With the likelihood of a Conservative (possibly majority) government coming to power here in Canada shortly, it makes sense to get a few things out before the US press spins it in its usual braindead fashion.

Ever since the current Liberal government fell in November, the tension has been between distaste for perceived Liberal arrogance and scandal and longstanding fear of the Conservative Party and in particular its leader Stephen Harper, a product of the wingnut Reform Party that filled the power vacuum after the Conservatives imploded in the early 90s. Routinely described as “scary,” Harper’s persona is that a wingnut homophobe in the American mold: evangelical, blown-dry, and devoid of charisma. In 2004, this tension played out to the Liberals advantage, with voters stepping back from handing the reins to the Conservatives at the last minute.

This time, however, it no longer looks like deja vu all over again. After a seeming stalemate in the polls before Christmas—and the first debate—the dynamic has shifted strongly in the Conservatives’ favor in January, with recent polls putting the Conservatives up by as many as 10 points over the Liberals. In some ways this mirrors the dynamic in 2004, which gives some Liberals hope of yet another near death experience. More ominously for Paul Martin this time, however, is the recent plunge in his personal approval ratings, which seem to worsen every time he opens his mouth. As the pollster put it today, voter reaction to Martin’s name is remininiscent of the waning days of the Mulroney era, “when spittle would run down their chins” at the mention of his name. Harper’s profile, by contrast, as risen in voters eyes, with voters trusting Harper 32 to 25 percent over Martin.

Having watched both debates, I can see why. As I blogged after the first debate, Harper singlemindedly projected a moderate image only slightly to the right of Martin, largely dodging toxic social issues such as gay marriage while promoting family friendly policies such as a $25/week tax credit for child care and low-income subsidies for mass transit. On taxes, he promised a partial repeal of the hated Goods and Services Tax (GST), a 7% surcharge on top of provincial sales taxes that can take total sales taxes on certain goods and services over 15%. In the second debate, he refused to tout privatization as a solution for waitlists in the health care system, instead contrasting his lifelong use of the public health care system with Martin’s hypocritical employment of a private physician.

For his part, Martin seemed to be following a script that called for playing the nationalism card at every turn, which in Canada means calling your opponent a crypto-American. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, frankly—Canadians justifiably look at the United States the way residents of Gotham view Narrows Island in “Batman”. (Gun smuggling from the US is to Canada what illegal immigration from Mexico is to Americans, perceived spillover from a country with serious social problems.) And Harper does have skeletons in his closet, having once called Canada “a European welfare state in the worst sense of the word”, advocated sending troops to Iraq, and telling the American Enterprise Institute that they were a “shining light” to conservatives in Canada—all positions he has backpedaled from.

The problem is that Martin simply comes across as desperate. Of the four party leaders, only Martin gesticulates wildly while answering questions, and he even trips over his words from speaking too fast. He reminded me of Bush I in the final days of his term, or of Nixon sweating opposite a cooly composed Kennedy. An alien unfamiliar with Canadian politics would never guess that of the four parties represented on stage, Martin represented the one that brought Canada back from fiscal insolvency, kept the country together in 1995, and avoided joining the most disastrous war in a generation. In this regard, the most immediate political comparison is to 2000, and Bush v. Gore, where voters punished the incumbent for the sins of his metaphorical father (Martin was specifically exonerated of wrongdoing in the scandal that has twice brought down his government) while ignoring the dark side of a conservative challenger presenting a “compassionate” facade.

So is Canada getting ready to say goodbye (pace the Onion) to its long nightmare of peace and prosperity? I frankly doubt it. Much as I’d prefer a Liberal win, the differences between Harper and Bush reassure me that Canadians are not getting ready to buy the same snake oil. For one thing, Harper’s promises are not manifestly fraudulent. He’s not promising to spend 125% of the budget surplus and still have money left over, for example. Ironically, Harper’s promised GST reduction is indeed semibogus, in that he does not actually promise to fulfill it until around 2010. but this is nothing for something, rather than something for nothing. It’s sleazy, but not fiscally reckless. (It’s also basically a repeat of the same broken promise the Liberals made when they went after Mulroney, whose passage of the tax cost Conservatives the government but set the stage for balancing Canada’s hemorrhaging budget.)

And Harper’s income tax proposals target only the bottom of the income ladder, which would make the effect truly progressive. To those of us accustomed to standard Republican priniciples of “White people and millionaires first,” this is hard to wrap one’s mind around. Yes, Harper’s for mandatory minimums to combat an increase in crime, but so are the Liberals and the NDP. His $25/week day care credit may be overbroad as a matter of fairness, but it still is a federal day care policy. As for gay marriage, I can’t think of a faster way for him to squander the voters’ fragile trust than to re-open that can of worms. A recent poll shows slender support for Harper’s call for a “free vote” on the issue (the Liberals had passed the earlier same-sex marriage bill under party discipline), but another recent poll shows that 66% of Canadians considered the issue of same-sex marriage “settled and it’s time to move on.” Nothing like dispelling your reputation as a divisive party by promptly reopening a divisive issue, one now enshrined moreover as a Charter right. If that’s what they want to do, I say bring it on.

When we moved here last year we knew we weren’t moving to a one-party state (we felt, accurately, that we were moving away from one). And in any functioning democracy, no party can expect to wield power forever. If, as seems increasingly likely, the Liberals are turned out, it will be because Canadians hold their politicians to higher standards than American do, not because they have suddenly become born-again laissez-faire capitalists. As a neighbor put to me, “Canadians are skeptical, but they aren’t cynical, unlike you lot are. Big difference.” Or as an NDP policitician put it not so long ago: “Whatever their political affiliation—whether it be Tory, Liberal, or NDP—every Canadian is, at heart, a social democrat.”

I can live with that.