Faltering Liberals?

Canada will hold another general election on October 14th, as Harper make a bold move to reestablish his mandate and possibly grab a majority government. (Its such a bold move he broke his own fixed-election law to do it, and his pretense was some false complaint about Parliament not functioning, even though it passed each one of his budgets and proposed laws.)

Right now, Liberal leader Stéphane Dion is failing to connect and could end up leading the Liberals to disaster over his cerebral “Green Shift” (cut income taxes by replacing them with carbon taxes to help the environment).

In fact, Jack Layton, leader of the lefty New Democratic Party, is garnering more attention as he seeks some of the after-glow of Obama-mania. Even Elizabeth May, the Green leader, is drawing more attention as she shoved her way into the debates.

Meanwhile, the Bloc Quebecois, French Canadian nationalists, are struggling to hold off a surging Conservative vote in Quebec, while Quebec native Dion is pushed into a distant third place there.

I’m not saying the Liberals will be wiped out in this election, but they are too much on the defensive and too far down in the polls to have any real shot at winning a plurality or majority of the seats. In fact, as it stands, Dion should be happy if he holds his ground.