I want an election now. As in yesterday. I may not be tanned, rested and ready, in fact, I’m pale, insomniac and ready to snap. But I want to know the level of meanness we will be expected to live through for the next four years.

All suspense is abhorrent to me. I can’t even watch Jeopardy. I don’t care whether Alberto Gonzales, the embattled U.S. attorney general, lives or dies but I’m losing weight over whether he’ll keep his job. The fate of Canada has given me a permanent twitch in three of my limbs, there’s only one leg to go.

Canada, I have to know! How will you vote? Will you speak up for the rather fine little civilization we have built here (yes, I know the NDP won’t win)? Will you shove the whole thing into the Liberal lap in a panic over Stephen Harper (smarten up, Liberals)? Or will you hand it over to the Conservatives for dismantling and shipping to the United States (how I miss the Red Tories)?

Weird pre-election stories have been floating around. One newspaper suggested that the NDP had done a deal with the Conservatives over some B.C. trees. They made it sound as if the NDP had prostituted itself for what we here in Toronto would call a “parkette” (two maples, a poplar, some shrubbery, a bench and an array of used needles). “I hate trees,” I muttered. This is how melancholic I’ve become.

As it turned out, the “parkette” was the Great Bear forest. The Conservatives had admirably thrown some cash at it at the urging of the NDP, and as Jack Layton told me in an interview in his Ottawa office, it’s about one-quarter of B.C.

“We have made no deal. There has been no tradeoff,” he said. “We are polar opposites.” It’s merely a fact that whatever the antics in the House of Commons, opposition parties and government frequently discuss such matters. The business of government goes on.

That’s a relief.

With the NDP officially Not Dead At All, I have just finished reading the new edition of Layton’s book Speaking Out Louder: Ideas that Work for Canadians. Layton is an intelligent and interesting politician. He embodies everything that is current in this world.

That’s the thing about New Democrats. They’re as energetic as many of us are idle, as investigative as we are incurious.

After Layton’s book, I want solar panels in my house and a little wind turbine on the roof. And a vegetable plot. I’m going to redo the front garden with drought-resistant plants and buy a Toyota Yaris. I want a little pointed stick to pick up litter in my neighbourhood and a scrub brush for the graffiti.

But the NDP won’t triumph. What they will do is lead in their own peculiar way by being the party to generate the ideas that will eventually be taken up by the Liberal behemoths. Or maybe even the Conservatives.

In the meantime, Harper’s Conservatives are planning the Americanization of Canada. They are peeling back all the things that Canadians do collectively. (Mystifyingly, this includes the Wheat Board, the only thing beleaguered farmers have on their side.)

Military spending has soared in a nation that has no need for a military. We can’t defeat the U.S., so why pretend? The only way to prevent a U.S. takeover is to build a nuclear bomb. It has worked wonderfully well for North Korea. Immoral as it is, nuclear warheads get respect even from bullies.

But all this is prologue. The real deal is the subterranean, ultra-secretive planning for something called “Deep Integration.” (Go to the Council of Canadians to learn more.) According to this, Canadian and American CEOs, as well as heads of government, have been meeting to plan the blending of the two nations in a way that suits business but certainly not citizens.

Our water will be shared. The proponents call it “a resource security pact” but it essentially means a giveaway of our natural resources. The border will be opened to suit business interests. Regulations will cover both countries, meaning that we won’t be able to keep out pesticides or GM food, for example. The U.S. has already been corporatized. Canada, too, will learn to obey CEOs rather than MPs. Our money will go to the military rather than health care.

It’s a nightmare scenario but it is happening. These business interests are desperate that news of these meetings and the plans not get out, because the Canadian electorate would be enraged.

If anything other than a hard-right Canada (which isn’t actually a Canada at all) is to emerge from the next election, the NDP and the Liberals âe” and yes, the Greens âe” should talk to each other about how to fight collaboratively.

We are reaching a crisis point. The Liberals are in danger. The NDP is in danger. Canada is in danger. I want my election now. If we’re going down, I want to know about it and decide whether to fight or make my peace. The weird thing is that a Conservative win would be good for people like me. I can afford dentistry and lawn care. Life is good. Yet all my life, I have voted against my own economic interests because I want the country to prosper and be civilized as a whole. I want public affluence, not public squalor. What a sucker, eh?

If the Conservatives win, will I have to turn right wing just to make my limbs stop twitching? That garret in Paris is looking more appealing every day. I’ll read my books, I’ll eat cheese, I’ll leave my Canadian broken heart behind.

This week

I am reading the British psychiatrist Oliver James’ book on middle-class misery. It’s called Affluenza and it studies the odd phenomenon of unhappiness increasing along with prosperity. We want wealth and fame âe” I find the fame bit truly mystifying and would pay good money to have American Idol not just cancelled but apologized for âe” but the eternal wanting is agonizing. Here’s a tip: Stop wanting what you can’t afford.