Predictions Revisited

I'm just going for forget my disastrous June 27th predictions and focus on the pre-writ campaign. Since, I think a lot of people in the Conservative camp are losing focus here. I wrote a hockey and politics post a while back and concluded that, as go the Calgary Flames, so would go Stephen Harper and the Conservatives. Like the Flames, no one gave the Tories a chance of being in the show even 6 months ago. At the start of the playoffs (or the campaign), few thought they'd win the whole thing - maybe a round or two. But when the Flames blew a 3-2 lead the fans were still upset because they'd come so close to something they hadn't tasted in a long time. It's the same thing. At the start of the campaign, this would have been considered a strong showing. Back when the merger was announced, this would have been unbelievable. Remember the talk about getting Belinda as leader since this election was a lost cause? She could then get experience for 2008. Well, the Tories had a great result, but since they came so close, it still hurts. Sort of like blowing a 3-2 series lead, eh?

Anyways, here are my pre-election predictions:

Lib 123
Con 100
NDP 30
BQ 55

Pretty much bang on, except for the strategic NDP voting (in fact, these are almost a mirror of my little strategic voting experiment below)

I did regional breakdowns as follows:

Atlantic
Lib: 18
Con: 9
NDP: 5

I seriously underestimated the effects of "culture of defeat" here. I wish there were some more Atlantic Canada bloggers out there (anyone know of any?) because I'd like someone from the region to explain to me why these comments stick. Martin and McKenna have said similar things yet Harper is still vilified for some reason.


Quebec
Lib: 20
BQ: 55

Pretty much bang on here. Quebeckers always rally to the Liberals when they hit the voting booth.


Ontario
Lib: 68
Con: 30
NDP: 8

Once again, these are fairly close to the final results. Like Paul Wells said, the Ontario results are a near carbon copy of the provincial election. This in itself is surprising since the McGuinty ran a much smoother campaign than Eves and is a much better politician (but then, I like McGuinty. I'm sure some would disagree). On the other side, the Liberals had scandal and a weak campaign. And yet, they still matched the provincial results.


Man/Sask
Lib: 8
Con: 12
NDP: 8

OK. I did really bad here. I think the strategic voting played a big role in the Conservative romp here, but I think I just plainly called it wrong. I should have seen the Prairies staying Tory.


Alberta
Lib: 1
Con: 27

Pretty obvious. Although I have it on good authority that the top Martin organizer in Southern Alberta was predicting 9 Liberal seats in Alberta at the leadership convention. And Dave Brody apparently thought 5 seats for the Liberals was still feasible at the start of the campaign.


BC
Lib: 6
Con: 22
NDP: 8

Toss one Lib for Cadman and these are bang on. A lot of people think the Tories did poorly in BC but at the start of the campaign, Martin was expecting big things. Remember the "my time as Prime Minister will be a failure if I don't win BC" speeches?


So, what's the point of this? Not much really. I just wanted to bring back some predictions I did fairly well on after seeing myself near the bottom of James Bow's Election pool. And, you know, after calling the election two weeks ago.

I think it's also worth putting things into perspective. This wasn't the terrible loss for the Tories everyone is making it out to be. For their sake, they should hope Harper stays on.