what it means for me to vote strategically

A while back I wrote a post about voting strategically in my riding for the upcoming election. I am planning on voting Liberal, not because voting Liberal in Vancouver Centre means that the Conservatives will not win the seat, but because if there is to be any hope of stopping Stephen Harper then Canada needs to elect as many Liberal MPs as it can. In Vancouver Centre the second place candidate is almost certainly going to be the NDP, so many people think I should just vote for who I really want to (I usually vote NDP, though not always). If Michael Byers of the NDP were to win in Vancouver Centre that would mean that the Liberals would have to win two seats somewhere else in order to have a net gain.

If a minority Parliament were a certainty than it would not really matter too much if Vancouver Centre elected a Liberal or a Dipper. It is my hope that the Liberals can still turn this campaign around. If the Liberals can pick up one or two points from the Conservatives, and another one or two from the NDP, and another one or two from the Greens then they are suddenly in a dead heat with the Conservatives. I think that it is still possible for the Liberals to win a minority government. That means that a seat like Vancouver Centre, which has been a safe Liberal seat for 15 years, needs to be won by the Liberals if they are to have any chance of winning this election.

If a seat like Vancouver Centre slips from the Liberals then they are in a great deal of trouble. While I think Michael Byers would be a good MP and would bring some great ideas to Ottawa, it is more important that the Liberal brand remain strong. Canada is not what most of us think it is without the Liberal Party. Canadians are a liberal people, sometimes we forget that and tilt slightly to the right, but we need to be careful right now as Harper is in my view not slightly to the right. Stephen Harper is a very intelligent man with a very well thought out view of what direction Canada should be heading in. Stephen Harper’s Canada is one based on small government that does not take active steps to help its citizens. Stephen Harper’s Canada is one where we would ignore our moral duty to fight climate change, where we would stand beside the USA on foreign policy issues rather than seek a broad consensus among many nations, where we would treat drug addicts and the mentally ill like criminals rather than like patients.

Stephen Harper’s Canada is not my Canada. I do not think that Stephen Harper’s vision of Canada is shared by many Canadians. Voters are buying into Harper’s image of strength, and the Conservatives depiction of Stephane Dion as too weak to lead the country. I say that Dion exhibits strength by not being unequivocal in everything he says. Dion realizes that there are many sides to every issue, he realizes that dissent can breed better ideas and solutions than simply overriding all opposition. Dion is more like ordinary Canadians than Stephen Harper is.