Thoughts heading into the weekend before the election:
- Polls showing a Liberal surge are going to help Trudeau, as anti-Harper voters get off the fence and hop on the bandwagon of the party they perceive as most likely to beat the Tories.
- Having said that, recent polls don’t reflect the Dan Gagnier resignation over the Energy East affair. It remains to be seen whether this will put a damper on the Liberals’ results on Monday.
- Meanwhile, Mulcair continues to take a beating in the Quebec press on the niqab issue. The NDP can expect to lose seats in Quebec on Monday, and hasn’t really shown a strong gain elsewhere in the country.
- The Bloc may pick up a few more seats, but probably not enough to buoy it out of irrelevance.
- Elizabeth May will probably win her seat, and no others.
- The Liberal vote is more inefficient than the Tory vote based on riding distribution, and thanks to recent gerrymandering.
- We also probably haven’t seen the last of the Tories’ dirty tricks, as it’s likely they’re holding onto some cards to try to sway results on Monday.
Realistic prediction: Liberals will win the popular vote, but Tories will win a narrow minority government. The government will be highly unstable with no opposition parties willing to prop it up but nobody wanting another election anytime soon. Chaos will ensue.
Hopeful prediction: Liberal government, with strong NDP representation to hold the balance of power and force an informal coalition.