Ontario 2018 election

[adma]

I mean no offense by this but some of you should consider restraining yourselves from posting ill-advised hot takes. The PC's are polling 5-7% higher than their 2014 result at the provincial level. The NDP are polling nearly 20% higher than their 2014 result at the provinicial level. If you're questioning the NDP's ability to hold onto Parkdale or Trinity-Spadina, you're questioning whether they'll crack 30%. If you think that the PC's could surge in both ridings, you're wondering whether the PC's will come close to 45%. This is wildly inconsistent with polling.

One thing you have to realize, though: just because we're commenting on PC sign presence doesn't mean we're predicting they'll win.  Just that they'll outperform expectations.

And really: when you're a hardcore psephologist like many of us are, even the "losing" numbers in each riding and polling station are meaningful, whether as barometers or cultural/social indicators or guidelines for future campaigns, etc.  So it's a little more "involved", and subtle, than a matter of "ill-advised hot takes".

[adma]

I agree that results are meaningful but I don't think that counting yard signs and overreacting to these yard sign counts is a wise choice, even if it's amusing. I think information can be obtained from yard signs, particularly in Canada, but I think you have to know what to look for.

Actually, many of us *do* know what to look for, i.e. which campaigns have their act together, what the public mood is, where the bigger momentum's headed, etc.  (And even, as has often been noted in this election, the relative *absence* of lawn signs compared to past campaigns can be meaningful.)  And if the final e-day count differs from what these signs are telling, well, that carries its lessons, too.

In the case of Parkdale-High Park, the explosion of PC signs compared to the last election *is* noteworthy, and taking note *isn't* "overreaction", unless you feel that dwelling upon parties/candidates that aren't likely to win is a waste of time.  (Heck, go back to the 1995 Common Sense Revolution election, and even I was taking note of how much surprising lawn signage for the Tories there was in Parkdale--yes, it was "only" good for 16%; but given how that was triple the 1990 share, it wasn't a waste of time to note that "presence".)

In going from an electoral Point A to point B, some of us prefer the scenic routes to the Interstates.  So there.

[adma]

Question for everyone. IF the province wide popular vote is tied between the PCs And NDP (or at least very close) and IF the PCs are winning their traditional rural seats by huge margins and IF the PCs are also winning almost every seat in 905 by double digit margins and sometime high double digit margins....where is the NDP piling up so many votes to make the province wide popular vote so close? I know the ndp is strong in some urban seats but they don’t seem to be winning those seats by the huge margins the PCs are winning by in their strongholds

 By the Mainstreety sounds of things, maybe the "huge margins" for the PCs *aren't* in their rural strongholds.  That is, if we consider that the York Region riding which is *both* most geographically peripheral *and* has the longest continuous PC history, York-Simcoe, might be poised to be, well, its closest thing to a PC-NDP race this time around.  (And hey, why not.  It's the only part which saw the NDP elected under Rae in 1990; there's long been a strong white-trash-populist element around Lake Simcoe which explains the same; and don't discount some backlash against the PC candidate, a parachute and the daughter of you-know-who...)

[adma]

At least in 1990 there was an argument to be made that the Liberals were the party best positioned to "stop the NDP."

But it makes no sense whatsoever in today's context - because almost nobody will be voting Liberal to "stop the NDP."  Things must have sunk really low when they're trying to save St. Paul's from going NDP or something.

Ottawa Centre, most likely.

[adma]

This allows them to vote their preference in ridings where Liberals were strong. Contrary to others, I actually think it will strengthen the Liberal vote in places like Ottawa Centre, Spadina Ft. York, Willowdale, Eglinton Lawrence and even places like Beaches East York. Will it be enough? Who knows.

But strong relative to *whom*?  In only two of those seats are the Tories historically the primary opposition.

Actually, I think the prime seat Wynne has in mind is her own--it's just her luck that she represents the ultimate "strategic left = Liberal" riding...

[adma]

Back in the 1972 BC elxn, then BC NDP leader Dave Barrett ran on this strategy - he basically conceded WAC Bennett would win & ran on electing a "strong opposition". Guess what? Barrett won.

So did Bob Rae relative to David Peterson in Ontario in 1990.

[adma]

In all this talk about Toronto vs Vancouver; maybe a more pertinent point re NDP strength vs weakness might be Ottawa vs Victoria.  (Though of course, one might counter that with SW Ontario vs the BC Interior.)

Where might Hamilton stand re such equivalencies?

[adma]

If you are leading your party to an historic defeat, I'd lost say it's almost better to lose your seat.

Privately, yes.  Publicly, better to keep up appearances for the sake of all involved.

[adma]

This allows them to vote their preference in ridings where Liberals were strong. Contrary to others, I actually think it will strengthen the Liberal vote in places like Ottawa Centre, Spadina Ft. York, Willowdale, Eglinton Lawrence and even places like Beaches East York. Will it be enough? Who knows.

But strong relative to *whom*?  In only two of those seats are the Tories historically the primary opposition.

Actually, I think the prime seat Wynne has in mind is her own--it's just her luck that she represents the ultimate "strategic left = Liberal" riding...

Let me be clear - Wynne is not doing this to help the "progressive vote" or the NDP - she is doing this to help the Liberal Party (as she should). And the Liberals have a better chance of keeping their previous margins if the voters believe that the party has already been punished. The fact that most of those seats are in areas where the main rivalry is with the NDP rather than the PC is just luck of the draw. And if some Liberals do vote for the NDP and help them beat PC in some seats, that still indirectly helps the Liberals as they will be the kingmaker in a minority situation.

As I said, this is a good move for OLP, but she should have done it a few days ago.

From the NDP point of view, this is still good as they may lose a few close seats to the Liberals, but with Liberal voter support, they will win a few against the PC and potentially get to a minority government position. As we discussed a couple of days ago, I do not see a path for an NDP majority, so this would be their best scenario.

I feel that in practice, you're reading too much "Simon Hughes" impulse into the electorate.

[adma]

Elliott may have won the Don Valley seats and Willowdale but they would have been at 4-5 seats.

Actually, on "Israel-Con" grounds (plus the fact of its being an open seat), I'd put York Centre ahead of either of those.  DVE and DVN as they presently stand are too "moderate" to be particularly singular; and Willowdale's increasingly defined by the moderating condo influence (and it was the closest to a Tory hold in the 416 in 2003 more because of David Young's personal popularity than anything).  Which leaves DVW; and it seems a little wild to imagine Premier Wynne as the *only* Lib in the 416 to fall to a Tory.  Oh, and if you're going to include all of those seats, might as well also toss in Eglinton-Lawrence (again, the Israel-Con thing; and it was their closest call in 2007) and Etobicoke Centre, too...

[adma]

Ugh. How many of those Liberal voters would've switched to the NDP had they not voted ahead of time? There was a lot of this in the 2011 federal election. Costed the NDP at least one seat in Quebec (Westmount) from what I recall.

One of the many reasons I would prefer people not vote ahead of time.

Though to be fair:  had the results shifted by a point and a half or so in three Toronto ridings in 2015, you could switch the party labels there.  (And advance polls made the difference in a number of Quebec NDP "saves" that year, too.)

[adma]

How acurate traditionally are these polls of early voting anyway?
Abacus seems to have the Liberals on average 3% higher then other pollsters so its  possible their advanced voting is overestimating the Liberals.

I also imagine as advanced voting is a small portion of the electorate and only a small portion of their sample claimed to have voted early those early voting numbers would come with a huge margin of error.

OTOH, there is a tradition of right-of-centre overperformance and NDP underperformance in advance polls.  When NDP overperforms, it's either when the demos most prone to advance voting tend leftward (as in many cultural-class urban ridings) or the campaign momentum shifts dramatically away t/w the end of the campaign (as in 2015 federally).

Though given "Ford populism", it could well be that the PCs are, well, underperforming their usual advance-poll overperformance.

Keep in mind that if it were all about the advance polls, 1990 would have seen something like a 3-way seat split.

[adma]

Ford is hardly a break for the PCs anyway - Harris led them into three elections and o/c won two. Not everything is about or like Trump...

I don't know about "hardly a break for the PCs"--there's a lot less grotesque pathology underlying Harris (or even Klein in Alberta) than there is underlying the Fords or Trump.

In fact, that's been the eternal insufferably-vocal-Ford-opposition myopia (whether municipal or provincial): when it recycles the same historical leftish tropes used against Harris, Harper, Klein, Dubyah, Thatcher, Reagan, Nixon, etc etc., with little or no regard for the possibility that Doug Ford, like Rob Ford before him, might actually be *worse*.  I mean, they *may* have a point; but more often than not, when "their" side wins, it's more *in spite of* them than anything.

Of course, the same goes for the other end of the spectrum.  If Ford wins, it'll be likewise *in spite of* his web-forum cheering squad chanting "MOGA!" and salivating at the prospect of the, uh, wicked sex ed indoctrination curriculum being abolished...

[adma]

True advanced polls are overused, but I find its mostly people who are diehard anyways and unlikely to change.  It's basically a way to ensure their vote is locked in case something comes up that prevents them from voting.  Also you need it as there are those with travel plans and its important those out of the province or country can vote too.

Though in these days of social media dominance, I find that advance polls have been *especially* overused in the name of being able to tweet or status-update: "I voted".  A sort of electoral ego-trip, as if voting in advance and posting about it were a declaration of *super*-commitment.

I'm old-fashioned.  Even if my electoral intent is set long beforehand, I'd rather vote with the herd on election day.  And, psephologically speaking: that way, my vote counts within my polling station, and on the polling map, rather than disappearing in the amorphous maw of "advance votes".  I'm contributing to the meaningful function of geographic polling data ;-)

[adma]

Burlington is interesting.  I guess not being very Fordian, having a bit of an urban core and closeness to Hamilton = some NDP potential?

Could be.  It's also worth noting that over the past quarter century, Burlington's had both an NDP Mayor and a Green Mayor.  And as I've said: were it not for the PCs' Cam Jackson's "non-Liberal" incumbent advantage, who knows how well the NDP might have done in Burlington in 1990 (they did get a quarter of the vote, anyway)

[adma]

OTOH, there is a tradition of right-of-centre overperformance and NDP underperformance in advance polls.  When NDP overperforms, it's either when the demos most prone to advance voting tend leftward (as in many cultural-class urban ridings) or the campaign momentum shifts dramatically away t/w the end of the campaign (as in 2015 federally).

Though given "Ford populism", it could well be that the PCs are, well, underperforming their usual advance-poll overperformance.

Keep in mind that if it were all about the advance polls, 1990 would have seen something like a 3-way seat split.

Do they skew elderly as e.g. postal votes do in most places?

They skew, I guess, "comfortably well off".  Which'd presumably include a good deal of the nest-egg elderly.

[adma]

"The NDP start day 27 of the campaign with an aggressive push through opposition territory. Horwath will make five stops on Monday in London North Centre (empty Liberal seat), Sarnia—Lambton (PC seat), Chatham-Kent—Leamington (PC seat), Elgin—Middlesex—London (PC seat), and Oxford (PC seat).

 NDP going all out trying to capitalize on Wynne's concession?

Other than LNC, I suspect the Libs are already polling in the basement in all of those seats, so there's little left to capitalize on.

[adma]

The NDP would win 95 other seats, before winning Oxford (or EML for that matter).  Horwath's campaign is probably just using her presence in SW to get some PR across the region.  It also doesn't hurt the NDP's credibility to be seen as interested in rural seats.  They won't win, but it is useful.

I agree with you.

Just talking about my riding, Woodstock is still quite conservative (I calculated the Woodstock #s earlier, it went 41-28 PC vs. NDP in 2014), and as long as that stays true, there's no path for anyone else to win Oxford. The rural areas can give the PCs over 60% in many cases too.

Ingersoll is the closest thing to an NDP stronghold (the NDP won there 39-33 over the PCs in 2014), but it's too small to make up for Woodstock at all.

Though in a funny way, I *do* find a left-field NDP gain in Oxford (or EML) more plausible than it looks--more so than in a lot of hitherto Liberal 905-belt ridings.  And I suspect that the Woodstock strain of PC support is more of a "parked" one and likelier to swing NDPward than that in rural Oxford County.  (Blame a lot of that on the growing sleeper factor of the auto economy.)

Maybe 85 or even 75 other seats, rather than 95?

[adma]

1. Inner TO ridings (Toronto Centre, University Rosedale, Spadina Ft. York) - there is no real reason for these to flip to the NDP.  The voters there are not necessarily unhappy with the Liberals, there is no PC threat at all, and the previous Liberal majorities were massive (in some cases 50%+).  I would expect the Liberals to hold at least two out of the three.

.

In fact, it is exactly ridings like these that have seen the biggest swings to the NDP.  

And if we must flip the argument around: a lot of prognosticators were making claims for the federal NDP in this territory in 2015 because the 2011 *NDP* margins were massive, in some cases 50%+, etc.  One never knows; Wynne as the new Mulcair, etc...

[adma]

I do think you're right about it being parked in a sense. A lot of people here vote PC because of Ernie Hardeman being very personally popular. I think it would be competitive in an open seat in this type of environment, but not now.

And besides the "parked PCs", also consider the matter of the 2014 *Liberal* vote: the same factors that put the Tories on top in Woodstock also gave the Libs results well above their riding average (particularly among the historic homes around Vansittart, where they won several polls)--I can definitely see them swinging NDP or at least finding Doug Ford too uncouth for consideration...

[adma]

At this point, and in a curious extension of how DoFo became PC leader, I'm wondering about the possibility of the pre-Renatagate advance polls "accidentally" handing the PCs a majority, while the e-day voters decide otherwise...

[adma]

Whether or not it goes that far, this rather reminds me of the last second 'revelations' about Jack Layton during the 2011 campaign. They brought the NDP momentum in that campaign to a screeching halt and, IMHO, ensured the Tories got a majority.

And also the Sudbury byelection, which might have gone the other way had it been a week later.

[adma]

Interestingly the old Beaches-Woodbine was a solid NDP riding since 1975, the north end, was Don Mills (East York plus but included areas now in Don Valley East and West) was more PC. Now, since about 2011 Beaches has trended OLP. in 2014 the NDP lost BEY because you can see a very noticeable N/S split; NDP winning the north, East York and the OLP winning the Beaches in the South. Still a bit swingy I feel, but there is a stronger OLP base then previously, due to just how expensive and NIMBY the area is here.

One factor explaining the N/S NDP "flip" through 2014: Michael Prue's home base was in the north, his having been the last mayor of East York and all, etc.

[adma]

Mostly EPP has a bias towards 'conservative' outcomes and the re-election of incumbents if there's any doubt. Sometimes this works out well (let's just say that a 91% success rate is rather better than you'd have got from almost any British political pundit last June), sometimes - as in the past two Canadian federal elections: getting roughly one in four seats wrong is a bit *ouch* - it's a bit of a fiasco. But always fascinating and I'm glad it's still going in this age of dreary DATA driven projections (which mostly are no better).

I've come to think of said "dreary DATA driven projections" as a little like the psephological equivalent of talking GPS: it may "get you there" (seemingly), but it's no match for well-tuned navigational skills--or what London taxi operators call "The Knowledge".  It's an easy crutch; that's it.

And when the CBC Poll Tracker tells us so-and-so and everybody sounds the "PC majority" note, it becomes a Voice From The Gods; much as with talking GPS, we don't *dare* defy what Siri's telling us to do.

I'm not saying a PC majority won't happen; but I'd rather be generous and open-ended rather than make too-firm predictions.  Much as there's many, many ways to get from Point A to Point B; and Siri can go shove it...

[adma]

One thing I don’t quite understand is, if the NDP vote is too inefficient, then where is it concentrated? Because isn’t Doug Ford supposed to be competitive in SW Ontario, where the NDP’s base traditionally is?

I know that their vote share will increase by a lot in a ton of safe PC seats, at the expense of the Liberals, but there seems to be relatively few NDP blowout seats (where they win by like an unnecessary 30 points or something), unlike with the PC’s. That doesn’t quite seem to add up, but maybe I’m just being dumb..

I'm supposing that the increased PC/NDP spread in these final polls will more "ergonomically" justify the seat spread.