This morning there were signs of real life from the campaign of Dennis Galiatsatos, the candidate from the Conservative Party. The candidate was shaking hands with people this morning at the Cote Vertu Metro, and I was able to chat with him. To my surprise, Mr. Galiatsatos thinks he has an excellent chance of beating Stephane Dion, in spite of this being a Liberal stronghold. His take on things was that this time around, voters knowing that this time Mr. Dion is running to become Prime Minister, will feel less inclined to vote for him than in previous elections. Mr. Galiatsatos also has noticed that many voters are not happy with the deal he made with Elizabeth May. Later, I decided to check out Mr. Galiatsatos’ website. It is extremely well done, and while playing up the candidate’s involvement with the political process, also uses photos of his meetings with Harper to reinforce the “Leadership” focus of the Conservatives’ strategists.

In my opinion, and having lived in the riding so long, I will be very surprised if anyone can beat Mr. Dion, simply because of the amount of loyalty citizens here feel towards the Liberals. St-Laurent is the borough of Montreal with the largest number of new Canadians and immigrants. The Bloc’s second place finish here the last few elections seems to represent the still francophone portion of the riding.

In the last campaign, the Conservative Party ran a Muslim woman who ran a small campaign office on Decarie, but otherwise, her candidacy was almost invisible. She finished behind Liz Elder of the NDP.

The NDP chose a candidate over a year ago, Carole Haddad. It is official now that she has had to withdraw. A replacement will be named by Monday. There should be some Jack Layton signs appearing in the coming days.

But today, from the grass roots level, it looks as if the Conservatives could finish a strong second this time around…