Election Predictions

Hey gang!

It's SU elections time again! Yippee! Hooray! In the spirit of trying to maybe actually run a blog, I'd decided to post my predictions on this year's elections, race by race! Please note that these do not necessarily reflect who I think ought to win, or who I necessarily will vote for, and are merely a reflection of my judgment of 'the mood'.

Without further ado:

President

• Rory Tighe: 75%
• Dr. Horrible: 5%
• None of the Above: 20%

First of all, I think that the NotA vote is going to be fairly strong this year in all races (VPSL a possible exception), purely because of the lack of candidates for most races. Looking at last year, even the contested races ran at around 20% NotA, with the exception of president - this year, with one presidential candidate, I think 20% is reasonable. Dr. Horrible hasn't done very much at all to make his presence noted, in my opinion, and I don't really think he's filled the normal 'role' of a joke candidate. Way more votes to NotA than him. As for Rory, his campaign has been solid, if not strong - I feel like it would have been much better if maybe he'd had some competition.

VP Academic

• Emerson Csorba: 75%
• None of the Above: 25%

Again, NotA is likely to be a bit stronger this year that normal, given the lack of competition. However, I think that Emerson's done a lot to talk to students, has really gotten his presence out there, and has been doing the ground-work for a very long time. The people who are going to care about the election definitely have confidence in him, and I think this will show.

VP External

• Farid Iskandar: 65%
• Godzilla: 10%
  
• None of the Above: 25%

Again, there's going to be a higher-than-normal NotA vote across the board this year, and this race isn't truly contested. NotA will possibly be higher than it was for president, though, partly because a) most people feel External isn't as important as President, and b) I feel there are some people who are genuinely going to vote non-confidence in Farid, based on conversations I've heGodzilla ought to do slightly higher than Dr. Horrible only because his posters are actually kind of cool, but otherwise this race is pretty straightforward.

VP Operations and Finances

• Andy Cheema: 70%
• None of the Above: 30%

Mostly some of the same reasons as before. Andy's platform is solid, but NotA always creeps up when there are uncontested races. I'd put the NotA higher than Emerson's again because I feel that the OpsFi position normally doesn't propose radical new ideas like a complete renovation of SUB basement, and there may be people who are genuinely opposed to it and have no choice but to vote NotA.

VP Student Life

• David McBean: Embarrassing second round finish
  
• Colten Yamagishi: Close second
  
• None of the Above: Tie-breaker
  

That's right, I chickened out of making actual quantitative predictions. Here's what I think is going to happen: on one side, we have David McBean: he's climbed the ranks of CSD through orientation, and is (in my view) going one step further to the post of VPSL. I think he's proven to students that he's involved all over the place in events (DJing doesn't hurt popularity, but probably doesn't strictly help credentials), and that he can make Orientation awesome (woohoo). On the other side, we have Colten Yamagishi: very involved in the LHSA, his fraternity, SL Planning Committee, and Students' Council over the last few years. My take on his campaign is that he's taking the knowledge he's learned from all of this, and moving up from the SU Governance side of things.

Why do I give the edge to David? Mostly because I think a) he's shown he can do what a VPSL has to do, and b) a lot of the people he'd be working with next year have already worked with him through CSD, and are adamantly supporting him in his campaign. Previous elections have shown that the "Lister vote" or the "Greek Vote" don't really exist, so we can't rely on them winning the election for Colten, and otherwise Colten hasn't been strictly in the spotlight of SU events recently, regardless of the amount of behind-the-scenes work he's done.

What do I think is going to happen? I think it'll be a two-round election count, with a majority of NotA voters swinging to David on the second count. What I really mean by this is that it'll come down to a popularity contest, and that in the end there will be a small edge given to David from the people who don't care, but really like Pokémon Cards.

Undergraduate BoG Rep

• Raphael Lepage Fortin: 65%
• None of the Above: 35%

Quite frankly, I think that despite Raph's presence at the fora, most students haven't ever seen his face, or of his material other than the hand-drawn pictures promising to save Christmas. People who don't know him personally but care about the position are probably going to be put off by this, and I think some of the NotA votes will strictly be out of non-confidence.

Fall Reading Week

• Yes: 60%
• No: 40%

I think the process this has gone through in terms of plebiscite will provide itself with this high a No vote. People have a variety of reasons to vote no: they don't like starting school earlier, they're confused about the proposal, they don't think a plebiscite matters if it's non-legally binding, or that they just don't want to have the Reading Week. On the other hand, people voting Yes will probably read the bit about the Reading Week, say "Sweet, man!", and vote without reading the logistical proposals. A lot of work has gone into this proposal, and it's funny that the majority of people voting yes probably won't be concerned about how it's implemented, whereas the how is going to be a large factor in the no vote.

Overall

I think voter turnout will be down this year over last, probably to about 15% (from 22% last year). Worst faculty turnout will be Augustana (I just can't imagine why they'd bother this year over any other year), and best could possibly be Sciences/Engineering, as they're running their elections through the SU system this year.

That's all for now!