Juno News - The politicization of the coronavirus

00:00:00.000 Everybody knows that Winston Churchill was one of the most decisive figures during the war

00:00:10.480 in beating back Hitler and beating Nazi Germany. The war wrapping up in 1945, and a slightly

00:00:17.600 lesser known fact is there was a general election in England that year. Winston Churchill lost.

00:00:23.320 That's right, the voters, after he led them to victory in war, well, they did not return him

00:00:27.920 to office. He screwed up his politicking, even though he won the war. Now, I wonder if he could

00:00:34.000 go back and do things differently, hypothetically. Would he have gone, ah, I focused too much on that

00:00:38.940 war thing and the beating Hitler thing? I should have probably focused more on, you know, coming

00:00:43.160 up with good campaign slogans and so forth in the general election so I could stay to power.

00:00:47.440 Should have been doing more polling, that kind of stuff, right? Right? No, of course not. I mean,

00:00:52.180 who would even suggest such a thing? And we don't really talk about Churchill's 1945 election loss,

00:00:57.780 we talk about the fact that he was the guy who beat Hitler. Right now, I'm a little concerned

00:01:04.500 that there are a lot of politicians everywhere right now, particularly in Canada, who maybe don't

00:01:10.060 know that anecdote, haven't reflected on it. Because the word on the street is Justin Trudeau,

00:01:15.280 Doug Ford, others. They're really looking at the polls right now in terms of how they manage the

00:01:20.580 coronavirus pandemic. Yes, I've heard that Doug Ford doing regular polls about his political prospects,

00:01:26.060 how he's faring with the voters and so forth. Justin Trudeau as well. Look, I get there's

00:01:30.960 always going to be a component of that, but are they really factoring polling into their daily

00:01:36.960 decisions about this unprecedented moment in human history we're in right now, the mass lockdown

00:01:42.440 of people that we experienced back in the spring? Seems like we're stepping more in that direction now,

00:01:48.080 going back into it. Something that is very traumatic for many people on an economic front,

00:01:52.940 psychological front, and more. And yet, you mean to tell me these guys are going, oh, well,

00:01:58.740 what are the decisions I make have to do with my re-election prospects? What? It's like you tell

00:02:03.880 Churchill, okay, here's the deal. You beat Hitler. You save Western civilization, but you're going to lose

00:02:10.640 the next election. Deal? I would like to think that any rational, sane person who actually loves their

00:02:16.840 country and loves freedom would say, deal, because the victory is good enough. That is not happening

00:02:23.120 right now in Canada, it seems, if they are as focused on the polls as I have been told that they

00:02:28.700 are. You do what has to be done because you feel it is the right thing to do, to both work towards

00:02:35.140 public health so that we beat back the coronavirus pandemic, but also so that we get into a situation

00:02:40.700 where these lockdowns are not causing all these awful consequences that are happening right now,

00:02:46.200 all of the heartbreak and all of the lost jobs and businesses closing and so forth.

00:02:51.300 So it's really alarming to hear that polls are a part of this. I see these opinion columns,

00:02:55.320 and I saw some in the Toronto Star, and I see there's panels on television where people are saying,

00:02:59.420 oh, well, you know, how should, what are the voters thinking about this, and how should Trudeau

00:03:03.720 appeal to this and that party? Guys, old-style political strategy, timeout, it's on hold.

00:03:09.960 None of those old rules should apply anymore. Right now, if we're in a wartime situation,

00:03:15.420 well, we've got to handle it like, well, hey, like Winston Churchill would.

Juno News - October 15, 2020