does Harper know something we don’t know?

I am surprised to be reading that there is a lot of speculation that Stephen Harper may pull the plug on his government before Parliament resumes on September 15. All the polls that I have seen over the last couple of months have shown the Liberals and the Conservatives in a dead heat, both far from majority territory, and the Conservatives still failing to gain ground in Ontario and Quebec. Further, by calling an election early, Harper would be directly ignoring the fixed election date legislation that his own government implemented.

Perhaps what Harper knows, which the public does not, is that the Conservatives are set to lose, and perhaps lose badly in the upcoming by-elections in Ontario and Quebec. I would think that Harper would like to wait and see how things turn out in those elections before pulling the plug on his government, but if their internal polling data shows a bleak enough picture, or alternatively a strong enough picture, they may want to go to the polls across the country as soon as possible.

There is also speculation that the Conservatives may want to go now, rather than wait for the economy to get even worse. Flaherty has already lowered the growth forecast for the economy this year to a very sluggish 1.1%. If things are only going to get worse on the economic front the Conservatives may as well go to the polls as soon as possible.

It looks to me like the Conservatives would be very hard pressed to win the next election, and are certainly in no position to win a majority. Traditionally, the governing party goes into elections with slightly elevated support as they tend to dominate the news, and during the campaign their numbers dip slightly. If the Liberals manage to pick up a point or two from the Conservatives, and a point or two from the Greens (who seem to be riding way too high in my view) then they could put together 36-38% of the vote. That is not enough to win a majority government, but if the Liberals could pick up 130-140 seats or so then they should be able to govern comfortably with the support of the NDP. After two and a half years of the Harper Conservatives a little Liberal/NDP action would be just the right medicine for Canada.