checkyoulater's Journal: The new math in Ottawa?

For those who don't know, the Fiberals managed to win a minority in Monday's election. Let me first say that I am dissappointed with Ontario voters again, and for the life of me can't understand why people keep giving these liars chance after chance. However, this je isn't really about my dislike of the Liberals, as I could go on for days and days.

Most media sources are saying that the NDP hold the balance of power in the new house. The Liberals have 135 seats, the Conservatives 99, the Bloc Quebecois 54 and the commies (NDP) have 19. There is also 1 independent. To have a majority in the House of Commons, which is made up of 308 seats, you need 155 (which equals 50% +1 of the seats).

Maybe I just don't understand the math, but how can the NDP hold the balance of power if their seats combined with the Liberals only add up to 154 seats? As much as the Conservatives and the Bloc hate each other, they also both hate the Liberals. Neither can be guaranteed to vote along the the Liberals on most issues. I would almost think that that Independent has more power than all the NDP combined. If the Liberals and NDP all support a bill, but the other 2 parties do not, it will not pass. Unless the independent candidate supports it as well.

Prediction: An election is called within 18 months and the voters who I call sheep in Ontario will propel Martin to a rather large majority. We can then have 4 years of the same cronyism and corruption that Jean did Oh so well.

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[turg]

First, re: balance of power. They started saying this on election night when it looked like the NDP were going to have 24 seats. They (or at least my news sources) have since corrected themselves.

Second, re: Ontario voters. The problem is that they don't see an alternative. The success of the Alliance was pretty much entirely based on scoring points with the voters in the west at the expense of central and eastern Canada. That they would do as well as they have in Ontario in this election is absolutely ast

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[checkyoulater]

You are right, of course. About the sponsorship scandal. Without that, the liberals would have handily won another majority. The funny thing is that before the scandal, it wouldn't have surprised me at all. (Mind you, I wasn't exactly surprised this time either, despite what all the polls said)

I don't expect Paul Martin to cause any problems, and I actually believe he is the best of the 4 leaders to govern the country. However, my biggest problem has been and will always be the fact that Liberal govern

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[turg]

They did chicken out and vote Liberal. But they chickened out and voted Liberal instead of NDP, not instead of Conservative.

You will be happy to know that in my riding the Conservatives had their best showing ever. They got 14% of the vote. I don't think they've ever broken 10% before, even combining the Alliance and PC. And this was with the Conservatives doing basically no campaigning here -- I probably didn't see more than 10 signs for the coservatives but hundreds for the Libs, NDP, and Greens (probabl