You’re mistaken in thinking the Liberals, or the NDP for that matter, care about advancing causes. They don’t. They care about getting elected.

As a registered member of one of those parties, I actually do. However, when it comes to the politicians, you're either partly or completely right. Getting elected butters their bread, caring about the issues is optional, although at least some do as a hobby.

As for professional staffers, I don't have as much experience. Mostly they just seem very busy when I interact with them.

Especially the Liberals: they’d rather go down in flames than risk losing political leverage by forming a coalition.

I mean, the Liberals have been in a not-technically-a-coalition with the NDP for some time now. Some of them don't seem to like it (of course, having all the power would be better for them personally), but from the outside it seems to be going well.

They saw, quite clearly, what happened to the Progressive Conservatives when they merged with Reform.

They continued being a highly relevant political party?