(UPDATED – SEE BOTTOM OF POST FOR FULL ANALYSIS)
Calgary Elbow
Cheffins (Lib) 46%
Henninger (PC) 38%
Reed (Gre) 6%
Greydanus (AA) 4%
Brown (NDP) 3%
Grover (SC) 2%
Willerton (Ind) 1%
Drumheller– Stettler
Hayden (PC) 58%
Dooley (Lib) 14%
Davidson (SC) 12%
Rew (Ind) 7%
France (AA) 5%
Wigmore (Gre) 3%
Bough (NDP) 1%
Full analysis tomorrow but, for now, let me say: I could get used to this…
A few morning after thoughts…
-Don’t read anything into this as far as the federal voting intent in Alberta.
-On a completely self-indulgent point, I’m fairly pleased I managed to call Elbow nearly bang on.
-That said, my Drumheller predictions sucked. Liberal Tom Dooley won 9 of 13 polls in Drumheller, but got absolutely obliterated outside of the city. If there’s any doubt about the Tory base, look no further than Big Valley, home of the creationist museum, where the Tories beat the Liberals by a 35 to 1 margin. I’d say rural Alberta is set to march behind the PCs yet again.
-There are still some positives for the Liberals to take out of the Drumheller byelection. If they can break through in some of Alberta’s small to mid sized cities, there are ridings to be won outside of Calgary and Edmonton.
-How much does it suck to be an Alberta Alliance member today. Sure, Elbow was always a write-off for them. And, sure, they didn’t have a very strong candidate running in Drumheller–Stettler but…fifth place? In the heart of rural Alberta, they lost to the “NEP Party”, a party that hasn’t existed for thirty years, and a crazy pro-Alberta independence independent candidate. Ouch.
-The news isn’t much better for the NDP, coming 5th in Elbow and 7th in Drumheller.
-The win in Elbow will be huge from a momentum stand-point for the ALP and should help them attract volunteers and candidates over the next year, leading up to the next election.
-While it’s dangerous to read too much into byelections and stupid to extrapolate those results to other ridings…what the heck, let’s give it a try.
Adjusting the Elbow vote through to the rest of the City of Calgary, gives the Liberals 8 seats next election, the PCs 8 seats, and leaves 7 as too close to call (within 5% either way). Given the Liberals need at least 15 seats in Calgary to have any chance of forming government, that shows there’s a still a long way to go…but at least they’re in the game.
