Andrew Coyne writes that, among the Conservative leadership hopefuls, Pierre Poilievre is clearly a northern Trump:
Bear in mind that, according to a recent Leger poll, 44 per cent of Conservative voters would vote for Donald Trump over Joe Biden. It is safe to assume that Mr. Poilievre holds an overwhelming lead among that particular voting bloc. (Indeed, he is currently the choice of 41 per cent of Conservative voters, to 10 per cent for Mr. Charest and 3 per cent for Mr. Brown.)
What those voters want is someone who will fight – well, I was going to say, fight for them, but it’s mostly fight against the people they despise, the people who they assume despise them: liberals, elites, academics, bureaucrats, the media of course, all the people who think they’re better than them, and need to be taken down a peg or two. Or at least given a poke.
Not very prime ministerial. But Poilievre's people don't want him to be prime ministerial:
They don’t want him to look prime ministerial or any other bow to conventional standards or expectations of how politicians should behave. These are the very sorts of badges of elite approval they detest.
Tapping into that resentment proved Mr. Trump’s particular talent, mostly because Mr. Trump was every bit as resentful of the same people. Mr. Poilievre is attempting to harness the same loathing, though perhaps without the same authenticity. For in truth Mr. Poilievre is a member of the same elite class he attacks. He is not an outsider, but a consummate insider. He is not an anti-politician: His whole career has been in politics.
Put bluntly, Poilievre -- like Trump -- is a phony. But, at the moment, that doesn't matter:
For the moment, however, Mr. Poilievre bestrides the Conservative Party. The only way his rivals can dislodge him is by selling new memberships wholesale – tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands – in effect remaking the party. It’s a long shot. The day we see Mr. Poilievre launch a charm offensive, we will know it is beginning to work.
A charm offensive for Poilievre? Not bloody likely.
Image: twitter
10 comments:
How much financial disclosure do MPs need to make.
What about financial disclosure for party leaders?
Are they officially required or is it just expected like the US Presidential candidates before (and perhaps after) tRump?
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If there are any good Canadian investigative-reporters still fogging a mirror, now would be a good time to look into Lil'PP and his finances.
Is this petulant-permanent-politician with his obvious case of social 'arrested development' really the richest MP? How does that happen on a MPs' salary?
We need to see a list of the companies he owned and traded while serving as Harper's attack-dog and lapping-up cabinet secrets.
There have been estimates of Poilievre's wealth, PoV. But I don't think there's been anything official.
Well, if PP really needs some advice about stacking the deck, Jason Kenny is definitely his "go to" guy for that. Jason is facing his own leadership challenges shortly, so he might need some friends in high Ottawa places in the near future. In politics, there's that old familiar saying that goes something like "as the stomach turns"....
The CRAP cum CPC just doesn't seem to be able to define what they want to be when (or if) they ever grow up...
They're just angry, Lulymay. Anger is what they're selling.
Coyne compares PP to Trump, but I think the more apt comparison is to Harper. Like Harper, PP's dripping with Alberta resentment and libertarian ideas. His political priorities are to further entrench oil and gas interests, and of course, to privatize and cut taxes.
He's not a social conservative and is not keen to rehash abortion and same-sex marriage. However, he remains acceptable to socons in the same way that Harper and Trump were, namely that he's willing to ignore democratic norms to further their white Christian nationalist project.
In short, he's the sort of nasty piece of work that Cons love but that has consistently lost to Trudeau.
Cap
The hate vote will carry the day.
Want to stop the average guy mid political rant?
Ask them 'Who was the last politician they liked'?
Intelligence and vision are almost political handicaps in the 21 century.
The comparison to Harper is more apt, Cap. Poilievre learned the art of politics at Stephen's knee.
I agree, lungta. Intelligence and vision are rare commodities these days.
Poilievre is a sign of the times, not a movement.
He represents the disruption by truckers and other anti democratic outrage's.
These people can form a convoy but do not vote collectively.
They are there purely for disruption and attention.
TB
I agree that they're all about disruption, TB. Let's hope you're right about their not voting.
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