Me too, Boom Boom (nice to see you, BTW.  Now is about the time we'd get a gardening thread going about our fall harvests, but it won't be me as the crap weather in Toronto this summer has meant my garden is a total washout).

At the risk of being a bit drifty: I think Stockholm got to the heart of it in this post:

The NDP wants more seats, so they're going to try and discreetly shed their fringier elements.  The Liberals would have handled this better, IMO; they've far more experience with being hypocritical sellouts.  

But take SS marriage, for instance.  The NDP adopted a principled stance, and we all applauded them for it, but there are people in the NDP who believe that supporting the most activist extremist position on that issue cost them seats.  And they don't want to lose more seats over another "fringe" issue.