Frnak McKenna runs for Liberal leadership in 2006

Canadian politics is not my specialty, so I'll just throw this one to those who know more about it than I do:

Let's say that Frank McKenna http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_McKenna decides to run for Liberal Party leadership in 2006. (1) Does he win it? (My impression is that he was considered the front-runner before he announced his non-candidacy.) (2) If so, how well do the Liberals do under his leadership in 2008? (Maybe better than they did under Dion, but would it be by enough to beat Harper?)
 
To be honest I'm not sure how he'd play nationally (Credible chance he'd win in 2008), but here in New Brunswick he's got a sizable following that supports him and a sizable group that despise him.
 
I imagine he'd win it; as you said, he was widely considered the frontrunner.

With a more competent Opposition leader, I suspect an election would be held earlier than OTL, probably in the fall of 2007, where in OTL the Liberals were polling better than 2008.

As for who would win, I'm not sure. I wouldn't rule out McKenna defeating Harper, as he'd almost certainly be a far better opposition leader than Dion, and has proven experience campaigning, but aside from Joe Clark governments in Canada have usually lasted more than one term. In this scenario I'd give the edge to Harper, but either way I suspect it would be close.
 
If Harper loses he's done as leader. Heck, even if he loses seats than people like Prentice will be organizing their people to remove Harper. People like Kenney won't be as established as they are now, so if the Tories get a new leader it's going to be free-for-all with Prentice as the kinda/sorta frontrunner.

Prentice versus McKenna would be an interesting contest.

McKenna only won in New Brunswick because of fatigue with the PCs, a relatively popular few mandates and the benefit of a severely divided Right-Wing. As Prime Minister he'd be in control of a relatively still weakened Liberal Party and a united Conservative-front.
 
Last edited:
Top