David Raymond Amos Its gonna be quite a circus and I am happy to play a part in it again
John Smih
Reply to @David Raymond Amos: r u running
David Raymond Amos
Reply to @john smith: YUP for the 7th time
Derrick
Cameron What if JT comes to Atlantic Canada and nobody shows up?Don't be surprised. We have seen enough of him already.
John Smith
Reply to @Derrick
Cameron: he got booed out of fredericton and had to run to moncton he
cut off and held up a funeral then one of his cars hit a lady in an
intersection and tried to blame her
Derrick
Cameron
Reply to @john smith: Wow! I was born in Fredericton. We're a tough lot!
Dory Crate
Reply to @john smith: of course he would he always puts the blame on someone else
David Raymond Amos
Reply to @Derrick
Cameron: I went to High School in Fredericton in the sixties after
moving up from Dorchester NB I know for a fact that the last thing those
snobs in Fat Fred City are is tough. Everybody knows I ran in
Fredericton against Andy Scott for his seat in the 39th Parliament and
was barred from every debate but one because my political foes were too
chicken to debate me N'esy Pas?
David Raymond Amos
Reply to @john smith: Too Too Funny
Jaymie Pastoor He will fall flat everywhere, hes a joke
Donald Gallant
Reply to @Jaymie Pastoor:
Have you checked the polls !
Owen Adams
Reply to @Donald Gallant: which polls, conducted by who ? If you believe the polls you'er likely stupid enough to vote liberal
Barry Odonnell
Reply to @Donald Gallant: Hilary Clinton checked the polls. How did that work out for her?
David Raymond Amos
Reply to @Barry Odonnell: Oh So True
David Raymond Amos
Reply to @Jaymie Pastoor: Methinks it would not be wise to bet the farm on your opinion N'esy Pas?
Jim Cyr Of course the Liberals will not “fall flat”......Just look at Justin’s last name. And he is handsome.
So Maritimers will vote for him in droves.
Sad. But true.
David Raymond Amos
Reply to @Jim Cyr: Dream on
Donald
Smith The
majority of Atlantic Canadians don't care about the 2 Canadians being
held prisoner in China. This existing Government doesn't have the goods
or know how to deal with China. Justin and the Javelin Affair [ lol ]
who can forget that one, Atlantic Canadian's will. Dominic Leblanc will
watch as New Brunswick voters put him back in even after having said,
he's got to go. [ lol ] Wait and see.
David Raymond Amos
Reply to @Donald
Smith: Methinks the SANB has made Dominic Leblanc's riding the safest
Liberal seat in Canada even since Trudeau the Elder became Prime
Minister Many folks remember when Chretien came down here to run in a
by-election in order to take on Mulroney and Boyz in Blue and wipe the
floor with them in 1993 N'esy Pas?
Owen Adams My
hope is that Atlantic Canadians wake up to the corruption of the
liberal "government" and vote these zealots out. We could start with not
watching/listening to trudeaus bought off "trusted media",like CBC.
David Raymond Amos
Reply to @owen adams: Methinks the Conservatives are no better and the CBC will certainly follow their orders too N'esy Pas?
James Risdon
Maybe
the CBC reporters should take a look at the map. There are four
provinces in Atlantic Canada, not just Nova Scotia. And there are more
cities than just Halifax.
Greg Howard
Reply to @James Risdon: Paul is not noted for his accurate reporting!
James Risdon
Reply to @greg
howard: I've never personally met the man. So, I can't really say. But I
do find it pretty myopic to write a story about Atlantic Canada and
focus 95 per cent of the reporting on Nova Scotia, including about 60
per cent of it on Halifax. Entire provinces were ignored in this news
report.
David Raymond Amos
Reply to @greg
howard: True Methinks Fundy Royal is gonna be a hoot to watch Hell even
the Rhino Party is running against us N'esy Pas?
Barry Odonnell Not
sure why Trudeau does not just buy short sleeve dress shirts with the
top button missing. He is always shown with his sleeves rolled up and
his tie undone. Obviously part of the image his pal Gerry Butts wants
him to portray
David Raymond Amos Reply to @Barry Odonnell: Gerry is the boss
Hugh MacDonald That
7.0 reading on the Richter Scale on election night won't be an
earthquake in Atlantic Canada. It will be the Liberals falling flat on
their faces.
David Raymond Amos Reply
to @Hugh MacDonald: Methinks many agree that the liberals will lose
about have the seats including the riding I am running in again which is
a bit of a nobrainer N'esy Pas?
Brian Robertson Why should Atlantic Canada be any different from the rest of the Country.
Anyone not embarrassed over the last four years at the antics,
immaturity and lack of ethics of this sorry excuse for a Prime Minister
simply couldn't have any self respect.
David Raymond Amos Reply
to @Brian Robertson: Methinks to be fair as an Independent candidate I
should ask what should the members of peoplekind who support Harper 2.0
think of themselves N'esy Pas???
Brian
Robertson Reply
to @David Raymond Amos: What we think of ourselves is hardly relevent
when selecting another person as a leader or a Party to form a
government.
I find your question disturbingly non sequiter.
David Raymond Amos
Reply to @Brian
Robertson: Veritas Vincit However methinks you forgot to ask me if I
cared about your knowledge of latin N'esy Pas?
Al
Anderson From
St. John's to Tofino to Tuktoyaktuk..Canadians don't like Justin
Trudeau, they want him gone...They will lose half of their seats in a
few weeks...
David Raymond Amos
Reply to @Al
Anderson: Methinks many expect to see Trudeau The Younger lose the wind
in his sails but he will still retain a minority mandate without without
the Maritimes on his side because Ontario will decide who is the next
PM and Doug Ford ain't helping Harper 2.0 find a sunny day N'esy Pas?
Mark Smith Goes
to show that atlantic canada voted with a knee jerk reaction in the
name of getting Harper out. In the end they didnt get the leader/result
they were hoping for. Remember your mistakes of the past and dont get
fooled again.
David Raymond Amos Reply
to @Mark Smith: Methinks we did our part to get rid of harper and
Harper 2.0 is a self admitted bird of the same feather Hence many seats
will remain liberal N'esy Pas?
Will team Trudeau fall flat in Atlantic Canada?
Liberals entering election holding all 32 seats in the region
Prime
Minister Justin Trudeau is shown with three Nova Scotia MPs, including
West Nova MP Colin Fraser (left), Halifax MP Andy Fillmore and South
Shore-St. Margaret's MP Bernadette Jordan. (Andrew Vaughan/The Canadian Press)
The last time a federal Liberal
government went into an election holding every seat in Nova Scotia, it
didn't turn out so good — at least not for them.
In a stinging rebuke, all 11 Liberals were defeated in 1997.
Mary Clancy was one of them.
"When
the writ was dropped in '97, I knew I was dead in the water," recalls
Clancy, a two-term Liberal MP who represented Halifax.
Her share
of the vote plunged from 45 per cent in the sweep year of 1993 to 21
per cent in 1997, when the Grits were wiped out in Nova Scotia.
Mary Clancy won the Halifax seat for the Liberal party in 1988 and again in 1993, but was defeated in the 1997 election. (CBC)
On election night, she took some comfort from an uncle.
"He looked at me and he said, 'Well you can't take this personally, as the whole province went down to defeat.'"
Could it happen again to team Trudeau?
Gravity calls
Twenty-two
years later, there are some very important differences in the political
landscape and one brutal similarity: there's nowhere to go but down.
And not just in Nova Scotia.
The Liberals enter the election holding all 32 seats in Atlantic Canada.
They've
rebounded in public opinion polls from earlier this year, but a seat
projection model used by Halifax-based Narrative Research suggests
Liberals could lose as many as 40 per cent of their seats in Atlantic
Canada in 2019, mostly in New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island.
"I
would certainly say that it looks as though the Liberals could continue
to hold the majority of the seats in the region, but certainly not all
of them as they did in the past," said Narrative Research CEO Margaret
Brigley.
Incumbent MPs defeated
The Liberals also
had a huge lead into the 1997 election, having won 31 of 32 Atlantic
seats in the 1993 election under the leadership of Jean Chretien.
Four years later, they fell flat everywhere in the region except P.E.I., where they held onto all four seats.
The
Liberals lost three of the seven ridings in Newfoundland and Labrador,
and six of the nine seats they held in New Brunswick, where the NDP won
two seats for the first time ever.
Elsie Wayne, the lone Progressive Conservative survivor from the 1993 election, was joined by four other Tories.
But
it was worse in Nova Scotia, where every Liberal — each an incumbent
MP — was defeated. The red team was replaced by six New Democrats and
five Progressive Conservatives.
That election launched the
federal careers of New Democrat leader Alexa McDonough and Peter MacKay
and Scott Brison, who both went to Ottawa as rookie Progressive
Conservative MPs. Brison would later cross the floor to join the
Liberals.
Mad at one, mad at all
Clancy and the other
bluenose Liberals were the first to feel the wrath of voters spoiling
for a chance to punish the deeply unpopular provincial Liberal
government of the late premier John Savage, who resigned one month
before the federal election call.
"People don't particularly
differentiate. If they're mad at the Liberals they are mad at all
Liberals. Mad with the Tories, mad at all the Tories," said Clancy.
"Premier
Savage, who is a man I absolutely adored and have the greatest of
respect for, was not the most beloved premier at the time."
Canada's
least popular premier today is Liberal Stephen McNeil of Nova
Scotia, according to pollster Angus Reid. In June, it said McNeil had an
approval rating of just 16 per cent.
Liberal
Premier Stephen McNeil of Nova Scotia is the longest-serving premier in
Canada, but polls suggest his popularity is waning. (Craig Paisley/CBC)
"I
will go out and do some work for some of the MPs who want me to," said
McNeil, who is also the longest-serving premier in Canada, when asked
this week if he will help out in the upcoming campaign.
"I haven't been directly asked."
Why 2019 is different
But here is where differences emerge.
Whatever
dissatisfaction there is with the McNeil government, the Liberal brand
has been holding in Nova Scotia. It's even on an uptick, according to
Brigley.
"We certainly don't see the provincial Liberal Party in the same dire straits as was the case back in 1997," said Brigley.
More importantly, Liberals this time are not carrying the dead weight of huge federal spending cuts in the region.
Prime Minister Jean Chretien waves to the crowd from his limousine following Canada Day ceremonies in Ottawa in 1996. (Tom Hanson/Canadian Press)
Changes
enacted by the Chretien government in 1996 helped balance the books but
made it harder for seasonal workers to qualify for employment
insurance.
Anger over EI is largely credited in the defeat of
two of the Chretien government's most powerful ministers: Doug Young in
New Brunswick and Dave Dingwall in Nova Scotia.
Less baggage
In
Nova Scotia, the spending cuts also closed or downsized military bases
and reduced federal spending on health care and education.
Health and education are both delivered by the provinces — a factor in Savage's woes.
One of his cabinet ministers publicly called out the 11 Liberal MPs at the time, accusing them of not protecting Nova Scotia.
"I haven't seen the federal MPs defending these programs," John MacEachern complained at Province House in Halifax.
Clancy denies that charge.
"I
was nine years in Parliament and I spent at least part of every day
that I was there trying to explain to Ontario ministers and Western
ministers why EI was not a welfare program, that if you live in
Cumberland County in Nova Scotia or rural Nova Scotia anywhere for three
months of the year when you're knee-deep in snow, there's no work," she
said.
Brigley said in 2019, the Liberals are not carrying the same baggage.
"The
reason for that is really the sense that Justin Trudeau's Liberals, his
Liberal team, they haven't enacted a serious policy initiative like EI
reform that has angered voters to the same extent," she said.
The exception might be carbon pricing in New Brunswick.
Greens are on the menu
Another
difference is the rise of the Green Party, which supplanted the NDP as
the third party in the Maritimes, according to Narrative Research
polling this summer.
With the New Democrats weakened and the
Greens new and untested, Liberals hope cautious voters could stick with
them, even if they are not satisfied with Trudeau.
"I would say
that the Liberals are not likely to be entirely wiped out in the
province [Nova Scotia] this time around, partly because, unlike in 1997,
the left of centre voters, they really need somewhere to park their
votes," said Brigley.
Even in a wipeout like 1997, the Liberals were not entirely out of it.
In Nova Scotia, they took 28 per cent of the vote, just behind the New Democrats and PC's at 30 per cent, who won all the seats.
A
Conservative sweep on the other hand would require breaking through the
party's ceiling in the region, which Brigley said has not exceeded 45
per cent federally.
"So the question here would be who does the
Conservative party have as leader in place to really change something
that has polled Liberal historically," she said.
Ripple effect of Brison resignation
And
then there is Scott Brison's resignation, an unforeseen event which has
already reverberated inside and outside of Nova Scotia this year.
Trudeau
adviser Gerald Butts told a parliamentary committee earlier in the year
that Brison's resignation was a complete surprise.
Scott Brison resigned from cabinet in January and stepped down as MP the following month. (Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press)
The
Prime Minister's Office tried to talk Brison out of quitting, fearing
its impact on longtime Nova Scotia Liberal MPs, who were passed over in
the cabinet shuffle it triggered. Those fears seem justified.
MPs Rodger Cuzner and Mark Eyking subsequently announced they were quitting.
They
joined Brison, rookie Colin Fraser from West Nova and veteran Bill
Casey from Cumberland-Colchester as incumbents not reoffering.
"In
short, in the span of a few months, we would go from holding all 11
seats in Nova Scotia with strong incumbents to having five of them open
in the next election," Butts told the committee.
Butts also
claimed Brison's departure led to the decision to move Jody
Wilson-Raybould out of the Justice portfolio, where she was resisting
efforts to intervene in a prosecution of Quebec engineering firm SNC
Lavalin.
Whatever the merits of that claim, the departure of the
incumbents in ridings that were traditional strong Conservative
strongholds is cause for concern for Liberals in 2019.
Butts
specifically identified Brison's Kings-Hants and Cumberland-Colchester,
where Casey was first elected as a Progressive Conservative in 1988.
Corrections
We
initially reported that Bernadette Jordan, the Liberal candidate for
South Shore-St. Margarets, was not reoffering in the 2019 election. She
is, in fact running in that riding in this election.
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