Angry in the Great White North

Sorry about the long stretch between postings, but things have been busy for me at work.

But in this case, I'm glad for the delay.  It prevented me from jumping the gun on analyzing the aftermath of the election showdown.  As you recall, Liberal Party leader Michael Ignatieff promised to bring down the government unless, among other things, the Employment Insurance system was dramatically reworked to set a new national standard threshold of 360 hours of work to be eligible for a year's worth of premium.

Indeed, Michael Ignatieff had been demanding this change for weeks.

And so the showdown happened, and faced with the government falling (assuming the NDP and the Bloc Quebecois joined the Liberals) and potentially losing an election, or saying "No" to Michael Ignatieff, Stephen Harper said "No".

And Michael Ignatieff beat a hasty retreat. 

To be fair, Michael Ignatieff wrang out a concession.  Instead of simply accepting Stephen Harper's plan to roll out an extension of the EI system to cover self-employed workers in the fall, as well as other tweaks, a blue ribbon panel was formed.

The panel would study EI, and then report back in the fall on how best to extend the EI system to cover self-employed workers in the fall, as well as recommend other tweaks.

So Michael Ignatieff got nothing.  The punditocracy laughed at him, and many Liberal apologists did not even bother trying to spin this. 

At the time I thought, as many, that the summer would see a major shift.  The resurging Liberals would stall and fall back.  They would be hurt by Michael Ignatieff's performance.  They would be hurt by the accumulating effect of the attack ads.  But mostly they would be hurt by a recovering economy.  The Conservatives would fan out across the country with stimulus checks, and that coupled with brighter economic news would work in favour of the Conservatives.

But then this is not a surprise.  Many people predicted this back in the early spring, long before this showdown began to even take shape, arguing that if the Liberals allowed the Conservatives to govern through the summer, these trends would mean the the Liberals would have squandered their best opportunity.

After a week of just reading the news (when I could), there seem to plenty of signs in polls that this is exactly what is happening.  The Conservatives are moving back up the polls.  Slowly, but a solid trend.  The first positive articles are appearing in local papers about infrastructure spending.  The backlash against the attack ads never materialized, and instead when people did voice an opinion with regards to the ads, it was to say the ads were having the intended effect.  Economic news is Canada continues to be positive, both from domestic and foreign analysts.

I didn't end up making a prediction, but if I had, it would have been right.  There seems to have been a window that has closed for the Liberals.

So I'm going to make a prediction now.  If by the fall the Conservatives have opened up a polling lead that is measurably outside the margin of error (not the case today), then we will witness the first leaks concerning serious discontent in some circles of the Liberal Party, aimed directly at Michael Ignatieff, and that these comments will echo the Conservative attack ads -- Michael Ignatieff doesn't understand Canadian politics, he spent too much time out of the country, he should have been forced to fight to become party leader instead of being handed the job like a visitor being given a gift.

I would not put money on this prediction.  But let's see what happens in September.