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Arriving early today, VanRamblings’ Decision Canada update provides you with a little insight into the day’s most provocative political events, and points you towards various stories, articles and political foofaraw of interest, available across the Web.
We’ll start off with this dispiriting bit of news: according to the latest SES poll, the Liberals and the NDP continue their freefall in support among Canadians. As my friend and colleague Jay Currie observes on his blog …
“The regional is also interesting: In BC SES has the Liberals at 31, Conservatives at 37 and the NDP at 26. That is 8 points up for the Conservatives from May 30 and down 3 each for the NDP and the Grits.”
Obviously, Canadians want change. But perhaps not the kind of change the Conservatives will bring.
Next up, we’ll post the following cartoon, by John Fewings …
 Stephen Harper: affable but lying through his teeth |
And lest you think that Stephen Harper is getting a raw deal from the press …
McGill’’s Observatory on Media and Public Policy has studied positive and negative mentions of the major parties and leaders in the news and commentary of seven leading dailies through the first 10 days of the campaign. The results show marked differences among the papers.
The Liberals are getting beaten up everywhere, but especially in the National Post where the average net coverage is —37 per cent. This percentage is based on the per cent of positive mentions minus the per cent of negative mentions — a score of 0 per cent would be perfectly neutral. Le Devoir (-32 per cent), La Presse (-30 per cent), and the Calgary Herald (-25 per cent) were close behind the Post. The Toronto Star and the Globe & Mail were at -21 per cent and —19 per cent respectively. The Vancouver Sun was kindest at —10 per cent.
The Conservatives are getting better press than the Liberals across the board. The Calgary Herald and the National Post led the way with +12 per cent and +6 per cent respectively. The Toronto Star (-12 per cent) and Le Devoir (-11 per cent) were most critical of the party while the Sun, La Presse and the Globe were basically neutral.
As one would expect, coverage of the leaders closely mirrored coverage of the parties. Le Devoir was particularly hard on Liberal leader Paul Martin (-32 per cent) and the Post was both particularly warm to Conservative leader Stephen Harper (+12 per cent) and hard on NDP leader Jack Layton (-32 per cent).
Thanks to James at Hewmon.ca for the item above, and to Jim Elve for his BlogsCanada E-Group posting service.
James’ full posting, with comments, is available here. Have a look.
For insight into Stephen Harper’s policies, as well as important 2004 federal election news events, click on VanRamblings’ full Decision Canada coverage.
