Ontario Election, Minority Government, What Happens?

With polls having the Tories and Grits relatively close in the Ontario election and the NDP highest since Bob Rae's majority, the possibility of a minority goverment looms large. If Dalton McGuinty wins the most seats, I don't really see him forming a formal coalition with the NDP, but rather attempting to govern like Stephen Harper during his recent minority period. I don't think that's inherently stable, especially with weak second and third quarter GDP growth causing problems. Hudak and Horwath coming together as a coalition is obviously very unlikely in this scenario.

What's more interesting is if Tim Hudak wins the most seats, but not a majority. Do McGuinty and Horwath form a premptive coaltion and deny Hudak a turn as premier, or do they lie in wait to eventually usurp Huday like Stephen attempted to do a couple of years ago federally?

I think for McGuinty, coming off of eight years of majority government, allowing Hudak to even be premier for a little while is problematic. A minority premier isn't all powerful, but there's probably a lot of skeletons in the Liberal closet that come out if McGuinty is not premier so there's considerable incentive for McGuinty and Horwath to do a deal.

Vote splits versus seat counts could also factor. If Hudak is close to a majority and has a lot more seats than McGuinty, than a NDP Liberal coalition will be more difficult. If the Liberals win more seats than the Tories, but lose the popular vote than things get interesting.