nationalised much of Canada's energy industry; spearheaded the destruction of Canada's military strength; instituted controls on the content of Canadian radio, TV, and film; brought in numerous mandatory "supply management" programs in agriculture and the steel industry; and set up unemployment insurance so that a person who worked only 8 weeks a year could get unemployment insurance (at 75%?) for the rest of the year.

Expect more of the same. Canadians (again, east of Winnipeg) voted to turn back the calendar. Rather pitiable, actually, but it could happen here in the States too in November. Kerry's campaign theme is "Let America be America again" -- loosely translated, Mommy, make it go away!

I wonder what it will take before people are finally and overwhelmingly forced to confront the uncomfortable reality that the world to the naive, soft world of the 1990s.

Weird stutter-step ...

I wonder what it will take before people are finally and overwhelmingly forced to confront the uncomfortable reality that we cannot return to the naive, soft world of the 1990s.

Patrick --

I hope they do show that maturity. I suspect Stephen Harper is a lot less tolerant of big mouths shooting the Party in the foot than Preston Manning was in the Reform days (we'll ignore the largely Stockwell Day – engineered train wreck of the Canadian Alliance).

I see it going two ways -- either the Liberals somehow convince the East (I'm afraid the West is lost to them for some time to come yet) that they are fit to govern, in which case they storm back with a large majority after the govt. falls, or the drip, drip, drip of sponsorship investigation revelations, coupled with a decent showing from Stephen Harper, lets the Conservatives eke out a small majority.

Cadman is very much a one issue (crime) candidate -- one of the reasons he lost the Conservative nomination in his riding. My sense is he'll support any legislation that meets his agenda, but otherwise his vote is up for grabs. I wouldn't be surprised if he's a wee bit bitter about the whole nomination thing, so assuming he'll generally go with the Conservatives is not a safe bet IMHO.

Also, thanks for pointing out the whole Speaker situation -- I'd forgotten that. Makes the whole majority-math-equation question even more interesting. I'll be watching the outcome of that VERY carefully.

Finally, I'm not looking for the Conservatives and the BQ to team up on anything but issues of convenience. Harper wants to woo Quebec federalists, not separatists. Beyond issues relating to federalism / state vs. provincial powers, the Bloc shares a lot more ideology in common with the NDP than anyone else.

Bart -- all you say is too true, I'm afraid -- excepting Alberta (and a few other places here and there, too). In Calgary you can actually tell people you're voting Conservative and no one looks at you funny at all. It’s kind of nice.

Bart Hall: "The UN has replaced Britain as the imperial power and Canada goes along with whatever France wants at the UN."

(nods) This applies to New Zealand too. It's why the "Anglosphere" doesn't work as advertised, and will never work as advertised.

Perhaps Canada is paralyzed by its bi-national structure? Would it be less corrupt or more representative if Quebec became independent?

Also I heard that the Conservatives lost their nerve and were unwilling to advocate allowing private citizens to purchase health care. Any truth to that?

BooPear - I agree with your point about Harper and the Bloc. Andrew Coyne had an interesting column about Harper in the NatPost last week, and he made this point. He said that Mulroney's critical error was to ally the Conservatives with the Quebec nationalists, an alliance that had no natural basis and had to fall apart. He said, too, that Harper knows this and plans to reach out to Quebec federalists instead.

For non-Canadian readers, the nationalist - federalist distinction in Quebec is between those who want to have Quebec separate from Canada and be an independent country (nationalists) and those who want Quebec to stay in Canada with some modifications to the relationship with the rest of Canada such as fewer government programs run from Ottawa and more run from Quebec City (federalists). Both groups want more Quebec-based management but they differ on whether this should involve an outright break or an evolution.

Bart - pretty good analysis from south of the border. I haven't met many Americans who pay that much attention to Canada :-)

To the Canadians who are posting, I want to ask how easy it would be, if a Prime Minister or a Cabinet doesn't work out, to either turn them out or get new elections? I gather that a past government under Joe Clark lasted only a short time.

I gather it's different in the US -- where legislators and the executive are not only separate but get to serve a fixed term -- from a country with a parliamentary system. Any insights here? I'm curious.

Well... if you have a majority government (that is, one party or a coalition of parties win more than 50% of the seats in the House of Commons) it's not easy at all. That Party will govern for a maximum of five years, after which they must call an election. Within that five years, however, they are free to call an election anytime they want.

As our last government proved, as long as you have a majority you can pretty much do what you want. Occaissionally a scandal comes along and you might see a cabinet minister lose his job (i.e., be fired by the Prime Minister) as a result of opposition / public / media pressure, but this is far from an everyday occurance.

Joe Clark's government fell because they had a minority in the House of Commons, and no coalition partners willing to make them a majority. When they failed to win a majority of votes for their budget, this was considered a vote of non-confidence and they were obliged to call an election.

Two interesting points: 1) The only votes which HAVE to be confidence votes are confidence votes themselves. It is only by tradition that certain other types of votes, like those on budgets, have become confidence motions. The Prime Minister could, if so inclined, simply read a statement into Parliament such that henceforth only actual confidence votes would count as such. Wouldn't even need to pass a law.

2) I once took a meeting with one of Joe Clark's cabinet ministers. He told me that Mr. Clark could have got the votes he needed to win that day, but that he WANTED to lose because he figured he'd win the resulting election (which he did not).

Corrupt Canadian Elections (Vote Fixing)

..............................................Let it be known to all........................................................
I wrote this document entitled “Remedy for our stolen democracy” In hopes that you’ll realize that this is information which all Free Canadians need to know, to insure the protection of our democracy. This statement has previously been released to all members of our Parliament. This has been read by many people on-line at the Internet's World Wide Web, at public forums, on line news medias…and more.

.........................................Remedy for Our Stolen Democracy....................................................

Dear Citizens: Please read this. (Revised after June 30 2002)
We in Canada have a very serious problem with corruption in our voting process. It has been going on since approximately 1969.(since the use of computers) I witnessed this as a result of working on a federal election campaign.
We have a very old voting system that is extremely flawed. First, it has to be understood how a voting station (polling station) works.
Polling stations are manned by public volunteers from all represented parties. All activities and ballot counting is witnessed by them in the polling stations. When the polling station closes, the witnesses manually count all ballots for each riding. Then the results are reported by telephone to the Solicitor Generals office in Ottawa (and local campaign headquarters). At which time the solicitor general can enter any vote results he or she feels like entering, as there are no witnesses present for this process.
In Canada, there is no way to verify those results. As all ballots are blank. The ballots are useless once the witnesses leave the polling stations. There is no way to verify the accuracy of the information that the solicitor enters in the computer bank. We have no safe guards against the corruption of vote results. Most corruption will occur in highly populated areas. Since these activities will likely not be noticed. Another thing to realize is that while the votes are being counted, no one knows what the vote count results are at the other polling stations in the riding, and in this way if the results reported on the television are wrong. None of the witnesses well be aware of it.. Realize that each riding has many polling stations. So none of the witnesses really knows what the total vote count is for the riding.. This makes it very easy to corrupt the vote count. Only the campaign headquarters knows the vote tally. And as I discovered when the fraud happens there is no remedy for it. Who would believe it.
It is to be understood that if even the smallest possibility for vote corruption exists. Then all possible safe guards should be put in place for the witnesses to eliminate it.
I suggest that we put into place a system where all ballots have a unique UPC bar code on the backside. Then each polling station would be allotted a predetermined number of ballots. The location of each and every ballot would be accounted for, through the whole voting process. The ballots would randomly and anonymously be given out to voters at each polling station. At the end of the day the used and unused ballots could be counted manually as well as with a computerized counting machine (Scanned with computer).
All activities need to be monitored by the volunteer (public) witnesses. The ballots will still need to be counted manually. In this way, all ballots will be accounted for in the whole country.
To further safe guard. Each and every volunteer will be given a printed signed copy of the results, to keep, before they leave the polling station. So that results can be collaborated in the future by the volunteers at an on line site or manually through public records. There should also be any other security safe guards put in place to ensure that the possibility for corruption never exists again.
Note; The chief reporting electoral officer should have no authority to do any certifying of vote results without public witnesses from the represented parties being present to witness all his certification activities…
Our votes need to be protected. Our democracy starts at the polling stations on the day we vote. Lets make sure it does not stop there!.
I AM A PROUD AND FREE CANADIAN…
Sincerely, Mr. Daniel J Towsey
danieltowsey@hotmail.com

All truth passes through three stages

First it is ridiculed

Second it is violently opposed

Third it is accepted as self evident

Arthur Schopenhauer, Philosopher
1788-1860