No Canadian election this summer.  No real surprise there.  All of the parties played their parts to perfection, gave us something to talk about for a few days, and we can now all go off about our vacation plans – assuming you have a job to have a vacation from – without the nagging concern that you should maybe possibly consider where you’d be at the end of July and whether or not you should think about maybe possibly voting.

Actually, I’m not as cynical about this as I sound – I’m one of the people that actually think Canada’s multi-party system has distinct advantages to the American two-party version, and that we’ve just seen the second example of why that’s so (the other recent example being the “coalition crisis”, but I’ll leave the why of that for another day).

The NDP and the Bloc set the stage – had they not come out solidly against the Friday vote, the Ignatieff Liberals would not have had the leverage they needed to force the Conservatives to the table, and the Conservatives wouldn’t have been able to save face by “saving” the public from the nasty Opposition.

We, the public also played our role to perfection. We clearly did not want an election. But we clearly are also tired of the Conservative bully and personal attack model of operation. Its just not the “Canadian way” – something the Conservatives seem to have a perennial blind spot to. Which is unfathomable to me, but there it is.

Regardless, there was a distinct possibility that, should we be riled by being annoyed throughout the first month of summer by having to mow around election ads, we would very likely switch to a minority government of a different stripe. That was something that Harper and Ignatieff could both agree that they didn’t want. Score one for common ground.

From there, the rest was a walk in the park I’m sure.

In a two-party system this would not have been nearly so clear cut. Note that in the US, success or failure in Congress and Senate are often a matter of convincing just a few “rogue” congressman or senators to vote against their party. Which gives, in my opinion, individuals way too much power in the governance of an entire country.

Sometimes, more (parties) really is better.

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