VoteForEnvironment or VoteForLiberals?

So, I’ve heard allegations that the “strategic voting” site voteforenvironment.ca was somewhat liberally-biased, but it’s not until I actually looked at the description for the riding of Central Nova that it really became apparent.

Let’s dissect.

Our Pick

Elizabeth May, Green Party of Canada

This is the riding where concerted action can take down Conservative Defence Minister Peter MacKay. A high profile NDP candidate came second in the 2006 election, but there is a new candidate running this time. Meanwhile, the Liberals agreed to not run a candidate against Green Party leader Elizabeth May (and the Greens are not running a candidate against Liberal Leader Stephane Dion). We strongly recommend voting Green for party leader Elizabeth May.

In addition to current polling, other considerations have been factored into our pick. We have improved the correction applied to reflect better Liberal participation than was the case at the beginning of the race. May’s debate performance and Dion calling on Liberals to work hard to elect May in his recent visit has produced a clear improvement in the enthusiasm of local Liberals for May. First, because the Liberals have not fielded a Candidate in deference to Elizabeth May we have apportioned the Liberal vote as following: Con 10.0%; NDP 5.0%; Green 68.0%; with the remainder not voting. Another consideration in this riding is the absence of the previous, dynamic NDP candidate which,in combination with May’s profile and excellent performance in the national debate, leads us to shift of 25% of NDP vote to the Greens.

So what do we notice:

1. They chose May, the Green Party leader, who openly supports Dion and the Liberal Party.
2. There is no Liberal candidate running, so they had to split the remaining Liberal vote in the riding up. This seems highly arbitrary and biased toward the Green Party.
3. Arbitrarily they also add 25% of the NDP vote to the Greens. This is a really heavy bias, too bad their justification falls on “the absense of a dynamic NDP candidate” and May’s “excellent performance in the debates” which I grant that her supporters would have appreciated (every partisan came out of these debates declaring victory), but beyond that, I don’t recall many claiming her performance as excellent.
4. Even with all those shifts, the <strong>best</strong> polls only give May a thousand point win, while most still hand the victory to Conservative Peter Mackay. Actually, most polls show (with the shifting) that the NDP and Greens are tied!
5. In the past elections, the NDP have had an increasingly strong presence, while the Liberal support has faded. I wouldn’t predict an NDP win here (even if voteforenvironment.ca had endorsed them), but they will likely do better than Elizabeth May.

So what’s my beef?

Basically, by endorsing Elizabeth May, VoteForEnvironment has given the riding to the Conservatives again. I wouldn’t be too surprised if this riding is split between the Greens and NDP with MacKay sailing to a few thousand vote victory.

The DemocraticSpace Seat-Prediction similarily would agree, granting MacKay a victory with 40%-44% of the vote, the Greens 33-36% and the NDP 20-24%.

If you take the 25% shift off of VoteForEnvironment from the NDP – it grants them a win. This just shows what they’re profiling is doing.

What should have happened? Elizabeth May should do with the Greens what the Bloc and Reform did – find a strategic regional base, win a half dozen seats with a stupid-low amount of the vote, and then (do what the Bloc and Reform haven’t done, and won’t) push for some electoral reform.

As far as I can tell, May chose Central Nova as it was a riding near where she first lived in Canada (she was born in the United States). She also ran there once in the 1980s to protest nuclear energy. If they focussed on a number of ridings in BC, where their polling numbers are statistically higher, they could potentially acheive a seat in the next election.

So my thesis remains: if all you care about is getting Harper out, vote strategically to your hearts content, but remember to take some of these sites with a strong dose of salt. Otherwise – vote for the change that you believe in.

Extra bonu – Edmonton Centre bias:

Longtime Liberal incumbent Anne McLellan lost this seat in the last election by 6% to the Conservatives.

This riding has become unattainable for the Liberals and we are recommending you vote with your heart.

Because of McLellan the normal mathematics of the riding have been altered to subtract 6% from the Liberals moving 5% of those votes to the Conservatives and 1% to the Greens.

Suddenly no Liberal voters might move to the NDP who only voted red because of “Lanslide Annie”? Give me a break.