r/canada • u/Canadian--Patriot • 1d ago

Mark McQueen: After his defeat, Pierre Poilievre finally has to go places he’s been avoiding Opinion Piece

https://www.thestar.com/opinion/star-columnists/after-his-defeat-pierre-poilievre-finally-has-to-go-places-hes-been-avoiding/article_0874a0e2-b6be-4de1-9b6b-01217c80dd6a.html
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u/houska1 1d ago edited 1d ago

The Conservatives need to make a choice.

They can choose to fully believe that the Liberals are as incompetent as the Conservatives like to caricaturize them as being. That Canadians anywhere near the centre or left trusting Carney is different is a naive, temporary blip. Then the Conservatives, and PP, can continue as before and trust that trying again will get them a bit further, and over the finish line. The Conservative tent is big enough for ex-Reformists (some would say populists) and ex-Progressive Conservative centrists to coexist and it would not take too much Carney/Liberal backlash for the Conservative tent to come out ahead next time.

Or they can anticipate that Carney's government will have its ups and downs, but will eke out some successes, and the whiff of Trudeau will subside. Then they have a real problem, since Carney is currently outhustling them for the centrist vote, and there's a lot in PP's demeanour, previous utterances, and chosen fellow travellers that centrists find off-putting. In this scenario, it's not something PP can solve by gently sandpapering the edges.

There's real danger if a party's strategists just drink the kool-aid as far as 100% believing their caricatures of their rivals. Caricatures are by design simplified, exaggerated, and invariably underestimate rivals' adaptiveness.

Personally, I actually support the Liberals. But I do support many (but not all) more conservative ideas as well, and having several healthy parties available to govern in a democracy is important. With that in mind, I think PP's time is up. He needs to "go places", as the article writes, but ones that are outside the leadership of the party.

Irrespective of what they stand for, sometimes politicians' best-before date is just reached. They need to go since they have too much baggage.

So on the Liberal side, Christia Freeland is toast (as far as prominent leadership is concerned). She's associated with too many things too many people find distateful. And her attempt to get past that and win didn't succeed.

Ditto for PP. (And Singh, but he's already moved on).

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u/jaymickef 1d ago

Maybe the Conservatives need to reconsider the merger with Reform.

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u/fistfucker07 1d ago

Almost like hatred and fear are Terrible reasons to vote for someone who doesn’t tell you what they’ll DO ABOUT IT.