Hello, America! Did you know that there's an election in Canada tomorrow? Of course you didn't. It never fails to amaze us cats how blind the US media are when it comes to anything that happens above the 49th parallel. (Except maybe for hockey, and possibly not even then.)
Anyway, you can count on two things about Monday's vote: Despite consistent polls showing a Liberal Party lead, prognosticators are saying that, basically, anything can happen. Oh, and Justin Trudeau will be seen somewhere with a baby.
We're not really surprised by the latter, since Pierre Elliott Trudeau was a doting if late-in-life father, and clearly passed an appreciation for small humans to his sons.
But what did puzzle us was the punditocracy's insistence that there could still be a "Conservative surprise," despite the fact that the Liberals have led in 17 consecutive polls, nearly all outside the margin of error. What was it, we wondered, about the ever-unappealing Stephen Harper that made observers refuse to count him out?
And then we realized that the answer is: the niqab. Never underestimate the power of teabaggy hate — personified by Harper's scaremongering about veiled Muslim women taking the oath of Canadian citizenship — to drive white, male, immature, Rob Ford types to the polls. (We cats realize that Ford metaphor is probably way too redundant.)
In polite terms, this phenomenon is known as "shy Tories." Originating with David Cameron's unexpected win in the UK this spring, the concept refers to voters who are too embarrassed to self-identify as Conservatives to pollsters. However, once in the voting booth, they succumb to Tory tactics and indulge their inner xenophobes.
We cats sincerely hope that all the strategic voting sites, the early-voting ballot shortages, and the continued popularity of "Harperman" all spell doom for the worst Prime Minister that Canada has ever had. We'll have to wait to see what happens, but that would make us PURR.
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