In Canada, people joined the Liberals because it was a natural route to power and no one gave a great deal of thought to ideological questions. The party just straddled the language divides and brought prosperity and peace to central Canada, where fordecades it built its majorities. Those days are gone forever now and unless the Liberals build support in Western Canada and among rural and exurban voters, it has no future. So the Liberals have to decide what they want to be: a Lefty party in the tradition of the European Social Democrats? Or a centrist party like the German Free Democrats? Or do they want to be a Canadian national party in tradition of Laurier, King and Trudeau? Lots of questions to answer but when they know who they are, perhaps they will be back in government again. But not for the forseeable future.
(Denny Crane: "Every one should carry a gun strapped to their waist. We need more - not less guns.")
I'm originally from Canada so I'm very familiar with party politics and how, in many cases, you are born into a party, kind of like how some people are born into a religion. But your observations of recent events are very telling. The Liberals seem to be heading down the European socialist path while under Martin and Cretien. It seems like the direction of the party will be based largely on who can lead that herd of cats effectively.