One wants to make allowances for the Conservatives. They were put in an impossible situation by the Prime Minister’s decision to call a snap election, scant weeks after the party had elected its first leader and with only the sketchiest consensus on policy. They have stood their ground manfully under heavy aerial bombardment from some of the sleaziest Liberal attack ads in memory, at the same time suffering continual sniping from most of the major media outlets.

Yet if this election presented the fledgling party with peculiar difficulties, it also handed them a rare opportunity. There can be few parties to have called an election after taking the kind of pounding in the press the Liberals did in the months before, not only from the unending stream of revelations in the Adscam affair, but also from a larger sense of disappointment that the drift and muddle of the Chretien years did not end with the Martin accession, but rather seemed to grow worse. That the Conservatives failed to capitalize on this—that indeed they are in the process of throwing away an election that was theirs to win—has to be chalked up to their own account.

It isn’t just the incompetence of so much of the Tory campaign: the infantile (and by now very stale) television ads, the largely contentless Web site, the press releases sent out in the wrong language. Nor is it only a matter of a few boneheaded comments by party members, such as Cheryl Gallant, who apparently lack the motor skills to close their mouths when a microphone is placed in front of them. The problem, rather, is rooted in some basic strategic and tactical errors, foremost of which was the failure to advance and defend their platform.

I don’t know who the genius was who decided to release the platform on a Saturday, when it would be guaranteed to attract minimal media attention, but it is perhaps not coincidental that the Tory slide in the polls began around that time. Yes, that was also when the Liberals launched their shock ads, alternately menacing the viewers with a pointed gun and an anaesthetic inhaler. But that’s the point: If, by your silence, you leave a void in the news cycle, your opponents will surely fill it.

But the failure to run on the platform did more than offer the Liberals an opening to go negative: it deprived the Tories of a positive message of their own, one that, had it been tried, might have proved immensely appealing. My initial disappointment at what the platform did not contain—whole areas of policy are passed over without comment, or consigned to the status quo—soon gave way to admiration for its focus on what was possible for a new party and a new leader to convey to the public within the time constraints of a snap election.

But can there be one Canadian in 100 who knows that the Tories would cut their taxes by $1,000 per family? Why was this never mentioned in any Conservative ad? Indeed, the public were more likely to learn of it from a Liberal ad, where they were also informed it would bring ruin upon the nation. Why, also, was no mention made of the Conservative democratic-reform plan? At long last, we might have a properly functioning Parliament, with free-voting MPs, elected Senators, a cleaned-up campaign finance system and fixed election dates. You’d think that would be worth telling people about.

If that sounds too wonkish, consider its importance as a bridging device, connecting public anger over the sponsorship scandals to a comprehensive program of reform—and thus to electing Conservatives. It is simply not enough to say, in effect, “elect us because we’re not them,” as the Conservatives are now discovering. Indeed, the public’s inclination to trust the challengers will be the less, precisely because of the (well-founded) sense that they are not being straight with them about their broader policy agenda.

It is striking to see how Stephen Harper’s image has changed over the course of the election. Going in, he was regarded as something of an ideologue, but a straight arrow, someone who would level with you, even if you didn’t much like what he had to say. Now the words one hears used to describe him are cunning, calculating. And it’s hard to say this is far wrong. He looked shifty on Iraq, demagogic over health care (he, of all people, would know today’s waiting lists have nothing to do with transfer cuts enacted in 1995). Policies left out of the platform keep popping up in candidates’ manuals (revamping the CRTC) or letters written mid-campaign (Air Canada). All of this was without the disastrous child pornography gambit, which succeeded in making him look both cynical and hotheaded at the same time.

Who knows? It’s possible the Tories may still eke out a win. But looking at the amount of grief they have endured for not telling people what they would do, it’s hard to believe they could have done any worse if they had.