Canadian Federal Politics Thread v5

[Monahammer]

Originally Posted by GranteedEV

What PP did was shift the Overton Window.


Now suddenly it's radical to talk about wanting to preserve the environment but it's normal to talk about deporting PoC for bogeyman reasons. Woke is suddenly an insult when it used to, literally, mean waking up to the reality of the world

PP just rode the coattails of those who actually shifted this window. He did not shift anything with his rhetoric, except perhaps a few limp weeners in the pants of canadian incels.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Firebot

That poll is specific to Poilievre as a leader, not measuring the CPC itself. Diehard partisans will toe the party line.

Accessible CPC is the clear inflexion point (where I would fit in for example), where Carney is significantly more palatable as a leader.

You want to be looking at leaders approval ratings, Carney is around 50% approval while Poilievre is around 32%, a stark difference from how the parties are polling.

Carney as a leader is more popular than the Liberals, and Poilievre as a leader is less popular than the CPC. Poilievre has always polled worse than the CPC from day 1 when he first became leader and was always a poor choice.

Let's not forget where we were a year ago. Conservatives were polling at well above 46% yet Poilievre never once went above 41% approval rating and generally polled lower than the CPC.

https://abacusdata.ca/canadian-polit...-january-2025/

Basically, the CPC needs a Carney with the significant shift that occured in priorities, but Carney is on the other side of the aisle and they are stuck with Poilievre.

While that's all true, it doesn't reflect your statement "That the CPC brand is significantly stronger than Poilievre himself". Is it? It seems they needed PP to drag the party to where it is, and how well they did in the election. But I don't know that that shows the CPC brand is strong. I'm not trying to beat you up on it, I'm genuinely curious if that is the case, and what evidence exists for it. I think we will only know with a change, and even that will depend on direction.

[Johnny Makarov]

Originally Posted by Manhattanboy

I would have preferred PP step down and the CPC recruit a non-career politician who can compete with Carney in terms of brains, management/business experience etc.

They would run as a Liberal. lol

No one with a brain is going to touch the Reform Party and their 3/4 of a basket of deplorables.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Johnny Makarov

They would run as a Liberal. lol

No one with a brain is going to touch the Reform Party and their 3/4 of a basket of deplorables.

Kevin O'Leary, step on down.


I know, it wouldn't be a fair fight.

[Johnny Makarov]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

Kevin O'Leary, step on down.


I know, it wouldn't be a fair fight.

Watching O'Leary on CNN as a guest panelist, Carney would eat him for breakfast.

The moron got lucky by selling kid's workbooks for 6 million. hahaha.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

While that's all true, it doesn't reflect your statement "That the CPC brand is significantly stronger than Poilievre himself". Is it? It seems they needed PP to drag the party to where it is, and how well they did in the election. But I don't know that that shows the CPC brand is strong. I'm not trying to beat you up on it, I'm genuinely curious if that is the case, and what evidence exists for it. I think we will only know with a change, and even that will depend on direction.

It depends what you believe happened last election.

Was opinion against Trudeau and the liberals so toxic that a made the Cons led by PP an option. Then when a credible option of Carney took over lots of people flipped back but some of the we need a change group stayed.

Or do you believe that PP gained popularity irregardless of the liberals poor performance.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

While that's all true, it doesn't reflect your statement "That the CPC brand is significantly stronger than Poilievre himself". Is it? It seems they needed PP to drag the party to where it is, and how well they did in the election. But I don't know that that shows the CPC brand is strong. I'm not trying to beat you up on it, I'm genuinely curious if that is the case, and what evidence exists for it. I think we will only know with a change, and even that will depend on direction.

The CPC base thought Trudeau was so unpopular they could run anyone they wanted and still win. And if it wasn't for Trump's lunacy changing the question in the election from "who do we trust to save us money" to "who do we trust to stand up to Trump" I think they would have been right.

I also suspect many folks didn't think Trudeau would actually resign, and PP would have (imo) won the election if Trudeau had run again. Carney is quite a bit closer to the CPC than Trudeau and took back a lot of the votes that the CPC was counting on, some of whom they may have kept with a more centrist candidate.

[Ped]

Yeah I think Trudeau was so toxic it didn't really matter who led the CPC, the voters just wanted Trudeau gone. This was exacerbated by Trudeau not reading the room and resigning until it was almost too late.


Trump's election and Trudeau's designation was all it took for many voters to turn away from the CPC.

[GordonBlue]

Originally Posted by Ped

Yeah I think Trudeau was so toxic it didn't really matter who led the CPC, the voters just wanted Trudeau gone. This was exacerbated by Trudeau not reading the room and resigning until it was almost too late.


Trump's election and Trudeau's designation was all it took for many voters to turn away from the CPC.

Even still PP and the cons had a chance. their refusal to pivot to a new strategy after those two events is what really killed them.
The conservative who correctly read the room was Ford. If he goes federal, then you'll see the CPC win the next election. he knows how to play the game as well as anyone.

[Mr.Coffee]

Carney read the room and is trying (I think) to kickstart and economy Trudeau buried for over 10 years. It’s not going to be easy, but it is the right direction. What wins elections? It’s the economy, stupid. PP is an awful politician, all he had to do was drive between the lines and make every sentence about growing the economy and investment. He fell for distractions and things that just don’t matter to the large majority of Canadians. The Cons desperately need to ditch him.

Carney won’t be perfect but he’s voicing the right things. Many want to anoint him king for this already and I can’t blame them, but I think proof is in the pudding. Let’s see results before awarding him god of Canada shall we? Canada still has an unbelievable amount of red tape, bureaucracy and is basically not competitive with the USA at all as an investable region… so lots still has to change.

Per NBC economics and strategy, (data from Statistics Canada and a couple other agencies)

Real GDP per Capita:
USA: 2014- ~103 2025- 124
Canada: 2014- ~102 2025- 105

Investment in Industrial Machinery and Equipment (volumes, index)
USA: 2010- ~140-150 2025- 190
Canada: 2010- ~145 2025- 75

Real Private Non-residential Investment (chained 2017 dollars)
USA: 2015- ~127 2025- 190
Canada: 2015- ~127 2025- ~112

Geometric end-year stock of capital in oil and gas extraction (conventional and unconventional):
Canada: 2015- ~$600Bn 2025- ~$500Bn

[Firebot]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

While that's all true, it doesn't reflect your statement "That the CPC brand is significantly stronger than Poilievre himself". Is it? It seems they needed PP to drag the party to where it is, and how well they did in the election. But I don't know that that shows the CPC brand is strong. I'm not trying to beat you up on it, I'm genuinely curious if that is the case, and what evidence exists for it. I think we will only know with a change, and even that will depend on direction.

GGG, Bizaro86 and a few other replied, but even if we look at just the numbers, only once in it's history has the CPC dropped below 30% of the vote in an election and that was in their first election after their merge in 2004 with 29.60% of the vote. CPC has always been either the 2nd strongest party in Canada, or the governing party. Even after a decade of Harper and fatigue, he still got 32% of the vote in 2015, and Scheer, O'Toole and Poilievre all beat that number.

It's fair to state that the CPC can largely count on getting around 30% of the Canadian vote at any given time and is quite a strong brand. You just have to look at the BC Conservatives coming out of nowhere and the defunct BC United in the worst branding gaffe in history to see the strength in a brand.

When Poilievre took over, his approval numbers were abysmal and many thought he was the wrong choice (myself included), as the party choosing to move further right and rejecting the centrist path that O'Toole built would alienate a number of voters.

How strongly Canadians were rejecting Trudeau-Singh's disastrous policies cannot be understated. Canadians were rejecting the out of touch left, not necessarily accepting Poilievre's populist conservatism.

Like look at this thing

https://338canada.com/35020e.htm

I mean Poilievre lost his own seat to a rookie within 4 months of having a 25 point party lead against the Liberals under Trudeau and a 45 point lead in his riding, how is that on anyone but him? And that's all because he didn't pivot properly to counter Trump's impact, or how to manage Carney who hard pivoted the Liberals back to the center with the carbon tax being eliminated on his first day.

A good leader would have pivoted to meet the new challenge but instead he doubled down on rhetoric. His attempts to paint Carney with the same Trudeau brush while dodging the big white elephant in the room that needed to be addressed failed miserably.

Canada wanted a leader at that point that could be counted on to fight Trump and Poilievre did everything but that.

I just think that a different CPC leader could have done just as well or better with a better strategy (see Ford) and the CPC was riding high despite him, not because of him.

[Fuzz]

I think there are lots of ways to read it that doesn't really make it clear if PP or the CPC are why they did well.


The collapse of the People's Party (80% drop from previous) was probably because they shifted CPC, primarily because of PP. That's an addition 704,000 votes(not all of them, obviously, but that was the drop and logically most are going CPC because PP and Maxime's messaging and targets were similar). That makes up almost a third of the vote increase to CPC. That's a huge chunk. (The NDP lost 1.2 million mostly to the Liberals). Most of the rest is probably largely due to increased voter turnout, and gains in strongholds like Alberta. Are those gains because of Pierre, or a hatred of Trudeau, or the CPC brand? Judging by sex with Trudeau flags, it is probably the middle one.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_C...deral_election

[MrButtons]

We all saw the 45 point lead and for some reason, PP and their team believed it was a function of PP, not in spite of Trudeau. When Carney came into the picture PP couldn't adjust even as the polls were starting to swing.

The irony to me is the failure of the conservatives to not understand what was driving their lead is the same driver that helped the Liberals win. Many people (looking at you QC) voted for Carney in spite of PP.

My question to the brain trust of CP, is considering conservative support is still strong, where do you battle the liberals? I'm of the opinion that you need to have someone who can go toe-to-toe with carney on the center right. If you make the decision to lean farther right as your original space is occupied, don't you fall victim to the same trap that lost the lead in the first place? Scaring voters away from you?

[Fuzz]

The only realistic path forward for the CPC is to move to where the voters are, and that's clearly Liberal territory. They don't need more votes in Alberta. They need them in Ontario and Quebec, and lesser in Eastern Canada. Going Trump is a losing strategy.


They have a line in due to Liberal fatigue inevitable settling in, and that's their path. But they need to be an alternative to Carney, not crazy town. I don't expect them to find a Carney equivalent, but perhaps they don't need to, if they can find someone who connects to average Canadians. And that person can not be arrogant.

[Johnny Makarov]

Pretty sure that even if Mr Dressup didn't step down the Liberals would have still won the election.

Even public opinion was on the upside when the Orange Rapist started spewing his tariff crap. Once they start tying PP and Trump in ads, PP's 25 point lead would have vanished even without Carney. poof!

[Johnny Makarov]

Whats the margin of victory for PP in Calgary this weekend? I say he wins with 90% support.

Weird, the smell in town will be worse than Edmonton this weekend. lol

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

The only realistic path forward for the CPC is to move to where the voters are, and that's clearly Liberal territory. They don't need more votes in Alberta. They need them in Ontario and Quebec, and lesser in Eastern Canada. Going Trump is a losing strategy.


They have a line in due to Liberal fatigue inevitable settling in, and that's their path. But they need to be an alternative to Carney, not crazy town. I don't expect them to find a Carney equivalent, but perhaps they don't need to, if they can find someone who connects to average Canadians. And that person can not be arrogant.

A CPC led by Jean Charest would have won, imo. Carney has been great which makes their path harder - I think now they probably need their own Carney equivalent to beat him in the next election, or someone very popular but totally off the board.

I'd vote Vladimir Guerrero Jr but he doesn't really speak English or French so that'd be a disadvantage. He was born in Quebec though which is an advantage.

[surferguy]

he was born ready

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by johnny makarov

whats the margin of victory for pp in calgary this weekend? I say he wins with 90% support.

Weird, the smell in town will be worse than edmonton this weekend. Lol

76%.

[Parallex]

Originally Posted by Johnny Makarov

Whats the margin of victory for PP in Calgary this weekend? I say he wins with 90% support.

I'd guess somewhere in that vicinity... 85% give or take 5%. There was no organized campaign against him and it's here so less accessible for the type of Conservative that would be naturally inclined to want a change at the top. So he won't get some of the far far right crazies for whom any rational person is an unacceptable choice and some of the diehards from out east who can't abide a loser... but for the most part he'll coast through.

I think the bigger question coming out of it is "Does Carney get a majority?" I mean it's not a big secret at this point that the center of gravity for PP's support is in the base, not caucus, so will he lose more MP's?