08 05 06	Sheriff Lobo 76.65.202.68
I think part of the problem is that the NDP still cling to the idea that the aging children of the 60's who live in the Beaches vote NDP. That's simply not true any more. These people live in very expensive homes and pay a lot of property taxes and other taxes. The days of voting for a party who's stick it to the rich are over for this group. This leaves Churley short of votes in the Beaches while she's been unable to dig into Minna's support in the northern part of this riding.
	08 04 09	R.O. 209.91.149.239
Well it is a rematch of the last election here well at least the 2 main candidates Maria Minna and Marilyn Churley. Both main candidates bring some experience to the race. The by-elections were good news to the liberals but they do not guarantee a win here. As this is one of the most ndp ridings in toronto that the federal ndp does not currently hold. It is ndp at the provincial level and more or less a stronghold. An interesting factor is former green leader Jim Harris ran here in last election and I do not think he is running again. So the greens without a leader here might not focus as much here. Although his vote total was not that high compared to other green candidates in other ridings. But it could stay liberal or it could go ndp its really too early to say.
	08 03 22	I'm Always Right 24.150.237.186
There is no doubt now that the surging Green Party is eating the NDP alive. What does this mean in the Beaches? It means Churley can't possibly threaten Minna. The Greens have a natural constituency in the aging hippie sections of the Beaches and will gain ground there. The Green Party has a message while Layton's NDP are stuck spouting slogans from the 1970's that just don't connect with the electorate. You can bet the Minna people were very pleased with the March 17 results.
	08 03 17	Peg Leg Pete 99.234.197.75
Sorry but I have to respond to the no name NDPer who recently posted his party spin for Beaches-East York. Claiming Minna is bleeding Crescent Town is simply typical wishful thinking on the part of the NDP. Colle-gate was never the NDP hoped it would be and has long been forgotten. What the no-name NDP doesn't want to talk about is how Churley can't break through is much of old East York, even with the help of Michael Prue from Queen's Park. There will be lots of back and forth between NDP spinners and Liberals on this riding. Just like last time. None of that will mean anything as I said earlier, Minna will win by 3000 votes this time and Churley will keep trying.
	08 03 15	Curley, Larry and Moe 24.244.244.114
Maria Minna is going be beat Marilyn Churley again because Maria will out work Churley. Minna spends her time during the writ knocking on doors all day long while Churley preps for television and looks to make speeches. This was the case in 2006 and it will be again. Minna and her political machine are simply too much for Churley. The Liberals keep the Beaches.
	08 03 01	76.68.37.12
Don't count out Churley - Beaches-East York voters don't take too kindly to Minna's party's stance on Afghanistan and their poor record while in government on the environment. Let's not forget her direct involvement in securing a grant for a Bangali group as part of ‘Colle-gate’. Minna's bleeding traditional support in Crescent Town and progressive vote in the Beach. Should be tight and chippy affair! Churley by a few hairs.
	08 02 29	Peg Leg Pete 99.234.197.75
I just don't see why there's going to be a different result in the Beaches this time. The Liberals and the NDP are about in the same place in the polls where they were last time. Maria Minna is well known and has the better campaign team. Marilyn Churley still can't compete when it comes to campaign teams and still seems shrill. I predict Minna wins by 3000 this time.
	08 02 12	Stevo 74.14.51.249
Quick Draw, turns out I agree with you here. Churley is headed for defeat once more. Oh by the way, you may not have noticed that IP addresses are included underneath each person's nickname. I suppose you are I'm Always Right's spouse? Otherwise it would indicate that you are using two aliases, and you wouldn't do that, would you?
	08 02 09	Quick Draw 69.49.33.94
May and her party do very well in ridings like the Beaches where rich hippies from the 60's have given up on the NDP and the always bitter Marilyn Churley and now support the Greens. Minna will have a BIG victory here by simply holding the Grit vote. Sadly another humiliating loss won't mean we've seen the end of Churley. She'll run for city council (and lose) while she waits for the next provincial or federal election. So the King of K will have lots of opportunities to knock on doors for Churley. Minna could have her biggest victory yet this spring. Sorry King!
	07 12 16	Kin of Kensington 70.52.185.217
To ‘I'm Always Right’ (a.k.a. ‘I'm Never Wrong’ who got it wrong for Hamilton East-Stoney Creek and Thornhill in the provincial election): certainly the Liberals can continue to hold Beaches-East York but by 10,000 votes??? Maria Minna won by about 7,000 votes in '04 but Marilyn Churley closed the gap to 3,000 in '06. The NDP didn't win like in Trinity-Spadina or Parkdale-High Park because they had to overcome a bigger Liberal margin of victory. This can go either way. The only NDPer who I think would be a guaranteed winner here is Stephen Lewis, as the mix of upscale Beaches and working class anglo semi-suburban areas further north somewhat akin to his old provincial riding are good demographics for him, but he has probably closed the door on electoral politics for good.
	07 12 16	A.S. 99.233.96.153
Er, I can see how it's possible that Churley might fall short again. But I *can't* see how it's possible that Minna will win by 10,000 votes, not next door to Jack Layton, uh uh, no way, not unless the NDP falls to 1993 levels or worse, and with Gerard Kennedy replacing Stephane Dion as national Liberal leader on top of that. Hey, ‘I'm Always Right’, you might come closer to living up to your name if you spigot out that excess testosterone in your predictions...
	07 12 14	I'm Always Right 69.49.38.142
Watch for desperate NDPers to fill this site with reasons why Churley is going to beat Minna this time. The truth is that Churley has the chance to become the Sid Ryan of east end Toronto. Every election the lefty media will call for her to come through and instead she'll fall flat on her face just like good old Sid. No new pick ups for the NDP next time, including this riding where Minna wins by 10,000 votes next time.
	07 11 09	seasaw 99.225.19.235
Maria's been a solid MP for many years. Though, not always articulate, she has represented the area very well. She's worked hard and earned her place. The only way she won't return, would be by retiring. If Maria decides not to run, this riding would be open for anybody to take.
	07 11 01	T.V. 209.202.78.177
This is crazy. Every time the NDP put up a star candidate, and every time the NDP and media say this time they're going to win it. They've never come close, even with the disastrous 2006 Liberal campaign and about the biggest star candidate that they could field in Marilyn Churley. The next campaign will be exactly the same, with Minna winning by at least a couple thousand.
	07 05 08	Layin' Down the Facts 213.33.77.174
It must be a real honor for Churley to have so many famous and important people at her nomination meeting, but I don't think it will change the outcome of the election. The NDP seems to try to shuffle its candidates from riding to riding often. In this particular case, Churley left her seat in the legislature for Toronto-Danforth to run here last time and lost, while Peter Tabuns, who ran and lost in this riding federally in 2004, picked up the provincial seat in neighboring Danforth. Tabuns, former executive director of Greenpeace Canada, was also a strong candidate but he failed to even come within 7,000 votes of Minna. Lets look at the numbers: In the 2006 federal election, the Liberals won just shy of 40% of the vote in Ontario, while the NDP won 19.4%, and Minna won by over 2,500 votes, which is a relatively narrow, but not an insignificant margin. Recent polls place the Liberals at 44% and the NDP at 13% in Ontario. In fact, of 17 different polls taken since mid-march, only one places the NDP above 19.4: probably the one where the result was NOT accurate ‘19 times out of 20.’ The next highest result was 17, and most were around 15 or 14. Finally, it should be noted that Jim Harris ran here last election as the leader of the Green Party. Although he did relatively poorly, his votes will bleed to the Liberals if to anyone. Considering that Harris was a fiscally-conservative former PC, I doubt any of his personal support will go NDP. Given the alliance between May's Green Party and the Liberals, many people primarily concerned with the environment will realize that the Greens are a lost cause and that Minna under Dion is the most effective 'green' vote. Regardless, there isn't that much Green Party vote to begin with. Churley would have needed 90% of the Green vote last election to put her over the top. David Suzuki is a big name, but the Liberals have a virtual endorsement from the Greens, and there isn't much Green vote to steal anyhow. And unless Ghomeshi personally sacrifices his career as a TV journalist to interfere with the election, I doubt his support makes much of a difference. The presence of so many big names from the party indicates that the NDP machine is going to work hard to win this one next election, but the cards are not in their favor. If Minna runs a solid campaign, and if the polls don't invert themselves, Minna will hold it.
	07 05 01	Seamus 206.130.173.37
What are smoking RJ? Marilyn Churley was uncontested for the NDP nominated which happened in February! The nomination came a week after a Tribute Dinner that attracted over 300 people. The honorary co-chairs were Mayor David Miller, David Suzuki, June Callwood, Shirley Douglas, Judy Rebick and Heather Malick and emceed by Jian Ghomeshi and featured a performance by Sarah Harmer. Layton and Hampton both attended and Layton, Rebick, Malick and David Christopherson all spoke. The ‘Colle-gate’ scandal is hurting Minna in Crescent Town, in particular, and East York and the Beach in general. Churley is picking up support from long-time local Liberals in the Bengali community.
	07 04 27	Tom 130.64.130.18
Jim Harris drew a lot of NDP voters to the Greens last time. The Greens are not continuing Harris's absurd ‘antagonize the NDP’ strategy. Maria Minna is a weak and unpopular incumbent while Marilyn Churley is well-liked. I was surprised that Minna held on in 2006, but I doubt she will in 2007. Narrowly, narrowly for Churley.
	07 04 26	R J Anderson 142.177.114.243
Minna by a landslide. Churley's burnt her bridges in the NDP and may not be re-nominated, and she was the strongest candidate they could have had, short of Michael Prue going federal (and it's not clear which party Prue'd go federal with, he has lots of friends in the Liberals and in the Greens). Jim Harris did fairly well despite his ludicrous assertion that he'd win. A thousand votes will likely go Liberal given the Green versus NDP feuding and May's stamp of approval on Dion.
	07 04 17	Dr Bear & Prof Ape 67.71.59.63
So the latest poll says that the CPC is not doing as fabulously as we have all thought and are actually lower than they were in 2006. This doesn't bode well for NDp fortunes in this riding which were partly hoping on Liberal votes going CPC. TCTC but we say the edge goes to the Liberals.
	07 04 08	free_thinker 208.101.105.184
This is going to be close but will fall to the NDP for one main reason; a chunk of the Liberal vote will fall to the CPC following national trends paving way for the NDP to come up the middle. Furthermore, Churley knows what she needs to do now - look for her to pick this up for the NDP.
	07 04 07	A.S. 74.99.222.209
The TCTC logic is plain and simple: Maria Minna's no Gerard Kennedy. And if Churley couldn't win it last time, she had strikes against her: parachuted in from next door (where her more greeny-touchy-feely NDPness was arguably more at home), and facing a surprisingly feisty Tory candidate as well as the federal Green leader, she wasn't as clear-cut the nominal viable ‘anti-Minna’ option as she'd hoped. And by being a sore loser (lashing out at Mayor Miller and threatening to run against him, etc), Churley added another potential strike after the fact. But, I guess in the end, she's still too valuable to waste. And as long as Michael Prue holds it provincially, the ‘if not then, then never’ argument against the NDP won't hold--after all, Churley did win oodles of more polls than Peter Tabuns did the previous election. So if the NDP winds up trading a Nash for a Churley, they'll be satisfied.
	07 04 07	Nick J Boragina 74.12.71.10
I dont really see the logic in declaring Parkdale to be Liberal, and yet making this one too close to call. Sure you have a Liberal ?Star Candidate?, but even NDP ?Star? Marylin Churly could not win here last time. Polls show the NDP's support at around half what it was last election. If an NDP star cannot win this riding with the Party at 19% provincewide, she will not win it with the party at 11%.
	07 04 02	M. Lunn 74.99.130.109
Considering that Marilyn Churley was considered a strong candidate and still couldn't take this, I think Maria Minna is pretty safe. This may go NDP provincially, but lets remember Maria Minna is generally on the left of the party so many NDP-Liberal swing voters are quite comfortable supporting her.
	07 03 30	Rey D.R. 130.15.234.201
With Churley running again it sets up a rematch with Minna. Churley coming within 2,500 or so votes last time. Like Trinty-Spadina this one will likely come down to the national campaign and should be TCTC for now. Give Minna the edge since she's the incumbent.
	07 03 27	King of Kensington 74.98.171.205
Too early to tell whether this riding will go Liberal or NDP. The old Beaches riding was held by the NDP, but Beaches-East York never was partly due to declining NDP fortunes in the 90s but also due to its more conservative East York part. Also the Conservatives fare much worse than the old PC's did which has benefitted the Liberals. In the last election, Marilyn Churley won the ‘trendy’ polls by the lake but she was clobbered by Maria Minna in East York.