I'm confused
Here's an article out today: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/story/2012/04/24/albertavotes2012-redford-plans.html
I believe this to be a rebuttal to Danielle Smith's election night speech. And yet, in my post yesterday, I shared from another article the following:
This was one of my criticisms about the PCs before the election: Redford saying things completely opposite of what others in her circle were saying. Why is this? The other incidents that come to mind are when Minister Lukaszuk said that Bill 2 was dead; Redford said it wasn't yet. She ended up calling the election a couple of days later. (Does this not bring up the question: Did she not know at that point she was calling the election right away?)
Another incident was during the campaign weeks where a robocall with a misleading survey about Wildrose was being done and there was a question as to whether it met the rules or not. Redford said on the Rutherford show that she did not support such a thing, but then a PC strategist was interviewed and he said they were definitely behind it. And now this: she has a strategist (I have no idea if it's the same one or not) saying that moving left helped get some NDP and Liberal voters to vote PC, but she says that's not it. I find this very confusing. And unsettling.
(A little aside: That said, I would say that both Danielle Smith and the strategist are wrong about the NDP voters. NDP votes went up this time: 126 572 for this election compared to 80 578 last election. PC votes went up by about 65 thousand. The Liberals, however, went from 251 258 votes in 2008 to 127 645 this time around. Huge drop. And it's unlikely most of those voters switched from Liberal to Wildrose. I haven't found voter turnout numbers yet to have a better idea of what these increases and decreases mean--if PCs are up 65 thousand and there were 65 thousand more people who voted, that's significant. If PCs are up 65 thousand and 500 thousand more voted, that's not that significant. (I'm just tossing numbers out there; I have no idea what the numbers really were.) The Wildrose went from 64 407 in 2008 to 442 429 this time. That is definitely significant! It would be perhaps accurate to suggest that many Liberal voters switched to PC and many PC voters switched to Wildrose.)
Speaking in Calgary on Tuesday, Redford rejected theories that many Liberals voted PC to block the Wildrose from gaining power.
I believe this to be a rebuttal to Danielle Smith's election night speech. And yet, in my post yesterday, I shared from another article the following:
A Conservative strategist said moving to the progressive side of the spectrum made the party more representative of the views of Albertans and better able to convince NDP and Liberal voters in the province that a Wildrose majority was not in their interest.
This was one of my criticisms about the PCs before the election: Redford saying things completely opposite of what others in her circle were saying. Why is this? The other incidents that come to mind are when Minister Lukaszuk said that Bill 2 was dead; Redford said it wasn't yet. She ended up calling the election a couple of days later. (Does this not bring up the question: Did she not know at that point she was calling the election right away?)
Another incident was during the campaign weeks where a robocall with a misleading survey about Wildrose was being done and there was a question as to whether it met the rules or not. Redford said on the Rutherford show that she did not support such a thing, but then a PC strategist was interviewed and he said they were definitely behind it. And now this: she has a strategist (I have no idea if it's the same one or not) saying that moving left helped get some NDP and Liberal voters to vote PC, but she says that's not it. I find this very confusing. And unsettling.
(A little aside: That said, I would say that both Danielle Smith and the strategist are wrong about the NDP voters. NDP votes went up this time: 126 572 for this election compared to 80 578 last election. PC votes went up by about 65 thousand. The Liberals, however, went from 251 258 votes in 2008 to 127 645 this time around. Huge drop. And it's unlikely most of those voters switched from Liberal to Wildrose. I haven't found voter turnout numbers yet to have a better idea of what these increases and decreases mean--if PCs are up 65 thousand and there were 65 thousand more people who voted, that's significant. If PCs are up 65 thousand and 500 thousand more voted, that's not that significant. (I'm just tossing numbers out there; I have no idea what the numbers really were.) The Wildrose went from 64 407 in 2008 to 442 429 this time. That is definitely significant! It would be perhaps accurate to suggest that many Liberal voters switched to PC and many PC voters switched to Wildrose.)
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