The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - Campaign Day 27: Yikes, that was .......

Episode Date: October 7, 2019

Day 27 of Canada's 2019 Federal Election. | Thank for subscribing and for submitting a rating and review! * TWITTER @petermansbridge | INSTAGRAM @thepetermansbridge ** https://www.thepetermansbridge.com/ *** Producer: Manscorp Media Services

and hello there it's Peter Mansbridge on a late Monday night day 27 is the bridge. Well, what did you think of that? I can tell you I didn't think very much of it. I thought it was brutal, in a word, brutal. You know, I've watched every debate since the first televised debate in 1968. I'm afraid to, sorry to bore you with these kind of old man stories, but I've watched them all, and there have been some real clunkers in there.

None of them match this one in clunkerdom. This was really hard to watch. You know, what was wrong with it? The whole thing seemed so rushed, like right from the get-go. Right from the opening minute. Everybody was being told to hurry up. You got to go. You got to stop. You got to start. You got to do this. You got to do that.

I don't know who came up with this format. I don't blame the moderators, all five of them. Don't blame them. They were handed this, you know, you fill in the blank, what you want to call that. That's what they were handed. So they had to fit to whatever the deal was that had been worked out. I don't know who worked it out.

I don't know whether it was one person's idea, whether it was the commission's idea, just what it was. But whatever it was, whoever was responsible for it should step forward and say, I'm sorry. Because what we witnessed tonight was unfair to the Canadian people. For those who wanted to sit and watch an honest debate between the people who want to lead the country

about the issues confronting the country, this format didn't allow that. What this format allowed was the leaders who'd prepped for this debate to bring out the one-liners. They had canned. They had all ready for them. They'd been working on over and over again. And they didn't really have time for anything more than the one-liners.

That was kind of it. So whoever put out the best one-liners, without somebody else talking over them or moderator cutting them off, is going to look pretty good. You know why? Because most people don't watch the debate. And I can bet that a lot of people who tuned into tonight probably left before it was over because they couldn't stand it. They couldn't hear half the stuff that was going on

because of the crosstalk. But even if they'd stayed for the whole thing, you know, it'll get whatever it'll get. Two, three, maybe four million viewers all told, maybe. I doubt it, but it'll be somewhere in there. Which means most Canadians didn't watch it. But what they will see is the clips. They'll see them online, they'll see them on television,

they'll hear them on radio. And, you know, for clarity, you pick the best clips that are the most understandable. And those clips are all the kind of worked out lines. You heard them, they all had them. They all had their lines. And there were some good ones. Let's face it, there were some good lines. Scheer was delivered on going after Trudeau.

He never used the liar word like he uses in all the speeches, but he used everything else. Phony and a fraud, I think it was right out of the gate within the first minute of the program. So he got his lines out, and I'm sure there'll be a few clips of Andrew Scheer in the days that follow, and they will use them to the best of their advantage, the conservatives.

Trudeau, I don't know, to me, kind of seemed a little flat, but he got some lines off. He had that one line at Bernier saying something to the effect that you say what, you say publicly what Andrew Scheer thinks privately. I'm trying to get at Scheer. He got him on a couple of other ones, but overall, he sounded a little flat. Maxime Bernier must be ecstatic. He gets played on the stage, same with the block leader,

Blanchette. They get the stage. Bernier's sitting there with, like, nothing in the polls, you know, 1% or 2%. He's probably going to go up in the polls because there are certain Canadians who like what he's saying, and tonight was the first time they got a chance to hear him. So he may go up.

We're not talking a lot here, but it may make a difference to Andrew Scheer because the likelihood is it's coming out of his pocket. The other big battle out there was between Singh and May.

For Jagmeet Singh, it was a night of opportunities, and he took advantage of them in that first hour. It seemed to be getting a little stale in the second hour. But he too had some good lines, lines that I'm sure had been worked on in the prep time. Elizabeth May was the Elizabeth May we have seen for a number of debates now. And there's no question about her passion on her major issue, on the environment, on climate.

But I don't know. If the battle is between Green and NDP for that left of liberal vote, it was probably a better night for Singh. But I don't know. So I said last night, or this morning, whenever you may have listened to the bridge, the pre-debate show, this is, you know, it's your call, and it's a tough one. I wonder how many of you may have tried out my little method of plus one or minus one. I wonder how many of you may have tried out my little method of plus one or minus one. I'll be looking forward to seeing your answers when you send them in.

But it should be. That's the way it should be. But I think most people will judge this debate based on what they end up reading in the papers, seeing on television, hearing on the radio, reading online, hearing from their friends, and they'll see kind of edited down versions of what happened. Mainly because this was not a program. It was barely watchable. You know, it's my job to watch it. But I, you know...

It was a Leafs-St. Louis game on another channel. I could have watched. Probably should have watched. Because this was... what can I say? And let's be clear on one thing. It was a travesty to put it on at 7 o'clock. Eastern time. Now, if you're living in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, or B.C.,

or parts of the north, you wouldn't have seen it anyway. Most of you would have been working, still working, or at school, at university. You know, it goes on in B.C. at 4 o'clock in the afternoon, it would have gone on. It would have been over at 6, just when you're getting home. Like, what? I don't get it. I don't remember, you know, maybe I'm, you know, maybe I'm forgetting,

but I don't remember going on that early. I remember 8 o'clock starts. I remember 9 o'clock starts. But 7 o'clock? That doesn't seem fair. Anyway, there are going to be lots of questions asked, and I wish I could give you the answers. I don't know who decided on that format.

I don't know who decided on that format. I don't know who decided on that time. But again, I don't blame the moderators. They were stuck with a losing situation. I'm trying to decide here whether to read a couple of letters or just leave it at that for this and kind of regroup through into tomorrow. I'll hear some of your letters. I'll hear some of your thoughts.

Maybe you'll disagree. Maybe you will have thought, hey, that's great. That's the way it should be. I love a debate like that. It was terrific. Maybe that's what you'll say. But that's what I say here at the bridge. Didn't like it. Not sure it helped Canadian democracy by having that.

I don't know, I'm sure, why it helped us having all those leaders on the stage. I agree with those who've written to me to say, what is the block leader doing on there in the English language debate? Why is he there? Getting as much time as everybody else. And makes him Bernier. Like, why?

Why? That was a decision made by the Election Debates Commission. Former Governor General heads that commission, David Johnston, who's a friend and somebody who I admire greatly and who was a terrific moderator in the 79 election debate. So it's not like he doesn't understand what happens in a debate. We sit on one of the boards I sit on, he sits on,

so I'll be looking forward to talking to him about this one. Anyway, I'm going to wrap it up for tonight because I'm not sure that there's much more to say than that you will determine who the winner of the debate was I'm not going to tell you who I think and quite frankly I don't know after watching that

I would be hard pressed to pick a winner there were some interesting moments for each of them. Some of them did better than expected. Some of them did what they had to do in terms of being better than they had been of late, thinking specifically of Shear. Trudeau went in there knowing he was going to get bombed from every possible corner.

I thought he might have had a few more lines ready to go. Kind of left Scheer untouched on some areas, including the passport issue. But he did what he did, and he will stand judged by the voters of Canada, and by the viewers who watched it, and who will get a sense from the coverage that comes out over the next couple of days. If history tells us anything, the first go-around on

who won the debate is usually wrong. You know, for the earliest assessments, based on whether it's surveys or analysis, it's usually wrong. It's a couple of days later when you start to get a sense what people who didn't watch the actual debate but have seen all the coverage since make up their minds based on what they see, and then you get a larger sample, and you make those judgments. Let's see.

I could be wrong. I could be sitting here tomorrow saying, my gosh, I'm so sorry. Why did I say that thing stunk? Maybe it's going to be great. Maybe you'll have loved what you watched. In the meantime, we're going to sign off for this night and try to figure out what to do with tomorrow.

So this is The Bridge on debate night in the middle of the 2019 federal election campaign. I'm Peter Mansbridge for The Bridge. Thanks so much for listening. Thank you.