Oh, Canada! – A Prelude

On Monday, Canada will elect its next Parliament, and it looks like the Liberal party, which escaped defeat in 2004 by scaring Canadians about their opposition, are trying to repeat the same exact campaign… and it ain’t working.

While polls have narrowed some in recent days, a few things are pretty clear about Monday night:

1) The Conservatives will emerge as the largest force in Parliament and Stephen Harper will become Prime Minister.

2) The NDP will also make gains in the number of seats they win, especially in Ontario.

3) The majority/minority status of a Harper government will hinge on the scale of the Conservative breakthrough in rural Quebec and Toronto.

4) The Liberals will suffer major losses, and aren’t likely to have representation at all in Alberta, or even Saskatechewan, and be reduced to a single-digit rump of Montreal seats in Quebec.

5) This will leave the Conservatives as the only truly national party, with the Liberals and NDP fighting for second place and the allegiance of left-wing voters.

6) Paul Martin will have a hard time holding on as Liberal Leader.

Those are my predictions; let’s see how close I am to being right.