June 29, 2004

Liberals salvage the election

I don't think that many of us expected as strong a result as Paul Martin's Liberals received yesterday. The signs were there, though, he we not been taken in by the seat projections that the media were playing up over the weekend.

The Liberals success (if you can call being reduced to a minority "success") came in Ontario where, the last week saw a collapse of Conservative support. For the Tories, the difference between 30% and 35% support in that province is about 20 seats. Had they held their support at 34-35% in Ontario, the result would have been the hung parliament that many of us predicted.

What explains the Liberal rebound in Ontario? I think that a number of factors were at play:

  1. The visceral anger Ontarians felt over the provincial budget of Dalton McGuinty has dissipated;

  2. The negative ads succeeded in creating enough doubt in voters' minds that some changed their minds;

  3. The Conservatives' decision to talk about forming a majority government seemed arrogant;

  4. The comments of some Tory candidates reinforced the Liberal attacks; and

  5. The ill-advised media release suggesting that Mr. Martin supports child pornography cemented the Liberal attacks in the minds of voters.

In short, a combination of good political strategy from the Liberals and a badly timed series of errors from the Tories have returned Mr. Martin to the Prime Minister's Office.

Posted by maxthecat at June 29, 2004 12:51 AM

http://www.maxsmewsings.com/mt/archives/2004/06/liberals_salvage_the_election.php