Canada’s Next PM
We don’t know when it will happen, because us ordinary citizens have to sit around and wait until at least Feb 24 to get any clues from the Important People as to when we may have an election and thus, almost certainly, a new government and PM, but it seems impossible to bet that it won’t happen by the middle of the year.
Today’s poll on the website 338canada.com/federal has the federal Conservatives’ support at 44%, the Liberals at 22% and the NDP at 18%. The election is not being held today, and the Liberals are in the process of selecting a new party leader, and shit surely can happen over two to four months but it would be very brave – or foolhardy – to bet against Pierre Poilievre being the next Canadian PM, leading a Conservative-majority government.
Is that a good or bad thing? I am asking this in a purely selfish way. A federal election is surely going to happen (although it seems Dougie is going to send Ontarians to the polls first, I will write about that down the road) and I will need to decide for whom to vote. Unlike the custom in the Canadian press and throughout society these days, I do not see myself voting for Poilievre or Carney or Singh. I am voting for who I want to represent me in Parliament, and in that vote, the party to which a candidate belongs is only one factor, albeit an important one.
Unfortunately, there is really no evidence that Canadian federal MPs of any party are allowed by their party leadership to truly represent their ridings, and I am not oblivious to this. Hence, a critical factor in how I vote in my riding is going to be what I think of the leaders of the various parties. I have nothing good to say about Singh or Trudeau after observing them govern Canada over the last many years. I see Freeland as having been very much a Trudeau acolyte until she suddenly got religion last month, although I give her kudos for changing her stripes, however late in the game. Mark Carney so far seems to me to be a classic Ottawa mandarin. We don’t need any more of those in my view, but he is also new to politics so I plan to listen carefully to what he has to say throughout the Liberal leadership race; assuming, of course, he has things to say.
That leaves Mr. Poilievre, who has been covered assiduously (and almost universally negatively) in the Canadian press as the Leader of the Official Opposition. In that role he has been very much in Attack Dog mode, and while I get that can be seen as pretty much his job description up to now, it has not made me favorably inclined toward him as an improvement over Trudeau as PM. Or over Carney (who at this point I would bet on winning the Liberal leadership race). Poilievre would certainly be preferable to Singh, but almost anyone would be in my view. The NDP does not believe in arithmetic, and that is disqualifying, in my opinion.
A couple of people I respect have pointed out to me that Poilievre sat down to be interviewed by Jordan Peterson on Peterson’s podcast last Dec 21. This was before Trudeau announced his intention to resign, but PP was riding high in the polls, and the episode is titled ‘Canada’s Next Prime Minister’.
So, I took the time (it’s an hour and 40 minutes long) to sit and watch the interview, in hopes of learning more about Mr. Poilievre than is possible from reading mostly hostile press reports.
However, getting information from podcasts is not my usual thing, so I will lay all my biases and misgivings about this out before turning to what I think I may have learned about Mr. Poilievre.
I don’t watch or listen to podcasts. Many people I know do, but I am very much a fan of the written word. This makes me a dinosaur, I know, but so be it. Had a transcript of this podcast been available (I could not find one) I would surely have read that instead of listening to the podcast.
I am not entirely a fan of Jordan Peterson, although I have a great deal of respect for him, and I thought his original 12 Rules for Life book, which I read, added something valuable to the culture. A psychologist of my age characterized that book to me as a bunch of wisdom you might get from a good 6th grade teacher. I think that’s actually fair, but what the psychologist failed to appreciate is that there are few such wise teachers anymore. Much that is written and published is not blindingly new, but if it fills a need felt by many (as Peterson’s book clearly did, particularly for young men), it is valuable. Peterson’s book was valuable.
Peterson is a rarity in that he has a wide-ranging mind, and, having heard him speak more than once, I appreciate that. I also think that his years in the spotlight have turned him into a media creature, and that this has not served him well. He is almost always in combat mode, and that has to be a very hard place to be. While I think I understand how that can happen to someone who has been attacked as much as he has, it still gets in the way of some of the good things I think he is trying to say.
Finally, and this is not unique to Peterson, I think that on this podcast, in which he was supposed to be playing the role of interviewer, there was too much Peterson. Another reason to see a transcript, because if one could, I bet the word count for Peterson would be higher than for Poilievre. As it is, I bet in the video there are more minutes of Peterson’s voice than of Poilievre’s, but I know of no way to check that. This has been my typical experience when I have listened to interviews done by podcasters. They are used to declaiming, they are used to being the focus, and the role of a good interviewer is to ask good, concise questions and then shut up and listen. Peterson did much too little of that in this interview, in my opinion.
As a result of this, I don’t feel like I learned all that much about Mr. Poilievre from this interview. None the less, here are some things I think I did learn.
The revelatory part of the interview to me occurs at about the 1:14 point in the podcast. Peterson notes that he doesn’t envy the task Poilievre will face as PM in taking over after 10 years of Liberal governance. I think that’s a fair comment, and keep in mind that this was said before Trump started blathering on about tariffs on Canadian imports into the US.
He then asks PP a pretty direct question and in my mind, a good one. This is not an exact quote but he asks Poilievre ‘Why should Canadians have confidence in you, what is your plan when you take office?’
Poilevre replies, again not an exact quote:
Cut bureaucracy, cut foreign aid, cut out the consultants, cut corporate welfare and use the savings to bring down the deficit and lower taxes. Unleash the free enterprise system, repeal C-69, which he calls ‘the anti-energy law’ to start a ‘massive’ energy boom in our country. Incentivize the municipalities to get building.
Then, an even better question: Can you highlight who are the key members of your coming administration and lay out what their roles will be once you form a government, and what their strengths are.
I will write out PP’s response to this in the form of a list:
Andrew Scheer, former party leader and Speaker of the House, he knows the rules of the game in Parliament, and that’s important for getting legislation passed.
Dr Leslie Lewis, current shadow minister of infrastructure, she’s doing a great job of talking about how we can improve infrastructure in this country.
Gamil Giovanni (spelling?, I’m working off an audio tape here) recently elected in an overwhelming mandate in Durham.
Melissa Lantzman, deputy leader, extremely well-liked in Toronto, terrific communicator, very smart.
We’re recruiting new candidates in ridings we don’t currently hold, to help me win the election and govern.
Asked by JBP in a follow-up – who PP has on the ‘energy side’, PP responds by saying ‘we’re very lucky as we have a lot of MPs from Alberta and Saskatchewan, and very few of them don’t understand energy’.
PP then shifts to talking about the good conversations he’s had with Premiers Danielle Smith and Scott Moe.
The conversation then moves off onto other topics.
So as to JBP’s first question about what is PP’s plan, what he says is not awful, there is nothing in it that I have any real disagreement with. However, beyond the repeal of C-69, there is nothing at all specific in it, either. What bureaucracies will you eliminate, what is an example of the corporate welfare you will eliminate, and how exactly do you plan to incentivize the municipalities to get more building done? Municipalities are creations of provinces, what on earth can the federal government even do in this realm?
To be sure, had any other party leader been asked that question, or Freeland or Carney, I would not expect any more detailed answers.
Even less inspiring was PP’s answer to the question about his team. It was all politics, a good house leader (ok, fair enough, that matters) MPs who won big mandates or are well-liked and smart. And, I’m sorry, but being from Alberta, particularly being a politician from Alberta, doesn’t imply you know doodly about energy.
Even more than the first, PP’s answer to that second question sets him out in my mind as a career politician. To be sure, that is who party leaders always are in the 21st century, although Carney may end up being an exception. And, there is no better example of the fact that not being a career politician does not necessarily make one a good leader than Donald J Trump.
Locally, London currently has a couple of city councillors who are well-known to be the candidates for various parties in the looming federal and/or provincial elections. People get into municipal politics not to contribute to their city – at least rarely so – but as a stepping-stone into a ‘real’ career as a higher level politician. The pension is very good, I hear.
So, we end up ruled by career politicians.
Returning to my selfish motivations, listening to this interview did not turn me away from the idea of voting for the Conservative candidate in my federal riding when that decision comes, it just showed me that if I do, I will be voting for a candidate whose party is led by a career politician. Not disqualifying, but not really a plus, either. So, I guess I gotta keep listening.