The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - Good Talk -- Canada Dumps Huawei, Alberta Dumps Kenney

Episode Date: May 20, 2022

Bruce and Chantal are focused on two subjects this week  -- Ottawa's decision to shut Huawei out of Canada's 5G networks, and Conservatives in Alberta push Jason Kenney out of the premier's chair.  What are the implications on both decisions?  

Are you ready for good talk? Ah yes, like everyone, I love Fridays. I especially love Fridays in this month each year as we head into a long weekend, a May long weekend. That was that long weekend that you grew up as kids going, it's so exciting. It really means summer is just around the corner. And here we go. We're into yet another long weekend in May. Hope you have a great one.

And what better way to get things started than a little good talk. Chantelle Hebert is in Montreal. Bruce Anderson is still in Montreal. Bruce Anderson is still in Scotland. Are you ever coming home? What's the deal? You know, the plan is I am coming home in two weeks, but it is pretty beautiful here. And I get to talk to you twice a week and Chantelle once a week. And so that works out pretty well. Yeah, it does work out well and uh you know it's good to have you with us obviously and you're clearly as plugged in as you ever are even though you're on the other side of the Atlantic love it okay here's how we're gonna

we've got a number of things to talk about today but we're gonna start with the Huawei decision that came yesterday afternoon in Ottawa. And, you know, it's one of those decisions that it seems like, even though it's been talked about for the last couple of years, that we kind of knew that eventually this was the decision that was going to happen. There were times where it looked like, well, maybeada is going to cut its own way from its allies who had already basically banned huawei from their development of 5g networks canada was sort of sitting on the fence not sure what it was going to do or looking like it was not sure when really there was so much going on in the background the two michaels various other things in the relationship between china and Canada. But yesterday they made this decision.

They pulled the plug from any possibility that Huawei would be involved with the 5G decisions in Canada. And they actually went even further. They said any company that's somehow involved Huawei in their technology already, they've got to pull that out too. So they're getting roundly kind of criticized by the opposition party saying, oh, really? What took so long? When everybody knew that the two Michaels thing obviously had something to do with it. But still, why wasn't there a clearer signal and much earlier?

So what's your thinking on that,al why don't you uh why don't you start why why did it take so long is it really all about the two michaels so i'm going to start off by saying that being in opposition means never having to say you're sorry and and the reason for that is i'm going to turn back the clock a bit. We do have some big telecom companies invested in Huawei, and Telus is one of them. But the impression that that happened because Justin Trudeau sat on his hands for all those years is kind of a bit off recent history. So I've folded this CBC story.

It's from 2012. And it quotes Stephen Harper. He's on a visit to China. And he says he's honored to have witnessed the signing of large contracts for Huawei to provide TELUS and BELL with the latest LTE high-speed wireless networks across Canada.

Why is that interesting in the context? Because you would say, yes, but that was then, and now we know that most of our allies have banned it. It's interesting because the US and Australia had already banned Huawei from such ventures at the time, and the Canada Security Services had warned the Harper government, I'm saying 2012 here, that's a decade ago, to possibly not go there because of security concerns. Now, why did Stephen Harper do that?

And why did Justin Trudeau follow up? Well, in no small part, because corporate Canada back then was pushing really, really hard for Canada to engage further in China. That's something to his, well, not credit, but Stephen Harper was always still very reluctant on China's engagement in Canada's industries. Justin Trudeau brought a different view, which was a view that became part of the DNA of the Liberal Party under Jean Chrétien.

Remember those Team Canada trips and all these premiers and corporate representatives who went to China with Jean Chrétien? Remember that Trudeau's father recognized what was then Red China, way ahead of the United States, so he brought this to government. And I think for a long time, the prime minister was reluctant to go back on this, felt that he was on solid ground because he was just building on what his predecessor had done. And if it was good enough for Stephen Harper, it was good enough for him. And then events,

the two Michaels, the Olympics, which brings us to why now? Well, by now, all of our allies in the 5i community, which is where we share intelligence, have barred Huawei from their 5G networks. There is a war on in Ukraine with Russia involved, and Canada cannot afford to be frozen out of this intelligence network at a time like this. And that brings us to today. You know, I think there are a lot of people, including, you know, many conservatives who underestimated the push on the part of corporate Canada, as you said, to hold the line in the relationship with China, that there was just so much at stake in terms of future contracts, millions of jobs, billions of dollars. You know, I can recall as little as a couple of months ago talking to one of the heads of one of the multi-billion dollar corporations in Canada who was saying, what the hell's the matter with them in Ottawa? Why are they doing this? Don't

they realize what's at stake? I mean, there's just so much at stake in terms what the hell's the matter with them in Ottawa? Why are they doing this? Don't they realize what's at stake? I mean, there's just so much at stake in terms of the country's economic future. They've got to be really careful on those decisions involving China. So, you know, I'm glad you bring that up because I think it is, you know, it's something that is often not considered, that kind of pressure on this issue. But, you know, equally on this issue, there was enormous pressure from some of the allies on this 5G question

and convinced that the Chinese were using it as a backdoor into the security systems of all, you know, the Five Eyes network. Bruce, your thoughts on this? Yeah, well, I think it was the right decision i haven't really seen anybody say that it's the wrong decision other than the you know that maybe huawei but um so then the real debate is um did the government take longer than was appropriate in the circumstances and um why might they have taken longer than some people might have

you know surmised was the right answer and i guess i look at this and say there's been a degree of politicization of the relationship with china in the last year or two conservatives have really loved to lay into the trudeau government by saying they're soft on china they're're soft on China, we should be really hard on China. And I've always found that a little bit kind of a bit performative in the sense that yes, there are human rights issues in China that Canada should be valuable on. But at the same time, the conservatives and not alone had for a long time been promoting the idea of really stronger economic ties with with china the huge trade relationship very important to them and not only to them and so i think if you're sitting in the government and this is i think the point that chantal was making

as well uh the world's a little bit more complicated you have a lot of stakeholders who really believe that um we need to make the right decision from a cybersecurity protection standpoint, but we don't need to use this as another way to ratchet up tensions in the relationship. And I think that seems to me the choice that the government made was to say this is about cybersecurity, where we're making a very clear decision here and it's in line with the decisions made by our allies but it wasn't also joined with a and china's a bad actor i think that conversation needs to continue obviously and i don't think that there's any sense in yesterday's announcement that the government has has forgotten about the human rights issues that it's been talking about with respect to China. But I also think that there does need to be an effort to maintain some structural positive relationships with China, even as we advocate

on those issues. And it feels to me like that's what the government has been trying to do. It has to be said, though, that over the past two and a half decades, the rationale that was very useful to pro-China interest amongst corporate Canada backers, or even the Jean Chrétien administration, was that the more you engaged with China, the more democracy and human rights would progress. I think that's been given a long, probably too long attempt. It was mostly a rationalization that sold well, but you can't sell it anymore to Canadians. Not after all that's been happening over the past five years

and all that's been happening inside Russia with minorities. And the notion that any prime minister can now go to China and say, I'm advancing human rights as I'm signing big fat contracts for corporate Canada, won't sell anymore, to the point where it's hurting even people who in private life took on contracts to advance Huawei's interest. I am going to name Jean Charest here, who was the first off the gate to say, I'm glad the government has banned Huawei.

I wish they had done it sooner, which kind of made you wonder whoever wrote that tweet. Because in the real world, Jean Charest was working for Huawei, pushing on the specific file of the 5G network. So he's basically saying, I wish they'd stop me from doing it sooner. It was awkward. But it does tell you what has happened to public opinion's perception of dealings with China.

It's not just the relationship between the federal government of Justin Trudeau and Beijing that's got to be fixed. It's convincing or bringing Canadians back to how they felt about engaging with China a decade ago. And we are a long, long, long way from that. You know, the Chinese have been known for centuries as uh as those who look at the long game uh the really long game uh and and the canada china relationship of modern times has been a pretty short game i mean it was only 50 years ago that pierre trudeau took that that trip to uh to beijing which was Peking in those days, right? At least that's the way we talked about it.

And the, you know, the relationship started to develop. And it's gone through, you know, a series of different ups and downs during that half century. But for China, it's a millisecond. And so it'll be interesting to see you know how how they react and you know i'm sure things will be said today from uh from beijing and from huawei um but don't expect anything immediate in terms of uh uh you know concrete reaction because they look at the long game and there's there's a long way to go on this before we leave the topic.

Bruce, is there any sense of kind of how Canadians feel about this relationship? Is there any data to look at in terms of, of, of, of how Canadians sense the relationship, but between the two countries, you know,

we, we talked about the conservative reaction and yesterday it was placed in the hands of Michael Chong, who's, who's, you know, a conservative MP from Southern Ontario and has been, you know,

has been considered by many from all sides as, as one of the most respected and, and reasonable people on the conservative side and you know and he was doing the why did it take so long uh line uh you know as well as a few others but i just wonder where where are the canadian people uh not necessarily on this decision but sort of generally about that relationship between canada and china do you have a sense of that at all yeah yeah we've done a number of studies on that relationship between Canada and China. Do you have a sense of that at all? Yeah, we've done a number of studies on that question over the last several years.

And I think that basically the best way to describe Canadians is having mixed opinions. And I don't by that mean some people are really pro-China and some people are really anti-China. There's not very many really pro-China people. And there are some really anti-China. There's not very many really pro-China people, and there are some really anti-China people, but there's not that many of them. The average Canadian opinion is a mixture of it would be nice to continue to see the development of a positive economic relationship. Canadians understand that China can be a big market for our exports of a wide variety of sorts. And obviously is a place from which we buy significant number of goods

that then get resold into the Canadian marketplace or used in the supply chain of Canadian manufacturers and so on. So there's an understanding of the dimensions of the Chinese economy and the potential upside for Canada in a positive engagement. So when we measure the idea of free trade with China, we find more people saying they're for the idea than against the idea, but a large number of people kind of in the middle saying, well, it would kind of depend

on how we felt about the nature of the deal and about China in the moment. And I think that's kind of where public opinion has been. And so this effort by some to really turn China into a target of fiery Canadian anger, I don't think has really worked. And I saw Aaron O'Toole doing quite a bit of it during his leadership of the Conservative Party. I don't think it really caught on. I don't think it resonates with people, in part because they see where there really was a sense of dismay with China, disappointment that diplomatic efforts were not working for the longest period of time, and frustration at the plight of the individuals and so on. But I think Canadian opinion is going to stay in that place. I think that people are aware that cybersecurity

is also an increasing question of importance in our security conversation, and that China is going to be front and center in any conversation that we need to have about are our systems safe from hacking, from attack? Is our security protected? All right. that we need to have about, are our systems safe from hacking, from attack? Is our security protected? All right.

Let's tie the knot on that one with that last comment from Bruce and move on. Next up is going to be the Jason Kenney departure from the premiership of Alberta. But before we do that, this quick break. And welcome back. You're listening to Good Talk on the bridge right here on Sirius XM, Channel 167, Canada Talks, or on your favorite podcast platform. And as we always say, glad you joined us from whatever platform you're listening to us on. The Conservative Party, whether in its federal incarnation or provincial,

has almost historically had this sense of loving to plunge the knife into the back or the front of their leaders. Some have survived that. Stephen Harper did. Brian Mulroney, to an extent, did. But there are many other names in the graveyard of conservative politics who met their final moment as a result of inflicted wounds from their own party. Now, it used to be that it's just the losers who got that treatment. And sometimes they were given a few elections of losing before they were tossed. Of late, the federal Conservative Party has been, you know, one and done. So you have one chance to win. If you don't

win, you're out. And that's why they're in a leadership race right now, because they've just done that again. Rare, though, is the time where you create a new Conservative Party, you win, and you win a majority, an overwhelming majority, and you don't get to fight another election. You're tossed in the middle of that first term. And that's what happened to Jason Kenney just this week. So what does that say about conservatives in the country, alberta when such a thing happens i want to try and get these kind of national implications of such a decision um bruce why don't you start i think this has been the best week in the life of the conservative party in many uh many years now. And the reason I say that is that what's happened with Jason Kenney,

along with the conversation that's happening around Pierre Poliev, the front runner in the conservative leadership race, is causing conservatives to have the kind of conversation that, you know, to be honest, we've been having on this podcast and that i think that they need to have as a party specifically some really thoughtful people who were part of the harper government really thoughtful conservatives have been alarmed at what they see as being the degree to which a radical fringe part of the conservative base has developed a sense of control and the ability to disrupt the conservative party overall. And I think that's been a source of concern for a while. But typically, as parties do, they bottle that conversation up for a good long period

of time. It hasn't really been as prominent as it has been in the last week. Now we have people talking about, including people like Ed Fast, the finance critic of the Conservative Party until yesterday. You know, a solid member of the Conservative caucus for a number of years now a minister in the harper cabinet um saying the stuff that pierre pauliev is saying about economic policy puts at risk the conservative brand i think he's right about that i think it was important that a conservative say that and i think it was an act of courage for him politically to say i'm going to step away from my

role as finance critic and i'm going to support je Jean Charest because I don't believe in what is being pitched by Pierre Paulieva as economic policy under the conservative brand. That was a great development for the conservative party. It remains to be seen whether it becomes influential in the course of the leadership race. And with respect to Jason Kenney, you've got a whole class of people who were conservative peers or associates of Jason Kenney when he was in Ottawa, who by and large thought of him as the artist's's going to be a big success. He's going to show how conservative can be successful and thoughtful at the same time. And it didn't work out that way. Now, some of that is Jason Kenney's fault.

There's no question about it. And I don't know how much time you want to spend today kind of getting into the nitty-gritty of the 10 different things that he didn't do very well. But there were a lot of those. But I think the real issue that they're focused on, these conservative commentators that I was reading yesterday, is what does this really say about whether or not you can be a thoughtful conservative from a policy standpoint and still command the support of a party that seems controlled or driven by this kind of angry anti-establishment populist sometimes pretty fringy in terms of its thinking subset of the broader conservative coalition in Canada and I think that's an incredibly

important conversation for the conservative party to have. And I'm delighted to see that conservatives are having it. And, um, I hope that it works out the way that I hope that it works out, but boy, it's good to, it's good to see that, that fresh, uh, air coming into the room, coming to their tent and letting them kind of work this, this out, uh, and, and to some degree in the public eye as well. Chantal? I'm guessing many conservatives who are not of the more right persuasion will be relieved to hear that what they think is a stink bomb is

actually fresh air in their tent because I saw more concern and joys from many prominent conservatives over what happened. And the comment that was the recurring comment was this, if Jason Kenney is not conservative enough for the base, who in the world will be and how could we possibly win elections? A word about Ed Fast, who was the finance critic of the party until he contradicted Pierre Poiliev's assertion that it would be a great thing to fire the governor of the Bank of Canada, and who stepped down on the same day under caucus pressure. The majority of caucus at this point, or the majority of those aligned in the

caucus at this point back Pierre Poiliev. It should should be said to put things in complete context that EdFast was already in a high-profile role in the Chagas campaign before this week. So for many MPs, this came out as a big Chagas supporter using his platform to echo what Jean Chagas had been saying on the debate podium. That doesn't make Ed Fast wrong, but it does provide context for the icy reception that his comments received. I also think that it's impossible to divorce what happened to Jason Kenney from the realities of Alberta politics. This is a province whose main ruling party, the Conservative Party, has a history of killing its leaders early rather than late. That's how Ralph Klein ended up leaving despite his long tenure as premier on securing a very weak result on a confidence vote. And then think about Stalmack, Alison Redford. The only premier I could find that got to complete a full term without being challenged by her own party was Rachel Notley of

the NDP, which tells you something about the conservative family in Alberta. You talked about when they lose, they get fired federally and provincially, which is true, and not strictly a conservative trend, more pronounced, but Stéphane Zéon and Michael Ignatieff would probably want to object to the notion that this is a strictly conservative sickness. They would have liked to hang around longer and try their luck a second time, and they never got the chance. I think Paul Martin would say that if he tried to stay, and they never got the chance. I think Paul Martin would say that if he tried to stay, he would have endured the fate of John Turner, who spent, how many years did we spend watching those knives, liberal knives, and John Turner's back,

because he wanted a second shot at running an election, which he did, but not with a hell of a lot of support from many liberals back at the time. So success. If Jason Kenney had been riding high on the polls in Alberta rather than way behind the NDP for months, chances are he might have had a better result. But he did look like a loser to many of the members who didn't really want to have him stick around. Their sense was that if they did give him a yes vote, he would be defeated by the NDP in the next election. He was toast in their minds, rightly or wrongly. I think there was still fight left in Jason Kenney.

I think part of the reason it's not just conservatism that is sick or poisoned by a minority. It's also that if you go through a pandemic, as we have just done, and you can't pick a lane between opening up the economy and protecting your population, you are going to lose on both sides, which is what Jason Kenney did. Now, guys, did any of us four years ago have Doug Ford headed for a potential re-election with a majority government the same month that Jason Kenney was dumped by his own party? I don't think so. Oh, if anything, it was the other way around a couple of years ago.

Bruce? Yeah, I wanted to pick up just a couple of more thoughts. One is that the, you know, a lot of people, I think, were using Twitter to resurface marked up versions of that famous McLean's cover story with the resistance picture of Ford and Pallister and Kenny and She with the x's for three of those who are no longer um well i mean kenny is still for a little while but basically the idea that this this not this group of conservative politicians that were meant to be uh justin trudeau's worst nightmare i think was the language that was used are kind of falling by the wayside and the question mark around Doug Ford in my view is that if he wins re-election it will be because he chose not to act like that resistance idea proclaimed that he would but more in the kind of the traditional role of you know less belligerence more cooperation with Ottawa not enough for some people obviously but uh but i think it's kind of

frustrated people who were initially really distraught at the idea of doug ford that he has ended up not giving them very much to work with uh in terms of being that i that firebrand populist that was going to take down justin trudeau and his his crazy carbon tax and all that sort of thing and and so i look at that and say this too is a signal um or should be a signal to conservatives that the idea of just hating on justin trudeau or or kind of lighting up anger uh and populism that way isn't a ticket to long-term success. I mean, Scott Moe sits out there, and I don't know what to make exactly of his situation. But there's more evidence that it can fail than that it can succeed, I guess is what I would say about that right now. And the last point is that I was surprised that Jason Kenney was surprised by the result. There are a lot of stories that say that he had expected that he was going to get 60% plus, and he got 51%. you run, you know, the party that is the best funded, arguably the best organized, you should

have access to the kind of talent and resources and information that help you understand where you stand. And this sort of raises questions for me that go to our conservative, our establishment conservatives having trouble understanding the dynamic in these one person, one vote scenarios. Because if we go back through, you know, the last couple of or last three, I guess, leadership races federally, there was surprise that Max Bernier did so well. There was surprise that Andrew Scheer did so well. There was surprise that Leslyn Lewis did so well, which is, is you know and that surprise was well earned i think in every case they didn't turn out to be uh the candidates that everybody you know might have hoped for in

terms of leadership talent within the conservative party but the inability or the the sense that that their surprise is coming out of these processes within the Conservative Party, I'm really struck by that. And I don't know what to make of it in terms of whether the party is going to wrap its arms around that challenge going forward. Surprised. I think we need to remember what Bruce talks about all these leadership battles. Andrew Scheer's victory, Maxime Bernier's New York victory, and then Aaron O'Toole versus Peter McKay and Leslie Lewis's strong vote. I think we need to remember that ultimately the Conservative Party is a new, relatively new party in its current incarnation. And when Stephen Harper was elected leader, that new reunited party was kind of on training wheels. It did not really have a full-fledged, let's just fight the legacy from the Reform Party, with a variety of,

I call them factions, for lack of a better word, the conservative, the social conservative wing, the libertarians. We had never seen a mix like that come together. Now, to take something from the Alberta example onto the federal leadership campaign, the danger to the conservatives, I feel these days looking from the outside, is that who you oppose has become more important than what you want to do together. And that's not a platform. It will get you, Jason Kenney in the last campaign basically spent part of the campaign demonizing Justin Trudeau and the NDP to a lesser degree, the provincial NDP, but never explained why his election would bring about policies that would make a difference. It's not a platform to say, if I become the Alberta premier, I'm going to do everything that Quebec did 40 years ago, which may have been appropriate for Quebec 40 years ago, but today is not terribly efficient. We're going to have an Alberta brand of nationalism that is going to change the world.

But the focus was on Justin Trudeau and Rachel Notley and how we were going to stand up to these evils. And now I watch the conservatives federally. And it seems to me watching the front runners campaign that he, he has now turned his guns on a large section of his own party. If you're not a conservative voter and you see how conservatives leadership aspirants, starting with Mr. Poitier, treat each other. You have to wonder how they would treat you as a voter.

If you support your interests. Yeah. Yeah. Or your interests. Because if, if you're not pure enough and you're Jean Chagay or Patrick Brown to be the leader of the conservative party, then why would someone who voted for the liberals or the NDP think that they

would feel welcome voting for the Liberals or the NDP think that they would feel welcome voting for the federal Conservatives? You know, it is a virus that sometimes hits other parties as well, as you mentioned, Chantelle. And you were listing the kind of recent examples, the NDP in 2016, with the way Tom Mulcair was surprised when they announced that vote as well. I'm not so sure that Jason Kenney was surprised. You know, he's been around. He's a pretty smart politician in spite of the mistakes you can argue that he's made in the last few years. But I thought he reacted so quickly that he kind of knew what was coming when that vote was announced, that it was going to be very, very close.

And very, very close is not a ticket to a successful leadership, even if you're on the right side of that very, very close issue. Let me make one other point before we move on. And that, you know, a couple of weeks ago we talked about, you know, is Polyev using the Trump playbook to win this? And, you know, I was roundly trounced by you two at the time, and I accept that. That is usually the way things go on on fridays here on good talk but then that's okay um stop whining but i gotta you yeah i gotta say that uh you know i

i know you you point to all these things that have happened by kind of the uh traditionalist conventional wing inside the conservative party that is kind of happened by kind of the uh traditionalist conventional wing inside the conservative party that is kind of arguing against some of the things now that polyev has been saying but it does sound you know there there's a familiarity to me to what happened in 2016 the way trump ran i mean his guns were targeted on on on mainly seeking the republican nomination on the old way of doing things in the Republican Party and taking that kind of rebel stand on all kinds of issues and trashing those who were running against him for the nomination.

And some of the things that seem so outrageous to a lot of people that Polyev is suggesting whether it's the bank of canada thing or others um i just wonder whether he's striking an appeal to the decision makers around who the next leader will be whether that's something that can win nationally in an in an election or not he's the, you know, what's next up on the calendar and next up on the calendar is the leadership of the party. It just seems to me that these positions,

which seem so outrageous to a lot of people, whether they're some of the older members of the party inside or whether they're, you know, commentators on the outside, are very deliberate and he's doing it to win the leadership well that's that's certain but where we part ways you and i is in your sense that once that leadership is behind him he's just going to turn around and become someone else.

The bets are open on that. I don't necessarily believe that there will be a pivoting of Pierre Poilievre as conservative leader if that is the outcome of the vote. Because I think there are people around him who believe that they can win with the section of the party that went to Maxime Bernier and just a few more people who are sick of the liberals and who at that point will go for change, not just some different version, more conservative version of the liberals. I think they seriously believe that. But I also believe that the problem with Pierre Poiliev's campaign, notwithstanding that it could win him the leadership, is that all those people he is, who are conservatives, who he is accusing of not being liars, or not being good enough, or not being real conservatives, or Ed

Fast, not being this and that, are not people who are going to want to be sitting around his cabinet table to work with him and to allow him to say, I have a strong team. And at that point, it will become more difficult to earn the trust of enough voters to actually win. I'm just looking at the Quebec MPs. Most of them, the vast majority support Jean Chaguet. At this point, they are beyond the we are playing for a different team, but we're all in the same league.

And they are saying, I'm not sure I want to stick around if this is where the party is going. So that is dangerous. It's dangerous to win a battle in a way that prepares you to lose the war. And there is some of that and what's

happening now just to push news i think you're both right i think that that you're right i'll take that i'll settle with that we no longer need to talk about anything i'll take the this is a good friday good talk this is really good so i think you're right that he has been running a Trump playbook. And I think that if we had not seen how the Trump playbook developed once he took office, we wouldn't be able to come to the conclusion that Chantal has been making, which I think is correct, which is that if he wins the leadership based on this approach, it's going to be chaos, his leadership of that party afterwards. And if he wins an election, it'll be a chaotic government. And so I don't think it's Trumpian by design in a smart way. I think it's Trumpian by design in a smart way to win the leadership, but it's a stupid way to imagine being positioned to run the country. And I don't think Canadians will go for it. And so one of the things that I think has happened in the last two weeks is I've gone from being sure that

Pierre Pauliev was going to win this running away to starting to wonder whether or not more conservatives are going to think about that again. They're going to wonder whether or not the sense of chaos surrounding his positions is something that they need to be concerned about. I'm not sure that that necessarily drives towards any other candidate in particular, although maybe there's a more consensus opinion that if you're looking for a more kind of reliable, stable sounding alternative, maybe as your second choice on the ballot, Jean Charest might be that name that you would look to or Patrick Brown. But my point is really, I think the enthusiasm for Polyev that we see in the pictures of the people who go to his events is maybe starting to be matched by a hesitancy among others in the party about what kind of leadership he would bring. And it goes to the

points that Chantal was making, which is that he has said so many things about his rivals and about his party, and he is so directly campaigned as a strongman fixer. I'm running for prime minister. It's very much a single-person focused campaign. I think that that makes people in a political party anxious, especially in the post-Trump era. And I think it's going to create more anxiety about him. And the last thing I would say is that in the wake of the dreadful events in Buffalo, the conversation about whether or not there were conservatives who were too close to people who also believed in this horrible replacement theory.

The idea that there are kind of forces inside politics and government and around the world that are trying to replace white people with non-white people in positions of authority and economic accomplishment and so on. There has been more of an open debate, almost open combat about that in the Conservative Party. And I want to give some credit here to Michelle Rempel-Garner, who wrote a pretty strongly worded piece about the importance of conservatives stomping on those ideas, kicking them out of their political party. And what's interesting about that, in part, is that she did that publicly in a very timely point. And that's obviously part of the conversation that's going on around the leadership.

And then Pierre Polyev responded by putting out a statement that was the strongest statement that I've seen him make, renouncing that kind of thinking. There are others who say, well, he didn't say it on YouTube, so he hasn't really kind of owned it yet. But I think the fact that he felt like he needed to say something suggests that he might be wondering or his team might be wondering if their victory is as secure today as they might have thought it was three or four weeks ago. I'll close this segment off by just saying to run the Trump analogy again one more time. And I'm not saying we're the same. We all understand the differences.

But if we're going to use that comparison, it's worth remembering that for all the trashing trump took in that 26 campaign from those who were who who he was equally trashing um and they said the party's going to be ruined if he wins uh you know we can't follow these crazy ideas etc etc just about all of them if not all of them fell in line as soon as he won the nomination and they were there for him kissing the ring you know even a guy like ted cruz who trumps or you know had pointed his finger at cruz's father and said that he was you know partially responsible for the assassination of john kennedy you you watch cruz now and the rest of them uh who had worried about trump are now following him into whatever abyss they're they're heading towards now so you never know how these things are going to turn out and what people will do uh once somebody they've criticized actually does end up winning if in

fact that's the case but once again they're not the same we got to take our final break when we come back gee we'll talk about the liberals for a second just in a moment peter mansbridge here in Stratford, Ontario. Chantelle's in Bruce. Chantelle's in Bruce. Chantelle's in Montreal. No, I'm not. Bruce is in Scotland. You know, there's a term that's used in shorthand and has been for a while.

That's kind of l m a o and you know what that stands for and for those of you who don't i'll think about it for a minute excuse me yes english is not my first language i don't have a clue what you mean you don't know what lmao means i don't have a proof sadly i hate this i am looking at this thinking honestly we sound so old and this is the cleanest podcast in creation it's laugh my something off oh thank you yeah i would not your not your butt not your butt off but okay you got it now okay thank you and the reason I throw that out there is there have to be times when the liberal government of Justin Trudeau, which can quite rightly be under attack for all kinds of things right now, sits by and watches, you know, the focus on politics in the country aimed directly at issues for the conservative party whether it's jason kenney getting tossed in alberta or whether it's the conservative leadership race and you know listen conservatives any party in a leadership race

loves the attention placed on them that's part of the reason they have these stretched out races. But this coming at a time when the liberals could be under the gun a lot for a lot of things, from inflation to pandemic response to all kinds of things. But they're not, for the most part. They're not um so there must be a lot of lmao going on inside the the liberal party and and the leadership of justin trudeau who uh after the election seemed like he was going to be under the gun continuously about whether or not he was going to stay his leadership etc etc but that's not what's happening for the most part.

So we'll start with Chantal on this. We've got, you know, we've got four or five minutes left here. Well, you may be right about the mood inside the conservative, the liberal caucus, but I think most liberals, this is a third term government. So these are not rookies who are suddenly giddy with the notion that they're suddenly in charge. They do understand that come the end of September, when the situation is settled in Ontario, is settled federally with the conservatives, it's going to be a different ballgame, no matter who wins. And like you in the previous segment, I don't expect a wave of resignations if the outcome is Pierre Poilievre. That's not how these things happen.

It's a slow burn. It's not a big brush fire on the morning after the vote. And if I were a liberal strategist, I would probably think that this is a time to get serious about actually moving legislation and getting my agenda done, because some of the priorities that the liberals have, for instance, between now and the summer, are not surprising. They want to advance the Broadcasting Act. They want to advance the the broadcasting act they want to advance the new official languages act but let's be clear if the focus doesn't turn on economics next fall they're going to be in trouble because it's okay now to use the time to get these things done

because once the fall comes given the economic picture, they will be vulnerable to an opposition party that gets its discourse and its act together. That's not going to happen until there is a conservative leader in place. But they may think back to this spring as a missed opportunity if they don't start thinking out how they are going to navigate the fall and spring. They do have that agreement with the NDP. It can become untenable for the NDP to continue to support a government that is seen as being asleep at the switch on issues that are bread and butter issues for voters. There is a point where it becomes impossible to sustain that agreement unless there is serious action. And the sleep of the switch, me, I see it in the Liberals' slow take on travel restrictions, for instance. Everyone has moved their clock to

the post-pandemic realities. Every province has done it. And there is a sense federally that it's okay to let Canada's airports become parking grounds where you call with parties actually uh because you do not want to rethink your restrictions on travel that to me is a sign of uh we are complacent and we are not doing what we need to do because we don't have to that's not a good sign bruce you got a minute and a half yeah i think look at politics life in politics is full of things that go bump in the night and people who work in politics sometimes they love that effect of it that it produces the unexpected all the time and a lot of the time it's unexpected and it's bad for you and you kind of hate that aspect of it, but you kind of crave the adrenaline of trying to fix a problem that has happened.

It's not a life for everybody. But I think Chantal's right that the liberals, most of the ones that I know anyway, are seasoned enough that they will take some sort of momentary pleasure in knowing that bad things can happen to other people too uh from a political fortune standpoint they will definitely be harvesting all of the things that are being said by conservatives about each other for use in their arsenal for future campaigns and they are there is a tremendous arsenal of those things built up already and probably more to come in the next several months so they'll be happy for that but the more experienced hands know what Chantal is saying is right which is that there's a sclerotic aspect to being in government this long being in government with this many stressful issues that are hard to manage trying trying to work virtually, trying to deal with

the pandemic and sort through that. I'm not making excuses for decisions that seem slow-footed. I am saying that the more seasoned among them will recognize what Chantel says, which is they need to be able to be agile and fresh and focused and disciplined and not spend too much time taking uh taking joy and others misfortune did i fit within that minute and a half yeah that was very good this whole conversation has been um you know in my humble opinion has been pretty good in this last hour i know that some viewers will take exception to that conclusion, but that's okay. And we'd love to hear from them as well. I'm feeling pretty

good about the last hour, because I feel like I'm escaping to the holiday weekend relatively unscathed. This has been your best Friday in a long time. Three mentions of Trump. Holding that mic allows you to come back with it again and again.

I'll take some of the 50-50 assessments that I was given that I'm sort of half right, which is considerably better than I usually get. So, listen, have a great weekend, both of you, and to the audience as well. Our first kind of early summer holiday weekend. I'm Peter Mansbridge for Chantelle Hébert in Montreal and for Bruce Anderson in Scotland. Have a great weekend, and we'll talk to you again early next week.