Triumph?

Paul Wells has a great column over on the Macleans website. It's a good read, and I'd recommend taking the time to give it a scan. His point is an important one, that everyone in the Liberal Party should be listening to: any sense that victory is a sure thing is premature and fooldhardy.

That said, I disagree with his characterization of the 2006 election as a "fit of revulsion" and the parallels he draws with the 1993 election. He writes:

But for more than 20 years now, Canadians voting in federal elections haven’t been in the habit of changing governments quietly, on balance, all things considered. No, it’s more brutal than that. We stick with incumbents—or we kick them out in a fit of revulsion.

Following the non-stop internecine warfare of the early 2000s and the revelations of the Gomery Inquiry, there is no question that Canadians felt a great deal of revulsion towards the Liberal Party in 2006. However, I am not sure that the progression from a majority to a minority to another minority (to another minority) that has characterized the 2004-present epoch supports Well's argument. He rests he premise on the belief that Canadians do not change their government's lightly, and when they do so it is with force and certitude. There is no question that 1993 supports this. I don't believe that moving from one minority to another minority displays the kind of force that Wells suggests it does.