Well, that's done: How the Liberals dodged a bullet

Remember how George W. Bush lost the popular vote in 2000? Everybody in the campaign along with anyone with common sense attributed that to the revelation that he had been arrested in Maine for drunk driving. the story broke on the Friday night before the election and may have been responsible for keeping as many as three million evangelical voters home.

Funny how that works, innit? Amazingly, it never happens to a campaign that isn't doing well. You only ever see it happen with very credible candidates. Well, something very similar happened with the last hour. Jack Layton's career just ended.

Sun News Network is on the air as I speak reporting that NDP leader Jack Layton was found naked by Toronto police in a rub and tug back in 1996. Layton wasn't arrested and no charges were filed. None of the major newspapers have anything online yet. Sun News is citing an anonymous retired cop as their source.

Of course, that's horseshit. Retired cops aren't usually noted for their political or media savvy. This is political and I'm pretty sure that everybody knows it. This was leaked by an opposing campaign. The officer didn't just go to Sun Media, somebody sent him. I know this because stories like this are always leaked by an opposing campaign, especially when they make the news on the closing weekend of an election and you have no time or resources to properly respond.

The way to properly analyze stories like this is too very calmly and cynically ask who benefits the most from the story. Not only will it lead you to the truth 99% of the time, it's almost always a great deal of fun.

It's really easy to conclude that, because Sun News is a Tory echo chamber, the story came from them. I don't buy it because Layton isn't a particular threat to Harper. The Conservatives aren't in any danger of losing any more than five or six seats at best to the NDP. Moreover, the NDP surge potentially divided the center-left vote in English Canada and could have let the Tories win more seats than Layton could have take from them.

The Dippers are, of course, completely annihilating the Bloc Quebecois. That's where most of the NDP's support is coming from. It's so bad that two prominent former BQ staffers today endorsed the NDP. But this coming from Duceppe's people makes no sense. First, because they have no history of operating that way that I'm aware of. Second and more important, if they were behind it, they'd leak it to the Quebec French media.

Gee, I wonder who that leaves .... Who benefits? Who has the political infrastructure to capitalize on something like is in a way that works for them?  Where will disasffected or offended women go on Monday if this story plays the way I think it will? Who's known for being so evil that they practically glow in the fucking dark?

Of course, Jack's crying "smear," but that's not going to work, especially in the NDP, which is so reliant on the feminist vote. He's right and everything, but he's not contesting the facts of the story. Not that it matters. The truth isn't going to just pop out over the weekend. And if it does, nobody will hear it. That's why stories like this always break on Fridays.

And that means that he's done. The Layton campaign cannot and will not survive this so late in the day, if only because they won't have the opportunity to respond. This story is going to dominate every political conversation over the weekend, and polling and advertising a legally obligated to go dark at midnight.

I expect that the NDP is still going to do well in Quebec, because the French generally tend to reward politicians that get their dicks wet. But their support in English Canada probably went into free fall an hour ago.

Stephen Harper may yet get his coveted majority. But more importantly, the Liberals live to fight another day. And that tells you pretty much everything you need to know about this story.

Update 2:53 AM EST:  As I indicated in the comments, I’m reconsidering the impact if the story a little.

I tend to look at these stories as how they play in American politics because there’s really no precedent for it here, especially not this late in a campaign. It’s too late to respond to, and too late to find out who did it before election day. It’s a very effective, very American, tactic. Ask both Presidents Bush.

But this isn’t the United States, and as I was writing and watching Sun News run the story, I didn’t consider the very real possibility of a strong sympathy vote for Jack. Because there’s no further polling before Monday, we won’t know if it’s coming, but this could theorectically drive Layton’s numbers up.

This is easily the weirdest fucking campaign I’ve seen or even read about in this country’s history. Who can say what’s going to happen anymore? But I’m sure the NDP braintrust is thinking this came from exactly the same place I do, which I think kills off a coalition rather nicely.

Uppderdate - Saturday, 8:05 PM EST They called me mad on Twitter! They even called me mad on my own blog! Now we shall see ....

@jonkay


For those who care, someone tried to shop me the Layton-massage story 2 yrs ago (without docs). It was a Liberal fixer

Who's your goddamn Daddy now? Who, I ask you! It is I! I am your Daddy and so I always shall be!

Special thanks to Richard at Eye on a Crazy Planet for the tip.