After watching the election results roll in Monday night, it soon became apparent that the real winners weren't the Conservatives and NDP, but the Canadian public. Common sense scored a victory and we all stand to benefit from it for the next four years.
This was a race where everyone won something. The Tories finally got their much coveted and well deserved majority, Jack Layton and Olivia Chow got a new house - a far cry from when they lived illegally on two MP's salaries in a subsidized housing complex in Toronto - the Liberals got rid of Michael Ignatieff, soon to be replaced by Norma Bob Rae who last night was sounding a lot like Al Haig just after President Reagan got shot, (I am in charge), the Bloc got a one way ticket to palookaville without a taxpayer funded bus, and Elizabeth May finally got a real job.
Now, after four elections in seven years, we can get on with the business of running our country for the benefit of the many, rather than the self interest of a few.
With 167 seats, Harper has a golden opportunity to address many of the issues that as a minority prime minister he could only dream about.
Harper's original budget which will be reintroduced, with its emphasis on fiscal restraint, job creation and a get tough on crime agenda is a good place to start.
Here in Prince George, you only have to peruse our daily court docket to see the gong show of concurrent sentences and one day probations to know that all is not right with the justice system.
At the same time, he is now free to deal with the crisis in healthcare spending that threatens to hit this country like a tsunami over the next few years. The wheels have fallen off the gurney and to continue to pump billions into the system at the expense of education, infrastructure and other social programs is criminal.
Now with the NDP as the Official Opposition, Canadians will have to pay more attention to some of their loonier policies, not to mention the grab bag of MPs elected from Quebec, even as they gave the one finger salute to the other three parties. Whether Layton can live up to the expectations of Quebecers and consolidate support that is a mile wide and an inch deep remains to be seen.
By electing only six Tory MPs, Quebec has effectively dealt itself out of the game and proven once and for all that you can form a majority government without winning Quebec. The worm as they say has definitely turned.
In the 1957 election, Quebec elected just five Tory MPs and after realizing the "old game" of holding the rest of Canada for ransom only works when you have enough seats on the government side of the House, they returned 50 Tories in Diefenbaker's landslide win in 1958.
The Liberals will now elect Bob Rae as Leader and as a former NDP premier of Ontario; he should have no trouble working with "Jock" Layton.
Who knows, depending upon the state of Layton's health, we may eventually see Rae emerge as the leader of a combined NDP/Liberal Party.
As Confucius said, "May you live in interesting times."
