O Canada! There’s hope for you.

“With all thy getting, get understanding”

CANADA’S POLITICS have long been left-of-center compared with those of its southern neighbor. Its rigid socialized medical system, for instance, allows virtually no private alternatives. But things may be changing—at least a bit. In the recent election in Canada’s second-largest province, Quebec, the longserving Liberal Party was routed, not by the traditional opposition party advocating separation from Canada, Parti Québécois, but by the new center-right Coalition Avenir Québec, or CAQ for short. The two older parties are both fond of taxes. The CAQ is skeptical of a proposed national carbon tax and is intent on deregulation, and it may actually reduce taxes. (The downer in this election was the 16% vote garnered by a truly hard-core leftist party, Québec Solidaire.)

In a stunner this summer, voters in the country’s largest province, Ontario, overwhelmingly tossed out a left-wing government, replacing it with a conservative one that ran against all subsidies for alternative energy sources. Alas for the reckless-spending incumbents: Windmills and solar panels are not cheap. Conservative candidates tapped into consumer anger over electricity bills that had gone up more than 70%. Needless to say, the new government has given a thumbs down to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s carbon-tax scheme. The conservatives are also winding down a minimum-income project—the kind lauded by such Silicon Valley moguls as Mark Zuckerberg, who should know better.

Leftist regimes in several other provinces are also losing popularity.

Canada is light-years away from becoming a Switzerland or a Singapore, as was evidenced by the election of tax-loving Justin Trudeau. But there are intimations of positive change.