Funnily enough, this kind of loser talk reminds me of the NDP and the Greens. Think of how Jagmeet Singh now claims that he made a conscious decision to sacrifice the success of his party to stop Poilievre - which comes across as an attempt to retroactively justify his poor leadership performance. I have also seen Green Party members in the past make points along the line of, "We would rather be principled in influencing government from the sidelines, than form governments ourselves."
If your political party's intellectual well is drying so rapidly that the government can "steal" a few of your ideas and you have virtually nothing novel left - or you are reduced to a petty debate on how "they're not implementing our policies with x degree of perfect calibration" - then there really is no one to blame for your party's misfortunes except yourselves!
Just because Carney stole some of their ideas doesn’t mean he can implement them without alienating the center left voters who put him in office. My bet is Carney fails to deliver economic growth or a pipeline or lower priced houses or intra-provincial free trade. But we’ll see.
I’ve been calling them the NDP of the right since the last election. Perpetual losers, perpetually aggrieved. If they actually won I’m not sure they’d know what to do with themselves at this point. It would shatter their carefully crafted identity built around victimhood.
Can we please do away with this blind, unqualified narrative that the CPC blew a 25 point lead? At their peak, the CPC was polling at about 43% while the LPC was at 18%. There is no realistic chance that the CPC could ever get anything meaningfully more than that 43% anyway. And in the election, they ended with about 41% of the vote - hardly a blown lead. The fact that the NDP collapsed completely and the Libs have a far more efficient voter distribution than the CPC can and should factor into any "blown lead" evaluation. Which is why I question the blind reduction of the entire election to "CPC blew a 25% lead".
In fact, the bigger question is how can the LPC, with ~44% of the votes in a favorable distribution actually fail to achieve a majority? That is, objectively speaking, a bigger failure.
Yah the "blown lead" narrative ignores basic math so badly that it just isn't a good faith argument. I only see it made by people who have an agenda, usually getting rid of Poilievre.
The NDP and Green vote totally collapsed, and the Bloc vote partially collapsed, due to a few different factors and all of these went almost entirely to the Liberals.
Basic math, from OP's own post: 43 - 18 = 25, hence 25 point lead...? OP then cited Libs at 44 in the end, with CPC at 41? So 41 - 44 = -3. There's the math. They were leading and then weren't. The NDP context explains why, but doesn't change the facts.
Blown lead implies that it was Poilievre's fault that the small parties collapsed.
If the CPC vote share went from 43 to 33, while the Liberals gained the same amount and the other parties stayed the same, well yes that would be pretty clearly on him. The more the Liberals gained from other parties consolidating to them, the more uncertain that argument becomes.
It seems like those making this argument are arguing completely from the end result and sticking their fingers in their ears about the multiple caveats because they want to place maximum blame on Poilievre. Including Jen Gerson apparently.
I guess it's semantics: you seem to associate culpability with the word "blown." I just see it as an observed fact. They had a lead, then they didn't. The reasons don't matter: it was blown.
But speaking of those reasons: sure there were factors beyond Poilievre's control, but there were also plenty of factors within his control, and that of the CPC, who selected him as leader. This is mostly JG's argument. If Conservatives discount those reasons out of hand, I think the party may continue to be surprised and frustrated by their electoral results.
Nope, the NDP did that to themselves. I think Poilievre (and the party) made certain choices - and have certain limitations - that made holding on to any part of that 25-point lead more difficult than it had to be. The degree of NDP collapse means those choices might not have made any difference, but they could have. JG's point is that Poilievre seems (at least publicly) uninterested in revisiting what could have been done differently.
Yes but they didn't close the deal. They are unable, currently, to close the deal. Blowing a 25 point lead points to something about the leader that voters find unpalatable. The only thing that matters is closing the deal. Probably go back and see why the other 60% of Canadians didn't vote CPC last year when Mark Carney was coronated by the parliamentary press gallery.
With NDP support imploding and Libs with MSM help fanning flames of TDS and Elbows Up BS, the conservatives just couldn't defeat those headwins. Come the next election and the NDP getting a new leader they are sure to pull votes from the Liberals...they won't be pulling votes from Conservatives...
I am so sick of hearing Poilivre blew the lead, he did not blow the lead, he got exactly the results most sane, intelligent people would have expected. His polling was always high before the writ dropped. Poilievre received 41.3 % of the vote, Jagmeet Singh collapsed and his vote went liberal, I have NEVER met an NDP voter who would swing conservative over night and every journalist knows this! Also, 41% of the vote, in any of the previous 6 elections would have been enough to form a majority government. You also know this!
Contrary to what legacy media, and appartently you as well, Jen, that election was about fear of Donald Trump which Carney harnessed instead of hope for a brighter future for Canada which Poilievre campaigned on. Sadly, we have neither benefitted from the fear, nor the"more statesmanlike" leader, instead we are still in the doldrums created by 10 years of bad Liberal policies. aEven sadder, Canadians look poised to reward them again if we get a snap election, and anyone wonders why Albertans are frustrated as hell with the status quo!
What a childish response, Jen. You know perfectly well that there’s little any Conservative leader could do if left wing voters shift to the Liberals in such huge numbers. Carney sold us a bill of goods about elbows up which aging boomers bought hook, line, and sinker. Of course, as you pointed out in your blistering column on Carney’s apology, he didn’t mean it. But sometimes lies work in politics.
Perhaps if a Conservative leader did things a bit differently than Poilievre, the shift of left-wing voters' numbers might not have been so huge. That's the point. Poilievre and the CPC agree with you, even though they don't seem to have done any introspection or analysis to examine alternate possibilities. "I'm stating my position loudly and repeatedly with neat catchphrases, so it must be correct!"
Are you just going to repeat this line as rebuttal? Really regretting resubscribing after my hiatus. If you're willing to refund the remaining balance, please let me know.
You can come and go as you please. The Line is a bad place for people who are uncomfortable with challenge.
I am merely pointing out that your comment is perfectly indicative of mainstream Conservative mentality right now. I can't say for you whether that observation should hold value to you. JG
The reality for Cons is that we have a majority center left voting base in Canada. 3 parties have traditionally shared that center left group, on the right is one party. A widely held coalition that does well when the NDP are strong. with a collapse in NDP and Green votes the Libs will be in ideal position regardless of what the cons do. Its a tough nut to crack as more moderate viewpoints put stress on the right coalition. Maintaining a happy base is an important aspect of party management. Lets give Steve Outhouse time to craft a new message, a vision for Pierre and the party. I really believe the opportunity will exist in 2-3 years for another shot as we all know this Liberal team will not perform.
I hope it comes sooner than that, BUT not this spring, that is too soon. I believe it will take at minimum another year for enough people to realize that Carney is all talk no delivery and a complete fraud who has failed upwards, like pretty much all Liberals over the past 10 - 15 years!
Yeah, I too get tired of the ridiculous "blew the lead" comments. Also, I'm glad at least one party leader isn't publicly slagging Trump every chance he gets. What possible good comes from that?
We all saw him praise the orange fascist in the Oval Office. And no one doubts he apologized for the ad. Jen Gerson wrote a highly critical column about it.
I think it’s a blessing for Pierre that he lost tbh. It would be hard cleaning up after the last 10 years. And people would blame him for not being able to. Carney won’t be able to do it either, but he’s the new shiny thing so has public goodwill behind him. I don’t think things will change until Canadians feel they’ve hit rock bottom. We’re a long way from that, but we’re gaining speed upon descent.
So confusing. are you saying they didn't blow the lead?
While we're at it, how do you square the ongoing obsession with the teacher, gone now for how long?, with insistence we can't talk about how the CPC lost, again, and why?
NDP voters wouldn’t need to swing to the Conservatives. The Conservatives should be able to pull over right leaning Liberal voters, just as a strong NDP pulls over left leaning Liberal voters. Turnout dropped substantially from the last election, so a lot of those NDP voters just didn’t vote at all. Poillievre lost his own riding, which he had held for years.
The problem for me is that the Liberals seem to be shifting right and the Conservatives relying on a voter base capped in the low 40s when the Liberals were leaning hard left is going to see conservatives relegated to the 30s like they were when we had the reform and conservative parties fighting amongst themselves while Chretien dominated.
OK - how about this, then: Poilievre couldn't make the sale in the end. He'd spent years wooing and pitching the client, and when it came time to sign the dotted line, the other guy swept in with a better offer and grabbed it from under his nose.
I paid for a year’s membership. Are you saying you will refund the remaining 11.5 months? That is my question. Your rudeness to me many many months ago was the reason for my previous hiatus.
"Pick the Technocratic Daddy whose faves/unfaves outrank Poilievre by nearly 20 points. Keep the Conservative policy. Best of both worlds, really."
...and it would totally work too, if only the Liberals would ACTUALLY implement the Conservative policies.
But they don't.
I've made this point repeatedly (just as Jenn has written endless versions of the paragraph quoted above) but what Carney stole from Poilievre were NOT "policies", they were talking points.
But SAYING you're going to "build faster" means nothing if no shovels go into the ground.
SAYING you want to "make Canada an Energy Superpower" means nothing if you're not willing to remove the legislative impediments which have boxed our resources in.
SAYING you will spend less, but posting the largest non-pandemic deficit in Canada's history.
You get the point. Poilievre unfurled a large and specific set of policy proposals in that election.
Carney adopted NONE of them.
But he did PRETEND he wanted to, which swung a lot of votes.
I think that’s a very valid point. The question you have to ask yourself is whether the Conservatives could do any better. That is, are they offering real policy, or just more talking points? JG
Yah this is aggravating. They only "stole" the policies to go as far as the announcement stage. So you get placated that your government isn't run by a kindergartener anymore but don't actually benefit from the thing you wanted to happen because surprise, the kindergarteners are still in charge.
The self-parody and irony is so thick you can cut it with a knife. I especially like the way they really lean into all the amazing things we have built as a nation ...in the 1950s and prior.
But here's the REALLY funny part:
When the writ drops and we go into campaign mode, every dollar they spent on producing and airing that ad is going to be described as "LOOK AT all the money we spent on building infrastructure at speeds never seen before..."
Politics is all about circumstances. If a body of a four-year-old hadn't washed up upon a beach just before the 2015 election, Justin Trudeau would not have won. You're trying to hard to convince us of your opinions, Jen.
I get your continual point that Poilievre sucks, didn't adapt enough, etc. and there is some truth to at least the latter.
But circumstances play a role. A big one.
Harper wouldn't have won (edit: a majority at least) in 2011 if not for the dual circumstance of an unusually strong NDP and a particularly inept Liberal.
2015 could have gone radically differently if the election was a different length.
Trudeau likely wouldn't have won in 2021 if not for Covid.
Carney wouldn't have won in 2025 if not for Trump.
You can call these counterfactuals or accept that a concerning amount of our democracy comes down to random fucking chance.
I think you're grossly underestimating how detestable PP is. If either of those people were around, you'd have the exact same government you have today....a Liberal NDP minority; just a different distribution of seats.
No, he's utterly detestable. He's a spin-doctoring bullshit artist, devoid of any credibility. His judgment is as bad as Trudeau's, based on his foolish support of the Convoy, which cost him his riding. He couldn't get a costed plan out before the advanced polls closed, suggesting he was completely unprepared for the election he was begging for. That's not leadership. He will never get my vote....
This is why your writing is so great. As with Pierre Berton, I can hear you reading this, and see the various places your eyes roll in disbelief.
Pierre was reaffirmed by a minuscule portion of the party who dropped a grand for the opportunity. He should ask Danielle how his big Canadian tent fits with her attack on trans people. The CPC refuse to learn from their failures....and aren't failures supposed to be an opportunity to learn?
So it's a giant bullshit distraction of the state sticking its nose in where it has no knowledge or business. Call it anything you want; it's legalised hate.
What is the appropriate response to Alberta separatism? Same as a year ago: Allow pipelines.
What is the appropriate response to Trump? Same as a year ago: Raid some fentanyl labs, promise to vet immigrants and go to Mar-A-Lago and negotiate like an adult.
Now tell me your ideas. Not why you think these won't work, but what you think will work.
Sure...do nothing for 7 years while a pipeline is being built.....kill all your green energy projects. Ignore the fracking chemicals showing up in the groundwater.....oil is all that matters. Not much of a vision for the future.
Not quite. As I've said here dozens of times, where would Alberta be if it had followed Rachel's plan and put it on the train? Tens of millions more barrels shipped by now, but clearly, Alberta Conservatives can't think outside the box...or today's political and legal realities.
Bakken crude and dilbit have little in common. Megantic happened because Transport Canada allowed an utterly ineptly managed railroad to operate in Canada. There have been tens of thousands of oil trains since, that haven't made headlines. Trains get your product to market. Pipelines that don't exist don't.
Yes, you have said that before and you are correct. But that option is already in play and yet Alberta separation is still a thing. I suspect that if the federal government committed to pipelines it would convert a lot of the separatists.
Good luck with your negotiations with Native Canadians about how much land you get to keep. It gets tiring pretty quickly hearing the richest province in the country, and the only one without a provincial sales tax, whining about how bad they've got it. But go ahead and destroy the country.....US ownership might not be the gift you think it is. And if BC stays, and we route around you through the territories, don't expect to get your pipeline to the coast..... or any help with TMX. I think Alberta separatists are fools, cutting off their noses to spite their faces.
C-5 gave Carney the right to overrule the First Nations and any other impediments to a pipeline. He doesn't dare use C-5, though, because the courts will expose it as the charade it is.
I suspect that if the federal government committed to pipelines it would convert a lot of the separatists.
END QUOTE
So, I guess you missed the MOU that the Prime Minister and the Premier of Alberta signed late last year?
You know, the one that engendered a lot of pushback from First Nations groups and others in BC who were worried about Ottawa's support in principle for more pipelines?
Holding Alberta to a higher standard while Eastern Canada sends their cash to the US to buy natural gas fracked there instead might not the best way to keep Alberta in Canada. Shifting the fracking to another area doesn’t decrease the environmental risks, it just send the money and environmental oversight outside of Canada.
Also, I’m pretty sure we are able to build a pipeline and also windmills/solar farms/etc at the same time. If we can’t, we have much bigger problems.
Most of Ontario's natural gas comes from Alberta. Danielle killed Alberta's green energy plans. Alberta has a massive pending water crisis. Where will it come from when the glaciers are gone, and the snowpack getting smaller every year?
Ontario's natural gas supply no longer mainly comes from Alberta, the majority is delivered from from the US. Are you reading into my comment that I advocated for fracking and that's why you're now bringing water into the discussion? Not clear to me. I did not advocate for fracking, I advocated for keeping environmental oversight in Canada rather than elsewhere.
Delivered from, or through the US? I think most of the gas pipelines now pass through the US, but it's still Alberta gas coming to Ontario, as far as I can find out. No, I didn't think you were advocating for fracking. It will make people a whole lot of money at a great cost to be paid later. But I do think Alberta...the entire Canadian west is facing a looming water crisis as the glaciers melt at unprecedented rates.
It's hard to get precise data on this, but Alberta gas shipping north of the Great Lakes looks like it's only 2% now. Shipping south of the Great Lakes happens still, but the US built at least 2 new pipelines to bring fracked gas into Ontario, shifting the supply proportion significantly to the US.
And yet, since the Liberals did it...with a leader who is basically a conservative but not an asshole, you still object. Pick a lane. They picked Carney. You kept Pierre after the greatest electoral collapse in Canadian history. Trudeau was a disaster. He's gone. It doesn't seem like the CPC got the memo.
The lead character changed but melodrama continues. The virtue signaling continues with a more pragmatic message, but again with no follow-up. MOUs are not achievements.
We can agree about that. Now, you need to find someone to put up the time and money to build it, because Canada has already done that. You need to get a whole bunch of people on side as well. And figure out who's going to buy it that justifies the investment. Again, there is a way you can increase the amount you ship starting this fall. You're choosing, again, not to take it. That seems like a self-inflicted wound.
We can agree about that, as well. $32B for TMX suggests some pretty serious profligacy. Now who was in charge of that? Why the same Dawn Farrell now heading up the Major Postponements Office.
Oops, drifted off-topic.
Do we have a facility to transship from rail cars?
I think Smith has until July to line up a consortium, but it is a Catch-22: "We can't raise funds until you invoke your C-5 powers and give us a moratorium on C-48." "We don't have to make those changes until you have the funds."
Although I'm sure you can't see it, you're making Jen's point for her.
It's not a pundit's job to create policy alternatives or construct platforms. That comes from within the party and is espoused by the leader. By casting around to everything and everyone outside, blaming circumstance for your failure and playground-taunting external, non-invested observers for their lack of contribution is and continues to be the kind of hubris Pierre simply cannot avoid.
I was just reacting to the two examples in the article. The Conservatives have a ton of pragmatic policy ideas.
But The Line has been chanting "Poilievre must react to Trump" for a year and a half now. They must have had some alternative in mind. Otherwise I have to assume it is just "Elbows Up," but that has been an abject failure.
I get it, though. Poilievre's' strategy is Poilievre's strategy, and so must be criticized.
I think it would be nice if PP recognised publicly that the US we knew is gone. Pretending otherwise, especially to appease a base, is a denial of reality and hardly leaderlike.
I'm having a hard time with the idea that "conservatives blew the election". Voters turned on Trudeau in the polls but showed they may not have meant what they said, running back to the liberals like a stampede. I've said for a long time that I sympathize with the conservative leadership because I have no idea what anyone should say to Canadians at this point. Tristin Hopper seems to be the most willing to say it (in so many words)- Canadians on the left have become utterly selfish and stupid creatures, among other things (immoral and evil are other terms that have come up in Hopper's tweets). Two points he made recently represent this well: 1) They're equating China and the US morally (with even Lombardi alluding to this idea saying the "ethics gap is narrowing"), 2) they're ignoring the fact that China is shipping arms to Iran while that regime murders its people in the street.
Are the conservatives supposed to meet these people where they are? That would be horrifying. Is there anything the conservatives can say to galvanize these Canadians and bring them back to sensibility? I don't think so. I would love to see my team win but not by any means necessary. If sticking to our values (to at least some extent) means we have to wait a long time for Canada to find its sense or morality (after significant demographic change), then fine. The liberals can enjoy their idiot's party in the meantime.
I don't envy journalists as they have to look at this nonsense day in day out while I can just put it out my mind when I feel an aneurism coming. That said, I'm feeling less intellectually challenged (and moored) lately and more simply put off.
Another point I'd like to make is about separatism. I've seen the tone of the discussion. Here's Conrad Black in the post a few months ago:
"The election of a climate change fanatic, Prime Minister Mark Carney, with a long record of demanding the most rapid possible shutdown of the oil and gas industry, has caused Albertans to think increasingly of the fact that if they seceded from Canada and made an agreement to sell their oil and gas either to the United States or through pipelines like Keystone XL through the United States to the world, they could probably abolish the income tax, would become a petrostate like Norway and become one of the per capita wealthiest countries in the world, which they could run themselves without hearing another word from Ottawa. In Alberta, as in Quebec, there are alternatives to Canada. And there is no public evidence that this federal government has given much original thought to how to keep Confederation going. Carney’s first five big projects did include an encouraging emphasis of liquefied natural gas, but they fall far short of an effective answer to the separatists of the east or west."
If the Line writers were addressing this point directly, would the response be in the same manner which others have received? I suspect that'd be like poking a bear.
You and Tristin Hopper might be on to something. How do you as the CPC deal with people who have been totally radicalized by their own stupidity, selfishness and I would add importantly fear, into supporting policies that are self evidently destructive? You can't point them to evidence - they are already choosing to disregard it. You can't pander to them without giving up reality and all the supporters that rely on you to provide some hope of a return to sanity. You are dealing with unfocused demons made of raw emotion. You are not getting these people back.
I think like the UK that we are at a Rent Seeking Behavior level of no return. Our Public sector and public sector adjacent economy so entirely dependent on status quo that any change is career and life threatening.
That's what happens when you elevate and subsidize so many non competitive industries and make-work departments and staff them with people who could never earn close to the same amount in an open market. And then set everyone in a place where the cost of living is so high you need an executive's income to lead a middle class lifestyle. People will defend their little niche industry or department to the absolute death. They care more about maintaining that than you or I care about almost anything.
Well said. Politics is (or should be!) about persuasion. The Cons need to keep talking about the economy and let Mr. elbows up try and fail to fix it (while getting us too close to China). I’d also say that Jen and Matt have no idea about the political mood in the states (I am Canadian but live in the US). Trump is increasingly unpopular here. It would be foolish of the Canadian government to bank on maga being in power after ‘28 or even ‘26.
Poilievre will be proven right, it just depends how much pain we all want to endure before we realize it.
I agree that relitigating the circumstances of the election and apportioning blame between controllable and non controllable factors is pretty pointless right now.
I think job number one should be to convince the mainstream media that a Poilievre win won't mean every columnist and TV presenter in the country will be out of a job and permanently unemployed give or take what they can make on personal YouTube views. Forced to choose between a shitty government and a fucking comet the size of Texas crashing into their careers, journalists are going to pick the shitty government. Perhaps even the plans to defund the CBC should be creatively reinterpreted to turn it into something more balanced. You can't run against the sources that inform so many people and expect to have anything other than an incredibly hard time.
Job two would be to somehow help the NDP resurrect itself...
I'm still not sure how the party deals with the Trump issue. The LPC has the market cornered on hyper fearful pseudo-patriotic boomers (who I'm sorry but I can't have anything but total disdain for, I just can't). Donald Trump clearly has a preference for a Liberal government, probably because it makes us weaker. I don't know, offer him a better deal to leave us alone for a few months run up to an election?
I do not belong to any party and vote based on the candidate and where I think the country needs to go. With the last election I did vote to get rid of the Liberals, I did not think it mattered who was their leader that the party was so far gone it had to go. I was happy with the Minority government as they were held in their power. I give Mr. Poilievre a lot of credit for getting rid of the worst PM ever. I am so pleased with what PM Carney has done. What a mess to clean up and a lot more to do. What I like best is he is an adult, he is intelligent and stoic and stands up for Canada in a mature adult way. The Conservatives continue to cow-tow to the 30% of its base that supports and actually thinks Trump is the way. Mr. Poilievre did not condemn Trump in his acceptance speech and only repeated the same lines with no real solutions. His moment in time has ended. We have seen first hand that 30% wackos can take control by swaying voters who are frustrated, angry and have valid issues and end up voting for change because they felt it was the only choice. (sound familiar?) We got lucky, we caught ourselves before we walked all the way down that path. We need a strong opposition that holds the ruling party to account but also knows to support the good/hard things we need to do to move Canada forward. We do not need an election. If the Conservatives push that, I think they will find out the hard way that the Center where I reside is no longer with them. By standing firm with that base of crazy, they have lost the 30% that would have made them the dominant party.
What exactly HAS Carney done, MOUs are not trade agreements. He has accomplished nothing, we are still in the doldrums brought about by Trudeau, who was advised by Carney.
We have 0 trade agreements, we have the highest food inflation in the G7, Healthcare has not improved, affordability has not improved, cross border trade between provinces has not improved, not one new rental or affordable housing door has been added by them, our GDP languished under 1% and into negative territory,
Everything Carney promised has not happened, you have been conned by a legacy media spinning n nothing into something, which they do endlessly. BUT he is redistributing and renaming the GST rebate, which has always been colloquially referred to as the working poor cheque in my circle, costing 12B which we do not have and was not budgeted for... Don't even get me started on the scam he is pulling on the budget, which only accountant truly understand!
Oh, as gov of the Bank of Canada, Carney lowered interest rates and kept them artificially low, leading people to borrow beyond their means, spurring bidding wars and causing a housing crisis. Well done, Mark!
Haha it's weirdly nice to know that literally the thing that had me most angry with the Harper government at the time was primarily Mark Carney's fault. Makes me feel less bad not appreciating the government we had then.
What exactly has Mark Carney done that pleases you so much? I am not talking about announcements of what he plans to do, but of his actual accomplishments.
With respect, you just recited the Liberal Party propaganda talking point list almost verbatim.
"Carney is the adult in the room and so much better than Trudeau, even though he has all the same people and most of the same policies. He is cleaning up the mess even though the results are vague. Better not look into those. Don't look at deficit, immigration, crime, productivity, or if any of these supposed trade deals are worth the paper their preliminary MOU are written on. The Conservatives are nasty and evil and like the Trump people because their voters are angry, etc."
I don't think he can pivot much further which is unfortunate as things are a hell of a mess across the board. He is, for me, still extremely unlikeable
Why does likability even matter, I am not electing a guy to have a beer with, I am electing the guy I think will run my country the best. You may find him personally unlikable, but I bet the guy you clearly do like would never dane to acknowledge your presence, unless you are waving a check for $1M for his favourite cause, climate change!
I like G&G but they're impossible to listen to when they expound upon topics about which they know very little. I agree that there was no contrition, I intensely disagree that there is any particular silver bullet that could have 'saved' the 2025 election for the tories. Continuing to claim otherwise, as G&G often have in pods and articles, demonstrates that they truly know nothing about running or working on a campaign.
Gurney came close in his pre-convention speech when he essentially acknowledged that tory staffers claiming it was too late to do anything during the campaign were probably right, but that there should ideally be some good messaging/response *now*. This is likely correct. And it's concerning that Poilievre still hasn't hammered out a strong message, though frankly entirely unsurprising that he didn't want to discuss the 8,000 pound elephant that party faithful unanimously agree lost them the last election (whether true or not) in a convention speech.
Here's some free campaign wisdom: you do not talk about the issue that the other guy is winning by 50 points. Had the tories focused more on Trump it is almost certain that Carney would've walked away with a large majority. That he outperformed the conservatives on this issue by as large a margin as he did, and that it was the top issue for as many voters as it was, suggests that there was literally nothing Poilievre could've said about Trump that would have earned more votes than lost.
It's also just completely stupid to dismiss the massive role that luck plays in elections. Staffers and politicians heavily overestimate their ability to change narratives. Consider it another way: take Mark Carney out of the equation and ask yourself if the Liberals still win. Does Chrystia Freeland snatch victory from the jaws of a 25 point defeat within 5 weeks? Karina Gould? If your answer is anything other than "absolutely not" then you're a liberal hack or so unbelievably stupid you shouldn't have access to a keyboard.
Lastly: "alienating the mainstream media limited the voter pool"
Good God man, do you listen to your own podcast? There is no amount of simping that a Tory leader can do to get sympathetic coverage from the mainstream media. The amount of times that you have both written about how bubble-istic, Laurentian, hyper-Ottawa, faux-progressive Ottawa's media is, but still suggest that Poilievre could have performed better in 2025 if only he'd been nicer to them, is just so incongruous. These are the same people who would chase Erin O'Toole into his vehicle in the waning days of the 2021 election demanding a response to whether he'd resign on election night and then criticizing him for declining to answer. The 'media' is no politician's path to victory, let alone a conservative's.
Purely for accuracy's sake, I don't think the staffers were right. I think they did let it slip away. But I acknowledge that it's something we can't prove and acknowledge that they might be right. I don't think so, but they might be.
Fair enough and my apologies for misrepresenting your comments. Wasn't my intent.
I just want to see some kind of proof that substantiates the absolute certainty that you both seem to possess about why the tories lost, because it seems to be nothing more than "top issue = trump, poilievre didn't talk enough about trump, = loss." And any conservative who doesn't acknowledge that is a moron deserving of scorn, based on Jen's commentary.
But the questions are (1) what did you know and (2) when, that would've caused you to change course on a multi-year, multi-million dollar campaign if you were the one in charge, and to what would you have changed that would've worked (and not made things much worse).
I get it, your job is to provide sideline commentary. That's quite literally what I pay for. And the mocking, especially when it's funny. But without considering the above then the criticism seems just as hollow as pontifications that nothing has to change.
I've noticed over my career that when I say things people agree with, but that I cannot prove, they are pleased. When I say something they dislike, they want proof. That's not how this works. Obviously I offer facts and data when I can. But I'm an opinion columnist. I can offer arguments, but rarely proof. And I think you know that.
Also, for the sake of accuracy, we have neither said nor implied that there was a “silver bullet” that could have saved the election for the Conservatives. In fact, I believe I have noted that even if the Conservatives had done everything perfectly, they might still have lost. But we don’t believe they did everything perfectly, and if you are serious about improving your chances of success in the future, maybe that’s a place to start.
Matt and I have spent many hours and words talking and writing about the myriad mistakes that we think they made. These are our opinions and you’re free to disagree with them, but we always presented these positions as complicated and multifactorial. The failure to address Trump seriously was one absolutely major error. But even this would not have been a “silver bullet.”
For a guy who is accusing us of expounding on topics about which we know little, you’re either horribly misinformed about the things we’ve actually said and the positions we hold — or you’re just pretending to be for your own purposes. JG
A little pet peeve of mine … “passive voice” is a grammatical term that has an actual, specific meaning. It doesn’t mean just sounding passive. There was not “a lot of passive voice” in the examples you gave. It wouldn’t take long to look up what passive voice really is.
Also: love your writing, truly! Great essay, great insights.
“...or, “alienating the mainstream media limited our voter pool”...”
Oh, come on, Jen, be a little fair. You don't need to alienate people who already have a prejudice against you: they're self-alienating. Nothing in this world Poilievre could have said or done would have caused legacy media to print a single word that risked widening his party's voter pool.
It’s possible that everyone in the media is a unified mass with no differentiation of opinion or perspective. It’s possible that they’re all engaged in a conspiracy to undermine the Conservative party forever. That’s possible. I don’t know.
What I am confident about is that if you treat the media as if this were true, you’ll fulfill your own prophecy. JG
Thanks for the reply... but it's evasive on two counts. First of all, if evasion isn't the aim why bother attacking a straw man position no one is defending? I haven't made any categorical claim about “everyone in the media” being a “unified mass,” nor do I need to. If for some reason you want to contest the very different claim that legacy media outlets like the CBC and Toronto Star have been ideologically captured by would-be social engineers masquerading their activist projects as journalism—activists who have little use for conservative input and tend to regard conservatives as impediments to realizing their projects—go ahead; but I can't imagine what you'd offer as evidence. Isn't The Line itself a reaction against legacy media's largely left-tilting politicization, and the consequent erosion of its credibility? Isn't offering an alternative, more reliable source of analysis supposedly the reason for The Line's existence?
Secondly, contextually the above is an irrelevant side-excursion, since I wasn't drawing attention to a media bias I presumed we both take for granted as self-demonstrating, but taking issue with the fairness of assigning Poilievre more than the most marginal responsibility for legacy media's hostility toward him and his party. If you think that's an unfair criticism, by all means explain why and we can at least have a conversation. My position is that the reluctance of the outlets already mentioned to present Poilievre in a light that might have helped expand his voter pool owes nothing to his having “alienated” them, and everything to their own ideological convictions. Poilievre didn't alienate me when I saw him interviewed on internet sites with no ideological axe to grind, where the interviewers weren't setting traps for him; and I've always voted NDP. I see little overlap between the man who emerges from those interviews and legacy media caricatures of him as somehow 'Trump light;' and for that I hold media—not Poilievre—responsible. It's perverse to pretend Poivievre's "treatment" of the media is an issue when the opposite is so clearly the case.
Funnily enough, this kind of loser talk reminds me of the NDP and the Greens. Think of how Jagmeet Singh now claims that he made a conscious decision to sacrifice the success of his party to stop Poilievre - which comes across as an attempt to retroactively justify his poor leadership performance. I have also seen Green Party members in the past make points along the line of, "We would rather be principled in influencing government from the sidelines, than form governments ourselves."
If your political party's intellectual well is drying so rapidly that the government can "steal" a few of your ideas and you have virtually nothing novel left - or you are reduced to a petty debate on how "they're not implementing our policies with x degree of perfect calibration" - then there really is no one to blame for your party's misfortunes except yourselves!
The Conservatives have a lot of pragmatic policies. You would just have to go look, but you won't.
It's the CPC responsibility to sell them, and convince us. The proof is in the eating.
Just because Carney stole some of their ideas doesn’t mean he can implement them without alienating the center left voters who put him in office. My bet is Carney fails to deliver economic growth or a pipeline or lower priced houses or intra-provincial free trade. But we’ll see.
Well, there is little doubt that he is winning the data war against U.S. Steel.
I’ve been calling them the NDP of the right since the last election. Perpetual losers, perpetually aggrieved. If they actually won I’m not sure they’d know what to do with themselves at this point. It would shatter their carefully crafted identity built around victimhood.
Can we please do away with this blind, unqualified narrative that the CPC blew a 25 point lead? At their peak, the CPC was polling at about 43% while the LPC was at 18%. There is no realistic chance that the CPC could ever get anything meaningfully more than that 43% anyway. And in the election, they ended with about 41% of the vote - hardly a blown lead. The fact that the NDP collapsed completely and the Libs have a far more efficient voter distribution than the CPC can and should factor into any "blown lead" evaluation. Which is why I question the blind reduction of the entire election to "CPC blew a 25% lead".
In fact, the bigger question is how can the LPC, with ~44% of the votes in a favorable distribution actually fail to achieve a majority? That is, objectively speaking, a bigger failure.
Yah the "blown lead" narrative ignores basic math so badly that it just isn't a good faith argument. I only see it made by people who have an agenda, usually getting rid of Poilievre.
The NDP and Green vote totally collapsed, and the Bloc vote partially collapsed, due to a few different factors and all of these went almost entirely to the Liberals.
Ranks up there with "Pierre can't get a security clearance!" lol
Basic math, from OP's own post: 43 - 18 = 25, hence 25 point lead...? OP then cited Libs at 44 in the end, with CPC at 41? So 41 - 44 = -3. There's the math. They were leading and then weren't. The NDP context explains why, but doesn't change the facts.
Blown lead implies that it was Poilievre's fault that the small parties collapsed.
If the CPC vote share went from 43 to 33, while the Liberals gained the same amount and the other parties stayed the same, well yes that would be pretty clearly on him. The more the Liberals gained from other parties consolidating to them, the more uncertain that argument becomes.
It seems like those making this argument are arguing completely from the end result and sticking their fingers in their ears about the multiple caveats because they want to place maximum blame on Poilievre. Including Jen Gerson apparently.
I guess it's semantics: you seem to associate culpability with the word "blown." I just see it as an observed fact. They had a lead, then they didn't. The reasons don't matter: it was blown.
But speaking of those reasons: sure there were factors beyond Poilievre's control, but there were also plenty of factors within his control, and that of the CPC, who selected him as leader. This is mostly JG's argument. If Conservatives discount those reasons out of hand, I think the party may continue to be surprised and frustrated by their electoral results.
Are you saying he could have helped boost the NDP and greens who were in full chaos mode, or that he could have held on to an organic 45%?
Nope, the NDP did that to themselves. I think Poilievre (and the party) made certain choices - and have certain limitations - that made holding on to any part of that 25-point lead more difficult than it had to be. The degree of NDP collapse means those choices might not have made any difference, but they could have. JG's point is that Poilievre seems (at least publicly) uninterested in revisiting what could have been done differently.
Yes but they didn't close the deal. They are unable, currently, to close the deal. Blowing a 25 point lead points to something about the leader that voters find unpalatable. The only thing that matters is closing the deal. Probably go back and see why the other 60% of Canadians didn't vote CPC last year when Mark Carney was coronated by the parliamentary press gallery.
With NDP support imploding and Libs with MSM help fanning flames of TDS and Elbows Up BS, the conservatives just couldn't defeat those headwins. Come the next election and the NDP getting a new leader they are sure to pull votes from the Liberals...they won't be pulling votes from Conservatives...
I am so sick of hearing Poilivre blew the lead, he did not blow the lead, he got exactly the results most sane, intelligent people would have expected. His polling was always high before the writ dropped. Poilievre received 41.3 % of the vote, Jagmeet Singh collapsed and his vote went liberal, I have NEVER met an NDP voter who would swing conservative over night and every journalist knows this! Also, 41% of the vote, in any of the previous 6 elections would have been enough to form a majority government. You also know this!
Contrary to what legacy media, and appartently you as well, Jen, that election was about fear of Donald Trump which Carney harnessed instead of hope for a brighter future for Canada which Poilievre campaigned on. Sadly, we have neither benefitted from the fear, nor the"more statesmanlike" leader, instead we are still in the doldrums created by 10 years of bad Liberal policies. aEven sadder, Canadians look poised to reward them again if we get a snap election, and anyone wonders why Albertans are frustrated as hell with the status quo!
"We didn't blow a lead. We did everything right. It was the circumstances that were wrong." JG
What a childish response, Jen. You know perfectly well that there’s little any Conservative leader could do if left wing voters shift to the Liberals in such huge numbers. Carney sold us a bill of goods about elbows up which aging boomers bought hook, line, and sinker. Of course, as you pointed out in your blistering column on Carney’s apology, he didn’t mean it. But sometimes lies work in politics.
Perhaps if a Conservative leader did things a bit differently than Poilievre, the shift of left-wing voters' numbers might not have been so huge. That's the point. Poilievre and the CPC agree with you, even though they don't seem to have done any introspection or analysis to examine alternate possibilities. "I'm stating my position loudly and repeatedly with neat catchphrases, so it must be correct!"
a bit differently how exactly?
Are you just going to repeat this line as rebuttal? Really regretting resubscribing after my hiatus. If you're willing to refund the remaining balance, please let me know.
You can come and go as you please. The Line is a bad place for people who are uncomfortable with challenge.
I am merely pointing out that your comment is perfectly indicative of mainstream Conservative mentality right now. I can't say for you whether that observation should hold value to you. JG
writing 9 paras as rebuttal to "they lost... do they know why?" is exactly the problem.
The reality for Cons is that we have a majority center left voting base in Canada. 3 parties have traditionally shared that center left group, on the right is one party. A widely held coalition that does well when the NDP are strong. with a collapse in NDP and Green votes the Libs will be in ideal position regardless of what the cons do. Its a tough nut to crack as more moderate viewpoints put stress on the right coalition. Maintaining a happy base is an important aspect of party management. Lets give Steve Outhouse time to craft a new message, a vision for Pierre and the party. I really believe the opportunity will exist in 2-3 years for another shot as we all know this Liberal team will not perform.
I hope it comes sooner than that, BUT not this spring, that is too soon. I believe it will take at minimum another year for enough people to realize that Carney is all talk no delivery and a complete fraud who has failed upwards, like pretty much all Liberals over the past 10 - 15 years!
Yeah, I too get tired of the ridiculous "blew the lead" comments. Also, I'm glad at least one party leader isn't publicly slagging Trump every chance he gets. What possible good comes from that?
Odd comment given that Carney has kissed Trump’s ass and even apologized to him for the Reagan ad.
According to Donald. Who are you going to believe?
We all saw him praise the orange fascist in the Oval Office. And no one doubts he apologized for the ad. Jen Gerson wrote a highly critical column about it.
Others here just love cheering for the ongoing destruction of our country. So much better than voting for a leader they find vaguely "yucky".
I think it’s a blessing for Pierre that he lost tbh. It would be hard cleaning up after the last 10 years. And people would blame him for not being able to. Carney won’t be able to do it either, but he’s the new shiny thing so has public goodwill behind him. I don’t think things will change until Canadians feel they’ve hit rock bottom. We’re a long way from that, but we’re gaining speed upon descent.
That’s the job of being Prime Minister - you’re always cleaning up a mess from the last government. Anybody who whines about it isn’t fit for the job.
I’m more concerned about Canadians than I am about a politician’s feelings.
So confusing. are you saying they didn't blow the lead?
While we're at it, how do you square the ongoing obsession with the teacher, gone now for how long?, with insistence we can't talk about how the CPC lost, again, and why?
My head is spinning.
NDP voters wouldn’t need to swing to the Conservatives. The Conservatives should be able to pull over right leaning Liberal voters, just as a strong NDP pulls over left leaning Liberal voters. Turnout dropped substantially from the last election, so a lot of those NDP voters just didn’t vote at all. Poillievre lost his own riding, which he had held for years.
The problem for me is that the Liberals seem to be shifting right and the Conservatives relying on a voter base capped in the low 40s when the Liberals were leaning hard left is going to see conservatives relegated to the 30s like they were when we had the reform and conservative parties fighting amongst themselves while Chretien dominated.
OK - how about this, then: Poilievre couldn't make the sale in the end. He'd spent years wooing and pitching the client, and when it came time to sign the dotted line, the other guy swept in with a better offer and grabbed it from under his nose.
At least you’re using your own words. Much better :-)
I paid for a year’s membership. Are you saying you will refund the remaining 11.5 months? That is my question. Your rudeness to me many many months ago was the reason for my previous hiatus.
Cry harder
Hang in there, champ. One day you’ll forget all about your trauma. I’ll 🙏 for you.
they lost.
they should try to win.
"Pick the Technocratic Daddy whose faves/unfaves outrank Poilievre by nearly 20 points. Keep the Conservative policy. Best of both worlds, really."
...and it would totally work too, if only the Liberals would ACTUALLY implement the Conservative policies.
But they don't.
I've made this point repeatedly (just as Jenn has written endless versions of the paragraph quoted above) but what Carney stole from Poilievre were NOT "policies", they were talking points.
But SAYING you're going to "build faster" means nothing if no shovels go into the ground.
SAYING you want to "make Canada an Energy Superpower" means nothing if you're not willing to remove the legislative impediments which have boxed our resources in.
SAYING you will spend less, but posting the largest non-pandemic deficit in Canada's history.
You get the point. Poilievre unfurled a large and specific set of policy proposals in that election.
Carney adopted NONE of them.
But he did PRETEND he wanted to, which swung a lot of votes.
I think that’s a very valid point. The question you have to ask yourself is whether the Conservatives could do any better. That is, are they offering real policy, or just more talking points? JG
There's only one way to find out.
GS, you are a bright light in this Substack.
aw, shucks :-)
Yah this is aggravating. They only "stole" the policies to go as far as the announcement stage. So you get placated that your government isn't run by a kindergartener anymore but don't actually benefit from the thing you wanted to happen because surprise, the kindergarteners are still in charge.
But they made a commercial. we are building you know. Mission Accomplished.
I love that commercial.
The self-parody and irony is so thick you can cut it with a knife. I especially like the way they really lean into all the amazing things we have built as a nation ...in the 1950s and prior.
But here's the REALLY funny part:
When the writ drops and we go into campaign mode, every dollar they spent on producing and airing that ad is going to be described as "LOOK AT all the money we spent on building infrastructure at speeds never seen before..."
With respect, if someone named Broadbent, Layton, etc, had been the NDP leader in 2024, we would currently have a Cons Fed Govt.
"We did everything right. It was the circumstances that were wrong." JG
In this country a strong NDP party will often get you a Cons majority.
Politics is all about circumstances. If a body of a four-year-old hadn't washed up upon a beach just before the 2015 election, Justin Trudeau would not have won. You're trying to hard to convince us of your opinions, Jen.
yes. and meeting those circumstances correctly...
PP missed that mark.
I get your continual point that Poilievre sucks, didn't adapt enough, etc. and there is some truth to at least the latter.
But circumstances play a role. A big one.
Harper wouldn't have won (edit: a majority at least) in 2011 if not for the dual circumstance of an unusually strong NDP and a particularly inept Liberal.
2015 could have gone radically differently if the election was a different length.
Trudeau likely wouldn't have won in 2021 if not for Covid.
Carney wouldn't have won in 2025 if not for Trump.
You can call these counterfactuals or accept that a concerning amount of our democracy comes down to random fucking chance.
People forget how strong the Layton NDP were in 2011 and the role in defeating Liberals..
That Quebec orange wave wasn't on anyone's radar, even the NDP's!
I think you're grossly underestimating how detestable PP is. If either of those people were around, you'd have the exact same government you have today....a Liberal NDP minority; just a different distribution of seats.
he's not detestable. he did his job as oppo.
No, he's utterly detestable. He's a spin-doctoring bullshit artist, devoid of any credibility. His judgment is as bad as Trudeau's, based on his foolish support of the Convoy, which cost him his riding. He couldn't get a costed plan out before the advanced polls closed, suggesting he was completely unprepared for the election he was begging for. That's not leadership. He will never get my vote....
This is why your writing is so great. As with Pierre Berton, I can hear you reading this, and see the various places your eyes roll in disbelief.
Pierre was reaffirmed by a minuscule portion of the party who dropped a grand for the opportunity. He should ask Danielle how his big Canadian tent fits with her attack on trans people. The CPC refuse to learn from their failures....and aren't failures supposed to be an opportunity to learn?
The Alberta trans legislation is focused on minors, parents/schools and girls sports. It has strong support among the public.
So it's a giant bullshit distraction of the state sticking its nose in where it has no knowledge or business. Call it anything you want; it's legalised hate.
What is the appropriate response to Alberta separatism? Same as a year ago: Allow pipelines.
What is the appropriate response to Trump? Same as a year ago: Raid some fentanyl labs, promise to vet immigrants and go to Mar-A-Lago and negotiate like an adult.
Now tell me your ideas. Not why you think these won't work, but what you think will work.
Sure...do nothing for 7 years while a pipeline is being built.....kill all your green energy projects. Ignore the fracking chemicals showing up in the groundwater.....oil is all that matters. Not much of a vision for the future.
So, no plan. Thanks for coming out.
Not quite. As I've said here dozens of times, where would Alberta be if it had followed Rachel's plan and put it on the train? Tens of millions more barrels shipped by now, but clearly, Alberta Conservatives can't think outside the box...or today's political and legal realities.
Lac Magentic ring any bells for you?
Oil by train is FAR more risky than oil by pipeline.
IF you care at all about the environment, that is.
Bakken crude and dilbit have little in common. Megantic happened because Transport Canada allowed an utterly ineptly managed railroad to operate in Canada. There have been tens of thousands of oil trains since, that haven't made headlines. Trains get your product to market. Pipelines that don't exist don't.
Yes, you have said that before and you are correct. But that option is already in play and yet Alberta separation is still a thing. I suspect that if the federal government committed to pipelines it would convert a lot of the separatists.
Good luck with your negotiations with Native Canadians about how much land you get to keep. It gets tiring pretty quickly hearing the richest province in the country, and the only one without a provincial sales tax, whining about how bad they've got it. But go ahead and destroy the country.....US ownership might not be the gift you think it is. And if BC stays, and we route around you through the territories, don't expect to get your pipeline to the coast..... or any help with TMX. I think Alberta separatists are fools, cutting off their noses to spite their faces.
I don't think native Canadians have the leverage to tell us how much land we get to keep, lol.
C-5 gave Carney the right to overrule the First Nations and any other impediments to a pipeline. He doesn't dare use C-5, though, because the courts will expose it as the charade it is.
QUOTE
I suspect that if the federal government committed to pipelines it would convert a lot of the separatists.
END QUOTE
So, I guess you missed the MOU that the Prime Minister and the Premier of Alberta signed late last year?
You know, the one that engendered a lot of pushback from First Nations groups and others in BC who were worried about Ottawa's support in principle for more pipelines?
It was an MOU, not a commitment.
Holding Alberta to a higher standard while Eastern Canada sends their cash to the US to buy natural gas fracked there instead might not the best way to keep Alberta in Canada. Shifting the fracking to another area doesn’t decrease the environmental risks, it just send the money and environmental oversight outside of Canada.
Also, I’m pretty sure we are able to build a pipeline and also windmills/solar farms/etc at the same time. If we can’t, we have much bigger problems.
Most of Ontario's natural gas comes from Alberta. Danielle killed Alberta's green energy plans. Alberta has a massive pending water crisis. Where will it come from when the glaciers are gone, and the snowpack getting smaller every year?
Ontario's natural gas supply no longer mainly comes from Alberta, the majority is delivered from from the US. Are you reading into my comment that I advocated for fracking and that's why you're now bringing water into the discussion? Not clear to me. I did not advocate for fracking, I advocated for keeping environmental oversight in Canada rather than elsewhere.
Delivered from, or through the US? I think most of the gas pipelines now pass through the US, but it's still Alberta gas coming to Ontario, as far as I can find out. No, I didn't think you were advocating for fracking. It will make people a whole lot of money at a great cost to be paid later. But I do think Alberta...the entire Canadian west is facing a looming water crisis as the glaciers melt at unprecedented rates.
It's hard to get precise data on this, but Alberta gas shipping north of the Great Lakes looks like it's only 2% now. Shipping south of the Great Lakes happens still, but the US built at least 2 new pipelines to bring fracked gas into Ontario, shifting the supply proportion significantly to the US.
Alberta has more wind power as a percentage of our electrical grid than any other province in Canada.
Ditto for solar.
But you were saying....
https://globalnews.ca/news/9875106/alberta-pause-renewable-energy-citing-rural-concerns/
https://www.alberta.ca/federal-provincial-energy-partnership
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/clean-electricity-regulations-alberta-9.6999432
https://www.pembina.org/pub/wind-solar-projects-alberta-cancelled-alarming-rate
Yes, I am aware that the Alberta government paused new builds in order to get their regulatory house in order.
This does not support your assertion that "Danielle killed Alberta's green energy plans"
As I mentioned, Alberta actually LEADS the nation in green energy.
Basically all the ideas that the Liberals abandoned when they installed Carney. Got it...
And yet, since the Liberals did it...with a leader who is basically a conservative but not an asshole, you still object. Pick a lane. They picked Carney. You kept Pierre after the greatest electoral collapse in Canadian history. Trudeau was a disaster. He's gone. It doesn't seem like the CPC got the memo.
The lead character changed but melodrama continues. The virtue signaling continues with a more pragmatic message, but again with no follow-up. MOUs are not achievements.
We can agree about that. Now, you need to find someone to put up the time and money to build it, because Canada has already done that. You need to get a whole bunch of people on side as well. And figure out who's going to buy it that justifies the investment. Again, there is a way you can increase the amount you ship starting this fall. You're choosing, again, not to take it. That seems like a self-inflicted wound.
We can agree about that, as well. $32B for TMX suggests some pretty serious profligacy. Now who was in charge of that? Why the same Dawn Farrell now heading up the Major Postponements Office.
Oops, drifted off-topic.
Do we have a facility to transship from rail cars?
I think Smith has until July to line up a consortium, but it is a Catch-22: "We can't raise funds until you invoke your C-5 powers and give us a moratorium on C-48." "We don't have to make those changes until you have the funds."
Although I'm sure you can't see it, you're making Jen's point for her.
It's not a pundit's job to create policy alternatives or construct platforms. That comes from within the party and is espoused by the leader. By casting around to everything and everyone outside, blaming circumstance for your failure and playground-taunting external, non-invested observers for their lack of contribution is and continues to be the kind of hubris Pierre simply cannot avoid.
I was just reacting to the two examples in the article. The Conservatives have a ton of pragmatic policy ideas.
But The Line has been chanting "Poilievre must react to Trump" for a year and a half now. They must have had some alternative in mind. Otherwise I have to assume it is just "Elbows Up," but that has been an abject failure.
I get it, though. Poilievre's' strategy is Poilievre's strategy, and so must be criticized.
I think it would be nice if PP recognised publicly that the US we knew is gone. Pretending otherwise, especially to appease a base, is a denial of reality and hardly leaderlike.
So none of what PP articulated in his speech count as policy statements to you?
I'm having a hard time with the idea that "conservatives blew the election". Voters turned on Trudeau in the polls but showed they may not have meant what they said, running back to the liberals like a stampede. I've said for a long time that I sympathize with the conservative leadership because I have no idea what anyone should say to Canadians at this point. Tristin Hopper seems to be the most willing to say it (in so many words)- Canadians on the left have become utterly selfish and stupid creatures, among other things (immoral and evil are other terms that have come up in Hopper's tweets). Two points he made recently represent this well: 1) They're equating China and the US morally (with even Lombardi alluding to this idea saying the "ethics gap is narrowing"), 2) they're ignoring the fact that China is shipping arms to Iran while that regime murders its people in the street.
Are the conservatives supposed to meet these people where they are? That would be horrifying. Is there anything the conservatives can say to galvanize these Canadians and bring them back to sensibility? I don't think so. I would love to see my team win but not by any means necessary. If sticking to our values (to at least some extent) means we have to wait a long time for Canada to find its sense or morality (after significant demographic change), then fine. The liberals can enjoy their idiot's party in the meantime.
I don't envy journalists as they have to look at this nonsense day in day out while I can just put it out my mind when I feel an aneurism coming. That said, I'm feeling less intellectually challenged (and moored) lately and more simply put off.
Another point I'd like to make is about separatism. I've seen the tone of the discussion. Here's Conrad Black in the post a few months ago:
"The election of a climate change fanatic, Prime Minister Mark Carney, with a long record of demanding the most rapid possible shutdown of the oil and gas industry, has caused Albertans to think increasingly of the fact that if they seceded from Canada and made an agreement to sell their oil and gas either to the United States or through pipelines like Keystone XL through the United States to the world, they could probably abolish the income tax, would become a petrostate like Norway and become one of the per capita wealthiest countries in the world, which they could run themselves without hearing another word from Ottawa. In Alberta, as in Quebec, there are alternatives to Canada. And there is no public evidence that this federal government has given much original thought to how to keep Confederation going. Carney’s first five big projects did include an encouraging emphasis of liquefied natural gas, but they fall far short of an effective answer to the separatists of the east or west."
If the Line writers were addressing this point directly, would the response be in the same manner which others have received? I suspect that'd be like poking a bear.
You and Tristin Hopper might be on to something. How do you as the CPC deal with people who have been totally radicalized by their own stupidity, selfishness and I would add importantly fear, into supporting policies that are self evidently destructive? You can't point them to evidence - they are already choosing to disregard it. You can't pander to them without giving up reality and all the supporters that rely on you to provide some hope of a return to sanity. You are dealing with unfocused demons made of raw emotion. You are not getting these people back.
I think like the UK that we are at a Rent Seeking Behavior level of no return. Our Public sector and public sector adjacent economy so entirely dependent on status quo that any change is career and life threatening.
That's what happens when you elevate and subsidize so many non competitive industries and make-work departments and staff them with people who could never earn close to the same amount in an open market. And then set everyone in a place where the cost of living is so high you need an executive's income to lead a middle class lifestyle. People will defend their little niche industry or department to the absolute death. They care more about maintaining that than you or I care about almost anything.
Well said. Politics is (or should be!) about persuasion. The Cons need to keep talking about the economy and let Mr. elbows up try and fail to fix it (while getting us too close to China). I’d also say that Jen and Matt have no idea about the political mood in the states (I am Canadian but live in the US). Trump is increasingly unpopular here. It would be foolish of the Canadian government to bank on maga being in power after ‘28 or even ‘26.
Poilievre will be proven right, it just depends how much pain we all want to endure before we realize it.
I agree that relitigating the circumstances of the election and apportioning blame between controllable and non controllable factors is pretty pointless right now.
I think job number one should be to convince the mainstream media that a Poilievre win won't mean every columnist and TV presenter in the country will be out of a job and permanently unemployed give or take what they can make on personal YouTube views. Forced to choose between a shitty government and a fucking comet the size of Texas crashing into their careers, journalists are going to pick the shitty government. Perhaps even the plans to defund the CBC should be creatively reinterpreted to turn it into something more balanced. You can't run against the sources that inform so many people and expect to have anything other than an incredibly hard time.
Job two would be to somehow help the NDP resurrect itself...
I'm still not sure how the party deals with the Trump issue. The LPC has the market cornered on hyper fearful pseudo-patriotic boomers (who I'm sorry but I can't have anything but total disdain for, I just can't). Donald Trump clearly has a preference for a Liberal government, probably because it makes us weaker. I don't know, offer him a better deal to leave us alone for a few months run up to an election?
I do not belong to any party and vote based on the candidate and where I think the country needs to go. With the last election I did vote to get rid of the Liberals, I did not think it mattered who was their leader that the party was so far gone it had to go. I was happy with the Minority government as they were held in their power. I give Mr. Poilievre a lot of credit for getting rid of the worst PM ever. I am so pleased with what PM Carney has done. What a mess to clean up and a lot more to do. What I like best is he is an adult, he is intelligent and stoic and stands up for Canada in a mature adult way. The Conservatives continue to cow-tow to the 30% of its base that supports and actually thinks Trump is the way. Mr. Poilievre did not condemn Trump in his acceptance speech and only repeated the same lines with no real solutions. His moment in time has ended. We have seen first hand that 30% wackos can take control by swaying voters who are frustrated, angry and have valid issues and end up voting for change because they felt it was the only choice. (sound familiar?) We got lucky, we caught ourselves before we walked all the way down that path. We need a strong opposition that holds the ruling party to account but also knows to support the good/hard things we need to do to move Canada forward. We do not need an election. If the Conservatives push that, I think they will find out the hard way that the Center where I reside is no longer with them. By standing firm with that base of crazy, they have lost the 30% that would have made them the dominant party.
What exactly HAS Carney done, MOUs are not trade agreements. He has accomplished nothing, we are still in the doldrums brought about by Trudeau, who was advised by Carney.
We have 0 trade agreements, we have the highest food inflation in the G7, Healthcare has not improved, affordability has not improved, cross border trade between provinces has not improved, not one new rental or affordable housing door has been added by them, our GDP languished under 1% and into negative territory,
Everything Carney promised has not happened, you have been conned by a legacy media spinning n nothing into something, which they do endlessly. BUT he is redistributing and renaming the GST rebate, which has always been colloquially referred to as the working poor cheque in my circle, costing 12B which we do not have and was not budgeted for... Don't even get me started on the scam he is pulling on the budget, which only accountant truly understand!
Oh, as gov of the Bank of Canada, Carney lowered interest rates and kept them artificially low, leading people to borrow beyond their means, spurring bidding wars and causing a housing crisis. Well done, Mark!
Haha it's weirdly nice to know that literally the thing that had me most angry with the Harper government at the time was primarily Mark Carney's fault. Makes me feel less bad not appreciating the government we had then.
What exactly has Mark Carney done that pleases you so much? I am not talking about announcements of what he plans to do, but of his actual accomplishments.
With respect, you just recited the Liberal Party propaganda talking point list almost verbatim.
"Carney is the adult in the room and so much better than Trudeau, even though he has all the same people and most of the same policies. He is cleaning up the mess even though the results are vague. Better not look into those. Don't look at deficit, immigration, crime, productivity, or if any of these supposed trade deals are worth the paper their preliminary MOU are written on. The Conservatives are nasty and evil and like the Trump people because their voters are angry, etc."
IF we go to the polls this Spring, it will be because the Liberals want a majority.
They risk a lot if they don't go to the polls PRIOR to the CUSMA talks.
Perfectly stated!
I don't think he can pivot much further which is unfortunate as things are a hell of a mess across the board. He is, for me, still extremely unlikeable
Why does likability even matter, I am not electing a guy to have a beer with, I am electing the guy I think will run my country the best. You may find him personally unlikable, but I bet the guy you clearly do like would never dane to acknowledge your presence, unless you are waving a check for $1M for his favourite cause, climate change!
We have a media driven decision making process, emphasis on TV. That's why.
Um, wow.
Beautifully written.
I like G&G but they're impossible to listen to when they expound upon topics about which they know very little. I agree that there was no contrition, I intensely disagree that there is any particular silver bullet that could have 'saved' the 2025 election for the tories. Continuing to claim otherwise, as G&G often have in pods and articles, demonstrates that they truly know nothing about running or working on a campaign.
Gurney came close in his pre-convention speech when he essentially acknowledged that tory staffers claiming it was too late to do anything during the campaign were probably right, but that there should ideally be some good messaging/response *now*. This is likely correct. And it's concerning that Poilievre still hasn't hammered out a strong message, though frankly entirely unsurprising that he didn't want to discuss the 8,000 pound elephant that party faithful unanimously agree lost them the last election (whether true or not) in a convention speech.
Here's some free campaign wisdom: you do not talk about the issue that the other guy is winning by 50 points. Had the tories focused more on Trump it is almost certain that Carney would've walked away with a large majority. That he outperformed the conservatives on this issue by as large a margin as he did, and that it was the top issue for as many voters as it was, suggests that there was literally nothing Poilievre could've said about Trump that would have earned more votes than lost.
It's also just completely stupid to dismiss the massive role that luck plays in elections. Staffers and politicians heavily overestimate their ability to change narratives. Consider it another way: take Mark Carney out of the equation and ask yourself if the Liberals still win. Does Chrystia Freeland snatch victory from the jaws of a 25 point defeat within 5 weeks? Karina Gould? If your answer is anything other than "absolutely not" then you're a liberal hack or so unbelievably stupid you shouldn't have access to a keyboard.
Lastly: "alienating the mainstream media limited the voter pool"
Good God man, do you listen to your own podcast? There is no amount of simping that a Tory leader can do to get sympathetic coverage from the mainstream media. The amount of times that you have both written about how bubble-istic, Laurentian, hyper-Ottawa, faux-progressive Ottawa's media is, but still suggest that Poilievre could have performed better in 2025 if only he'd been nicer to them, is just so incongruous. These are the same people who would chase Erin O'Toole into his vehicle in the waning days of the 2021 election demanding a response to whether he'd resign on election night and then criticizing him for declining to answer. The 'media' is no politician's path to victory, let alone a conservative's.
Purely for accuracy's sake, I don't think the staffers were right. I think they did let it slip away. But I acknowledge that it's something we can't prove and acknowledge that they might be right. I don't think so, but they might be.
Fair enough and my apologies for misrepresenting your comments. Wasn't my intent.
I just want to see some kind of proof that substantiates the absolute certainty that you both seem to possess about why the tories lost, because it seems to be nothing more than "top issue = trump, poilievre didn't talk enough about trump, = loss." And any conservative who doesn't acknowledge that is a moron deserving of scorn, based on Jen's commentary.
But the questions are (1) what did you know and (2) when, that would've caused you to change course on a multi-year, multi-million dollar campaign if you were the one in charge, and to what would you have changed that would've worked (and not made things much worse).
I get it, your job is to provide sideline commentary. That's quite literally what I pay for. And the mocking, especially when it's funny. But without considering the above then the criticism seems just as hollow as pontifications that nothing has to change.
I've noticed over my career that when I say things people agree with, but that I cannot prove, they are pleased. When I say something they dislike, they want proof. That's not how this works. Obviously I offer facts and data when I can. But I'm an opinion columnist. I can offer arguments, but rarely proof. And I think you know that.
Also, for the sake of accuracy, we have neither said nor implied that there was a “silver bullet” that could have saved the election for the Conservatives. In fact, I believe I have noted that even if the Conservatives had done everything perfectly, they might still have lost. But we don’t believe they did everything perfectly, and if you are serious about improving your chances of success in the future, maybe that’s a place to start.
Matt and I have spent many hours and words talking and writing about the myriad mistakes that we think they made. These are our opinions and you’re free to disagree with them, but we always presented these positions as complicated and multifactorial. The failure to address Trump seriously was one absolutely major error. But even this would not have been a “silver bullet.”
For a guy who is accusing us of expounding on topics about which we know little, you’re either horribly misinformed about the things we’ve actually said and the positions we hold — or you’re just pretending to be for your own purposes. JG
A little pet peeve of mine … “passive voice” is a grammatical term that has an actual, specific meaning. It doesn’t mean just sounding passive. There was not “a lot of passive voice” in the examples you gave. It wouldn’t take long to look up what passive voice really is.
Also: love your writing, truly! Great essay, great insights.
Oh, grant me a little writerly license. :) JG
Okay, okay, you’ve won me over with your charm. I won’t complain about it anymore. Sorry for being a pedant.
So right about the passive voice. I am annoyed its misrepresentation here and elsewhere :-)
“...or, “alienating the mainstream media limited our voter pool”...”
Oh, come on, Jen, be a little fair. You don't need to alienate people who already have a prejudice against you: they're self-alienating. Nothing in this world Poilievre could have said or done would have caused legacy media to print a single word that risked widening his party's voter pool.
It’s possible that everyone in the media is a unified mass with no differentiation of opinion or perspective. It’s possible that they’re all engaged in a conspiracy to undermine the Conservative party forever. That’s possible. I don’t know.
What I am confident about is that if you treat the media as if this were true, you’ll fulfill your own prophecy. JG
Thanks for the reply... but it's evasive on two counts. First of all, if evasion isn't the aim why bother attacking a straw man position no one is defending? I haven't made any categorical claim about “everyone in the media” being a “unified mass,” nor do I need to. If for some reason you want to contest the very different claim that legacy media outlets like the CBC and Toronto Star have been ideologically captured by would-be social engineers masquerading their activist projects as journalism—activists who have little use for conservative input and tend to regard conservatives as impediments to realizing their projects—go ahead; but I can't imagine what you'd offer as evidence. Isn't The Line itself a reaction against legacy media's largely left-tilting politicization, and the consequent erosion of its credibility? Isn't offering an alternative, more reliable source of analysis supposedly the reason for The Line's existence?
Secondly, contextually the above is an irrelevant side-excursion, since I wasn't drawing attention to a media bias I presumed we both take for granted as self-demonstrating, but taking issue with the fairness of assigning Poilievre more than the most marginal responsibility for legacy media's hostility toward him and his party. If you think that's an unfair criticism, by all means explain why and we can at least have a conversation. My position is that the reluctance of the outlets already mentioned to present Poilievre in a light that might have helped expand his voter pool owes nothing to his having “alienated” them, and everything to their own ideological convictions. Poilievre didn't alienate me when I saw him interviewed on internet sites with no ideological axe to grind, where the interviewers weren't setting traps for him; and I've always voted NDP. I see little overlap between the man who emerges from those interviews and legacy media caricatures of him as somehow 'Trump light;' and for that I hold media—not Poilievre—responsible. It's perverse to pretend Poivievre's "treatment" of the media is an issue when the opposite is so clearly the case.
Ggaawwwddd...... this article gets 100 downvotes.
Haha yah we get it. Jen Gerson hates Poilievre. It's definitely getting engagement though, myself included.
Everybody seems to think that I hate them. I’m starting to take it personally. JG