Liberals lost a lot of seats tonight. Dion will have a serious choice to make soon and I think he will do the right thing for the party. If he doesn’t step down, he might risk getting thrown off. Harper has one more election in him. NDP gained seats so Layton has at least one more election in the tank. May should stay on, she has name recognition now, but needs to hire some political consultants that will convince her to give herself a realistic chance at winning a seat. 

Here is an interesting parallel: US elected republicans twice in a row, Canada now elected Conservatives twice in a row. In US, this resulted in eventual desire for change causing the Democratic party to pick a new and inspirational leader that attracted millions of new voters and sparked unprecedented interest in politics. Could lessons from US mean that Canada could see our version of Obama emerge in the next couple of years? The optimist in me would say yes. I think this election showed that there is a real hunger for inspirational and charismatic leaders. A leader who can unite and bring people together from all political backgrounds and show that he/she can change Ottawa to be more in touch with regular people. Liberals have an opportunity to go that route in the Spring. NDP and Conservatives will likely have that opportunity within the next couple of years, depending on results from next elections. 2008 election could be the turning point that could put Canada on route towards discovering new leaders that change how politics is done in Ottawa. The party that finds this leader first will form majority government for a long time. In the mean time, all attention will now turn to south of the border.