Canadians are looking for a leader who has a vision of Canada - one which extends beyond simply being a "me-too" copy of the United States.

We are on the verge of a new Canada - different than the one we know, and whether we like how it looks will rest on the next few years. With the current prime minister, skilled as he is in the dark arts of partisanship, we risk losing the best of us. We have a national government shrinking from every challenge, making us a "me-too" copy of the United States, who views every issue through the prism of what hurts the other political parties, not what is best for Canadians.

But we all feel that something different and better is possible. The public reaction to Harper's roguish prorogation carries with it a cri de coeur, a public fed up with the tone and tenor of a leadership that is all about the small, the selfish, the bully tactics. Canadians want something to believe in; we want a little bit of greatness to aspire to.

We need someone to step forward with an idea of Canada that unites us, inspires us, tests us, enthralls us, and makes us dream. A little under 50 years ago we stepped into the void with an experiment in a third way - a country built on an evolving model of citizenship - where our culture was open, shared, and created every day as new people arrived on our shores, built on shared prosperity - where we cared for those who the market left behind, built on the notion that might did not always make right. Above all else, we believed that a good deal was better than a bad war, that the Canadian flag stood for a distinctive voice in the world, that each of us owed something to every other Canadian. In recent times, some of the sinews of nationhood have torn and the challenges have grown but the pettiness of public life has left us all less hopeful, more inward.

When someone on the national stage can rise to this challenge and lay out some provocative and challenging ideas for a 21st century Canada, Canadians will be engaged. Not everyone will be thrilled or love all, or even any, of what the leader preaches, but they will be engaged. We want our own change. We want someone who can speak to that better Canada we all carry in our hearts. And sooner would be better.