The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - SMT -- Opening Impressions -- Danielle Smith, French Debates, Crowd Size, Tom Mulcair

Episode Date: March 25, 2025

It's only been 48 hours and opening impressions rarely last long, but what about these?  How damaging was Danielle Smith's US interview to Pierre Poilievre?  Bruce Anderson and Fred DeLorey are here with their spin.   

Smoke, mirrors and the truth. Anderson, Delore, both in the house, coming right up. And hello there, Peter Mansbridge here, along with Bruce Anderson and Fred Delore, another edition of Smoke, Mirrors and the Truth, coming to you both on our podcast and on SiriusXM and also on our YouTube channel. So enjoy. All right, gentlemen, I guess we're, what, 48 hours into this campaign? And, you know, everybody wants a clean launch. That's kind of the way these things go. You want a clean launch, but sometimes something happens.

Things go awry on the first day or the second day, and it doesn't stick. It doesn't, you know, people get all excited about it, get worried about it, but usually within a few days, things move on. So we're trying to find out whether this one's different because there were a couple of hiccups in these first 48 hours. Fred, why don't you start is how uh how damaging was the whole daniel smith thing to pierre poliev i don't

think it was damaging yet but it still could be it could be one of those things that fester and continue to uh to eat at him but he i thought he handled it very very well on his launch day when all of his questions about it he was able to pivot right back to his core message about how he was, you know, putting Canada first and how he was going to stand up to Trump. And then reiterating how Trump actually endorsed Carney, which I'm sure didn't leave Bruce too happy, knowing that he keeps bringing up Elon Musk and Alex Jones. But here's Trump himself weighing in on the side of Carney. But it is one of those things, though, that could continue to fester or could continue to cause problems throughout the campaign.

And I understand, I think, is it later this week, Danielle Smith is again speaking in the U.S. at PragerU with Ben Shapiro. You know, will she say something again That is disruptive and unhelpful. It's very possible. But it was unhelpful, is the bottom line, right? For sure. For sure it was. And credit to the Liberals, this was three weeks ago, I believe, that this interview happened with Breitbart in the States, and they sat on this and they waited until the day before the writ dropped to push it out into Canadian media. And, you know, that's one of the things conservatives always have to be aware of,

is that the Liberals are very good when that campaign season starts. Governing, they're absolutely terrible and horrendous at, but my God, they're good campaigners. All right, Bruce, what's your spin on this well i'm not gonna uh offer spin because you know fred and i we try to come on here and just give you the honest take no smoke no mirrors all truth well yeah i mean i you know and fred is mostly truth uh a little bit of spin sometimes maybe that was a little bit of spin sometimes. Maybe that was a little bit of spin. But no, I mean, I don't think that.

I watched Polyev's opening attentively. And I thought it wasn't great, but it was okay. I thought it was excessively long. I thought that he used up a lot of his energy giving a long version of his opener in French. And by the time he got to English, I know this is kind of mice type stuff, but, you know, we're into it and we're talking about it. So I assume that people who are going to be watching this or listening to this are into this level of depth.

I found that by the time he got to the English version of it, he kind of lost some of the emotional kind of connection to the words that he was saying. It felt a little bit like a singer who you're watching sing a song that he's sung a thousand times and so the um the the intensity and the personal kind of emotion that was delivered in those sentences wasn't quite uh there um and and you know and a lot of what he's saying is his kind of he's struggling between talking about the past and talking about the future. And it ends up sounding like a litany of grievances about the way Canada is rather than a series of promises about where Canada can be. It feels like he wants to talk too much about Trudeau and not talk enough about Trump. All of that said, it was okay,

except I do think the Danielle Smith issue is an important one. I think that what it really said was, Pierre Poliev says Canada first, but what Danielle Smith is saying is, behind the scenes, it's conservative first. And I think that is a thing that's going to clang around the Pierre Poliev campaign for as long as it takes before Pierre Poliev finds the way to say, she shouldn't have said that. And if anybody in my campaign was trying to do the same

thing, they shouldn't do it. I'll fire anybody who is having those kind of conversations with the Trump administration. It's a very serious issue. And Fred's right, I think, in the sense that Polyev did just pivot, didn't answer those questions. But I'm not sure that's going to be the way that that story ends. I think there's enough meat there, substance there, and concern there on the part of Canadians that it's going to keep coming up.

What I found interesting was that here we are, you know, days into the campaign and, you know, starting last week, really, two of the most critical entries into the campaign are not made by federal politicians, but by provincial politicians politicians either directly or indirectly um you know daniel smith with that uh interview in the states doug ford last week with the story that came out through the toronto star i know there's been some arguments over it but the basic thrust of it i think most people agree is is in fact true but the role of premiers in a federal campaign. I found that part interesting. Fred? Yeah, well, the game has changed over the last few years where I think there's been a lack of federal leadership, specifically on tariffs,

where the Trudeau team was quite quiet for a while and the premiers had to step up and fill the void. And since they've stepped up, they haven't gone away. At the same time, the Council of the Federation has flexed its muscles. That's the Council of all the premiers. And Doug Ford is currently the chair of that. And he's been to D.C. a lot defending the country. And we are in this existential crisis with the U.S.

And because, you know, there know there has again been a lack of leadership these folks have in their way are stepping up and doing what they believe they need to do um you know we should have had an election a long time ago months and months ago we dragged and dragged and dragged this out uh and i think that's reflective of why we're seeing this sort of thing right now. Peter, you know, I don't know how many years, well, I do actually know how many years you've been covering national politics. It's a lot. But in the period of time that you've covered politics and that I've kind of watched it closely, Fred's younger than both of us.

There's been a kind of a drift towards the idea that bringing the premiers together with the prime minister is more risk than reward. It's just more risk than trouble than you could possibly get out of it, right? That all that will happen is that the premiers will come to Ottawa and find a bank of cameras and a bunch of journalists ready to record their gripes with the way that the federal government is performing so better on balance not to do it rather than to do it um and so there have been very few of those meetings uh not just because it feels politically kind of unrewarding but i think because um it's been difficult to get all of these people into a room together and have any prospect of them agreeing on a on a broader agenda just the way that politics has developed over time. So I was happy to see that Mark Carney was able to bring the premiers together with the exception of Danielle Smith, but Daniel Smith, the other premiers and the prime minister Carney seemed to be able to have a conversation about important matters for the country without, you know, without daggers drawn.

I didn't get the sense that that meeting was acrimonious. I got the sense that the meeting was constructive and positive and the people don't all see things the same way, but they feel like they want to have a conversation about internal trade barriers and about how we're going to Trump-proof the economy and strengthen it and diversify it going forward. I think that's all very, very constructive. I do think that the fact that Mo and Danielle Smith, you know, and I don't blame them for wanting to talk about energy. I wish that there was a kind of a bigger agenda that they were prepared to kind of engage in and that their comments didn't always feel as though they're more driven by their alliance with their federal conservative cousins. But it is what it is. It's better that we have that much conversation going at the First Minister's level than not. And it's more than we had before. And I think that's positive for the country.

Okay, time to give Fred something that he can run with down the sidelines here. And that is the issue of the TVA debate in Quebec. Now, there already is a debate, one in French and one in English, that's agreed to by all the parties and the election commission that helps establish these things. TVA, a private network in quebec wanted to have its own debate has had it in the past and has had all the different leaders at it they uh their their proposal this year was to have one where the parties would be charged for their entry i think 75 000 a lot of money to get into the debate now initially, initially, it seemed like the Liberals were on side with this, including Mark Carney. But within

a few hours, it became, we're not on side, we're not going to do that. And the debate ended up being cancelled. Okay, Fred, go. Well, thanks, Peter. Well, first of all, I don't blame Carney. His French is not very good compared to Paul Ayers, so he's clearly afraid of debating him here. Now that I got that out, the fact of the matter is what I find. You're going to want to stretch that out longer, right? Like add another minute of like.

No, here's the thing. Here's the odd thing about it. I had heard yesterday morning that Carney was not going to do the debate. And then he gets asked a question in a press conference and says he's going to do the debate. And he said he'll take Don Polyev anywhere. He'll do the debate. He'll happily do it. And then a few hours later, the liberals come out and say, no, we're not doing the debate.

It's one of these things, you know, this campaign. Campaigns are all about stories and how they develop and momentum and which way it goes. I feel there's so much energy on the conservative campaign. But on the liberal side and on the carny side, there's this expectations are very high for him. I think we're Canadians are hoping he's really good. But he keeps doing these weird things in these press conferences where he's either stretching the truth, not answering questions honestly, or doing what he did yesterday on this. And it made me think as well with the whole Trump thing that came out yesterday where, you know, he would say, I'm not going to talk to President Trump until he recognizes that we're a sovereign state. But now it turns out that, no, the Trump officials just aren't returning the calls of Team Carney.

This is a whole different story that keeps shifting here. And I think there is a real possibility that momentum begins to gain, that people start losing faith in what Carney's saying. And again, the TVL thing, back to your question, Peter, it was so odd for him to basically arrogantly say yeah i'm doing this and then immediately they pulled out all right bruce well you know um i used this metaphor before of the skating judges you know looking at the triple south cap and saying, is he just a landing was just a little bit off, right? Now, Fred is a great skating judge and that's what he's doing today. He's, he's looking at some extraordinarily small points. In my opinion, this is just my opinion. Obviously this is not necessarily fact, but neither is what he said.

Not first of all on the French debate. I think that the conservatives are really This is not necessarily fact, but neither is what he said. First of all, on the French debate, I think that the conservatives are really trying to rub these sticks together and see if they can create a fire. But the truth is, the consortium of media organizations, I guess, that proposed debates for this election said, what about one in French and what about one in English? This is my understanding of it. I may be wrong about this, but I think that the Carney campaign said, sure, we'll do one in French and we'll do one in English. And then TVA also wanted to do another one in French. So maybe there was some confusion about whether or not he was saying, yes, I'll debate him in French. Of course, I'll debate him in French versus, yes, I'll debate him twice in French. I don't think I think of the idea is that there's a debate in French and a debate in English. Then there's debates. People can say that they want more.

But I don't really understand the logic of saying there should be two in French and one in English. So I think the conservatives are trying to make something out of basically nothing on this. And I also would say that it wasn't that many weeks ago that people were saying, well, among the many reasons why Mark Carney will never be successful as a politician, never, never, never, couldn't happen, couldn't win the liberal leadership, couldn't compete in politics because he's never done it before happen couldn't win the liberal leadership couldn't compete in politics he's never done it before doesn't understand it no social skills inability to do any kind of retail politics his french is terrible he has been improving uh and proving

those theories wrong all the way through um and well i I think Fred's right that Pierre Poliev's French is more fluent than Mark Carney's. Other than conservative advocates, I don't run into that many people who say his French is inadequate to the job or inadequate to the task of explaining what it is that he wants to bring to the country. And I think that's been evident in the fact that the Liberal Party is pulling way ahead of the Conservative Party in the province of Quebec among francophones. So I think there needs to be a little bit of a truth test there on that whole this is a little thing that could turn into a big thing.

I don't think that's right. Tell me from each of your perspectives, how important crowd size is. And I ask this because there's a clear difference, it seems, on the size of crowds that are meeting Mark Carney and the sizes of the crowds that are meeting Pierre Polyev. Now, they're in different parts of the country, and it's more heavily populated where Poliev is right now.

We'll see how that changes for Carney. But Carney's crowds are kind of in the hundreds. Poliev's crowds are in the thousands. What difference does that make? Does it make a real difference in significance in terms of how these leaders are campaigning and the support they're gathering? Well, from my perspective, I've never seen anything like this before. I've never seen a conservative politician in this country draw crowds at that level in all the campaigns that I've worked on.

There's something there. There's an energy there with Polyev. And there's a following that um you know that he certainly brought in and i think it's a lot of people based on the research and stuff we've seen people that haven't necessarily voted before or have not have not been actively uh participating in politics before coming out to see him so he's tapped into something unusual there and it'll be interesting to see. And if I'm the conservative that's running that campaign,

it would be the entire focus to make sure you get those people out to vote because they're out there. And they may not be getting picked up in the polls as well either. But, you know, we do, from the research, see that these people don't usually vote. So it's going to be interesting. But if he can bring these crowds out, then certainly he should be able to bring them to the polling stations

when the time comes. And to Carney's credit, you know, he is getting decent-sized crowds where he's going. They are in smaller communities. I know he was in Newfoundland the first few days, and he's in Nova Scotia today. And we'll see when he gets to the GTA what kind of crowd he brings in as well Bruce yeah I think that Fred's right that all he has crowds are impressive in size and energy and enthusiasm and he's had a couple of years of practicing his skill and his

party practicing its capacity to to make that kind of chemistry happen And it's not gone unnoticed. It's why he built a 25-point lead over the Liberal Party. Or at least it's the evidence that he has built a significant opportunity for the Conservatives. I think what I see with Mark Carney mark carney is a level of uh open-mindedness first starting to turn into enthusiasm and when we last talked i think fred was making the point that there's a lot of canadians who still don't know mark carney i think that's true but i also think there's a lot of canadians who still don't really know Pierre Pauliev. And the evidence so far is that the more people get to know Mark Carney, they seem to like

him. They seem to feel comfortable with the idea of him as the leader of the country. And the same isn't exactly true with Pierre Pauliev, that over time, he arrived at a point where his positives were the same as his negatives. And I've always kind of found that interesting because when you're opposition leader, there's no reason for you to have high negatives. You don't have to make any decisions or tough choices on behalf of people. So it's really just people looking at either your party or your personality and saying, we're not sure that we like it. And so I think that's still to be watched through the course of the campaign. It feels to me that Mark Carney is presenting himself as an individual with ideas and with

a kind of a calm demeanor, very different in style, very, very different from what Pierre Poliev does. He doesn't stand on a stage and try to do the things that Pierre Poliev does in his events. And I don't think he ever will. I don't think that's what he's cut out to do, and I don't think he needs to do it, and I don't think he should try. I just think he's kind of, he approaches politics somewhat differently. The last thing I'll say is that the X factor for me about Pierre Polyev's crowds is I don't know how many of those

people are there because of things that they don't like, like Justin Trudeau. I don't know how many of them are people who like Donald Trump. I think that the challenge for the conservatives underneath the hood, and it manifests itself in some challenge for Pierre Pauliev every day, is that 40% of their vote thinks Donald Trump is doing a good job. And that makes it hard for Pierre Pauliev and a crowd of 2,500 people to say the same kinds of things about the U.S. and their attack on Canada that Mark Carney is saying in his events in St. John's and Gander and today in Nova Scotia.

And I do think that is the conversation that Canadians want to dial into in this election campaign. They want to hear that you really are going to defend the country against this attack. But if your room has 40% of people thinking, don't say bad things about Donald Trump, I think it changes the chemistry in the room if you do. Fred, I saw you wanting to get in there a moment ago well just on on Carney I agree with Bruce that he shouldn't try to emulate Poliev in his style at all Carney is the calm comes across as very intelligent and that should be the brand that he's pushing and I think he's doing that well if he if he gets inauthentic and starts trying to do the Justin Trudeau type events

that's going to fall flat and is basically an attack on his own brand so he needs to be consistent on that on Polyev and his crowds look I don't know what the research actually says about his you know people who support

him and others who are those people who also like trump at whatever degree i don't know what it is they like about trump but i from what i feel is they certainly don't like trump attacking canada and if they have certain things they like about trump uh one thing that i've it feels universal they do not like the uh the shots of the country and i think pauliev his whole narrative canada first for a change, ties into that, where it's about building our country up, but at the same time, defending it against Trump and his attacks. But at the end of the day, the top issues that a lot of, you know,

that what conservatives would like the ballot question to be is on affordability and hitting on those issues. And that's what he's going to be hammering on through his campaign rallies. When he launched his campaign, it was a very long, long speech that he gave, as we discussed earlier. But he had so much information he's trying to get out. And it is a challenge. He's trying to blend these two topics together, both the existential threat of trump and tariffs and affordability and i think he got there with the slogan canada strong for a change i think that works uh sorry canada first fortune first great change

you guys get your slogans mixed up here i am it's early days the campaign um but yeah i think this works for him i think this is a message that could resonate uh but it is a challenge when you've got let me ask you a question you know i i if you were advising him would you and how would you advise him on the proportion of a speech like the one that he gave on opening day? The proportion that should be devoted to talking about Trudeau and the last nine years versus Trump and the next four. This is a trap. You know, this is like a gotcha question. But they're both the number one issue of Canadians right now is not Trump. It's affordability.

So that's something we have to keep in mind. Like we've got to remember, like when he's getting these big crowds out there, there are people who are angry, people who feel left behind people who are hurt, people who are dealing with major financial issues. And he has tapped into that incredibly well. And you can't forget about that.

You can't just talk about, you know, how I'm going to take on this person. You have to talk about how you're going to fix things here at home that have allowed this to happen over the last nine years. So it's a balancing act, and it's a difficult one, but it's one that has to be done. Okay. Here's my last question for today. And, you know, we kind of talked about this last week, even though Bruce…

But Frank can ask me a question too, right? Listen, he kind of cleaned up on that one. He's probably not going to push it now, right? No, here's… You know, last week we talked about this, and it's how the NDP fits into this race. And Bruce kind of was very dismissive of me raising it as a, that it was a pretty significant thing that was happening in the polls.

I apologize, by the way. I want it to be on the record. I'm sorry I said that. The flowers were a nice touch, too. I appreciate that. Now, the question this week raises out of Tom Mulcair's piece. I don't know whether you saw it yesterday online, but it was pretty interesting. Here's the former leader of the NDP basically arguing,

I don't think he used it in so many words, but it was certainly the impression was, that the NDP is irrelevant in this race. This is a two-party race and nice people on the NDP, his old party, and in other parties in the Greens, but this is really between the Liberals and the Conservatives and nobody else really matters. What do you make of that? Bruce, why don't you start it? Coming from where it came from. Yeah, I think it's quite interesting. And I didn't feel the same interest in your point last week

that I do this week. So kudos to you for being ahead of your time. I was maybe just thinking it wasn't the big headline. It was just like an important secondary story. But I still think that it is a very important story. I was looking at some data last night that looked at voting intentions among union members. And I was shocked at how low the support was

for the NDP among union members. It's not been the case that the NDP only gets support from union members, but it has been the case that it's an important source of support for the NDP for a very long period of time. And you can see in recent years that major unions were losing faith in the NDP as the vehicle to advance their interests for a variety of reasons. In some cases, Pierre-Paul Lievre has done quite a good job of pulling union voters towards himself with his arguments about affordability, with his arguments about the need to focus on the economy rather than a lot of other issues that typically the NDP leadership has been this kind of amalgam of people who are championing progressive ideas for the

world and economically advantageous ideas for the working class in Canada. And that always kind of fit together more or less well, but it fits together more poorly in the last several years because people have really been kind of saying, you know what, we got to fix our problems at home together more or less well, but it fits together more poorly in the last several years because people have really been kind of saying, you know what, we got to fix our problems at home first. We need to focus on the cost of living. And so politicians who sounded like they were saying yes, but we're losing some support. And I think that maybe hurt the NDP a little bit more. I think those progressive voters also react to the Trump phenomena with a degree of urgency about what's happening to progressive ideas in the world that makes it more likely that they will want to say, if this is going to look like a two-party race,

then we may as well deal with it that way. And I think that's created much more opportunity for the liberals under Mark Carney. The last point for me is you could have fashioned the story that said, well, Mark Carney is going to be more of a centrist style liberal than Justin Trudeau was, which, you know, I think on the evidence of the policy measures so far, he's definitely talking a lot more about the economy. He sounds like that centrist liberal that that mainstream Canadian voters have wanted to see for a while. And if that was true, you could make the case that it would be hard to attract those NDP voters. But that isn't what is happening. I think that those NDP voters have decided that they want an economic champion who's focused on the economy and who sounds like he doesn't have any baggage, the kind of which the conservatives sometimes look to have to those progressive voters. It is an extremely interesting story, Peter, and thank you for continuing to raise it. He's so nice. Okay, Fred, you get the

last word. So the NDPSE, there's four big issues. One, I think Jagmeet Singh is a terrible leader. I think he is a very poor communicator and he is not a full-time leader. This is a part-time job for him. The stories I've heard around Ottawa, he's a nine to fiver. He doesn't put in the extra work and it's left them in a bad spot. The other point, second point is the supply and confidence agreement with the liberals. He cannot represent change when he was a part of essentially this last government in so many ways. So it's very hard for him to communicate as a member of the change movement. Third, Bruce's point, this isn't squaring up to be who is going

to be prime minister who can deal with affordability slash Trump. And there's only two people on that ballot, and that's Carney and Polyev. So that just squeezes them out even further right now, if you really are worried who you want to see leading the country. And the fourth and final point I would make on this is the NDP aren't even talking about the economy, the number one overarching issue in all of this. They're talking about if I lose my job, they got my back. That's their message. They will help me if I lose my job. And that's all fine and dandy. But the other parties are talking about how they can help me keep my job, which is way more persuasive to me, and I would say to many other Canadians.

And that's where I think the NDP made a huge strategic mistake on that front. All right. Good discussion. As always, here on Smoke, Mirrors, and the Truth, Fred Delorey, Bruce Anderson, both. Fred nailed that last answer. That was amazing. That was really good. Thank you.

He kind of nailed that one. Official party status. I think they're going to have one of their worst showings ever. Well, the more you get to a two-party race, the more you get to the likelihood of a majority government. Yes. Now, you know, we haven't really talked about the bloc in here, but the bloc has had problems. It'll be interesting to see whether they can get out of those problems in a campaign.

But, you know, it's interesting that a reduction to two parties would leave you looking at the possibility, the much more likelihood of a majority government one way or the other, depending on how this campaign breaks. But it's early days, very early days, five weeks to go. Thanks, gentlemen. Talk to you again next week. Thanks, guys. Good to see you. Hello there. Peter Ransbridge back again. Welcome back, part two of today's episode of The Bridge. Of course, the beginning of the episode today was Smoke, Mirrors and the Truth with Bruce and Fred. And now a number of things here in segment two of The Bridge for this Tuesday.

Starting with a reminder that tomorrow is an Encore Wednesday program. Thursday, though, is your turn. We gave the question out yesterday, and there has been, as has been the case for the last few weeks, just a torrent of emails from those of you who are interested in having your view expressed. No matter where you are in the country, from coast to coast to coast, we welcome your thoughts and opinions. Many of them

end up on the program. As many as I can get on that follow the rules. 75 words or less is the marker and we hold true to that. Include your name and the location you're writing from. Get it in by 6 p.m. Eastern time tomorrow. And the address is themansbridgepodcast at gmail.com, themansbridgepodcast at gmail.com. The question for this week,

many of you are still writing about Trump being the major issue for you in this campaign, or at least how to respond to the United States because of terrorists, because of the 51st state nonsense, whatever the case may be. But we wanted to expand it and say, look, we accept that that is probably the ballot question. And for most of you, it is a major important issue, but there are other issues as well, and we'd like to hear some of those. And you've been really good about that. When you're totally focused on the U.S. stuff, you write about that. But there have been many other comments on other issues. So I guess what we're trying to ask you

is accepting that the most important issue is probably the Trump thing. Is there another issue that you worry won't be talked about enough that it's going to be lost in the Trump mess? So don't be shy. Give us your thoughts. Remember, 6 p.m. tomorrowm tomorrow eastern time is the cutoff date

75 words or less name and location don't forget those and you're writing to themansbridgepodcast at gmail.com okay time for an end bit. And I've chosen this one because in your letters over the last few weeks, a number of you from different parts in the country have sent along material that you recall, either you recall or you've seen your parents have kept in their trunk of goodies, stuff from the 50s and 60s,

which were basically survival instructions. You know, I went to school during the 50s and 60s, so I remember the whole duck and cover stuff and hide under your desk and all that stuff as a result of the Cold War. And some of you have been writing, looking at this and saying, you know, should we be doing something again in terms of survival?

Civil defense. And so I found this interesting. You may have noticed this yourself. It came out over the weekend. It was reported by The Guardian. And it came out of The Guardian correspondent in France, Kim Wilshire. Here's the headline. France preparing survival manual for every household in the country.

So I'll read a little bit from the story. Think about this. The French government is reportedly planning to send a survival manual to every household in the country with instructions on how to prepare for an imminent threat, including armed conflict, a health crisis, or a natural disaster. If approved by Francois Bayrou, who is the Prime Minister, the 20-page booklet will be sent to households before the summer. That's what's being reported by French media. It will be divided into three parts with advice on how to protect yourself and those around you,

what to do if a threat is imminent, with a list of emergency numbers, radio channels, and a reminder to close doors and windows if the threat is nuclear, and details of how to get involved in defending your community, including signing up for reserve units or firefighting groups. Now, that alone sounds Europe is always extremely aware of the potential threats that it faces. It has, after learning for centuries about those threats, and the damage, and the killing, and the dying that can happen as a result of them.

Let me read a little more. It will also suggest putting together a survival kit in each home consisting of at least six liters of water, a dozen tins of food, batteries, and a torch, as well as basic medical supplies, including okay, I don't know this name, perastamol, compresses, and saline solution, according to Europe One Radio, which reported the story.

It quoted a spokesperson from the PM's office saying, the purpose of this document is to ensure the resilience of the populations in the face of all types of crisis, whether natural, technological, cyber, or security related. So, what do you think of that? Think we should be doing that? Do you think we should be looking at some basic warnings for individuals about how to be prepared in these, you know, difficult and challenging times, not just because of conflict, but also natural disasters,

health crises. I mean, we learned how ill-prepared we were as a result of the pandemic just a couple of years ago. So is this something we should be thinking about? Interesting. I'm sure you have strong thoughts on that. Okay. I'm going to wrap this up for today. It's been, you know, smoke mirrors and truth is always,

always gives you stuff to think about. Now, these two guys, you know, Fred was, Fred ran the Aaron O'Toole campaign in 2021, the last federal election. He was a part of the Doug Ford campaign just recently in Ontario. Bruce, as you well remember from his time on Good Talk, is a well-respected member of the bridge crew, but he's now a partisan.

He's working for Mark Carney, working with Mark Carney. He's not in a paying position, but he is working with him. And so he felt, and he was quite correct, and I agreed with him, that he should step away from good talk while he's in that position. And so we created this program, Smoke Mirrors and the Truth, where both these two partisans have an opportunity to, you know, try their spin out on each other,

and they suffer the consequences at times as a result of that. But it gives you a sense of what's going on in the back rooms and how they're trying to spin their story in a fashion that benefits their candidate. So anyway, we're glad to have them along as they take up, you know, half an hour every Tuesday in the latest, in this case now, on the federal election campaign and will continue to do so right through until and probably immediately after the results become clear on April 28th. That's not far. That is not far away. Less than five weeks.

Lots to happen during that time, including the election debates, which are always kind of a signature moment and usually represent the last big moment before the voting. There will be things that happen in the week, two weeks after that debate, but they kind of nail down where people feel and where people stand. So that's all yet to come. Tomorrow, as you said, an encore edition of The Bridge. Thursday will be your turn and the Random Ranter.

You have your letters coming in at huge numbers. You know, the last time we did this, it stretched out over two weeks. It very well may do that again because there are a lot of letters coming in. And I assume that will be the same today. Friday then, good talk. Chantelle Hebert and Rob Russo will be by on Friday. So that's it for this day.

I'm Peter Mansbridge. Thanks so much for listening. It's been fun. Talk to you again in about 24 hours.