I would point out the GOP's "purifying the party" goal of the last few years. They don't care of they appeal to everyone, because they openly attack and show hatred to anyone that doesn't believe exactly the way they do. Yes, they are largely religious bigots.

 

 

Meanwhile, Democrats have a lot of liberals (Where Republican liberals may as well not exist). The more tolerant nature of the democrat party in the United States is why it largely overshadows the republican party in number of members.

 

However, what it ends up being is, "You either agree to the GOP line or get out." Look at how Ron Paul was treated, for example. He was a traditional conservative and his party set out to destroy him when he ran for president, because he isn't following the party line. Which unfortunately means that a lot of people become democrats, simply because they can't follow lockstep with the GOP ideals and both the democrat and republican parties have both pushed us into a "winner takes all" system in every voting area possible, to deny third parties from growing.

 

 

When universal healthcare gained momentum in the 60s in Canada, there was never the unfounded town hall verbal diarrhea that seems to shape the American mindset in the current attempt at healthcare reform. The pervasive childish, anti-intellect in the US boggles my mind. Both Republicans and Democrats support the socialism of Medicare and Veterans Affairs as do most Americans. Yet those same Americans cry foul at any tax payer based "socialist" public plan for the 50 million who are uninsured. I could never imagine anything similar in Canada.

The Canadian who chugs down Molsons and watches Hockey Night in Canada has an American counterpart who is a beer guzzling NASCAR loving Joe Sixpacker. Superficially they both seem to be the same and yet that Canuck would defend his universal healthcare right. The American on the other hand only wants to defend his right to own and use a gun. And they could live just a few miles from each other at the Windsor-Detroit border. Yet culturally, they seem to be lightyears apart on such fundamental issues like education and healthcare.

 

Well, I would say that you are at least partly correct there. However, there are a couple of other factors to consider.

 

Population: Remember that there are nearly ten times as many people down here. That means that there are more people willing to argue any specific issue. If that does not slow progress down, then I don't know what does. Actually, that is probably not a bad thing when you consider what stunning turds of legislation tend to come out of Washington when we do come together politically.

 

Political organization: While you are correct that there is probably a spectrum of ideologies, would that not be true for any nation that has at least a fairly large population? What is probably more relevant is the differences between the two nations as far as how party politics comes together.

 

From what I gather, Canada currently has four political parties holding some amount of power on the national level. In the US, while we have many defined parties, really only two of them are viable. Now the fact of the matter is that in a two party system, coalitions are not really viable. What matters more to us are the centrists who can cross from one side to the other at will depending on the specific issue at hand.

While we do have more than two recognisable parties that hold, have held, or will foreseeably hold seats(there are 5), only two of them are truly viable. The Block du Quebecois only can take seats in Quebec, which will forever deny them the ability to gain federal power. The NDP has never won a government, and at best can be considered a bunch of successful independents who joined forces. The Greens, while making remarkable strides over the last few years, just don't have enough to win more than a handful of ridings. The Liberals and Conservatives are the only federal parties that really matter.

I also find this to be the case (though I assume you mean Conservative, as in the federal party).  The party lines are not as distinct.  As was pointed out, it seems there are a mixture of centrist performers in both parties in the States as well as a wider spectrum of differing ideologies within the parties themselves.  I've always had a difficult time deciding on the real differences between Democrats and Republicans whereas with Conservatives and Liberals it has always been quite easy.

The divide is certainly there.  There are just more divisions and a different distinction between rural and urban (Canada has a tenth of the people and of the largest 100 urban areas 82 have less than 200,000 people and 64 have less than 100,000 ...our urban areas are fewer and smaller than those in the US).  Nationally, industrial, highly unionized, urban centres tend to NDP, large mixed economy urban centres invariably tend toward Liberal (or in Quebec the Bloc), rural areas in Eastern Ontario tend toward NDP, rural areas in Western Ontario tend toward Liberal, Quebec is dominated largely by the Bloc with (historically) a fare Liberal mix, the East is mainly Liberal with some Conservative in the Southern Maritime provinces, Manitoba is largely NDP with some Conservative in the South, West until BC is all Conservative, BC is all Conservative but the coast is NDP, Northwest Territories is NDP, Yukon is Liberal and Nunavut is Conservative.  The last election really skewed things because of a particular hatred for the Liberals -Canadians will cast strategic votes when pushed.

A key:
 

NDP - Left
Bloc - Left
Liberal - Left, Centrist
Conservative - Right

Essentially, you can count on the West being right, the East being left and urban centres being left.  Naturally, as with the US, there are exceptions to the pattern.