How does the next Conservative leader beat Justin Trudeau？
Episode Stats
Words per minute
196.7544
Summary
In this episode, I sit down with Hamish Chait to talk about the current excitement surrounding the Conservative Party of Canada's newest candidate, Pierre Polyev. We talk about his campaign, why he's running, and why he should win the next election.
Transcript
00:00:00.000
What I see, Hamish, especially from True North viewers and people in the comments section,
00:00:04.340
is a real excitement around the candidacy of Pierre Polyev,
00:00:08.320
even people who are longtime supporters, people who love Maxime Bernier,
00:00:12.320
and they want to see Bernier and Pierre kind of run together,
00:00:16.040
or a lot of people who have signed up for the Conservative Party who have never done it before because they're excited.
00:00:22.460
Not necessarily about, you know, what Pierre is saying, but just the way that he says it.
00:00:28.280
I mean, obviously what he's saying, but, you know, he seems like a fighter.
00:00:31.520
He seems like he's going to stand up for Canadians, marginalized Canadians.
00:00:34.820
The kind of people who would go to a protest party like the PPC because they're frustrated with the status quo,
00:00:39.920
well, they seem to be listening and Pierre seems to be appealing to them.
00:00:45.500
So I think that there's something to the idea that, you know, the party that morphs,
00:00:50.500
you can capture imagination with the right candidate speaking their language
00:00:54.740
and really appearing to be pushing back against the gatekeepers and the status quo like Pierre talks about.
00:01:01.000
Well, I guess just a final question for you, Hamish.
00:01:04.760
You know, there's always this sort of soul searching that happens and this reflection that happens after a party loses,
00:01:10.240
and it is good that we're having these kinds of conversations to help improve, you know,
00:01:17.340
What do you think the big takeaway for conservatives should be,
00:01:21.120
and do you think that there's any lasting damage in trying to say,
00:01:25.340
okay, we have the right strategy, we just have to tweak it a little bit
00:01:28.780
and keep with this idea that we need a moderate socially liberal candidate in order to beat Trudeau?
00:01:36.340
I mean, I think there's two important takeaways.
00:01:38.440
Number one is that you can't take the conservative base for granted.
00:01:43.360
You have to make sure that conservatives see themselves as part of your candidacy and your plan
00:01:50.620
So if conservatives, sort of activists, don't see themselves as part of that,
00:01:59.620
Number two, I believe that if you're running to present change, you have to look like change.
00:02:05.160
You have to put on policies that are different.
00:02:08.960
Running and saying we agree with the government on,
00:02:11.220
this is true of any party of left, right, whatever situation it is.
00:02:14.540
If you're running and saying we agree on 98% of things,
00:02:17.100
we're doing a couple of little things different and our leader is a different sort of person,
00:02:23.060
One of the reasons Trudeau was able, and I'm obviously not a fan of it,
00:02:25.900
one of the reasons Trudeau was able to win in 2015 wasn't just that he was young and dashing
00:02:32.300
but he offered a distinctly different policy agenda
00:02:36.320
and one that frankly looked more like change than the NDP.
00:02:41.700
They were trying to look more like mature, responsible choice.
00:02:45.440
The Canadians felt it was time for change and said,
00:02:48.440
Sure, there's an exciting new leader, Justin Trudeau,
00:02:50.580
but he's also saying he's going to do all these other different things.
00:02:52.680
Now, he ended up not doing a whole bunch of them
00:02:54.300
and I would argue many of those things he wanted to do were bad ideas,
00:02:59.900
You have to, if you're saying we're going to be different, you have to be different.
00:03:03.960
Otherwise, people are going to say they're going to stick with the devil they know.
00:03:07.820
So that's the big takeaway that I take from all this stuff.
00:03:11.520
You have to offer something different and you can't ignore,
00:03:13.880
you can't just take the conservative base for granted,
00:03:16.680
or even as it seemed like at times during the O2 leadership,
00:03:20.240
run against your own base, demand that the party,
00:03:22.980
point out how your own party was somehow lacking.
00:03:25.620
That's not the way to build a winning coalition.
00:03:32.480
get them more excited about your party, bring in new folks.
00:03:35.660
That's why O2 will end up losing half a million votes.
00:03:38.060
But it's also why the Polyev's campaign has attracted so many people.
00:03:42.680
Signing up 312,000 people is a massive accomplishment.
00:03:46.260
Those aren't people who are all former conservative members or people.
00:03:49.860
Many of those people are new to politics and that's exciting.
00:03:53.420
And if you can build a movement and grow that movement, that's how you win.