Full Comment - Why Justin Trudeau ‘prime minister for life’ might not happen

00:00:00.000 hey everyone thanks for joining us today on full comment is justin trudeau going to be prime

00:00:10.380 minister of canada forever how's that to get you all fired up and we've got a great conversation

00:00:15.200 about elections lined up with jenny byrne joining us who was deputy national campaign manager and

00:00:20.020 later main campaign manager for the conservatives under stephen harper talking all about this issue

00:00:24.940 now all signs right now point to an imminent federal election in canada a new governor general

00:00:29.640 has been appointed the pork barrel spending is happening from coast to coast and the nasty

00:00:34.460 partisan shenanigans are ramping up and all signs point to a strong justin trudeau liberal victory

00:00:40.220 or do they what's going to happen and what does it mean for the future of our nation what do past

00:00:45.720 elections have to tell us about what's about to unfold jenny byrne joining us now ceo of jenny

00:00:50.280 byrne and associates the perfect person to break all of this down for us hey jenny welcome to the

00:00:55.040 program hi how are you doing i am doing well how are you i'm doing great thanks so much for for

00:01:01.280 stopping by it's great to chat with you about all of this because there's you know there's so much

00:01:05.300 election speculation going on and that is just a kind of like a classic thing in the canadian

00:01:11.080 political chatter sphere will there be an election whenever you're in a minority government status but

00:01:15.620 right now it seems like the uh the chatter is more justified uh than than at some times yeah i think

00:01:22.620 it's pretty clear the liberals uh the liberals plan on uh calling the election sometime in early to mid

00:01:27.560 uh to mid august they're not even disputing it if you if you see uh reporters that have asked

00:01:32.480 questions to uh ministers or to the prime minister uh they're not even saying you know we're not having

00:01:37.840 an election they they they they fully go into talking about what a potential election could be

00:01:43.260 about the ballot question the uh talking about kind of the recovery after uh after covid and so i think

00:01:50.120 that uh it's safe to say uh that we're heading into a campaign right now i think the conventional

00:01:55.120 wisdom that i have heard uh from many people is that an august 15 uh rip drop for a september 20th

00:02:01.580 election uh e-day okay and and what are the what's the thought process behind all of that i mean to

00:02:08.040 your point it's the government gets to decide this is the time that is that is strategically to our

00:02:12.800 advantage what what's happening right now in sort of the the political pulse of the nation

00:02:17.380 well i think that to to your point exactly i think that right now if you look at the poll

00:02:22.240 polls um even the most uh uh even the best polls for the conservatives still have them about three

00:02:27.560 points down uh from uh from the liberals and three points down from where they were uh in the uh in the

00:02:33.080 last federal election and so if you're the liberals you're sitting there and you're thinking is it going

00:02:37.000 to get any better for us uh because there are troubling signs within the economy that that things

00:02:42.320 are going to get tougher uh economically look at inflation especially uh there's certain groceries

00:02:48.060 uh uh that the price has gone up astronomically as well as uh as as building materials uh the price of

00:02:54.400 lumber and so i think that uh uh you know as inflation goes up uh so too could eventually interest rates

00:03:00.860 regardless of what the bank of canada uh wants to do and so i think that if i'm the liberals if i'm

00:03:05.520 sitting in uh justin trudeau's prime minister's office or his as his campaign manager i want to uh get this

00:03:10.780 election out of the way uh before i think the ramifications economically of covid uh uh kind

00:03:16.760 of come to come to bear and i guess you know there are a lot of people who are enthusiastic about voting

00:03:21.200 liberal and supporting justin trudeau but i think there's also that general kind of blah that sort of

00:03:26.080 ennui when it comes to the conservatives particularly under erin o'toole right now i just want to read a

00:03:31.420 line from my colleague lauren gunter in a recent column of his he says currently 56 percent of voters say

00:03:36.700 they would consider voting for trudeau prior to last election that number was just 50 percent also

00:03:41.800 last time uh 52 percent of voters thought it was definitely time for change this is abacus data

00:03:46.860 numbers today just 40 percent do moreover only 41 percent of voters said they'd consider o'toole

00:03:52.460 that's down from 48 percent the last time interesting stuff and then lauren gunter goes on to say well

00:03:58.020 he's not predicting a kim campbell collapse when she left the conservatives with what was it two or

00:04:02.780 three seats but more of a michael ignaty of stock collapse when the conservatives are just left with

00:04:07.220 you know two or three dozen seats what do you make of all of this the fact that the people even willing

00:04:12.440 to vote conservative at least if we're believing these polls say they've they've stepped down a bit

00:04:16.140 yeah so this is a challenge we have and i i really hope that's not the case i i uh have a lot of

00:04:21.880 friends that are going to have their names on ballots and uh it's uh the conservative movement is

00:04:26.520 something that i care very uh deeply uh deeply about having worked uh in uh variations from reform

00:04:32.680 to alliance the conservative party for my entire uh adult life so uh i think the issue that conservatives

00:04:38.920 have right now is um uh there isn't a lot of excitement for uh for aaron it's actually the uh the

00:04:45.800 opposite uh unfortunately and and i think that a lot can happen like a lot of that has to do anthony with

00:04:50.840 the leadership his leadership campaign uh and his priorities during the leadership campaign uh and

00:04:56.920 then you look at the the priorities he's had since becoming leader and so i think a lot of conservatives

00:05:01.240 especially those conservatives at west feel very betrayed um and uh i think that uh you know at the end

00:05:08.840 of the day usually the day after the election we're all looking east we're all looking to see how ontario

00:05:13.080 voted how quebec voted uh i think this election is going to be very interesting because i think everyone's

00:05:17.400 going to be turning their heads west to see how the prairies voted how bc voted uh because i think

00:05:22.120 that it's going to be uh it's going to be very interesting and a lot of the public polls have the

00:05:26.760 other column marked um you know with seven to ten percent of the vote and that's in alberta for

00:05:32.200 example is probably a mix not just between the ppc but also uh the maverick party and so um i think

00:05:37.960 it's going to be a it's going to be a challenging campaign for the conservatives uh conservatives conservatives

00:05:43.560 at west jenny you touched upon something interesting there the idea that the person you are when you run

00:05:48.200 for leader in the leadership race is different than the person you are when you run in the general

00:05:52.760 election and look i i get the strategy thing of your you're sort of catering to to different groups

00:05:57.400 and different pockets you know one's the diehard party member the other's the general voter but also

00:06:01.320 like how is this still acceptable i mean we live in the age where everything's documented social

00:06:06.040 media i mean you get people who who are just doing almost completely different things aaron

00:06:09.800 o'toole was railing against cancel culture and i'm going to be the guy to knock this down and

00:06:14.120 having followed him over the years i thought well you know maybe kind of has those views but he's not

00:06:18.200 a guy who typically speaks that way and then we just had a series of people basically calling to cancel

00:06:23.160 canada day and mayors all across canada happy to oblige and there's something that o'toole could

00:06:28.040 stand up and just hit it out of the park and say nope this is about celebrating our nation

00:06:32.200 the founding of our nation celebrating our first people celebrating everyone this is the one day

00:06:36.840 we don't knock canada he didn't do that yeah and i think this is the issue that he's going to have

00:06:43.000 with uh with conservative supporters and why you've seen you know there's always been this conventional

00:06:47.640 wisdom that you know the conservative floor is uh 30 percent uh of uh of the electorate and we've seen

00:06:53.880 in most polls uh over the last couple months uh the conservatives being anywhere from 24 to 29 um and

00:07:00.600 and a few up in 31 32 and so i think this is the challenge he has with uh with conservative uh with

00:07:06.760 conservative voters because they're expecting uh that they're they they're they're really expecting

00:07:12.040 it and i think that uh in in you know stephen harper ran a leadership campaign and governed uh that was

00:07:18.840 not that dramatically different andrew sheer uh ran a leadership campaign and his his leadership style

00:07:24.040 with the conservative party was not different from from his leadership campaign i think the problem that

00:07:28.440 aaron has is is that his his persona uh during the leadership race is nothing like how he's uh

00:07:34.680 leading the conservative party and i think probably the biggest uh the biggest issue that he has in

00:07:39.880 terms of policy is is uh is the carbon taxi he campaign campaign viscerally against a carbon tax

00:07:46.120 and then has a policy to uh to bring one in yeah i hear a lot of analysts want to say well the

00:07:51.640 problem is conservatives have to stop being so much you know like this xyz and basically yes aaron

00:07:56.440 a tool needs to be even more pro-carbon tax and so forth but i tend to look at it the other way

00:08:01.080 you've got the liberal party which is basically a green party you've got the ndp which is basically

00:08:04.920 a green party you've got the green party which is sometimes a green party maybe we can have a

00:08:09.000 party that just isn't the green party and then maybe that's that's a value-added proposition for

00:08:13.800 why this party is a bit different than the others and i i feel like it's kind of reasonable to

00:08:18.920 say aaron why don't you differentiate yourself from all these other parties well conservatives i agree

00:08:23.800 with you anthony conservatives don't win when they try to out liberal the liberals and so

00:08:27.960 we've seen uh conservative uh conservative parties uh do well on things like taxes and the carbon tax

00:08:34.120 and i think the carbon tax has become very uh extremely symbolic uh in a whole host of uh on

00:08:39.800 a whole host of reasons but uh doug ford uh was elected with a massive majority government uh just over

00:08:45.560 three years ago in ontario uh with his signature policy being against a carbon tax and saying he would

00:08:51.480 not implement the federal government's plan uh to bring in a carbon tax and you've seen scott mo

00:08:56.200 and jason kenning and others uh blaine higgs that all campaigned on on carbon tax so i don't i i think

00:09:01.640 that if there is a view within aaron's team that they have to kind of put more water in their wine uh to

00:09:08.360 win the election i think that the the past um the past conservative victories both federally and provincially

00:09:15.400 would indicate the complete opposite of that yeah i mean i feel like generally conviction

00:09:19.640 politicians prevail whether it's barack obama or donald trump or stephen harper or you know there's

00:09:25.400 other people on the left who do well i mean bernie sanders is a conviction politician i know he hasn't

00:09:28.920 sort of prevailed and come to victory but i mean the people who really have the staying power and

00:09:32.680 attract the supporters and so forth are the ones who kind of say what they mean plant their feet firmly

00:09:36.680 on the ground and stick with it yes 100 100 agreed people people i think that if politicians think

00:09:44.520 that canadians uh that the electorate doesn't see authenticity i think they're uh they're making a

00:09:50.120 a big mistake i think that uh uh you know for to not to not go back and pound on it but in terms of

00:09:55.800 the carbon tax to say that it's not a it's not a tax which is wrong i know that's kind of the conservative

00:10:01.960 uh talking points on that but the you know the involuntary collection of money from citizens by the

00:10:07.640 government is a tax regardless of what you want to call it yeah i know it's just something that's the

00:10:13.480 sort of wordplay games uh that they have there speaking of authenticity though so so we're saying

00:10:17.880 okay maybe erin o'toole has a bit of an authenticity problem what about justin trudeau though i mean a

00:10:22.280 lot of people i won't use these words myself but uh let's say selena cesar chavan she has said

00:10:27.000 justin trudeau's a phony a few other people have humbly suggested that word may apply to him as well so

00:10:31.960 you've got a guy who who maybe the authenticity problem applies to him even more than it does erin o'toole

00:10:37.720 kind of seems like it's a winner for him right now though yeah well no i agree with you there's

00:10:43.800 been lots of there's been a lot of examples about justin trudeau and his authenticity over the years

00:10:48.440 from before getting elected uh as prime minister from uh you know the uh reported uh the reported uh

00:10:55.480 stories on uh him uh him groping a reporter in bc to to blackface and then since authenticity when you

00:11:01.800 see his treatment of uh selena as you mentioned as well as uh judy wilson wilson raybold and so um

00:11:08.120 i think we've seen that uh for whatever uh for whatever reason uh canadians uh canadians seem to

00:11:13.880 be uh uh willing to give him uh the benefit of the doubts uh in terms of uh in terms of some of that

00:11:21.480 stuff i i i think that there will be people right now or people that that are talking to pollsters that

00:11:26.840 may say they're going to support him but i don't think it's that enthusiastic um and uh

00:11:31.800 so so we'll see what happens on election day because because campaigns matter um uh but we'll

00:11:38.920 we'll see he's there seems to be a benefit of the doubt that that true that trudeau gets that uh

00:11:44.280 other leaders uh are not afforded yeah well speaking of that i i mean we often talk about

00:11:49.080 politics as if it's in these rigidly defined you know lines and so forth and teams and camps and what

00:11:53.800 have you and it is for for many people but then you go out into the broader world for people who who

00:11:57.240 vote but are not particularly in the day-to-day of the politics and what do you call them i guess

00:12:01.560 you call them the persuadables or what have you i've heard some theories that the number of

00:12:04.680 persuadables is decreasing i guess in our polarizing age and so forth i know you know very well about

00:12:09.960 the the different regions of canada where there's swing votes and so forth and i guess these strike

00:12:14.360 me as just you know decent average middle-class canadians who are just looking at the platforms

00:12:18.600 and okay i'll vote liberal one year conservative the next maybe toss an ndp in the mix i mean what what's

00:12:23.720 going on with those people who i feel like are underrepresented in our our sort of uh you know our

00:12:28.520 our partisan discourse these days yeah i think most people i think regardless of partisanship

00:12:34.200 but i think that most people who would who to your point would you know do not consider themselves a

00:12:39.480 member or supporter of any party and they they vote either uh you know by on the leader on the local

00:12:45.320 candidate on on certain issues i think everyone is just looking for some like kind of hope and optimism

00:12:51.080 uh leading out of the last uh uh the last year and a half i think that covet has taken a toll on people

00:12:58.520 um uh and even people that were you know more i i've anthony been very uh i have uh i have been very

00:13:06.360 anti-lockdown and and what have you in certain government policies almost right from um uh from

00:13:12.120 the beginning but i think people that kind of uh believed in that stuff a year and a half ago have

00:13:16.600 have kind of hit their wits ends for lack of a better term and i think that one of the things

00:13:20.920 that trudeau has really touched on is is that he's really changed his mantra into uh into hope people

00:13:26.920 are done with talking about covet they're they're they're sick of it they don't want to talk about

00:13:31.240 it they don't want to talk about the ramifications they want their kids to go to school in september uh

00:13:35.720 and they want their life to kind of start transitioning back to normal and i think that trudeau picked that

00:13:40.280 up like there were two different kind of politicians in in uh in covet i think you had the the john

00:13:45.160 horgan's and jason kenney's who were more clinical um you know who were always suit and tie and what

00:13:50.760 have you and then you had the heart politicians the the the trudeaus and the and the fords and uh you

00:13:56.280 know who were we're all in this together and all that kind of stuff that you know um has now even

00:14:03.080 become like radio and tv ads which you know annoys me to no end but trudeau started to transition back in

00:14:11.320 march uh there was no more question period from uh from the from his house there was no more press

00:14:16.760 conferences from uh in the spring there was no more press conferences from outside his front door

00:14:21.320 he even you know he was in a suit and tie he was uh in the house of commons he was doing his his uh

00:14:27.080 pressers from uh the national press theater and and i think that he has kind of caught on that he caught

00:14:32.520 on quickly that canadians are now transitioning into uh what they uh that they they don't want to talk

00:14:37.800 about covet anymore except that it's in the rearview mirror jenny you fit upon something

00:14:41.880 so interesting i think described better than anyone has described it before you lump john

00:14:45.960 horgan and jason kenney together in one category is clinical and then doug ford and justin trudeau

00:14:50.200 together is the more emotional or what have you normally one would not set those individuals in

00:14:54.280 those sort of uh lines and camps but i think it's completely accurate and i have felt for months now

00:14:59.560 that it is to doug ford's eternal shame that the only ndp premier in canada is really schooling

00:15:03.960 doug ford on what it means to be a believer in small government and sort of you know lighter touch

00:15:08.280 in terms of how to micromanage people's lives well what does that mean for the political landscape

00:15:13.800 in canada that there are sort of people who were diehard doug ford supporters who feel incredibly

00:15:18.120 betrayed by him right now i'm not sure what people are thinking uh on the ground ndp or you know

00:15:23.800 whatever people in bc provincial activists and so forth but the lines are kind of being a little

00:15:28.280 blurred right now well and this is this is interesting so we'll see how we'll see how

00:15:33.000 blurred they they remain like horgan horgan went from a minority to a majority uh in the fall uh uh

00:15:40.040 you know uh getting uh uh getting re-elected so we'll see if that it actually it actually stands like

00:15:46.040 with covid was so different in terms of how politicians around the world dealt with things

00:15:51.160 um it almost did come down to the personality of the the leader as opposed to uh uh as opposed to the

00:15:57.640 political uh affiliations uh in terms of the decision making and so we'll see if it has any

00:16:03.160 long lasting uh we'll see if it has any long lasting effects uh what what the the federal liberals did

00:16:09.800 almost masterfully though is they stayed out of most of the decisions that affected canadians that

00:16:15.160 affected us day to day they they weren't they weren't making the decision on lockdowns they give a lot of

00:16:19.960 advice um what what affected us was was the most was vaccines and they did drop the ball on that

00:16:25.880 significantly um you know we've caught up but they they dropped the ball significantly in terms of

00:16:31.240 uh procuring vaccines and and when they started to go in people's arms um but but but there was very

00:16:37.080 little criticism uh of them that's kind of the only thing that people think about in terms of the

00:16:42.040 federal government's uh the federal government's response the decisions to keep you know people

00:16:46.600 locked in their homes and schools closed and small businesses uh shut those were all decisions made

00:16:52.120 by provinces so we'll see we will see if if uh we'll see how when people vote uh in the upcoming

00:16:58.920 elections whether it's going to whether it's going to be in a lasting effect or whether people are just

00:17:03.080 so happy that it seems to be over now now i've received emails facebook messages from people i went

00:17:07.240 to high school with university folks who i haven't communicated with for years who got in touch and

00:17:11.240 they're basically like whoa you know i thought i was a liberal or i thought i was a left winger but i am

00:17:15.480 just scandalized by what's happening i guess i'm this thing called libertarian that i've been reading

00:17:19.240 about i'm so frustrated but but then jenny i also saw and i'm sure you know what i'm talking about

00:17:23.640 people who are who are nominally conservative who are basically like yeah cops got a hold everybody

00:17:28.280 down one by one vaccinate them by force and so forth i'm like wow you know that's like i i maybe people

00:17:34.600 can just put all this stuff down and then go back to the way they were before you know sort of the day

00:17:39.240 after this is all over but i i don't know i mean i think there's been some some philosophical

00:17:44.120 ideological psychological stuff that's that that's kind of changed you know to say i'm a liberal

00:17:48.280 voter i'm a conservative voter right now to upholster in 2021 does it mean the same thing

00:17:53.240 as you would have said you know in the last election no i i agree it but it'll depend on

00:17:57.800 if people are going to vote on covet so i agree with you i was i was surprised by um some people

00:18:03.400 who were i hate to say i don't like to say pro-covid but we're we're more pro lockdown measures and and

00:18:09.960 keep the border shut and what have you as a and and as well as then on the other side the people that

00:18:14.840 are like i don't want to wear a mask and and all of this kind of stuff i like to think i'm i'm closer

00:18:19.480 to the middle um right uh i mean you know maybe leaning one side other than the other but i'd like

00:18:24.280 to think i'm close to the middle and i'm the same with you i was shocked at some people that i expected

00:18:28.360 to be one way and and actually felt uh the other i think what will matt what will matter though is

00:18:33.800 whether people are going to vote uh if covet is going to be front of mind when uh uh when people vote

00:18:39.560 and i'm not sure that it's uh i'm not sure that it's actually going to be i don't think we we saw

00:18:44.360 that in the provincial elections that we had we had last fall when covet was still more front of

00:18:48.920 mind and and we didn't know as much what was going on there was no vaccines and and what have you so i

00:18:54.200 will we will see that if politicians will end up paying the price for decisions they made during uh

00:19:00.600 during covet jenny i want to go back to this narrative that is kind of perennial that all the

00:19:04.040 conservatives are done no one's voting for them the whole party's in disarray and so forth and that

00:19:07.560 narrative is creeping up right now when it comes to erin o'toole and we talk about justin trudeau's

00:19:12.840 last victory as if you know he totally destroyed the conservatives but i mean he didn't andrew

00:19:17.480 sheer and the conservatives got more votes than the liberals did more people ticked off conservative

00:19:22.520 in canada in their ballot last time around than did liberal just you know that doesn't win you uh

00:19:26.760 government depending on way the way the seats distribute and so forth but you know the idea

00:19:30.280 that all is not lost when when that's actually the outcome of of sort of the ballot taking and so

00:19:35.560 forth what does that tell us well i listen as as i said campaigns matter i think that aaron has a lot

00:19:41.240 of uh um aaron has a lot of uh you know good attributes i think that um it'll be interesting

00:19:47.320 to watch the debate for example like aaron's a very skilled uh debater uh not only in the legislature but

00:19:52.920 he he's a former uh former lawyer he's a lawyer as well um so i i think that you know i don't i i don't

00:20:00.440 think that it's um uh i think the campaigns matter and so i think that people conservatives are going

00:20:06.040 to be expecting a very strong campaign out of the gates um with aaron uh uh with with aaron and his

00:20:12.920 uh team but i think that uh we should expect the same from the other parties you know the greens are

00:20:17.480 in a bit of disarray like we could we could talk for hours on on their problems uh um as well the ndp

00:20:24.120 right now is pulling well uh sing uh from what i have heard uh the ndp campaign has more money than

00:20:29.880 what they had uh the last time they're doing uh they're doing well uh and the liberals i think they

00:20:34.840 made one they made they made mistakes during the last campaign but i think their biggest flaw was

00:20:39.880 they decided to not go uh negative it was the kind of the sunny ways justin trudeau campaign and i think

00:20:44.760 that after it was exposed of him wearing blackface um he never really kind of got his sea legs back he

00:20:51.640 never really fully recovered from from that i think on a personal level just watching him he was

00:20:55.560 very uh very shaky and i think uh anthony the the difference that they are going to make um

00:21:01.880 the difference in this campaign which is not good for the conservatives i would be shocked if they

00:21:06.600 didn't go negative um i think that they will run a uh or a contrast campaign i don't think they'll

00:21:12.200 make the same mistake uh that they did uh they did last time because they very easily could have

00:21:16.680 eked out some more victories especially in ontario um and the east if uh if they

00:21:21.480 had uh if they'd run a negative campaign now when you say go negative do you mean okay are no tools

00:21:25.800 policies will be bad for you and your family for xyz or did they mean you're a racist you're a this

00:21:30.680 you're a that and so forth and it's always quite something that the the one person who has been

00:21:34.440 found to have worn uh blackface so many times in his 20s that he doesn't remember it is the one

00:21:38.200 making those accusations but for whatever reason some people are are sort of amenable to being

00:21:42.440 framed that way what are we going to see well and and i think that the the the photos just from his

00:21:47.800 high school the when he was a teacher at a high school i think he was in his 30s then or

00:21:51.320 at least close to it so it's not just it's not just 20s but uh um i don't think they can go

00:21:56.680 negative as in you know you're a racist or any of the the culture stuff because there's nothing

00:22:01.560 you can say about aaron or the conservatives it's just it would be factually inaccurate the best the

00:22:05.640 best negative ads are the ones that that have a grain of uh a grain of truth in them so i don't

00:22:10.280 think they can i don't think they can go after aaron on a personal level he's uh you know he's a former

00:22:15.720 uh seeking navigator he went to rmc he's a lawyer he's a family man like there's i don't think there's

00:22:21.640 anything they can go there so they i guess they can try they they will probably turn to conservative

00:22:25.960 policies what they'll focus on who knows i just don't think they're going to i just don't think

00:22:30.680 they're going to uh kind of wear the kid gloves uh with the conservatives uh or the ndp for that matter

00:22:36.200 uh this campaign like they did the last now you're so right the ultimate ad still is is the one that

00:22:41.160 the conservatives did michael ignatiev he didn't come back for you and and that and i know ignatiev

00:22:46.680 was so upset he wrote pretty much an entire book about how much he hated that ad and there's been

00:22:51.080 so much discourse about it and so forth but the kernel of truth to it you know does a guy quit

00:22:55.240 being like a senior position at harvard making lots of money influential in the u.s scene to just

00:23:00.120 go to canada and you know be a random backbencher no you know what happened here and i read the guy's

00:23:04.520 books i really appreciate a lot of his work i admired him a lot as a writer but you're kind of like

00:23:08.520 yeah you know this ad kind of gets to something here well he left he left back he he left to uh

00:23:14.440 leave canada uh very shortly after the uh 2011 campaign right yeah i guess that's kind of telling

00:23:21.480 tells you all you need to know exactly jenny i i want to go back to uh the the fear-mongering

00:23:27.960 line that i began with is justin trudeau going to be prime minister of canada forever i remember

00:23:33.560 so back in 2019 i said um you know could we could we be in a 1972 situation all over again so 1968

00:23:42.120 trudeau mania pierre elet trudeau kind of new guy on the scene bam majority government gets into power

00:23:47.320 and everybody's swooning over the guy but pretty quickly they're like yeah i'm not crazy about this

00:23:51.720 guy you know maybe he's a phony or whatnot he goes to bed that night thinking he's lost but then in the

00:23:55.800 morning they kind of retabulate one or two writings nope just squeaked it through he's in a minority

00:24:00.120 situation two years 1974 runs for re-election gets a majority mandate and he's only just getting

00:24:08.360 started sticks around for another decade what are the similarities between then and now i'm not sure

00:24:14.840 i'm not sure i get the the the sense i i think that uh and all this is speculation i think that uh if

00:24:21.560 trudeau wins uh uh wins the next election a majority or minority um uh you know he sticks

00:24:28.200 around uh i'm not sure he hasn't he's he's gonna run in another election and i have zero reason to uh

00:24:34.120 to to know that uh but it's just a feeling if if especially if he wins a majority in this camp coming

00:24:39.880 upcoming campaign he's got two majorities he's got one minority he's got three you know elections

00:24:45.000 three elected governments governments and if he's in a majority he's actually in a a better position for

00:24:50.360 the party uh to be able to kind of govern for a year and a half to two years and uh and decide to uh

00:24:56.680 and decide to uh uh step down i think that in this country you know the parties pretty much get 10 years

00:25:02.520 before uh before canadians see them as long in the tooth so if uh if i'm justin trudeau uh and i win

00:25:09.960 another government especially a majority one i'm gonna leave while i'm i'm kind of at the top of my game

00:25:15.720 and and who's the person waiting in the wings it's christie freeland it's mark carney it's someone

00:25:21.080 else i mean what's going on right now in liberal land well i don't know you'd have to what's i i can

00:25:26.760 only speculate uh from uh from way afar um uh but it looks like those are the two the two names that you

00:25:33.560 mentioned are the are the front runners i think that freeland obviously has her eye on the prize and

00:25:38.440 i think that uh carney does as well i think him announcing that he's not going to run uh in this

00:25:43.080 election uh i wasn't surprised by it if if uh if i was him um if i were him i would i want i would

00:25:49.720 want to like run as an outsider so come in and say especially if the economy starts to uh go a bit

00:25:55.640 go a bit south he can he can stand on a on a stage beside christia freeland in a leader's debate and say

00:26:01.240 i wasn't there i wasn't sitting around the cabinet where the country is now is not me had nothing to do

00:26:06.760 with me and so i think if i'm him i would rather kind of do that make some money um uh make some

00:26:12.840 money uh like outside of uh politics and uh uh and just run in the leadership race instead of

00:26:20.440 you know sitting as you know the industry minister or the environment minister for two years before uh

00:26:25.240 before trudeau decides to uh uh to resign well and let's be honest christia freeland she didn't come

00:26:30.200 back for you mark carney he didn't come back for you i mean when i found out she was had a top job

00:26:34.680 in journalism at reuters in manhattan again she was you know doing the davos forums and all that kind

00:26:39.720 of stuff and you're like what and you're running to be a like a backbencher for the liberal party

00:26:43.720 back in canon no that's not actually what's going on here so we got both of them who are both these

00:26:47.720 sort of you know high performing individuals and so forth um but also maybe we see what the motive

00:26:54.040 is going on here and it's a similar situation to the ignatiev is it not well and but she's been

00:26:59.640 plugging it out she was elected in oh what year was she elected she was elected in a by-election

00:27:05.400 um after uh after ray uh resigned like fair enough she's been slugging she's been slugging it out um

00:27:11.240 uh uh somewhat it would be it would be much different that that's something her team could

00:27:16.360 kind of argue with carney like she's at least been she sat in opposition um uh and she's been

00:27:21.800 a cabinet minister for you know two terms now yeah no good point indeed i want to go back to

00:27:27.880 what happened around 2004 2006 when stephen harper came to power because here i am saying oh is

00:27:33.400 justin trudeau going to be prime minister forever and then well maybe we'll see him actually lose

00:27:37.000 this coming election similar thing back in 2004 i think it was susan delacour who came up with the

00:27:41.800 phrase juggernaut to describe paul martin so paul martin senior uh always want to be prime minister

00:27:48.040 never really happened his son goes paul martin jr i'm going to be pm and there's this power struggle

00:27:53.080 between paul martin and jean chretien jean chretien didn't know when to give it up they finally

00:27:56.920 said come on man you got to step down he stepped down paul martin runs to be runs to be confirmed as

00:28:03.560 prime minister in 2004 and we're told this is a juggernaut campaign he is going to have a super

00:28:08.840 majority he's just going to dominate canadian politics he's going to stay prime minister

00:28:13.080 practically for life oops minority government holds onto it for what 18 months i can't really tell you

00:28:19.240 too much about what he accomplished then and then stephen harper comes to power what what happened

00:28:24.120 then and why was the narrative and the prevailing wisdom basically 180 from reality well i think

00:28:30.920 that you had uh i think well you had you had uh martin's own people uh you know telling the media

00:28:37.320 that they were going to win the biggest majority in uh in canadian history uh which did not uh which

00:28:42.760 did not help for issues uh issues expectations uh so uh and and things did change liberals had been

00:28:50.280 in power by the time he took over for for 10 years um so there they were kind of a long in the tooth uh

00:28:56.040 government uh government then and the and the conservative party or this the progressive

00:29:01.560 conservative party and the canadian alliance merged so you had that um so you had that dynamic as uh as

00:29:07.160 well the 2004 campaign um was uh was a fun one for me i was the ontario desk for the conservative

00:29:13.560 party and we went from two to 24 seats so it was uh it was a uh uh it was a lot of fun and then by

00:29:19.720 2006 they had now been a government in power for 13 years and um you had a you know a pretty well oiled

00:29:27.960 machine in uh in us stephen harper uh had a had a good focus in terms of uh making sure that that he was

00:29:35.640 not just uh holding the government to account in the uh uh in the house of commons but also building a

00:29:41.400 party that was going to be able to uh to challenge a government challenge a you know a very long-term

00:29:47.000 uh seasoned uh liberal government so um i think that uh i think that that um uh those those fat

00:29:56.680 that that those were a lot of uh a lot of factors i i'm not sure i see similarities unfortunately for

00:30:03.560 aaron that we had in 2004 the 2006 campaigns but i know there was a lot of commentary at the time that

00:30:10.360 stephen harper was not a brand name he wasn't any sort of celebrity figure he was very lacking in

00:30:15.400 charisma and those are similar things that was said about andrew shear previously um they're being said

00:30:20.280 by some people about aaron tool right now where are the similarities and dissimilarities then with

00:30:24.600 with those sort of uh analyses well i think you're always going to have certain members of the media

00:30:29.560 that have those similarities that that you know conservative leaders don't have the charisma don't

00:30:34.360 have the gravitas no one's going to be a perpetual narrative oh yeah and and and you're not going

00:30:39.400 to be able to like win the charisma battle with uh justin trudeau regardless of who you are it's just

00:30:45.080 you know it it is what it is um and uh uh i think the dissimilarities um the dissimilarities are is

00:30:54.520 that that um well for lack of a better term it you know aaron isn't stephen harper and so

00:31:00.840 um i think for for a whole host of reasons but i think that that you know stephen harper we had a

00:31:06.840 very strong uh party a very strong apparatus and i think that uh and a strong ground organization and

00:31:14.040 i think that part of the challenge that aaron is going to have during this campaign is that uh because

00:31:20.040 people feel somewhat disappointed because of uh some of the um the policy stances he took during the

00:31:27.640 leadership race versus how he's governed um it's it's hard on a good day to get volunteers and uh

00:31:33.720 and what have you out and about uh uh uh you know to go door knocking and make phone calls i think that

00:31:40.360 it's going to be a challenge for some candidates um based on uh based on that yeah i mean what is the

00:31:46.360 energy level right now among the conservative base and among the donors and and the people who really

00:31:50.680 uh do that sort of you know slugging it out knocking on the doors and so forth

00:31:54.200 um well i think there's some candidates uh that have great teams going i know my friend melissa

00:32:00.440 lanceman who's running in thornhill to replace uh peter kent she's got a fantastic team out and uh

00:32:06.600 um i you know they're they're knocking on uh on doors i think there's other conservatives that are

00:32:12.520 a little bit less anxious to get uh uh to to uh uh to get involved but i think the mood uh very much is

00:32:20.760 uh you know conservatives conservatives will be there's there's still a level of optimism among

00:32:26.920 conservatives that um they want you know they're looking forward to this campaign uh they're ex

00:32:32.840 they're excited because uh they do want to replace uh uh justin trudeau and so i think that although

00:32:40.440 people are upset uh regarding uh regarding certain policy stances there's still a high level of

00:32:46.360 expectation that aaron's going to do uh uh well in this campaign in terms of fundraising i guess

00:32:51.560 we'll see the the q2 numbers the the second quarter numbers aren't out yet i know they were released

00:32:56.920 provincially yesterday or the day before um here in ontario but uh i guess we'll see kind of what the

00:33:02.600 last the the second quarter brings uh when they're out they should be out um they should be out soon

00:33:08.520 when it comes to things switching around unexpected changes i'll never forget back in 2015 what happened with

00:33:13.880 the ndp and my pal tom milcare it was so fascinating to see that during the summer there in that campaign

00:33:19.320 it looked like tom milcare was going to become prime minister with a majority first ndp government

00:33:25.320 in canadian history building upon those successes that jack layton brought them in 2011 and then all

00:33:30.840 of a sudden in a matter of well you know i don't know two weeks or so i know you were watching these

00:33:34.840 numbers day by day switches around and you see justin trudeau surge and i remember writing pieces where i

00:33:40.120 said when it became clear stephen harper was no longer going to be likely wouldn't be prime

00:33:43.720 minister anymore and i was saying you know tom milcare is actually you know not a bad choice

00:33:47.160 in terms of you know fiscal sanity and so forth i'm not sure if you want this trudeau as prime

00:33:50.280 minister and people thought it was like some conspiracy theory that i want to split the votes

00:33:53.560 i was like no i think this might be a smarter choice uh than justin trudeau but it was not to be

00:33:58.760 and uh mulcare went from hero to zero really quickly but then at the same time just a few months

00:34:03.480 before there were polls that said his name recognition was pretty much zero so it's just something these days

00:34:08.280 how fast things change a hundred percent things can things can uh things can change on a uh things

00:34:15.240 can change on a dime and uh you know more cares numbers uh and his uh the polling went down for

00:34:21.480 them in quebec uh first uh pretty much the last week of september and i think that other canadians

00:34:28.040 looked then that if they weren't if the ndp if the if the if the party that uh that bill jack that jack

00:34:34.520 built in quebec uh was not going to be sustainable then they wouldn't be a sustainable government and

00:34:38.440 i think that that hurt them uh that hurt them as well i'll be honest with you though anthony i never

00:34:43.240 thought for a minute that uh the ndp was ever our uh our opponent in uh in the 2015 campaign i knew it

00:34:49.400 was all going to be the liberals i i do think though if i can put forward a couple alternate universe

00:34:53.640 theories if tom will care because he's traditionally a liberal he was a quebec liberal cabinet minister

00:34:57.400 if he in that by-election had not run as an ndp mp but as a liberal mp things would look very

00:35:02.520 different now you know who did run for leader in the liberals in 2011. if jack layton had

00:35:06.440 unfortunately not uh you know died before his time politics would look very different in canada right

00:35:11.720 now i mean just very simple you know who's on the scene who isn't and so forth i think plays

00:35:16.440 plays a huge role lots of hypotheticals there i don't know i wouldn't even know where to start

00:35:21.240 commenting on that i i'll be honest i try not to talk hypotheticals right no no fair enough it's just uh

00:35:27.080 looking at all the puzzle pieces and you go how how things just could have absolutely been so

00:35:31.640 different there when people you know are asking you make the prediction right now where are you

00:35:38.360 leaning if we can talk hypotheticals yeah so i don't i don't like i i i i don't usually uh like

00:35:47.560 to talk hypotheticals and i i never give c projections uh uh but uh i would say right now if uh if the polls

00:35:55.160 are correct um uh i think the liberals are at least going to get their uh i think they're going to get

00:36:00.040 their minority back um uh and uh you know i i am uh i am going to keep my fingers crossed that the

00:36:07.480 conservatives uh run a campaign that i know that you know aaron ran a a very good leadership campaign

00:36:12.840 let's take policy aside in terms of the ground operations my my friend fred delori ran a very

00:36:17.720 good leadership campaign in terms of you know identifying votes selling memberships identifying uh

00:36:23.560 uh our members and then getting them out to vote and it could not have been easy uh during uh during the

00:36:28.680 uh height of uh a height of covid so um my expectation is aaron through the debate and uh

00:36:35.160 and the campaign that they're going to run uh is that they are going to uh they are going to defy some

00:36:40.360 expectations and uh um and do better than what uh some of the polls are saying jenny that is that is my

00:36:46.920 hope before we go broadly speaking i know so many canadians are complaining about the the toxicity in

00:36:51.960 politics the tone everything is at this sort of twitter level of got you and if i can find a way to sort of

00:36:57.640 reassemble your sentence and your words to make it look like it's a this or that so i can call you

00:37:02.040 this name or that name and so forth i will and that's increasingly what it's about so many people

00:37:06.440 say they're tuning out of that but i also feel at the same time so many people really relish in that

00:37:10.280 and they love it and they love the mudslinging and more and more people have actually gotten in

00:37:13.640 the game and so forth it is just such a mess the sort of general nastiness of it i'm a guy who just

00:37:18.520 loves public policy and you know fighting out those details and and so forth and you know one can be

00:37:23.640 very passionate when one has those discussions and so on but where are we heading right now in

00:37:27.800 canadian politics about how we even discuss politics how our elections are fought and so on

00:37:33.880 well i actually think things haven't changed that much i just think because of social media we just

00:37:38.200 see it more i think that it's all right it's always had the level of discourse discourse but it's

00:37:44.600 just more people are participating in it through twitter or um uh instagram or you know the tick

00:37:51.560 talk which i'm not on but uh uh i hear about uh from my young cousins um so i think it's it's

00:37:58.120 always been there i think it's just more it's become more mainstream in terms that more people

00:38:03.240 are engaged on a day-to-day basis it's not it's not like when you know i was younger and it would

00:38:08.680 literally be you know you watch the 10 or 11 o'clock news and that's how you're you know you're getting

00:38:14.440 your news like i remember when i was first involved in politics that you know i'd get up on saturday

00:38:19.400 mornings and the first thing you do is you get you'd gather all your change to go out to the

00:38:22.920 different boxes and pick up all the papers and that's how you got your your it wasn't like you

00:38:27.080 woke up and checked twitter uh uh for for the news so i think it's always been there i just think that

00:38:33.080 it's more prominent now because more people are are involved or more people see it on a regular basis

00:38:39.080 jenny burns ceo of jenny burn and associates thanks so much for joining us for this great conversation

00:38:42.920 thanks for having me thank you all the best full comment is a post media podcast i'm anthony fury

00:38:48.760 this episode was produced by andre prue with theme music by bryce hall kevin libban is the executive

00:38:53.800 producer you can subscribe to full comment on apple podcasts google spotify or wherever you get your

00:38:59.240 podcasts you can help us by giving us a rating or a review and by telling your friends about us

00:39:03.880 thanks for listening

Full Comment - July 26, 2021

Why Justin Trudeau ‘prime minister for life’ might not happen

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