Put your average Western Canadian conservative and Manhattan liberal in the same room, and I don't imagine they'd find they had a lot in common. But on one front, at least, they could agree: It's no fun losing elections and it's always easier to blame someone else when it happens.

Since the Nov. 2 U.S. presidential vote, a good number of Democrats have refused to look in the mirror for the reasons behind George W. Bush's re-election. It wasn't John Kerry's lack of personality, or his waffling on Iraq, or the absence of any clear campaign message, they're saying. It was all those Jesus freaks in the South.

For their troubles, they've rightly been chastized for being out of touch with the voters they'd need to get a Democrat back in the White House. And ironically, nobody in this country has been more effective in delivering that criticism than the conservative types who reacted to the federal Liberals' re-election last June by lashing out at the parts of the country that had the temerity to vote for Paul Martin's party.

Trust me, I'd know. A few days after our election, I dared to make the case that, rather than blaming Ontarians for electing Liberals in 75 of 106 ridings, Conservatives should consider their own failure to relate to our biggest province.

Big mistake. "You sir, are a grand representative of all the arrogant little s--ts who want no change at all if it comes from west of the Manitoba border," one e-mail writer said, summing up most of the messages clogging my inbox.

"Collectively Ontario views forms of government as a solution to their problems," another offered. "That and general stupidity is why the Liberals can still win 75+ seats in Ontario."

The response to the election from conservative opinion leaders wasn't much different. Lorne Gunter wrote that Ontarians had been persuaded "to dread change, to look not at policies and platforms but to vote according to their prejudices." Barry Cooper suggested the province was "complicit" in government waste. "Ontarians are scaredy cats," wrote the National Citizens Coalition's Gerry Nicholls (an Ontarian, no less), pronouncing them "wary of change, wary of new ideas and wary of the unknown."

There was an element of truth there, as there is in liberal complaints that conservatives in the South are motivated by fear of the unknown and their own prejudices. But you can either sit around griping about it or you can set about figuring out how to win them over.

Unfortunately, the aggrieved parties seem more inclined toward the former. Maybe it's inevitable that a few drama queens in the United States will threaten to flee the country, just like the reactionaries north of the border who spent the summer ranting about firewalls and burgeoning separatist movements. But even their less reactionary counterparts -- the ones who should be working toward turning things around-- seem inclined to throw up their hands as well.

The challenges faced by the two groups, of course, are completely different. Democrats are perceived as elitists by the people they need to break through with; Conservatives are trying to sell themselves to people who, in their minds, are the elitists. But recent history shows neither challenge is insurmountable, provided they nominate the right candidates and run the right campaigns.

In both 1992 and 1996, Bill Clinton took Arkansas, Missouri, Tennessee, Kentucky and Louisiana -- all states that the Democrats never even dreamt of winning with Mr. Kerry at the helm. And while Ontario has yet to vote for a hard-line conservative national party, Mike Harris's Tories easily won power in 1995 and 1999 running on the sorts of policies that "scaredy cat" voters are supposedly terrified of.

Have voters in the American heartland all become born-again Christians since then, and suburban Torontonians shifted wildly to the left? Probably not so much as American liberals and Canadian conservatives have failed to serve up leaders strong enough to win their votes.

It was easier for Mr. Clinton to sell liberal values to the South as a Southerner, and for Mr. Harris to sell conservative ones to Ontario as an Ontarian. But if that was all it took, Al Gore would be gearing up for a second term in the White House. What's needed is a combination of personal charm -- enough to overcome an initial bias against your party -- and an ability to craft a message that sells outside your core base.

John Kerry had neither, and the same goes for Stephen Harper. Now, the trick for their followers is to find leaders who do. If Canadian conservatives instead choose to send me more angry e-mails, I'll take it as a bad sign.