Well, it seems Jack Layton and his NDP Caucus will no longer be supporting the good ship Martin, which may mean a winter election in 2005... perhaps we will still win our bet with Mr. Bullerwell and be $20 richer come New Year's Eve...
This left us wondering what will go on in our newly adopted riding of Edmonton Strathcona (we were previously in Edmonton Centre, represented by Deputy Prime Minister Anne McLellan).
Candidate-wise, it looks like Mr. Rahim Jaffer will be running for the Conservatives again (he has represented Edmonton Strathcona under the Reform, Canadian Alliance, and Conservative banners since 1997).
For the NDP, environmental lawyer Ms. Linda Duncan is their candidate of choice. As some of you may remember, the more controversial Mr. Malcolm Azania was the NDP candidate in Strathcona last time around.
The Liberals are in the midst of a 3-way contested candidate race with former U of A Secretariat Director Ellen Schoeck taking on fraud investigator George Hodgson, and lawyer Andy Hladyshevsky. It should be an interesting nomination race. We know both Ms. Schoeck and Mr. Hodgson and the're both very nice people. We don't know Mr. Hladyshevsky, so we can't really offer any sort of opinion on him.
No word on who the Greens have nominated or yet to nominate.
Though we're fairly sure Mr. Jaffer will be re-elected, he won't be getting the pleasure of our vote. We're really not sure who we're going to vote for yet. Time shall tell.
For those of you interested, the last couple of elections in Strathcona went like so...
2000 Federal Election
x-Rahim Jaffer, CA - 23,463
Jonathan Dai, Lib - 17,816
Helene Narayana, NDP - 8,256
Gregory Toogood, PC - 5,047
Ken Kirk, MP - 814
Kesa Rose Semenchuk, AP - 299
Kevan Hunter, M-L - 164
2004 Federal Election
x-Rahim Jaffer, CPC - 19,089
Debby Carlson, Lib - 14,057
Malcolm Azania, NDP - 11,535
Cameron Wakefield, Grn - 3,146
Dave Dowling, MP - 519
Kevan Hunter, M-L - 103
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My opinion on Mr. Hladyshevsky is that his name is a mouthful.
ReplyDeleteInterestingly,
14K + 11.5K > 19K.
And 19K - 14K is only 5K.
That doesn't seem like an insurmountable climb for the Liberals, especially if they don't nominate another nincumpoop candidate like that floozie Debbie. (It's funny because I'm writing this in a School of Business class, on the School of Business wireless network. Hello Mr. Percy.)
But if I were a betting man - which I am, apparently, thanks for refreshing my memory - I'd say Rahim will win again, easily.
And there's no way you're getting your $20. To quote my personal hero Paul Wells:
"No election before the New Year. There will be no election before the New Year. Tell yourself. Learn to love the idea. Learn to hate it. I don't care. But deal: no election before the New Year."
The gap between Jaffer and the Libs is definately closeable, but we find it unlikely that it would happen this time around.
ReplyDeleteIn our humble opinion, Mr. Jaffer hasn't been getting re-elected since 1997 because he's a good MP. Mr. Jaffer's re-elections have been caused by the strength of both the Liberals and NDP in the riding, who split the centre-left vote and allow Mr. Jaffer to swim up the middle track.
As for Mr. Wells, well, we don't have a column on the back page of Maclean's, so he might have more reliable sources than us (ours being the CBC)...
Jaffer is in fact a terrible MP... why do all the MPs in Edmonton have to be so terrible. Why?
ReplyDeleteI'd vote for Jaffer if I was in his riding. It's time to rid this country of the digusting attitude of self-entitlement and abuse of power which is the Liberal Party and there's no way I'm voting for the NDP which is pretty much communist. All the Liberals are doing right now is buying votes with their day care deals and throwing money around like they're Santa Clause. That party is just awful and Paul Martin is just as bad as Chretien. I can tell you Rahim Jaffer represents Alberta views better than that moron Anne McLellan
ReplyDelete"I can tell you Rahim Jaffer represents Alberta views better than that moron Anne McLellan"
ReplyDeletesure... but which views are those?
Oh Emil thanks for that rant. For the record neither are good local reps. Jaffer has been voted the laziest MP by the press corps. So if by your comment you mean Albertans are lazy - I would have to disagree, we are quite industrious in fact.
ReplyDelete