I read Tom's post.

Sorry, Tom, you're optimism may not be warranted.
A quick explanation of our political system is needed here for you Americans.

First: Primie Minister-elect Harper's conservative party elected to office is at the mercy of the other political parties
in parliament.

Here's the bottom line; The conservatives under Harper have only 124 elected members in Canada's
parliament out of a total of 308 elected members in this election.
They have a fragile minority.

If, in the next few months Canada's other elected members from the three other political parties
[the socialist NDP, the separatist Bloq, and the Liberal party members] gang up against
the conservatives in parliament by voting a nonconfidence motion, the conservatives would
then be forced to go back to the fickle electorate who may not appreciate another election campaign
within months of each other.
That's how it works up here in Canader, as Phil calls our land.