January 20, 2006
NDP tops 20% in latest Ekos poll
The every-other-day poll track:

Alan McLeod (the Red Ensign Brigade's token lefty) will be pleased to see the NDP's numbers jump over the 20% barrier for the first time during this campaign.
Sourced, as usual, from the Wikipedia page on the election.
Posted by Nicholas at January 20, 2006 10:06 AM
Alan's employed, right? Alan owns a home, right? Why would anyone with a job and home be happy to see a rise in support for the NDP?
I don't get that.
Because Alan's family has had cancer, quad bypass, hugely remature child birth among other things (like a husky bite to the face) that has not led a private health insurer to raise the deductables to the point we cannot use the service like has happened to our upper middle class retired relatives in the states. See I have a family that lives in the home and the survival of the fittest wet dreams of the libert-anarchist set are not much good when there is a long term disability care from a car accident or a miscarriage in the night.
First, Alan, I hope that everyone in your family has been able to receive the treatment that they needed and that they have recovered from their illnesses and accidents. I hope you will read this as being sincere.
So what do we do to "fix" health care in Canada? Do we just keep throwing money at it? That seems to me to be what the NDP is suggesting, according to what I read on their website. It does not look like they will seek out efficiencies in health care -- they will just regulate where the money goes, and ensure that none of it goes to a private practitioner or clinic that might be able to provide effective service at less cost.
Do you really think we need more socialism, Alan? Really? Honestly?
Thanks for that, Jon. I hope I was more emphatic than angry in my response. I think that we need an acceptable level of socialism which I admit is a lot like a statement like "soveriegnty association". There is much more good in the public health system than the right admits and much less good in it than the left would have us believe. I do accept the warnings on deductibles I hear about from stateside family as well as the massively increased insurance bureaucracy from doctors I know who moved there. For me right now the NDP works as it is maybe the best most realistic and least experimental option.