Blue Whigs are moving to the Tories faster than the far left is moving to Ignatieff

A very interesting column from John Ibbitson in the Globe and Mail speculates that Stephen Harper's increasing support is coming from fiscally responsible Liberal voters at a greater rate than Ignatieff is siphoning votes from the NDP and Greens by moving his party to the left.

Ibbitson uses the term "Manley Liberals" for right-leaning Liberal voters, but I like "Blue Whigs" better.

Conflicting polls mask an emerging truth: As all parties contemplate a possible spring election, the numbers show the Liberal Party under Michael Ignatieff successfully draining support from the New Democratic and Green parties, just as it hoped to do.  

But it is paying a price, as John Manley Liberals defect to the Conservatives, increasing the chances that a spring election would return Stephen Harper as prime minister with a strengthened minority, or possibly even a majority, government.

Full article at the Globe and Mail