As a write this the final French language leaders debate is ongoing. These debates are organized by the media for the media and they rarely have the impact the media would have us believe but the last one is usually the starting line for the final sprint to the finish in every election. After tonight the parties will step up their efforts until it reaches a frenetic pace during the final weekend of the election.
One thing about this period is polls become even more unreliable than usual. For the most part public opinion begins to change fast and that rate of change increases as we get closer to election day. As a result, polls which often take at least a day or two to collect, process and publish cannot keep up. Remember that the last polls of 2015, published about 48 hours before the polls closed were "predicting" a Liberal minority government.
So if you want to see how the election is shaping up over the next 10 days watch the parties. The two main parties and maybe the NDP have pollsters and data analysis experts on retainer during elections. They conduct polls, although for gaining useful information instead of advancing a media narrative plus all of the parties have central databases that are fed nightly by the local campaigns. They take that data plus some other data, such as social media metrics, and model the probable results of the election down to the riding level. They are similar to the seat projection models used by the media but the parties have much better quality data than the media has so their models are much better quality as a result.
Of course, the parties do not make any of their data public. They keep it to themselves and they use it to refine their message and to determine where they need to focus their efforts. However, one can gain some insight into what they are seeing by watching the parties in general and the party leaders in particular.
At this stage of the campaign those managing it are going to put the leader where they believe they can do the most good. That is where the leader can either save a seat from falling to the other parties or where there is a possibility of picking up a seat currently held by another party. So for the next 10 days watch where the party leaders campaign. As well, watching what they say can also be a good indicator.
An example would be the fact that Mr. Trudeau campaigned in the Carleton Riding today, a riding that has been held by Pierre Poilievre since 2004. I found that interesting. That has been a safe Conservative riding for 15 years. It is true that it is very close to Gatineau, where the debates are occuring but that can be said of over a dozen ridings around Ottawa. He could have gone to Glengarry-Prescott-Russel, which according to the media seat projections is a Liberal Riding that could change hands this time or there are other ridings in Quebec where the media is saying the Bloc could defeat a Liberal incumbent. He did not do that. Instead he campaigned in what has been a safe Conservative seat. Either he really wanted to buy that pumpkin from a farm near Manotick or maybe their data is indicating that the ridings the media say are vulnerable are not so vulnerable and that the Carleton riding could be a candidate to change hands this time. It is true the local Liberal candidate is running a particularly strong campaign and we have not seen anything of Pierre Poilievre during the whole election. This is not to say that the Carleton riding will switch. It is just to say that there are plenty of places to buy pumpkins in the National Capital Region and it is curious that Mr. Trudeau's handlers had him buy one there.
Oh yes, remember the media is stating that the Bloc is on the rise in Quebec threatening the Liberals. So what is Mr. Trudeau's play. Go to British Columbia tomorrow morning. I bet the Bloc never saw that coming.
It is harder to find out where Mr. Scheer was because finding his itinerary on the Conservative Party website is much harder but it should be noted that Mr. Scheer blew the dog whistle very loudly yesterday in Quebec while the various Proud websites brought up the fear of Sharia Law again. It is curious that they have decided to do this at this stage of the game and a clue as to why might be the news that Mr. MacKay appears to be gearing up for a leadership race for the Conservative Party after the election.
This was stated by a senior Conservative "friend" of Mr. MacKay's, who apologized soon after. However, it should be noted that he apologized. He did not retract the statement. Make no mistake. This was not a error on the part of the source. If the person is a senior Conservative he would have had the media sense not to make those kinds of statements to a reporter. This was a deliberate act designed to do what? I am not certain right now but it does seem that at least some of the Conservative Party do not believe Mr. Scheer will pull out a victory in 10 days.
Over the next 10 days you should be able to discern how the election is going to turn out by watching what the parties and the party leaders are doing. They will be a much better indicator than anything the media will tell us.
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