Election results.

NOTE: THE ATC SWAP IS NOW OFFICIALLY CLOSED. SWAP PARTNERS HAVE BEEN EMAILED! THOSE WHO SIGNED UP, GO CHECK YOUR INBOX!

A couple of my friends have mentioned that they are patiently waiting for the obligatory post-election blog post. To be honest, I wasn't going to do one. But I suppose I have changed my mind...

Going into the election I was absolutely positive of one thing: Stephen Harper was going to be elected Prime Minister of Canada for the third time. I was fairly certain about another thing: there was a good chance the NDP was going to be official opposition.

Both these things came true, and much to my complete and total dismay, Harper was given a majority government. Meaning he will be PM until fall of 2015. I don't think people have grasped that yet - but trust me, they will eventually.

Here is a run down on how I felt on election night as the results were coming out, as well as how I'm feeling now that it has sunk in.

Liberal/Bloq Quebecois Leader Loss
- I did have a moment of shock when I saw that Ignatieff (Liberal leader) wasn't going to be winning his seat. But it was Duceppe (BQ leader) losing his seat that had me gobsmacked. It really broke my heart to see his wife sobbing beside him as he resigned as leader! To see all the people in that room look like they had lost a dream. I don't support separatism (obviously I want my country to stay as one), but that moment put tears in my eyes.


Liberal and Bloc Quebecois' Future
- These two major parties were absolutely decimated in this election. The Liberals will probably gain back momentum sometime in the future (I'm thinking they'll break out their golden boy sooner than later). But the Bloc? I highly doubt they'll become as powerful and widespread (in Quebec) as they once were.

NDP: Blessed or Cursed?
- The NDP gained more seats than ANYONE predicted they would. Jack Layton's speech on election night made it seem like he had won the race for Prime Minister. It's definitely an amazing transition that I am 100% happy to see! But... they got babies. They got babies for MPs. A cage fighter? A university bartender? A 19 year old?! It's a little scary.

(source)

Goodbye Arts Funding/Money for Parties
- Although there are going to be a lot of changes under Harper's regime, these are the two that stick out in my head. Harper doesn't like the arts. He has already cut funding for the arts like you couldn't even imagine - and this was under a minority government! I really liked this article from Broken Pencil which sums a lot of it up better than I ever could.

Harper also doesn't like the funding that the political parties receive based on the number of votes they get. Be assured that that this will be cut almost immediately. And that's going to kill the other parties (particularly the Green party) who are not as good as the Conservative party at fundraising.

Obviously I was sad with the outcome of the election, but at least Newfoundland stayed blue free (Labrador on the other hand...)!

Anyone else have thoughts on the federal election? Were you surprised? Did you vote?