Speed Dating with the Dippers

Sunday's NDP debate was a chance to get a first look at the field of candidates, for the 99.9% of Canadians who don't have the complete collection of Paul Dewar speeches on their Ipod.

With nine debaters on stage, it's impossible to get anything more than a sense of each candidate and what they stand for. This was the case with the Liberal Leadership debates in 2006. The Grits tried to add pizazz by setting up mini 3-person debates, but this led to channel changing moments whenever the moderator announced "we will now listen to Joe Volpe, Carolyn Bennett and Ken Dryden debate the environment". Click. The NDP copied this format, and the results were equally riveting.

In his opening statement, Brian Topp said "we won't win when we talk in platitudes", but followed this up by declaring "we fight for the Canada of our dreams". I don't fault Topp for that, because it's hard to eloquently describe the Canada of our dreams in 30 seconds (I know mine has free maple syrup for all!). It was equally silly to ask debaters to explain their economic platform in 15 seconds. Even New Democrats have more to say about the economy than that.

So it's better not to think of yesterday as a debate. Rather, it was more like speed dating for New Democrats - five minutes for each candidate to introduce themselves.

From the bits of the debate I saw, Thomas Mulcair made a strong impression - while I'm not sure he'll look like as promising a suitor once voters get to know him better, he was good enough yesterday to earn a second date. Niki Ashton and Martin Singh were impressive, but only in the same way Martha Hall Findlay was impressive in 2006. In other words, don't start printing those orange wedding invitations.

Nathan Cullen seemed to be enjoying himself the most on stage, but he's already tied the "merger" rope around his neck and that will overshadow anything he says the rest of the campaign. Sort of like the guy who lets it slip on the first date that he's into Scientology...or at least that he wants to set up a non-compete pact with the Scientologists.

Unfortunately, Romeo Saganash was sick, but a sick first date is rarely the start of a long relationship (with the obviously exception of Cory and Tapanga on Boy Meets World). Robert Chisholm's weak French was likely a deal breaker for a lot of Dippers.

None of the others really stood out, and attempts to paint the Topp-Dewar scruffle as the second coming of "do you think it is easy to make priorities" are laughable. If you already liked or didn't like Brian Topp, Peggy Nash, or Paul Dewar, nothing they said yesterday was going to change your mind. If you didn't know much about them, their steady performance and status as "contenders" would likely be enough to tempt most Dippers to Google them or Facebook stalk them for a bit.

In terms of an introduction, the debate served its purpose, but anyone expecting fireworks was setting themselves up for a letdown. Of course, there weren't going to be winners and losers. Of course, no one was going to start off the first leadership debate by going on the attack. Of course they were all going to agree on most policies, especially the policy of "we don't like Stephen Harper".

The Value of Endorsements

Leadership races are notoriously hard to handicap, due to the absence of credible polling data. Asking Canadians who they want as the next NDP leader is pointless, since only 3 or 4% of NDP voters will buy a membership. Despite the best efforts of the Globe & Mail, few Canadians have heard of Brian Topp, never mind Nathan Cullen or Paul Dewar.

One way you can stickhandle around this is by counting endorsements, which is what the website 308.com has started tracking. His system assigns points based on endorsements from federal and provincial politicians, and was calibrated on data from the 2006 Liberal and 2003 NDP leadership races. It currently ranks the candidates as follows:

Topp 40.8%
Mulcair 23.2%
Nash 18.2%
Chisolm 5.0%
Dewar 4.0%
Ashton 3.9%
Cullen 3.1%
Saganash 1.7%
Singh 0.0%

It should be noted that nearly half of Topp's points comes from Ed Broadbent's endorsement, which would be by biggest quibble with the scoring system. Still, the model does a decent job of quantifying establishment support.

What it is likely less successful at, however, is predicting actual support. Many of these endorsers won't sell more than a couple dozen membership forms and I suspect their influence over existing Dippers is negligible. Yes, sometimes there's a correlation between endorsements and support...but sometimes that correlation is actually negative.

For proof of that, we need to look no farther than the Alison Redford and Christy Clark victories from earlier this year. Redford had the support of just 2 MLAs (one of which was named Alison Redford) on the first ballot and 5 on the second. Redford would have been projected as an also-ran under any endorsement model - especially one which weighted former leaders so heavily (Ralph Klein was a Mar man while Don Getty was all about Horner).

Clark's case is perhaps even more remarkable because, unlike Redford, she was the undisputed frontrunner of the campaign from start to finish. While she did have some support from former caucus members, she counted only one MLA endorsement and would have projected out in third under any formula (unless it assigned God-like status on Harry Bloy). This, despite the fact that everyone knew she would be in front on the first ballot.

None of this is meant to knock the 308 model which, as I said, does a decent job approximating establishment support. It's just important to recognize that support among the establishment doesn't always translate into support among party members, just as support among the general public doesn't always translate into support among party members.

There are significant risks in being seen as an establishment candidate, so I remain unconvinced that the Topp juggernaut is as unstoppable as these numbers would suggest.

Asymmetrical Federalism

The NDP has made a lot of noise arguing Quebec deserves a fixed percentage of seats in the House of Commons. At the same time, they continue to move full speed ahead with a leadership race where Quebecers will be little more than an afterthought.

After some enthusiastic headlines about the party's membership numbers "soaring" and "tripling" in Quebec earlier this week, comes a dose of reality:

The NDP has attracted 11,200 new members since the launch of its leadership race in August, with the addition of 3,900 new card holders in Quebec providing the biggest boost.

Overall, the party has now 95,000 official supporters, up from 83,800 when Jack Layton died three months ago.

Still, Quebec continues to be under-represented in the race to find a new party leader with just 5.9 per cent of the party cards in the one-member, one-vote leadership race.

The 5.9% figure isn't the worrisome number for the NDP - that number is due to the fact that no one (not even some of their MPs) had membership cards in Quebec a few months ago. What's more relevant is that Quebecers made up just 35% of the new members the party has signed up during the leadership race. If the NDP keeps adding 12,000 members a month, with 35% coming from Quebec, Quebecers are going to cast just 15% of the votes in the leadership race.

This from a province home to over half the NDP's caucus. This from a province the NDP has recognized as a "nation" deserving special status in all areas...except leadership races apparently.

Maybe that's fair, but it's certainly not good news for a party hoping to build an organization in Quebec. And it's certainly not good news for Thomas Mulcair, who hopes to ride Quebec to victory.

The Race for Stornoway

The NDP leadership race appears to have solidified, with nine candidates vying for the keys to Stornoway.

While I doubt any of the contenders are causing Stephen Harper sleepless nights, it's a diverse field which is good news for the Dippers. Every true-orange New Democrat will be able to find a candidate to their liking, and a lot of membership forms will get sold. Nearly every imaginable demographic is represented...all that's missing is Pat Martin to provide comic relief.

It's too early to seriously handicap the field, but a nine candidate field and a 5-month race means it would be incredibly premature to declare this a Topp-Mulcair showdown. Someone will emerge from the pack to challenge the frontrunners, and it's likely to come down to second and third choices.

Pundits Guide appears to be the place to be for NDP leadership news, while Far and Wide puts the candidates under a Liberal lens.

Here, I present a brief overview of the field:


Topp of the Pack

Brian Topp: The media crowned him as the race's frontrunner within hours of Jack Layton's death, though that may have simply been a case of journalists unable to resist a good pun. Topp has the most establishment support, but as Alison Redford and Christy Clark recently showed, that may not necessarily be an asset.

Topp has released a "tax the rich" proposal which should be popular with NDP members, but it's not without risks. I can guarantee eight other leadership camps will be whispering about the Tory advertising onslaught this would bring about, in an effort to brand Topp as unelectable.


The Challenger

Thomas Mulcair: The longtime NDP Dauphin has had a rocky start to the campaign, spending more time complaining about the rules than giving Dippers a reason to vote for him. Still, Mulcair is experienced and is the party's best bet at holding Quebec (at least according to Thomas Mulcair).

Unlike Topp, Mulcair's pitch has been directed more at the general public than the NDP faithful, promising to ween the NDP off their union dependence. He's clearly trying to portray himself as the candidate most likely to lead the NDP to the promised land. That's not a bad pitch - even though federal NDP members might be less concerned with power than most, it's a message that should resonate with provincial Dippers in BC, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and Nova Scotia who have tasted power. Hell, who am I kidding - everyone wants to be in power.


Dark Horses

Paul Dewar: Dewar would probably be my choice at this point if I had a bit more orange in my veins but I'm always a sucker for an underdog. He's a good communicator, though some questions remain about his french.

His urban strategy is smart politics, since that's where the votes are in a one-member-one-vote leadership race.


Peggy Nash: She's relatively well know and relatively well liked, and I imagine she has a good network of NDP, union, and activist contacts to solicit for support. I can't imagine anyone is overly excited by her, but she's the highest profile woman in the race and might have some appeal as a consensus candidate.


Nathan Cullen: His proposal to work with the Liberals in some ridings will help him stand out, but it might make him too polarizing a figure to get the second a third ballot support he'd need to win. He has a strong social media presence so far, and all indications are he'll get his fair share of media coverage.

Cullen also has geography working in his favour. He's the lone BC candidate, and one-third of all current NDP members are from that province.


Long Shots

Robert Chisolm: On paper, Chisolm is a strong candidate - he's a former union leader and former leader of the Nova Scotia NDP. He has the ability to clean up in Nova Scotia, but lack of name recognition will be an obstacle elsewhere. He's going to need to find an issue to call his own, to distinguish himself from the crowded field.


Romeo Saganash: Saganash was the first candidate out of the gate, and is intriguing enough to warrant a close look - he's from Quebec, is fluent in English and French, and has been actively involved with the Cree Regional Authority. I'll confess to knowing little about him, but if his political skills are polished, he's likely to get media attention and could be this season's break-out star.


Martin Singh: Singh is likely the least known candidate in the contest and doesn't have the House of Commons platform to raise his profile. I can't see him winning, but his pro-business stance could help him stand out.

Singh is from Nova Scotia, but launched his campaign in Brampton - his support in the Sikh community could make him a formidable threat in a one-member one-vote contest, and I wouldn't at all be surprised to see him in the top 5 or 6 on the first ballot. Growing from there will be more challenging.


Niki Ashton: Ashton is expected to declare shortly, and it's no secret this will be more about raising her profile than about winning. At 29, her support will come predominantly from youth and from her home province of Manitoba. If she does well, she could position herself for a future run in 10 or 20 years.

This Race Is Unfair, Vote For Mulcair!

Some leadership campaigns like to make a policy announcement every week.

For Thomas Mulcair, it appears he had adopted a "complaint-a-week" strategy. The latest:

NDP's Mulcair blames 'whisper campaign' for tough slogging in leadership effort
Candidate says the fact he's from Quebec is being used against him by some party members

Outremont MP Tom Mulcair blames "a whisper campaign" and clever spinning by competitors for a perception he's trailing Brian Topp in the NDP leadership contest.

During a recent trip to Vancouver, the 57-year old lawyer and father of two told me: "The people who spin for Mr. Topp use the word 'front-runner,' as they have done from Day 1.

"But there have been a fair number of polls so far and every one has put me ahead, so I'm happy with that."

Mulcair also cited "a whisper campaign by anonymous sources" about his having a bad temper and not being a team player. "My best calling card to answer that," he said, "is there were 33 people standing on stage with me the day I announced my candidacy" on Oct. 13.

Tous Ensemble

Nathan Cullen shakes up the Mulcair-Topp cage match with an interesting idea:

His plan would be to let grassroots members of the three parties [Liberals, NDP, Greens] decide in each riding currently held by the Conservatives whether they wanted to hold a joint nomination meeting. If they agree, all parties could run candidates at that meeting and all card-carrying members of the three parties would get a vote, but only the winner would go on to run for a seat in Parliament under the banner with which they ran in the nomination.

Something like this is a lot more realistic than a full blown merger. It at least deserves consideration, since the death of the per-vote subsidy removes some of the incentive for parties to run kamikaze candidates.

Still, I question how many ridings would actually agree to a proposal like this. From a pure game theory perspective, there's no incentive for the Greens to participate since they'd never win a joint nomination. Similarly, I can't see Liberal and NDP members agreeing to an open nomination unless they were both convinced their candidate could win it - that likely limits this to a dozen ridings coast-to-coast. Even if things made it that far down the track, the logistical nightmare of a joint nomination meeting might be too much to overcome.

Cullen himself admits the Liberals and Greens are unlikely to go along with his plan, and he's probably right. But good on him for putting the idea out there for debate. I'm a staunch anti-merger Liberal, but even I concede it's worth at least considering.

It's bad enough the NDP are letting other candidates run

September 2nd: Thomas Mulcair says he won't run for the leadership of the NDP unless the party agrees to hold its convention in late winter or early spring, because he wouldn't be able to compete in a short race.

September 19th: [Muclair] told reporters on Monday that he has truly not decided if he will throw his hat into the ring because the numbers for a Quebec candidate do not add up well. Although the majority of New Democrat MPs are from Quebec, “Quebec is the only province that does not have a provincial wing of the NDP,” said Mr. Mulcair.

I've spent the last hour wracking my brain to come up with a rationale for how Mulcair's musings might help him in this contest, but can't think of anything.

On Topp

I find the media generally tends to assign too much importance to endorsements during leadership races. After all, Christy Clark came out on top in BC earlier this year with a lone MLA backing her.

But some endorsements do mater. And since Olivia Chow has said she will stay neutral in the race, this is as big as it gets:

Broadbent backs Brian Topp to replace Layton as NDP leader

OTTAWA Brian Topp burst out of the blocks in the NDP leadership race Monday, taking an early head start powered by some muscular endorsements.

The Montreal-born party president became the first official candidate in the race to succeed the late Jack Layton, who died of cancer last month.

He was accompanied by party icon Ed Broadbent, the most popular and successful federal NDP leader — until Layton.

Without fail, the quickest way to get intoxicated during a federal election is to play the "Ed Broadbent" drinking game at an NDP rally. Broadbent is adored within the NDP and his endorsement is widely considered to have been the tipping point that pushed Jack over the top in 1993.

So this was a big score for Topp who, despite never holding elected office, is now considered the frontrunner in the Race for Stornoway. That said...a little perspective people! From Stephen Maher:

With Broadbent behind him and deep roots in his party, Topp now looks to be in the same situation as Paul Martin in 2003.

Thomas Mulcair, the most likely effective challenger, must have been very disappointed to see Broadbent today. He may not want to play the role of Copps in this race.

Ummm....no.

There's a long list of frontrunners in leadership contests who found out 6 months is a long time the hard way. Topp will be building an organization from scratch. He lacks both experience and charisma. He's also spilled a lot of ink over the past decade as a pundit, so I imagine there are at least one or two controversial comments he'll need to climb down from.

Broadbent's endorsement makes him the frontrunner. But being the frontrunner doesn't mean much.

The Race for Stornoway

The rules have been set. The NDP will select their next leader March 24th in Toronto. The entry fee will be $15,000, with a $500,000 spending limit. It will be one-member-one-vote, and unions will no longer receive a set percentage of the vote.

Not that I would want the job, but were I in charge of the rules, I would have chosen Montreal as the location, to build on NDP momentum in Quebec. I also would have weighted votes by riding, to encourage candidates to sell memberships outside traditional NDP strongholds.

But on the whole, I think the executive did a fine job. The timeline strikes the right balance, and ending the special status for unions is a key step for the NDP as it tries to remake itself into a more mainstream party.

So who will win?

Well, the March vote means Thomas Mulcair will grace the NDP race with his presence. Mulcair is no doubt the favourite, but given the bleak NDP membership totals in Quebec, he has his work cut out for him. It likely doesn't help that no one inside or outside the party seems to like him personally, either.

Brian Topp has been named as a frontrunner since the day Layton died, so I'd expect him to run, and contend. Odds are Francoise Boivin, Anne McGrath or Megan Leslie will run to ensure a strong female candidate. Pat Martin has said he's in, to provide comic relief.

But if you put the Vegas odds in front of me, my money would be on Peter Julian or Paul Dewar right now. Lesser known MPs, but well-liked within the party and both possessing at least a pinch of experience and talent.