First: there's no natural coalition that can hit the magic number of 155 seats (156 if you exclude the Speaker). While the Liberals and NDP can come close at 154 (and may hit it if some recounts go their way), right now, they can't command a majority of the House, decreasing the incentive to create a formal coalition government. We can more or less discount the possibility of Liberal/Bloc and Conservative/NDP coalitions, leaving us with only one other even vaguely possible set of partners, the Conservatives and the Bloc (who won't form a coalition, but could work together on some issues). Surprise, surprise, a Conservative/Bloc block has ... 154 members.

The implications of this are positively delightful — a Conservative/Bloc block has a serious chance of pushing through legislation or defeating government legislation if the Liberals aren't on their toes every single day. Also, there now is a non-trivial incentive to try poaching members from the opposite bench. If Harper was appropriately inclined (I don't think he is), making a list of the top few opportunistic Liberal MPs that got passed over for goodies and then spending a lot of time wineing and dineing them might prove fruitful. Watch for individual MPs to suddenly become much more important.

Second: there are three winners in this election, and their names are Stephen, Jack, and Gilles (who went up a Parliament Hill to fetch a pail of water....), but they won in very different ways.

• Gilles managed to tie (or almost tie, depending on recounts) Lucien Bouchard's record for Bloc MPs. He can probably write his own political ticket from here on in. Watch for him to think about jumping to provincial politics and replacing Bernard Landry.
• Jack managed to nearly double his vote and seat counts. He put the NDP back on the electoral map in BC and Ontario, and took out Dennis Mills. Provided he doesn't excessively irritate the Canadian public with his perennially over-perky smile, he's set. He also holds the balance of power right now on a wide range of issues and can hold the Liberals to their promises, putting him in a good position for the next election.
• Stephen Harper managed to make some inroads (although not as much as might be liked) into Ontario and the East, and hold his Western base. Not bad for the leader of a new party that hasn't even had a policy convention yet. He gets to consolidate the party, hopefully steering it in a more attractive direction for urban Ontarians. This is probably the best result he could have hoped for, since it buys him time to wait until the Adscam story resurfaces and to ride out any problems with the economy without actually being in power. In fact, if I were him, I'd've been thinking along these lines during the election and when it became obvious that I couldn't win a majority, I'd think long and hard about trying to throw the election. Remember that he's always had a two-election strategy for becoming PM, so this fits his game plan perfectly.

Third: there's one big loser in this election, but it hasn't yet hit him. Paul Martin managed to squander plenty of goodwill between when he took office and now. As Warren Kinsella put it,

When Jean Chrétien figuratively left town, in mid-December 2003, the Liberal Party of Canada enjoyed the support of approximately 55 per cent of Canadians, in every region. Eight weeks later, Mr. Martin's brain trust had figured out a way to lop 20 per cent off of that figure - the level where, during the writ period, the Liberal Party's support has mostly remained. Dropping 20 points in a matter of weeks; that is no small achievement, but Mr. Martin's acolytes pulled it off.

Martin now has to deal with a Parliament that won't let investigations into Adscam die (as it benefits the other parties to keep it alive as a political issue), is going to be very restive, and in which it's entirely conceivable that he could lose votes at any time. Look for him to try governing as if he has a minority and to hold that only confidence votes will lead him to resign. Look to him to try to implement much of the "democratic deficit" agenda (how committed he is to it is another question altogether), as if he doesn't, the other parties will slap him upside the head and do it without him.

In addition, he'll probably have to go to the polls between one and two years from now (I'm expecting a fall/winter 2005 or early spring 2006 election) where it's quite conceivable that he'll get thumped hard unless he seriously improves his performance. Think of this as probation, if you will. Expect him to be unceremoniously dumped shortly after that election, unless he manages a stellar performance. The Paul Martin Magic(TM) has definitely worn off, but he might yet necromance it into dancing for him.

Finally: if you're looking for entertainment out of your Parliament, this is about as good as it gets. Now we get to hang on and enjoy the ride!

(Favourite moment of the evening: the Marxist-Leninists leading for a few minutes in a Toronto suburb. Must have been the poll where all the candidate's friends voted.)