Our Neighbors to the North

Big news in the Canadian election, last night.

The near-death of the liberal party, which lost its status as the official opposition to the Conservatives. You might remember the Liberal party as the political home of former Prime Minsters Pierre Trudeau and Jean Chrétien. The party leader, Michael Ignatieff lost his own seat and has resigned the party leadership.

From Canada TV:

The Liberals went into the election with 77 seats, which made them the second-ranked party in Parliament and the official opposition.

After the election, only 34 Liberals will be headed back to Ottawa, where they will form the small caucus of a minor party that lags behind the governing Conservatives and the Opposition New Democrats.

The almost certain-death of the Bloc Québécois, a Canadian federal party whose primary objective is the sovereignty of Quebec. Bloc Québécois Leader Gilles Duceppe also resigned his party leadership, after losing a seat he won more than 20 years ago. 

The Bloc only retained four of its 47 seats, but it still finished in second place in Quebec, with 23.4 per cent of the vote. It was far off the NDP at 42.9 per cent, but ahead of the Conservative Party at 16.5 per cent and the Liberal Party at 14.2 per cent.

A stunning election breakthrough for the left-leaning New Democrats (NDP) and its leader Jack Layton.  With the demise of the liberal party, The NDP is now the official opposition party.  The party did particularly well in Quebec, as votes shifted from the Bloc Québécois.

By early Tuesday morning, the NDP was leading or in control of 103 seats, many of them in Quebec, where the party had only one seat when the writ was dropped.

While Layton managed to grow his party every election, he smashed predecessor Ed Broadbent's 1988 record of 43 seats to become the first New Democrat to move into Stornoway, the Ottawa home of the leader of the Opposition.

And of course, the outright win of the Conservative Party:

For Prime Minister Stephen Harper, obtaining a majority was the overriding focus of his campaign. In the end, he did much better than the dozen seats he needed to secure the 155 required for control, acquiring 165, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation projected. The New Democratic Party won 105 seats, well above its previous record of 45, while the Liberals held only 35. Elizabeth May, the leader of the Green Party, became its first, and only, elected member.

Hard to say of course, which of these line items is the "real story."  But I would bet in the real, day-to-day lives of real Canadians, it is the fact that they now are assured a stable, Conservative Party-led government for the foreseeable future.  If Prime Minister Harper has his way, Canada's will continue its shift into a more right-wing country.

And, if you are interested in a geeky, interactive map of the results, you can find it here.