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If you happen to know someone who ran for office and lost in the last provincial election, find a way to give him or her a hug.

Even if you just see one on the street, really. While the winners are applauding throne speeches (if they’re Liberals) or trying to figure out how they’ll get to write one of their own in four years (if they aren’t), the losers are struggling. The way Rem Westland did.

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Westland, a longtime official in the departments of defence and Indian affairs, put aside his $120,000-a-year job as a real-estate consultant to run for the federal Conservatives in Ottawa-Vanier in 2011. He had deep roots in the riding, spoke candidly and intelligently about issues both national and local, and came third, pulling 27 per cent of the vote — about what Conservatives usually get in a riding that’s voted for Liberals forever.

His 58-page campaign memoir, written in the form of a report to his leader Stephen Harper, is a cri de coeur from a candidate who knew he was a long shot but believed in himself and his party enough to try anyway.