With last week's announcement that the Liberals are abandoning their promise of electoral reform, coupled with their out-of-control deficit spending, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau may have already burned the bridges he built, both to the left and to the right, that won him a majority government in 2015.  

The Liberals cannot win a majority in 2019 without the support they siphoned from the Greens and the NDP on the left, nor without the soft conservatives and Red Tories who turned to them after a decade of Stephen Harper. After all, as much as we view Trudeau's 2015 majority as a resounding victory, the Liberals captured less than 40 per cent of the popular vote. Subtract five per cent and all bets are off.

When the new Minister of Democratic Institutions, Karina Gould (No, this is not fake news -- the Trudeau Liberals still do have a minister tasked with democratic institutions) released her mandate letter from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau it read: 

"A clear preference for a new electoral system, let alone a consensus, has not emerged. Furthermore, without a clear preference or a clear question, a referendum would not be in Canada's interest. Changing the electoral system will not be in your mandate."

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So long, electoral reform! Welcome back, first-past-the-post!

Elizabeth May, the leader of the Green Party, said yesterday that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's announcement that his clear promise of electoral reform back in the 2015 federal election campaign was going over the side left her feeling "more deeply shocked and betrayed by my government today than on any day of my adult life."

Those of us who are old New Democrats, or old Tories for that matter, may not feel quite so much shock.

It is Groundhog Day, after all, and we've seen this movie before -- over and over and over. Every time we're persuaded to vote Liberal for one reason or another, as a matter of fact.

Four key steps were taken toward electoral reform in 2016. A multi-partisan committee of MPs worked together to submit a majority report recommending proportional representation. A new Alliance of 62 groups called Every Voter Counts was formed to advocate for equal and effective votes. P.E.I. rejected the majoritarian options on the ballot in a plebiscite and a majority voted for a mixed-member proportional voting system. Finally, Justin Trudeau reasserted his promise to change the voting system and confirmed he will introduce legislation in May 2017.