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With 12 of 12 meetings reporting, Bob Rae has won the most Liberal Leadership delegates in the province of Newfoundland & Labrador.

2pm, Saturday. The Big Question on everyone’s mind is: How are the Liberal Leadership Candidates Doing after Friday? First, the answer (see COMMENTARY and EXPLANATION below):

FRIDAY’S PROJECTED VS. ACTUAL (# OF DELEGATES)

FRIDAY’S PROJECTED VS. ACTUAL (% OF DELEGATES)

* NOTE: This is not the overall projection, but rather a weighted projection of Friday’s meetings.

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I’ve got to hand it to Gerard Kennedy’s people. Whether by design or not, the slogan (drum-beat, even) that leads their charge into Super Weekend — “REAL. LIBERAL. CHANGE.” — offers a direct challenge to Kennedy’s three chief rivals: Bob Rae, Michael Ignatieff, and Stéphane Dion. All are credible candidates and quality people, but they aren’t the best choice for Liberal leader at a time when, after 13 years in power, the Party must re-build from the ground up.

REAL. One of the biggest challenges that Bob Rae faces (apart from his belief that no new ideas are needed to win the race) is convincing Liberals that he is a real Liberal. Bob Rae joined the Liberal Party a few months ago to run for its leadership, and as late as the January 23 election, he donated to NDP candidates who narrowly defeated Liberal candidates. Unlike Rae, Kennedy has always been a Liberal, and has worked for socially progressive causes under the Liberal banner. That Kennedy held a strong NDP riding as a Liberal attests to his ability to attract progressive voters (Liberals got 24% before Kennedy, 56% with Kennedy, and 33% after Kennedy). A recent straw poll at Progressive Bloggers showed that 42% of people thought Kennedy was the most progressive candidate (vs. 20% for Dion and Rae, and just 6% for Ignatieff). As the most progressive and most Liberal candidate in the field, Kennedy offers the best hope for a united practical progressive Canada, one lead by the Liberal Party.

LIBERAL. That Michael Ignatieff’s foreign policy is largely indistinguishable from Stephen Harper’s suggests that he will have difficulty attracting progressive voters to the Liberal Party; indeed, some wonder whether his absence from Canada for the past 30 years, his abandonment of Canada’s peace-building role, and his desire to recognize Quebec as a nation (and thus, re-open the academic constitutional debate) genuinely represent Liberal values. His support for the Iraq War and George W. Bush’s theory of pre-emptive use of force (what Ignatieff has called “Empire Lite”) also worries many Liberals. By contrast, Kennedy, as a defender of using Canadian military forces in the service of peace-building, has strongly criticized the Afghanistan mission — a mission where just 6% of Canadian funds are going to aid and reconstruction. Kennedy asserts that only by helping build a viable, Opium-free economy, empowering Afghani civil society, and helping re-build their institutions, can the security that our soliders are bravely fighting for hold in the long-term. These are Liberal values and these are Canadian values.

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DemocraticSPACE is projecting that Michael Ignatieff will emerge from Liberal Party’s “Super Weekend” with the most delegates in his bid to replace Paul Martin as leader. While there is little doubt Ignatieff will emerge with most of the near 5,000 elected and 850 ex-officio (unelected) delegates, he faces a serious challenge from three closely-packed rivals: Bob Rae, Stéphane Dion, and Gerard Kennedy. Taking into account polling data, new member sign-ups, the distribution of campaign contributions, and the number of people signed-up to run as delegates in ridings and clubs across the country, DemocraticSPACE is projecting the following results:

For a Detailed Breakdown, including ridings (by region), youth, seniors, aboriginals, and ex-officio, please see below.

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METHODOLOGY

The projections (see SUMMARY) use four sets of data, each weighted equally:
1. POLLING DATA (25%)
2. PROVINCIAL ANALYSIS OF CONTRIBUTIONS (25%)
3. PROVINCIAL ANALYSIS OF MEMBERSHIP SIGN-UPS (25%)
4. NUMBER OF DELEGATES RUNNING BY REGION (25%)

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WE NEED YOUR HELP in compiling a tally of the number of people who are standing as delegates in each riding. If you know who is standing on the ballot for each candidate in your riding, please LEAVE A COMMENT BELOW or SEND US AN EMAIL. We will put your information into the charts, organization by province. NOTE: These are the total number of people who want to be elected for each campaign (i.e. those who submitted Form 6s) — out of these, 14 people will be elected per riding at delegate selection meetings this weekend.

SUMMARY TO DATE ¹

	UNDEC.	BRISON	DION	DRYDEN	MHF	IGNATIEFF	KENNEDY	RAE	VOLPE
TOTAL TO DATE	164	142	638	167	112	825	528	482	177
% TO DATE	5.1	4.4	19.8	5.2	3.5	25.3	16.2	14.9	5.5

NOTES
¹ Does not include Ignatieff’s or Dion’s Nova Scotia tallies or Dryden’s B.C. tallies (we will add these into the tally upon receive of delegates from other campaigns).
² Readers should be aware that campaigns are running the same person in multiple ridings, thus inflating their totals artificially. Delegates can only be elected in one riding, club or commission. Totals are presented as they appear on the ballot, thus include people running in more than one riding.
³ You have to click on either the “More…” or Post title for the quick jumps below to work.

SELECT DELEGATE TYPE **
1. RIDING DELEGATES

2. YOUTH DELEGATES
3. WOMEN’S CLUB DELEGATES
4. ABORIGINAL COMMISSION DELEGATES

Note: means listed numbers are complete for that that riding, club, or commission.

***

1. RIDING DELEGATES
ONTARIO

	Riding	UNDEC.	BRISON	DION	DRYDEN	MHF	IGNATIEFF	KENNEDY	RAE	VOLPE
	Beaches-East York		1	20	5	3	27	10	24	2
	Dufferin-Caledon		4	6	2	1	14	19	18	2
	Guelph		1	4	1		1		1
	Halton	3		5	3	1	9	18	9
	Kitchener-Waterloo			5	4		10	20	7	5
	Lanark-Frontenac-Lennox & Addington	2		5	2	1	3	2	7
	Newmarket-Aurora	15	1	2	2	12	7	5	9	1
	Niagara Falls		2	2	15		17	17	3	6
	Nickel Belt					1
	Nipissing-Timiskaming			2	5		14	2	1
	Oak Ridges-Markham			15
	Ottawa Centre	3	9	34	18	3	36	14	19	5
	Ottawa-Orleans	1	5	9	4		18	33	17	4
	Ottawa-Vanier					1
	Parry Sound-Muskoka	2		2	1	3	10	11	6	4
	Prince Edward-Hastings	1		4			14	6	6
	Sault Ste Marie		1		1		21	3	1
	Simcoe-Grey	2		2	2	13	8	2	6	8
	Toronto Centre	10	3	65	3	7	40	17	58	1
	Toronto-Danforth	7	1	17	6	5	26	12	31	8
	Trinity-Spadina			2			4	4
	Windsor-Tecumseh						26
	York-Simcoe	2	2	1		10	2	10	1	3
	TOTAL TO DATE	48	30	202	74	61	315	205	224	49
	% TO DATE	4.0	2.5	16.7	6.1	5.0	26.1	17.0	18.5	4.0

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One of the perks of living in Hollywood is getting pre-screening tickets (that is, special invitations to see a longer version of a movie, before its final cut, and attended by media, celebrities, etc). Well, I was fortunate enough to go to a pre-screening tonight of “Man of the Year”, starring Robin Williams, Laura Linney, Lewis Black, and Christopher Walken. I’m not allowed to disclose anything about the movie, unfortunately (they make you give up your first born if you do). You’ll be happy to know that I sat close to Bill Maher who took in the show. Maher of course is an idol of mine - if you don’t watch Real Time with Bill Maher, you should; it’s Must TV for anyone who follows politics, along with The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report, of course. But it was funny to see him there since the premise of the movie is that a political comedian becomes President (and Maher was mentioned a couple of times in the movie). So another night, another run-in with celebrities at the Arclight.

Hedy Fry has finally dropped out of the Liberal race. Undoubtedly, this is because she had so few people even running as delegates. Her support for Bob Rae is largely symbolic, as she doesn’t bring with her much support. Still, the optics of Rae landing all three drop-outs does give the impression that Rae has the momentum.

Moreover, a new EKOS poll shows that Bob Rae is the man to beat in the Liberal race. For many in Ontario, this will come as a surprise, since there are bitter memories of the Rae’s time as the only NDP Premier of Ontario. As the Gandalf poll noted, “Bob Rae is a polarizing figure in the electorate” (p. 18) and that “he will likely pull some votes from the NDP and lose some current Liberals to the Conservatives” (p. 30). It is also surprising because Stephen Harper’s best-case scenario is to face off against Bob Rae in Ontario, reminding voters of “Rae days” and the struggling economy under Rae’s leadership.

Rae’s relative strength illustrates just how odd this race really is. The Liberals are trying to re-unite the different factions of the party, a challenging task given it occupies the centre of the political spectrum, and because of the Chretien-Martin conflict. Almost all of the candidates are polarizing figures. It’s well understood that Rae is a polarizing figure, as noted above. As a former NDPer, many see him as too far to the left. Michael Ignatieff has also proved to be a polarizing figure, and his alignment with Stephen Harper on foreign policy, his support for the Iraq War, his being parachuted into his Etobicoke-Lakeshore riding, and questions raised about his opinions on torture (rightly or wrongly), has prompted many to see him as too far to the right for the Liberals (or at least not different enough from Harper). Scott Brison also has some polarizing qualities, as he once ran for leadership of the PC Party, and some have not yet accepted him as a Liberal. Joe Volpe is likewise either loved or hated due to preceived boss politics. Stephane Dion is also loved or hated within Quebec because of his drafting of the Clarity Act. Gerard Kennedy doesn’t bring the same level of animosity, but there are those who think he’s too far to the left to lead the Liberals. About the only candidate that everyone seems to like is Ken Dryden. But most don’t believe that he has enough core support to win. So whoever wins, will surely have a challenge bringing everyone on board. This suggests the possibility of a compromise candidate emerging on the convention floor — possibly Dion, Kennedy, or even Dryden.

The Liberal leadership race has now officially entered the weird phase. On the heals of Joe Volpe’s membership scandal in Quebec, there are now allegations that Michael Ignatieff’s team improperly signed up people in Ontario, again including at least one person who is dead. On the surface, it appears to be payback by the Volpe team for what they believe is a smear campaign orchestrated by Ignatieff’s Quebec team. On the other hand, if these allegations prove correct, it would cast a tall shadow over the Ignatieff campaign.

Volpe’s campaign was already plagued by his acceptance of over $10,000 by children of a pharmaceutical company executive, and having lost his campaign manager. By contrast, Ignatieff has not had previous scandals, although there are questions being raised about his July contributions report. For example, Ignatieff was the only campaign not to publish its July contributors. It turns out that the Party, for reasons unknown, did not return Ignatieff’s contributions to his campaign before the July 31 deadline, so contributions made in July (and the Ignatieff campaign claim they had 170 July contributions) would not be registered as July contributions. As such, they don’t appear in his July contribution report. So the only report required by the Liberal Party contains no information that wasn’t contained in the statuatory Elections Canada second quarter report in June. And since the Party decided against requiring an August report, Ignatieff’s July contributors will remain shielded from public view until late October when the Elections Canada 3rd quarter reports are published — well after this weekend’s delegate selection meetings.

But this irregularity is nothing compared to the allegations that Ignatieff improperly signed up new members, paying for their fees and signing up people who didn’t ask to be signed up (includng the dead). Whether these charges are legitimate or not, we will have to wait and see. But suffice to say, this race just enter the weird phase.

Update: I have heard from someone in the Ignatieff campaign about the controversy. He says: “that the dead member had signed up a 5 year membership and died after that. None - I repeat, none - of the memberships in question are campaign memberships. i.e. they are all old membership forms signed up before the campaign even got going, some years ago. All ridings are going through a membership form review and cleaning up the old forms. Every campaign gets to see all of the membership forms so this single source for the complaint was obviously from someone’s campaign.”

Update 2: Ignatieff’s team was cleared of any wrong-doing. Joe Volpe, however, was fined $20,000, which he must pay within 30 days, or drop out of the race.