The challenge ahead

Brian Topp nicely sums up the next steps for the NDP:

So our friends (the folks used to running things) are going to stop ignoring us. They will shortly stop laughing. And then they're going to fight.

New Democrats should welcome this – it is how Canada's entitled are going to inadvertently communicate to the people of Canada that the NDP is close to victory. We won't be hearing about “don't waste your vote” any more. Now it's going to be “don't make a terrible mistake”.

Which gets us to the core of the business that lies before the New Democrats over the next four years: That is to earn the new role Canadians have given the party and to build on it – into a governing mandate – whether the voices of the past like it or not.