Some lawyer guy with a suspicious last name:

I was immensely cheered yesterday to see that the Conservatives have made no meaningful headway in the polls.

This is a remarkable feat of political incompetence. The Conservatives face a fractured opposition led by a leader whose English is shaky and is still gaining his feet as a national leader. While Monsieur Dion may in time prove himself as a competent (or who knows, even imspirational) leader that time has not yet arrived. Moreover, Stephen Harper has a hotel sized buffet of issues from which to chose around which he could rally the troops, mobilize his core and shift the necessary number of votes in the margin. On top of that, the Liberals are trebly burdened with a sizable debt (both at the party and individual leader levels), a non-functional fundraising apparatus and new fund raising limitations imposed as a farewell legacy gift from Jean Chretin. Why has Harper therefore failed to build a steamroller of support that will carrry him to the next election?

I for think that the answer has to lie in his failure to communicate and then stand behind any vision. While Paul Martin was wilting under the heat of Gomery and Harper was rolling toward victory, I for one was living in dread of the victory of the Conservatives. I expected a range of actions on matters near and dear to my heart -- be it social issues like same sex marriage or constitutional issues like limiting federal power in favour of the provinces or creating a triple-E senate -- that would fundamentally alter the political, legal or social structure of Canada creating a meaner, more conservative, less functional and less cohesive nation.

I'm fairly certain I won't be voting for the CPC in the next election, though my reasons will be different from Robert's, his "remarkable feat..." bit pretty well sums it up.

As a parting shot though, I'll have to note the triviality of the items which fills him (and his peers, no doubt) with dread, which could roughly be summed up as "rolling the clock back to the nightmare years of 1998".