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By the time this column is posted we will be beginning Day 76 of a 79-day election campaign, the last 10 of which probably being the only ones that actually got your attention. Those 10 days certainly got Stephen Harper’s attention, if only because a growing number of polls suggest Justin Trudeau, the Liberal leader who was perceived as the Conservatives’ main political target when this campaign began last Aug. 2, is enjoying a growing momentum of support among voters sufficient to propel him into Harper’s job and the Liberals into what some are forecasting will be a “strong minority” government.

Of course the only poll that matters is that conducted of the electorate on voting day, and opinion surveys have been wrong – sometimes drastically, jaw droppingly wrong – before. But it’s intriguing to note the same polling establishment that now suggests the Liberals are poised to form a minority government found that Harper’s Conservatives were within striking distance of a potential majority on Sept. 22, which is to say just 51 days after Harper asked the governor-general to dissolve Parliament. Of course nothing lasts forever, and in the three weeks since Sept. 22, the Liberals have swapped the statistical lead with the Tories on an almost daily basis while Tom Mulcair and the NDP watched their chances statistically evaporate with each passing day.