Now that Stephen Harper has “called” a “long federal election” –  for October 19, as already prescribed in his own 2007 fixed election date legislation –  here are three quick notes to celebrate the start of the official campaign (as opposed to the unofficial one underway for almost too long already) : (1) Fixing elections? […]

Exactly one week ago I quoted the excellent Douglas Bell’s critical view of the 2011 Canadian federal election campaign: “my guess is that by the end of next week, the numbers will have changed dramatically.”Â  It is now clear that, for the most part, this guess has proved plain wrong. There are a few straws […]

Now that both the English and French TV leaders’ debates are over, some two and a half weeks remain in the 2011 Canadian federal election campaign. And according to Chantal Hébert in the Toronto Star: “Debates keep Harper on road to majority.” At the same time, a Postmedia News report in the Vancouver Sun offers […]

Almost exactly three years ago now, it was reported that: “Former RCMP commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli’s decision to name then-Liberal finance minister Ralph Goodale in a criminal investigation likely influenced the 2006 federal election, the chair of the RCMP public complaints commission says.” Mr. Zaccardelli’s action did seem to correlate remarkably closely with the ultimate shift […]

[UPDATED FEBRUARY 18, 20]. Those of us who have not been happy about Stephen Harper’s (technically minority) stewardship of the Canadian experiment over the past five years will not be happy about the three latest opinion polls on Canadian federal politics either. The Canada-wide results from EKOS, Ipsos Reid, and Harris Decima are (in that […]

Technically, a Canadian federal election on December 31, 2010 could still be called as late as November 26 – 11 days from now. (And as some will want to remember here, the Federal Court of Appeal has “ruled that the Bill C-16 fixed-election-date measures” which became law “in May 2007 … did not … change […]

On the Calgary Herald website there is a photograph of “Prime Minister Stephen Harper at a news conference in Calgary Sept. 1, 2009” – just after Michael Ignatieff announced “Liberals will vote against government.” And it is at least arguable that the prime minister looks a little like a cat who has just swallowed the […]