For years we insisted that the Liberals weren’t really liberals. Silly us. Canadians looked around, they saw a pretty liberal country: universal health care, public education, progressive taxation, the best immigration record in the world.

"If New Democrats think this is conservative then they must really be pinko-commie-bastards, right?"

This stuff nearly destroyed the party. It only made us look extreme.

My, though, how the tables have turned. The Tories are the new New Democrats. They tell us -- despite all evidence to the contrary -- that Paul Martin isn’t a conservative. It's déjà vu, all over again.

This reversal of fortune may seem as though it's come out of nowhere, but it hasn't. Liberals have traditionally been a left-of-centre -- not a centrist -- party. How do think universal health care was established? How do think Kyoto was ratified? Why do you think a majority of Canadians (55%) support gay marriage? Because most Liberals are liberal.

Enter Paul Martin. Times have changed.

Of course, Liberal leaders have always sold out their progressive ideals to win elections, but at least Liberal leaders had progressive ideals. Unlike any Liberal leader before him, all indications are that Paul Martin actually is a centre-right, conservative. As the Tories insist that he’s not, they foreshadow their own irrelevance.

The NDP nearly became extinct trying to claim that Liberals weren’t liberal. We should have realized: It wasn't our values that were different, but our commitment to them.

Now, it's the Conservative Party's turn. So, as a New Democrat, let me offer this advice: the only difference Conservatives ought to be highlighting between themselves and Paul Martin is that they’re proud of their conservatism, while Mr. Martin is ashamed of his. Something like this...

"We aren't extremists. We have the same policies as he does. We just stand up for what we believe in."

If instead, Conservatives just keep assuring Canadians that they're even further to the right than the new Prime Minister, they'll soon seem even more extreme than they actually are.