Predictions

From what I'm reading, the Conservatives are aligning the planets to have an election in June.
How will they do that?

The Quebec election is in March. In the last week of the campaign, the federal budget will be presented, which is filled with tax cuts, including the tax back guarantee from interest savings on debt repayments, but also the deal to "solve" the fiscal imbalance.

All three opposition parties will defeat the coming budget in May. Duceppe will say there's still an imbalance (yeah, maybe in his head!), the Liberals will defeat it because they already said they would, and the NDP don't like tax cuts, so all of them will vote against it and this will kick off the campaign.

The NDP will be marginalized. The Green's will pick up a seat. The Bloc will lose seats to a few Conservative and Liberal gains.

The big issue is the environment of course, which the Conservatives appear to be handling. The Liberals are seen as no better on the environment, so Dion doesn't have a soapbox to stand on. He'll get creamed in the debates by cool, collected Harper.

The Conservatives need about an extra 30 seats to get a majority. With Jack Layton and the NDP sucking the hind tit lately (watch Question Period), the Greens gaining on them, and Jack making a deal with the Tories on the environment, unfortunately, those NDP votes will go to Liberals, and some to the Greens, who have some money in the bank now.

Watch British Columbia, a hodge-podge of folk who are pro-environment but also pro-democratic reform, which is an issue only the Conservatives have a handle on with Harper's push for an elected Senate. The Conservatives lost a few good seats there last election.

That said, the Bay Street business crowd will now turn against the Liberals with Dion as leader, so you may see the Liberals lose any blue liberals they had that liked Paul Martin, but what's potentially stopping that is the Tories reversal on taxing Income Trusts.

Any potential majority for the Conservatives will all come down to whether they can penetrate the Greater Toronto Area.

But will the economy hold? Housing prices are levelling. Thousands of job losses at Nortel and Chrysler can't be good. Industry is about to be regulated on pollution, which may slow things down at bit. There have been predictions for some time that the economy would slow as it's been going full-tilt for many years now.

Also, there are predictions that this summer will be very warm in Canada, fuelling the global warming hysteria.

So the timing of an election for the Conservatives isn't such a bad idea.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that the Conservatives will win another minority, but with more seats than they have now.