I'm well out of the politcal scene happening back home, but from my perspective it seems to me that the conservatives have gone all "let's better friends with the US", and adopted a number of policy changes that look something like US GOP policy. Or the Liberals have muddied the argument enough as to cast doubt on them for it.
To me, the CPC = the Reform Party. Lots of cast members are the same, and the well right of your average Joe Canadian members still carry a lot of power. Their platform is sneaky, and sorta reads a little like GW's 2000 platform - vague, positives emphasized, with heaps of room for interpretation. They also capitualate to the needs of the current US administration in their platform(Kyoto, missile defence), and we know that, generally, the public in Canada loathes GW.
For the conservatives to come to power in Ontario, and indeed Canada, they need to project themselves in terms of fiscal responsbility, and leave the moral issues that assoiciate them with the GOP behind.
I voted for Joe Clark when I was in Calgary, and would do so again because he was smart enough to understand that. Your classic social liberal, fiscal conservative. Someone along those lines running the CPC might have made the election a slam dunk. (In fact before the scandal, these were the things said of Paul Martin).
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