So, will a big beneficiary of all this wheeling and dealing with Briony Penn, Green turned Liberal in Saanich-Gulf Islands?
If the Greens run a strong candidate to grab a chunk of the vote, Gary Lunn is in much better shape.
If they don't, Penn probably ends up in Ottawa.

Paul, the numbers are not there in Saanich-Gulf Islands for Lunn to lose. Cabinet members in a government that gains in popularity only losses if they themselves have done something dramatic to screw up.

Why the next election will see his vote rise:
1) Lunn is now in cabinet -
2) The Harper government is no longer considered scary and seen by most middle class people as quietly competent.
3) 2004 was the low point for Gary Lunn - just under 35%. In 1997 and 2000 he reached 43%

The Green vote alone is not enough to elect Penn as a Liberal - and that is if 100% Green goes Liberal. Anyway, I would be very suprised if a Green was not running here and got about 10% of the vote.

The NDP is going to try and campaign hard in this riding and is unlikely to drop below 20%

This leaves 70% of the vote for Lunn and Penn to fight over - Lunn will win.

For once I find myself in agreement with Bernard.

The real purpose of the entire Liberal-Green arrangement, from not running a Liberal against May or a Green against Dion, to shifiting Briony Penn from the Green to the Liberal ticket, has been a re-tooling and updating of the Liberal "vote strategic" game of 2004 and 2006.

The target of course is the NDP. That's why you find both Saanich Gulf Islands and Central Nova on the wheeler-dealer list. They have Conservative members facing 2nd place NDP challengers, and the object of the Green-Liberal deal is to make sure the NDP doesn't pick up these seats by uniting centre-left voters in those ridings.

Look for a similar Green-Liberal deal to unfold in another Tory-NDP fight in Pitt Meadows-Maple Ridge-Mission. NDP candidate Mike Bocking is already nominated and campaigning full-out with an office in Mission. The Liberal nominee is a twenty something hair stylist with no previous political experience. After David Suzuki's smash hit at the local Maple Ridge performing arts theatre during his cross-country, non-partisan, political mobilization tour, look for perennial Green candidate Mike Gildersleeve to be running with suprisingly substantial cash resources at his disposal.

Elizabeth is a fool. There are 308 ridings across Canada and how many of those will Green Party run and how many liberal seats will Green Party endorse? It is obvious to Stephen and the rest of us that Green Party will not win a single seat and Stephen is obviously using Elizabeth's endorsement to gain votes in Quebec. Will Green Party get enough votes to obtain funding after the next election? If not, the demise of the tree huggers should begin in the near future.

Paul's probably right. If Saanich Gulf Island residents make the environment the number one issue, voters will be asked "which mainstream party can be the most responsible steward of the environment". If it is the number one issue, and people want real change now, they need to place their confidence in one of the two mainstream parties. If that's how this riding shapes up, Penn goes to Ottawa on the strength of a coordinated Centre Left vote.

Saanich and the Islands was won last time around by Lunnbecause the NDP and the green candidate split the vote. Dr. Briony is very popular on the islands but so is the NDP. North saanich gives a lot of support to the Greens. If Penn figured the greens could win there against the other parties , being as she is a green as one gets , she wouildn't be running as a Liberal, This will be no cake walk for Lunn. If there had been no Green running in saanich and the Islands Lunn would have been out looking for work. Hopdfully this time he will be down at the UI office.

If that's how this riding shapes up, Penn goes to Ottawa on the strength of a coordinated Centre Left vote.

Everyone knows that's not the game, Big Red Machine, and no one more so that Liberals like yourself. The object of this exercise is not to obtain a Liberal win, but to prevent an NDP gain.

The other thing that is missing from the equation is the the federal Liberal constitution makes it a requirement for the party to run candidates in each and every riding.

So the federal Liberals are in essence violating their own rules for political "gain".

Interesting that the party accepts this, but won't remove the power from the leader to appoint candidates.

The federal Liberals are certainly not democratic.

I'm a long time supporter of the NDP who as at times voted strategically when the outcomes were clear and it mattered.
The Dion/May move is brilliant and hopefully, only the beginning of a serious stratregic effort to prevent a Harper gov't from destroying this country.
Instead of blowing air at Dion, the NDP should get on board and cut a few deals themselves, to try and hold on to ridings where the margin of victory was thin, and the Conservatives were the second place finisher.
Responsible people think clearly and make tough choices. It' foolish and irresponsible to cling to notions of national pretensions when the evil doers are inside of the gate, and there is a chance to make real progress on the environment

"The Dion/May move is brilliant and hopefully, only the beginning of a serious stratregic effort to prevent a Harper gov't from destroying this country."

How would Harper "destroy the country" as opposed to let's say the Liberals?

"Responsible people think clearly and make tough choices. "

Reponsible people look at the options and actually
know how to think.

"It's foolish and irresponsible to cling to notions of national pretensions when the evil doers are inside of the gate, and there is a chance to make real progress on the environment"

and the Liberals and NDP have this down pat, right?

The Liberals have had a long time do things about the environment and instead did nothing.

Stuart,

Still getting a sheep herder to cut your hair?

Cheers