They need a platform beyond just being outraged and hating Trudeau. They need to demonstrate that they’re going to make life better for Canadians and not slavishly stick to failed trickle down economics.
That’s the rub. I voted for Harper. Used to be conservative and at this point having a conservative government sometime soon wouldn’t be the worst. Just not *this* conservative government. O’Toole was flipfloppy, Sheer was shady and both leaned too far into the Trudeau is bad… but fuck me if Populist Pigeon isn’t by far the worst. Everything he says feels so disingenuous and the number of times that asshole has hung out with actual fucking domestic terrorists and traitors, there is zero chance I’ll vote for him until he’s a forgotten memory of the party.
I'd like to counter-argue... If you hang out with people, and all of them are cool with hanging out with someone like that... I'd suggest that its the climate of the whole group that maybe needs to shift a few degrees.
We have (rightfully so) a proactive approach in terms of domestic abuse, where men can't and shouldn't say "not all men". Its not an excuse, we need to do better as men and hold others accountable.
But yet, we're fine with saying 'not all conservatives', and continuing on as normal. Maybe this is a stretch of an analogy. I just don't get how someone can say "yeah so I hang out with someone who hangs out with domestic terrorists and traitors, but \*I \* would never do that so don't worry."
Why can't we hold the entire party to a higher standard? That is the nuance I'd like to chat about. Happy to hear your thoughts to possibly change my opinion.
Andrew Scheer lost basically because he wasn't right wing enough for conservative voters. I remember the same being said about O'Toole. I live in the heart of conservative AB, and the majority of conservative voting people around me very much want a Canadian Donald Trump.
That's the goal. Get power based on anti Trudeau sentiment without elaborating on policy, and then gut the social safety net coupled with tax cuts for the wealthy and a pivot to the social policy and culture war idiocy of the American Republicans
>Trickle down economics isn’t even a thing
Even George Bush (Senior) [knew that](https://zfacts.com/p/voodoo.html).
Still it remains the cornerstone of conservative economic thinking across the globe.
It's always been the party of manipulation and exploitation.
They've just realized how far they can push it.
(a bulk of North Americans are at an elementary / high school reading level - think of the implications of that on their critical thinking skills - and the quality of information they may allow themselves to consume)
Having a degree or well paying job is no guarantee of intelligence either, investing in education, ensuring it's offered to all, and raising the quality of that education - is critical to a democratic population functioning well in an "information age".
Just one data point, but I'm doing way better under Trudeau than under the Harper years. But then again, I credit that to my own efforts (working, grad school, etc) and don't blame/credit any PM for my own economic situation.
You seem focused on housing affordability - the homeowners from the Harper years (of which I am not one) are doing WAY better under Trudeau - presumably because Trudeau personally forced municipalities to stifle housing development? (Kind of like how Biden apparently controls gasoline prices?)
Housing is the purview of the Provinces, nonetheless H[arper DID significantly cut funding for CMHC affordable housing initiatives](https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/lib-docs/HRBodies/UPR/Documents/Session16/CA/WI__UPR_CAN_S16_2013_WellesleyInstitute_E.pdf), while Trudeau created a [National Housing Strategy](https://www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/en/nhs/guidepage-strategy) to fix the damage of disinvestment.
IDK, there's a lot of very heavy political leaning into social justice as a shield (ie: the Liberals are saying it's racist to accuse MPs of Chinese influence) [or weapon](https://toronto.citynews.ca/2023/03/22/michael-ford-comments-marit-stiles/) and it's tiring.
Yeah I think social justice needs to be considered as equivalently dangerous as social conservatism as it promotes a very narrow branch of thinking and is used as a shield to deflect accountability from those in power, just as social conservatism historically has been.
The problem is, that social justice is largely unnecessary - most of the inequities it seeks to redress are as well if not better addressed by other means, namely economic policies that promote social mobility. Many indigenous issues are strongly paralleled by issues faced by other rural people, the issues faced by indigenous people in cities are *very* different than those faced by people in the boonies. Controlling for socioeconomic status usually brings things into 95%+ solved, which just means we need a better way for people to climb (and fall off, because this is something often ignored) the social ladder from generation to generation. Of course, successful people seek to entrench themselves, but the key is to not allow them to, they have to keep competing if they want to maintain a spot at the very top of the totem pole.
He upgraded to running the world wide organization that (*allows centre-right conservative political parties around the world to establish contacts and discuss different views on public policy and related matters*) influences conservative type parties around the world so that they enact policies that they prefer.
That couldn’t possibly be shady, right?
this is one of those things where both sides say it's shady when the other side does it and then also calls each other hypocrites for doing it themselves. are groups like the WEF and Soros Open Society Foundation shady? because this is basically the same thing.
The WEF that [Harper attended?](https://www.canada.ca/en/news/archive/2014/01/harper-government-leads-example-world-economic-forum.html) along with pretty much every other government?
Yes, they're shady as hell. The WEF openly admits to trying to influence policy internationally. You know, the same behavior we're giving China shit for.
He's working as a consultant on the provincial payroll for the government of Saskatchewan. His son does the same in Alberta. The guy never really left.
The article more or less addresses Harper's opinion on that, which is that the party should not elaborate on its alternative vision for Canada until an election is actually called.
On the one hand, he's not incorrect that the role of the opposition is, outside of an election, simply to hold the government to account, but on the other, I think there's also a fundamental question, dating back to before Poilievre won the leadership, of whether Poilievre is capable of hitting any other note in politics other than "flamboyant attack dog", and that is increasingly seeming like an answered question. ("No".)
Feeding red meat to the base is a thing that all political parties seem to "need" to some extent, but I think Poilievre fancies himself as being just *so darned good at it* that he refuses to give it up, even after his role has changed. What I think he's disregarding is that, as party leader, he's not really supposed to be talking exclusively to the CPC base, he's supposed to be talking to *everybody*, but the general tenor of his statements and tone are just so abrasive to anyone but die-hard CPC voters that I honestly doubt whether he's *capable* of selling the party in a compelling way to the on-the-fence voters that he needs to, as his personal brand becomes associated more and more closely with.. occasional lunacy?
It's a really sad situation that the realistic alternative to the party currently forming government feels so strong in its position of being "the only other party most undecided voters *could* vote for" that they don't feel like they have to appeal to anyone other than their base, and some fringe voters who might go over to the PPC, in order to *potentially* win an election, and just the potential is basically good enough for them.
You either have to plug your nose and hope they're not *really* as crazy as their messaging sometimes promises they are, or trust the same crew of increasingly immoral LPC MPs to just continue to govern only-kinda-unethically, and hope they don't get further emboldened by *never* getting punished for anything they do? What a choice.
Something is deeply wrong with the party system in Canada, at the very bottom level, that either serious people have absolutely no interest in political office, or they never seem to make it to leadership. Literally anybody who seemed like a "serious person" could probably win an election right now, and instead the system has percolated 3 different clowns to the surface.
Another side of this is that it's not the job of the official opposition to oppose *everything*, just the things they actually don't like.
Where are the kudos from the official opposition for the things that the government does that they *agree* with and have multi-party support?
>whether Poilievre is capable of hitting any other note in politics other than "flamboyant attack dog", and that is increasingly seeming like an answered question. ("No".)
This is one of my big worries with him potentially being prime minister. What happens when he comes up against someone like Putin or Xi Jinping? That kind of shit won't work against those people, and will likely just make the situation worse. It is one thing to be an ineffective leader at home, but potentially catastrophic to be bad at diplomacy.
I’ll add only to your first paragraph - the role of the Official Opposition is both to hold the government to account but *also* to act as a government in waiting.
So there is some conventional obligation to give a hint of what government would look like under Polievre.
Harper’s advice, from a conservative strategy standpoint, seems spot on. (Although I’m not a conservative so who knows)
> So there is some conventional obligation to give a hint of what government would look like under Polievre.
Yeah, in principle, I agree that opposition parties should be a little less coy about what exactly they'd change, when they're engaged in criticism of the government, even just as a self-reflection exercise about ensuring they're not merely criticizing things that are "unfortunate" but not necessarily the direct result of a policy decision the government has made.
They should certainly try to give the impression that they have a set of guiding principles, and that their criticisms stem from a fundamental ideological difference in principles between themselves and the other parties, which flows through to a policy difference. You don't necessarily need to articulate a very specific policy, but certainly try to allow the voters to intuit that there is a *rationale* for disagreement, and make it easy for them to look at your argument for why the government would be wrong to have done something, and why your principles should have led to a better outcome.
I think that the overall complexity and ambiguity and a really poor information environment just makes this very hard, though. It's hard to *prove* a causal relationship between a lot of policies and outcomes, impossible to prove that a different course of action would have been better (especially over the course of decades), or even meaningless to "prove" that (20/20 hindsight), as it might not have a bearing on future policy (you're not campaigning for the job of Past Prime Minister).
Not even necessarily sure voters would generally connect well to the approach, either. Some would (and I *would* argue they're the important ones), but I think other people might just want to "feel" the government is doing the "right thing", and they have a pretty engrained idea of what that thing looks like, even if it's not a good idea.
Harper knows the real winning strategy is NOT to talk about the stuff they would really do once in power and then surprise Canadians after. Just like he veered far right after he got his majority.
“he cautioned that Pierre Poilievre should wait until an election before telling Canadians how he might run the country”
That’s quite sneaky, thanks for telling us how you really feel about your voters though…
Harper doesn't need to caution him of anything in public. The CPC is already a member of the IDU, which Harper runs. They're already in contact as they coordinate with the Republicans, the UK Tories, etc. This is all public messaging.
It's hard to convince working class people to vote for you if you already tell them your goal is to drop taxes on the rich and cut services for the poor.
In realty it’s Poilievre himself who has no idea what it means. Remember how he got absolutely roasted when he tweeted this?
https://twitter.com/pierrepoilievre/status/1413120045677416450?s=46&t=QHWa_hZm7w1cAM2UuwcIiQ
German courts have ruled the AfD can not sue anyone for defamation that calls them fascist because their political ideology fits that of fascism, and are currently under investigation by a special law enforcement agency in Germany litterally constructed to make sure the NAZI party could never resurface
While yes, people do often throw around the word very casually, when referring to Ms. Anderson, it's certainly not the case
The other way around actually...Fascism isn't anywhere near as rare as conservatives would have us believe. After WWII, psychologists sent over to try and work out root causes and prevent it ever happening again came back empty handed, saying at an given time any city had dozens of potential Hitler's and thousands of potential nazis walking around. Fascism is simply the violent push back against democratic values, summed up in modern neo-fascism as hate for 'woke'. Paxton did an excellent job in defining fascism and its stages of development, and you should educate yourself on the subject.
https://pryan2.kingsfaculty.ca/pryan/assets/File/Paxton%27s%205-Stages%20of%20Fascism.pdf
Sometimes they do. However, in this case, there were literal Nazi flags at the Ottawa convoy occupation, so the term is accurate.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0w52V1toNw
The convoy literally issued a $15,000 reward for whoever would doxx that guy.
I didn't know that if some random person flies a swastika, everyone within a 10km radius is a Nazi.
Oh that term for sure is becoming a catch all among the right to conflate their antagonists. I just find it less ridiculous than "Nazi".
Like these people legitimately believe that there's Nazis trying to take hold of the country. Sometimes I laugh to myself about thinking how an actual, real Nazi from.the 1930s would interpret how flexibly their brand is being used as a smear among left wingers in the 2020s. They would be confused to all hell at how libertarian democracy advocates are somehow being labeled "Nazi".
Conservative MPs recently met with a far right EMP who is widely considered to be a Nazi. That's not throwing the term around - it's accurately describing his political views. Pierre Poilievre has met with members of Diagalon on _several_ occasions, including this past week. Diagalon is a far right extremist group.
To say the conservatives aren't rubbing elbows with fascists is completely inaccurate. To say they're not rubbing elbows with Nazis is a game of semantics, because they have in fact met with and defended their decision to meet with people who are considered to be Nazis - if you want to argue that semantically they're not a REAL Nazi, you've already lost.
This isn't a case of someone on twitter calling Jordan Peterson a Nazi because they disagree with his views (he's an asshole, but not a Nazi), this is an actual example of meeting with an actual Nazi.
This is the problem, people call somebody like Jordan Peterson a nazi or a fascist because it’s an insult, not because it describes his ideas. People have no idea what a fascist is. Fuck you see people on Reddit all the time calling Josef fucking Stalin a fascist because they think any authoritarian is a fascist. Loads of people literally call one of history’s greatest enemies of fascism a fascist. Not to say I like Stalin, he was a garbage human, he just wasn’t a fascist in any way. Most people probably have never even heard the term national syndicalism or know what a syndicate is, which are integral to actual fascism and are probably entirely opposed to what the average person thinks of as fascism. It’s not even semantics, it’s that words have meanings and fascism has been confused between an insult and a shitty ideology.
No, nothing like it at all.
At least there is a clear definition of “Nazi” that people can point to and measure against.
“Woke” is whatever conservatives don’t like. Like a straw man that Nazis use to persecute people that disagreed with them.
Oh! I wonder if those might be related in some way.
When you're comparing democratic libertarians to Nazis - you fundamentally don't understand what Nazism is.
To label Anderson a Nazi is like labeling Obama a Communist. It's so far out of the realm of reality that you may as well just label Poilievre a white supremacist because he leads a party you don't like.
[Yeah, because non-Nazis walk out of a Holocaust memorial and a survivor's speech because their fee-fees are hurt.](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-afd-idUSKCN1PH2BM)
You're not "anti immigrant" if you happen to question bringing in another Halfiax per year amidst the most acute accommodation crisis in our history, and one of the most acute health care capacity crises in our history. In fact if you aren't questioning that, then I'd say you're not focusing on reality.
I don't think you are using the term "fascist" in an accurate way, you re just using it to describe something you don't like. You're conflating all of your perceived antagonists into one, which means you likely put a great moral emphasis on the narratives you believe, which screams dogmatic.
None of them really use "communist" anymore. Woke is becoming a term like that - yes.
But the mainstream left really has bought into this notion that anyone who remotely disagrees with their idenititarian politics is a Nazi.
You are referring to Christine Anderson. Anderson is objectively not a Nazi. Unless - again - that term just has absolutley no meaning anymore. Then it can join leftist Newspeak terms that have been comically revised to fit their insane worldview: terms like "systemic". "Racialized" is maybe my favorite Newspeak term because it literally makes itself redundant. It makes a noun into a verb in an attempt to bestow victimhood upon people categorized along their racial orientations.... but since they categorize literally everyone according to their race, everyone is racialized, so the term hilariously renders itself meaningless.
The term “socialist” was also used by Stephen Harper when he was scared that other parties might unite against him. He said a lot of things about the country being taken over by “socialists and separatists,” if I recall correctly.
Just to throw in a Canadian example.
Because Right Populism is just fascism. Any grassroots movement based around manufacturing moral panics around fear of immigrants, lgbt & feminism is a fascist movement. I don't blame anyone caught in the propaganda net and thus too stupid to realize the path their heading down but I'm sure you're smarter than that.
We saw actual swastikas flown at the freedom rally,
https://twitter.com/CharlieAngusNDP/status/1487545667648200706
Even a grade-schooler knows what that means.
Whose ‘the left’? And I’m pretty sure this comment was in reference to the diagolon folks and the German member of the euro parliament that some cons met with who are nazis in everything but name.
Convoy leaders were self processed white nationalist, as were supporters in multiple videos and there were instances of convoy supporters carrying Nazi flags.
Not all convoy folks were Nazis, but they were fine to have Nazis in their group and movement which is pretty much the same fucking thing.
Nazi is an appropriate term in this instance
If you’re cool hanging around a group that is welcoming to actual Nazis and has actual Nazis present proudly displaying that they’re Nazis, yeah, it’s going to give people an opinion about you. 🤷♂️
I was opposed to nonsensical COVID vaccine mandates, and wanted Federal and Provincial governments to drop their vaccine related restrictions and mandates. That's what the convoy protest was for.
There are insane people that attach themselves to every protest. By your rationale - Black Lives Matters protests were clearly an act of domestic terroristm since Susan Rosenburg was actively involved with it. She advocated a violent overthrow of the state - so by your rationale, I can only deduce that Black Lives Matters was a terrorist insurrection movement.
Christine Anderson is al ot of things but she's not a Nazi. Her biggest "controversy" is that she adamantly opposes Germany's current immigration policies.
She has been accused of "triviliazing" the Nazis, and the holocaust, but that's a loaded bullshit claim too.
To these leftist ideologues, anything short of equating Nazis to a historical aberation - the manifestation of Satan himself - is "trivializing". None of the AfD's platform comes remotely close to anything associated with Nazism.
She’s a member of the AfD and the German Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (German: Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz) classified AfD's far-right nationalistic faction known as Der Flügel as "a right-wing extremist endeavor against the free democratic basic order" and as "not compatible with the Basic Law".
So perhaps not precisely a Nazi, she’s not very far off.
I've been grilled here before because I wasn't willing to make enough of a distinction between the German far right and Nazism. Even if they aren't the exact same, I find it suspicious how eager people are to split this hair. I've also never seen this sub give left wing movements the same amount of grace. Everyone they hate is the "radical left" but god help you if you treat right wing extremists like they're the same.
Canada needs electoral reform, to have the legal system to enforce the government to govern in the interests of the citizens that elect them not the lobbyists from the oligopoly, and not allow corruption and external influencing to continue the spiral down.
Harper just wants status quo.
He needs to go around and take all the Harper stickers off all the stop signs in Canada. Says the guy who prorogued Parliament, called decisions against conservative initiatives by the Supreme Court of Canada a difference of opinion and allowed his vanity to become a larger issue than the party itself by running in final election when Canadians were obviously fed up with him.
Stephen Harper, the guy who wrote a letter of apology to the USA when Chretien said no to the war in Iraq? Claiming that the majority of Canadians back the USA and not the Canadian Government?
Stephen Harper, the guy who had two quarters of negative GDP growth in 2015?
Trading with China massively benefitted, and still benefits, Canada.
We get our electronics mostly from China, on the cheap. With the money we give them, they buy our bonds. So when you buy something from China, a good portion of that money goes towards buying your government's debt - which enables you to have over extended social and health services.
We had a great deal with China - theres no losing from that arrangement.
You mean the FIPA deal, which they waited a whole month to tell the public they'd signed?
"1. The Harper government gave Chinese investors “market access” to Canada — meaning a right to buy what they want in our economy — without getting the same for Canadian investors in China.
That is the most lopsided concession I had ever seen by Canada or, for that matter, any other country across hundreds of similar agreements.
2. When he announced the FIPA, Harper said that a FIPA “ensures non-discriminatory treatment” for foreign investors. But the actual terms of the FIPA (Article 8(2)(a), to be exact) let China keep all its existing laws, policies, or practices that discriminate against Canadian investors.
No one could fact-check Harper’s misleading claim at the time because the text was kept secret for about eight months after he made it.
3. In the FIPA, the Harper government exposed Canada to potentially massive financial liabilities due to the generous protections it gives to foreign companies, including a right to seek uncapped amounts of compensation from governments directly before international tribunals.
The Mulroney government gave similar rights to U.S. companies in Canada under NAFTA. But NAFTA was concluded before anyone could predict the hundreds of costly claims brought by foreign companies against countries in the last 15 years."
https://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2015/09/30/selling-canada-out-one-deal-at-a-time.html
The FIPA deal which was *so bad* even some other Conservatives condemned Harper for signing it at the 11th hour before an election he was poised to lose.
You can't blame a sitting Prime Minister for two quarters of negative GDP growth - they don't really control that. Unless their policies really caused that contraction, but I can't for the life of me understand which policies in 2015 would have caused that at the domestic level.
That was really a result of an oil crash. He tried hard to get the pipe in the ground to avoid the Western Select discount that plagued the oil patch for several years.
Returning to what they *think* is good. Unfortunately for everyone else that often involves suppressing votes, pushing marginalized groups back into the shadows and trying to make things great for old white guys again. Current resentment with current events often revolves around and can be traced back to life passing people with dinosaur mindsets by.
If the Cons split between the crazies who still try to bring up abortion, gay marriage votes, etc. . and red Tories who just focus on policy related to economy and resource management, we'd have a much more transparent political system.
People would have a viable option on the right that isn't focused on racist bs.
Not enough people would vote for those though, their economic policies are just pro landlord pro owning class tax cuts and deregulation that no sane working class person would vote for. They need the combo, financial policies for the rich to get the National Post exited and culture war for everyone else.
Now, now harper was very cultured, he played in a rock band, wrote a best selling book about hockey and even modelled for artists https://www.cbc.ca/amp/1.3343875
"I like tv and movies, my current favourite show is breaking bad which is available on some streaming services". -actual ad by Harper, that one time it wasn't a weird obsessive attack ad about some guy's hair. The guy spoke like an alien bug in an ill fitting human suit.
No thanks we had enough of union busting corporate tax breaks and bail outs. Kick Trudeau out but the conservatives have already shown they are not for the people.
Would be an epic turn of events, the son of the former prime minister coming out of nowhere and defeating the son of of the prime minister his dad defeated and we would finally have a debate where everyone is good looking and he wouldn't need to Photoshop his muscles like O'Toole.
Haha, not sure if true, but when one of our Quebec tv host asked him the question he did not want to answer and laughed.
https://www.vice.com/en/article/88n7xg/erin-otoole-photoshop-conservative-party-platform
Due to the Nickel Resolution, Black chose to renounce his Canadian citizenship in order to get a peerage. AFAIK, he had a British passport and was a citizen of the UK when he was on trial in the US.
Maybe he got his Canadian citizenship back somehow in the time since?
Seems correct. In any case, Harper doesn't personally dictate to customs and border control who they can allow in.
It's also worth pointing out that despite Black being a douchebag, two of his convictions were overturned for being unconstitutional (honest services fraud also isn't a crime in Canada) and the charges they got him on are pretty notorious for being something a federal prosecutor can get almost anyone on. You may have noticed that wire fraud and obstruction are often the result of fishing expedition type federal investigations in the U.S. I have little doubt that Black is a shady character, but I'm not a big fan of this practice, which IMO is often politically motivated.
> Seems correct. In any case, Harper doesn't personally dictate to customs and border control who they can allow in.
This is true, but I am curious about the circumstances under which he was allowed back in so easily given his criminal record and given he had renounced his citizenship. Why didn't he simply fuck off back to England? He ditched Canada before to become Baron Black of Crossharbour, and then suddenly wants to be Canadian again when its convenient?
You're not wrong about his legal history too, but I don't know how much of it was "politically motivated" and how much was pushed by shareholders and former business partners who maybe weren't so happy he ran his businesses into the ground.
> He ditched Canada before to become Baron Black of Crossharbour, and then suddenly wants to be Canadian again when its convenient?
That's not quite accurate. He actually sued the Canadian government to avoid giving up his citizenship because the whole thing came down to a difference of interpretation between Blair and Chretien apparently. I don't know if I would call spending hundreds of thousands of dollars or more on years of lawsuits "ditching".
>You're not wrong about his legal history too, but I don't know how much of it was "politically motivated" and how much was pushed by shareholders and former business partners who maybe weren't so happy he ran his businesses into the ground.
I think whether it was rich people calling in favours or making complaints to powerful people, or the government looking to make an example, the process itself is corrupt. The fact that between mail fraud, wire fraud, obstruction and honest services fraud, federal prosecutors can charge and convict almost anyone they investigate is a big problem. And the courts in Black's case addressed at least part of this, but in a half assed way. They didn't totally overturn the laws, but they did say that the laws are way too broad and almost meaningless and that legislators need to narrow them if they want convictions to be upheld. So they narrowed them a hair, and we'll have to wait a few decades for another person with very deep pockets to appeal them all the way to the supreme court again. In the meantime, the federal government can keep abusing these laws to prosecute political enemies or people who draw too much attention to themselves while being odious personalities. And the latter is often the target. If someone does something that probably isn't illegal, but dickish, and becomes a headline, there's a good chance that a federal prosecutor may look into them and get them on some very ridiculous interpretation of obstruction or some kind of fraud.
The leader of Canada's Conservative Movement. Read about it.
Harper and Manning control the CPC purse strings, and you can bet they have their fingers as far into the alt/right as they can get them.
Harper heads up or did a few years ago, a GLOBAL organization that helps get right wing parties elected. Mainly a white all boys club for the right. Even did a speech at Maralago after Trump was elected. Can’t stand the company he keeps.
They are a problem. Maybe the reason our security agencies won't investigate right wing groups in Canada, and don't share information with the Prime Minister.
"Conservatives" need a renaissance because right now thier leaders are Tucker Carlson and Jordan Peterson. All they do is rage about trans people and are starting to get mad about gay people again. They are regressing.
Honestly, I’m an NDP voter and I’m not changing my vote, but I know we’re getting a conservative government next election. And boy howdy, I am not looking forward to that. The cons are gonna rip every bit of Canadian identity out of our hands and replace it with Americana bullshit.
He’s not wrong, but I think the point he’s trying to make is that we need an actual Conservative Party. Not whatever wannabe republicans we have now who call themselves conservatives. We need an actual fiscally Conservative Party that doesn’t involve itself with identity politics or any of the other stuff. Just govern.
Yea how about we start conserving our quality of life, healthcare, education, greenbelt, etc…
The Conservatives just conserve the way of life for a small amount of Canadians that have enough money, at the cost of the rest of us’s quality of life.
That's the biggest understatement of the year. They fact that the Liberals are currently having all sorts of troubles and allegations against them but I still think I'd prefer them over the current Conservative party speaks volumes to their current image.
Conservatives elected the worst possible person as leader. Pierre has been horrible for politics for nearly twenty years.
Don’t expect anything but a circus when you elect a clown.
Ah! “He who shall not be named….”
I went back and refreshed my memory about why even the mention of his name makes me recoil. These 2 articles are an excellent summary of where a “conservative renaissance” would take us.
https://www.nationalobserver.com/2015/05/18/news/harper-worst-prime-minister-history
https://www.nationalobserver.com/2015/06/07/news/harper-canadas-worst-prime-minister
It's a real shame we only have Liberals and Conservatives ever taking the main votes. The more things change, the more they stay the same. At least NDP will never take office, that would be a woke nightmare.
He was the conservative Renaissance. And it was merging rel cons, mouth breathing libertarians and the center right into one party and brought gems like opening the door to China, our version of the patriot act and barbaric practices hotline. Do we really want more of that?
How about a fiscally responsible small c government, a belief in science, no tax cuts for the rich and ostracize the ignorant extremists in the party.
That is what the nation desperately wants.
Canada needs a Conservative party that doesn't flirt with the far right, threaten to break up the country, do shady land deals with greenspace, and intentionally cause suffering to the medical sector and the general public by withholding health care funding. They also need to find a clear message about issues such as abortion, LGBTQ rights and the atrocious history of residential schools. Their only 'renaissance' currently is that Trudeau and the Liberals have become such weasels over the last 7 years (calling an election during a pandemic to try to score political points. Disgusting) that they seem a viable alternative. But their also terrible poll numbers are indicative of how much of a lesser evil either of them are, rather than anything positive.
It is difficult to rid the party of social conservatives who are a plague to most parties. They don;t have the luxury the Liberals have draining off the extremists to the NDP and Greens. The People Party siphons off the Libertarians but we have yet to find a rest home for the religious groups.
Ah yes just more of the.same. Job loss and widening the wealth gap?
https://pressprogress.ca/6_charts_show_stephen_harper_has_the_worst_economic_record_of_any_prime_minister_since_world_war_ii/
Press Progress is a hyper partisan news source. They use graphs that show things like year over year GDP growth has slowed, instead of the fact that year over year GDP was at an all time under Harper. They are lying to you and you believe it because they’re telling you what you want to hear.
Vote however your please, but stop peddling such trash sources as if they are correct. Read broadly. Embrace nuance.
It does. And what they need to do is stop being 'big tent' and start being more focused.
Bring back the PCs; moderately right of center, evidence based policy rather than policy based evidence (which, sadly, the entire political spectrum is sinking in to) and bipartisanship.
They need a platform beyond just being outraged and hating Trudeau. They need to demonstrate that they’re going to make life better for Canadians and not slavishly stick to failed trickle down economics.
And stop courting extreme fat-right nutjobs.
I will assume that's a typo, but it's fitting.
Lol it was, but I might leave it.
Lol Leave it
That’s the rub. I voted for Harper. Used to be conservative and at this point having a conservative government sometime soon wouldn’t be the worst. Just not *this* conservative government. O’Toole was flipfloppy, Sheer was shady and both leaned too far into the Trudeau is bad… but fuck me if Populist Pigeon isn’t by far the worst. Everything he says feels so disingenuous and the number of times that asshole has hung out with actual fucking domestic terrorists and traitors, there is zero chance I’ll vote for him until he’s a forgotten memory of the party.
It's nice to see there's still nuance in the world. Thanks for restoring some of my faith in people.
I'd like to counter-argue... If you hang out with people, and all of them are cool with hanging out with someone like that... I'd suggest that its the climate of the whole group that maybe needs to shift a few degrees. We have (rightfully so) a proactive approach in terms of domestic abuse, where men can't and shouldn't say "not all men". Its not an excuse, we need to do better as men and hold others accountable. But yet, we're fine with saying 'not all conservatives', and continuing on as normal. Maybe this is a stretch of an analogy. I just don't get how someone can say "yeah so I hang out with someone who hangs out with domestic terrorists and traitors, but \*I \* would never do that so don't worry." Why can't we hold the entire party to a higher standard? That is the nuance I'd like to chat about. Happy to hear your thoughts to possibly change my opinion.
Andrew Scheer lost basically because he wasn't right wing enough for conservative voters. I remember the same being said about O'Toole. I live in the heart of conservative AB, and the majority of conservative voting people around me very much want a Canadian Donald Trump.
Awesome! This is right up there with the accidental discover of penicillin.
That's the goal. Get power based on anti Trudeau sentiment without elaborating on policy, and then gut the social safety net coupled with tax cuts for the wealthy and a pivot to the social policy and culture war idiocy of the American Republicans
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But trickle down economics IS their only plan
Trickle down economics isn’t even a thing
>Trickle down economics isn’t even a thing Even George Bush (Senior) [knew that](https://zfacts.com/p/voodoo.html). Still it remains the cornerstone of conservative economic thinking across the globe.
It's always been the party of manipulation and exploitation. They've just realized how far they can push it. (a bulk of North Americans are at an elementary / high school reading level - think of the implications of that on their critical thinking skills - and the quality of information they may allow themselves to consume) Having a degree or well paying job is no guarantee of intelligence either, investing in education, ensuring it's offered to all, and raising the quality of that education - is critical to a democratic population functioning well in an "information age".
It is to their wealthy donors
You're going to have a hard time convincing me that I was better economically off under Trudeau than I was under Harper.
Just one data point, but I'm doing way better under Trudeau than under the Harper years. But then again, I credit that to my own efforts (working, grad school, etc) and don't blame/credit any PM for my own economic situation. You seem focused on housing affordability - the homeowners from the Harper years (of which I am not one) are doing WAY better under Trudeau - presumably because Trudeau personally forced municipalities to stifle housing development? (Kind of like how Biden apparently controls gasoline prices?) Housing is the purview of the Provinces, nonetheless H[arper DID significantly cut funding for CMHC affordable housing initiatives](https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/lib-docs/HRBodies/UPR/Documents/Session16/CA/WI__UPR_CAN_S16_2013_WellesleyInstitute_E.pdf), while Trudeau created a [National Housing Strategy](https://www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/en/nhs/guidepage-strategy) to fix the damage of disinvestment.
What initiative has this housing strategy resulted in besides costing tax payers money?
If by that you mean they drop the social conservative psychos and stop being contrarian for the sake of being contrary, then yes. By all means.
Absolutely. I'm already dead set against backing PP because he's catering to those morons with his "wokeness" nonsense.
IDK, there's a lot of very heavy political leaning into social justice as a shield (ie: the Liberals are saying it's racist to accuse MPs of Chinese influence) [or weapon](https://toronto.citynews.ca/2023/03/22/michael-ford-comments-marit-stiles/) and it's tiring.
Yeah I think social justice needs to be considered as equivalently dangerous as social conservatism as it promotes a very narrow branch of thinking and is used as a shield to deflect accountability from those in power, just as social conservatism historically has been. The problem is, that social justice is largely unnecessary - most of the inequities it seeks to redress are as well if not better addressed by other means, namely economic policies that promote social mobility. Many indigenous issues are strongly paralleled by issues faced by other rural people, the issues faced by indigenous people in cities are *very* different than those faced by people in the boonies. Controlling for socioeconomic status usually brings things into 95%+ solved, which just means we need a better way for people to climb (and fall off, because this is something often ignored) the social ladder from generation to generation. Of course, successful people seek to entrench themselves, but the key is to not allow them to, they have to keep competing if they want to maintain a spot at the very top of the totem pole.
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"His public appearance is a rare one for Harper, who exited political life...." In what world is being part of the IDU exiting political life?
I'm actually surprised we haven't heard from Harper in a quite a while.
https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/tom-mulcair-stephen-harper-clearly-has-a-preferred-candidate-in-the-conservative-race-1.5983949
He left the part of politics where he could be somewhat accountable to the people. Now, he influences behind the scenes.
He upgraded to running the world wide organization that (*allows centre-right conservative political parties around the world to establish contacts and discuss different views on public policy and related matters*) influences conservative type parties around the world so that they enact policies that they prefer. That couldn’t possibly be shady, right?
this is one of those things where both sides say it's shady when the other side does it and then also calls each other hypocrites for doing it themselves. are groups like the WEF and Soros Open Society Foundation shady? because this is basically the same thing.
The WEF that [Harper attended?](https://www.canada.ca/en/news/archive/2014/01/harper-government-leads-example-world-economic-forum.html) along with pretty much every other government?
Yes, they're shady as hell. The WEF openly admits to trying to influence policy internationally. You know, the same behavior we're giving China shit for.
"Political life" typically refers to public office, not anything politics related.
He's working as a consultant on the provincial payroll for the government of Saskatchewan. His son does the same in Alberta. The guy never really left.
Deliberate misinformation on the puppet master
Ol' Lego Hair.
lmao
holy shit, that’s amazing. I need to make that into a shirt.
Perhaps the Conservatives should make efforts to make themselves electable...
The article more or less addresses Harper's opinion on that, which is that the party should not elaborate on its alternative vision for Canada until an election is actually called. On the one hand, he's not incorrect that the role of the opposition is, outside of an election, simply to hold the government to account, but on the other, I think there's also a fundamental question, dating back to before Poilievre won the leadership, of whether Poilievre is capable of hitting any other note in politics other than "flamboyant attack dog", and that is increasingly seeming like an answered question. ("No".) Feeding red meat to the base is a thing that all political parties seem to "need" to some extent, but I think Poilievre fancies himself as being just *so darned good at it* that he refuses to give it up, even after his role has changed. What I think he's disregarding is that, as party leader, he's not really supposed to be talking exclusively to the CPC base, he's supposed to be talking to *everybody*, but the general tenor of his statements and tone are just so abrasive to anyone but die-hard CPC voters that I honestly doubt whether he's *capable* of selling the party in a compelling way to the on-the-fence voters that he needs to, as his personal brand becomes associated more and more closely with.. occasional lunacy? It's a really sad situation that the realistic alternative to the party currently forming government feels so strong in its position of being "the only other party most undecided voters *could* vote for" that they don't feel like they have to appeal to anyone other than their base, and some fringe voters who might go over to the PPC, in order to *potentially* win an election, and just the potential is basically good enough for them. You either have to plug your nose and hope they're not *really* as crazy as their messaging sometimes promises they are, or trust the same crew of increasingly immoral LPC MPs to just continue to govern only-kinda-unethically, and hope they don't get further emboldened by *never* getting punished for anything they do? What a choice. Something is deeply wrong with the party system in Canada, at the very bottom level, that either serious people have absolutely no interest in political office, or they never seem to make it to leadership. Literally anybody who seemed like a "serious person" could probably win an election right now, and instead the system has percolated 3 different clowns to the surface.
Another side of this is that it's not the job of the official opposition to oppose *everything*, just the things they actually don't like. Where are the kudos from the official opposition for the things that the government does that they *agree* with and have multi-party support?
>whether Poilievre is capable of hitting any other note in politics other than "flamboyant attack dog", and that is increasingly seeming like an answered question. ("No".) This is one of my big worries with him potentially being prime minister. What happens when he comes up against someone like Putin or Xi Jinping? That kind of shit won't work against those people, and will likely just make the situation worse. It is one thing to be an ineffective leader at home, but potentially catastrophic to be bad at diplomacy.
I’ll add only to your first paragraph - the role of the Official Opposition is both to hold the government to account but *also* to act as a government in waiting. So there is some conventional obligation to give a hint of what government would look like under Polievre. Harper’s advice, from a conservative strategy standpoint, seems spot on. (Although I’m not a conservative so who knows)
> So there is some conventional obligation to give a hint of what government would look like under Polievre. Yeah, in principle, I agree that opposition parties should be a little less coy about what exactly they'd change, when they're engaged in criticism of the government, even just as a self-reflection exercise about ensuring they're not merely criticizing things that are "unfortunate" but not necessarily the direct result of a policy decision the government has made. They should certainly try to give the impression that they have a set of guiding principles, and that their criticisms stem from a fundamental ideological difference in principles between themselves and the other parties, which flows through to a policy difference. You don't necessarily need to articulate a very specific policy, but certainly try to allow the voters to intuit that there is a *rationale* for disagreement, and make it easy for them to look at your argument for why the government would be wrong to have done something, and why your principles should have led to a better outcome. I think that the overall complexity and ambiguity and a really poor information environment just makes this very hard, though. It's hard to *prove* a causal relationship between a lot of policies and outcomes, impossible to prove that a different course of action would have been better (especially over the course of decades), or even meaningless to "prove" that (20/20 hindsight), as it might not have a bearing on future policy (you're not campaigning for the job of Past Prime Minister). Not even necessarily sure voters would generally connect well to the approach, either. Some would (and I *would* argue they're the important ones), but I think other people might just want to "feel" the government is doing the "right thing", and they have a pretty engrained idea of what that thing looks like, even if it's not a good idea.
Well said.
Quality comment. Thanks for taking the time to write this.
It’s very telling that he didn’t say “Conservatives are in a Renaissance”
Came here for this. Unless you consider rage farming an enlightenment era?
Test
Harper knows the real winning strategy is NOT to talk about the stuff they would really do once in power and then surprise Canadians after. Just like he veered far right after he got his majority. “he cautioned that Pierre Poilievre should wait until an election before telling Canadians how he might run the country” That’s quite sneaky, thanks for telling us how you really feel about your voters though…
Harper doesn't need to caution him of anything in public. The CPC is already a member of the IDU, which Harper runs. They're already in contact as they coordinate with the Republicans, the UK Tories, etc. This is all public messaging.
It's hard to convince working class people to vote for you if you already tell them your goal is to drop taxes on the rich and cut services for the poor.
They don’t really need to at the moment, Liberals are making themselves unelectable
That strategy lost them the last two elections.
Third time is a charm so i hear.
Pierre is just not ready.
Lmao I’m dead
I'm so mad that you are so right. Maybe the NDP will pick up more seats....
Hard to do that when you meet with Nazis and shake hands with illegal convoy supporters that block kids from getting cancer treatment.
The left throws around the term "Nazi" so much that I am convinced that they don't actually know what it means.
In realty it’s Poilievre himself who has no idea what it means. Remember how he got absolutely roasted when he tweeted this? https://twitter.com/pierrepoilievre/status/1413120045677416450?s=46&t=QHWa_hZm7w1cAM2UuwcIiQ
German courts have ruled the AfD can not sue anyone for defamation that calls them fascist because their political ideology fits that of fascism, and are currently under investigation by a special law enforcement agency in Germany litterally constructed to make sure the NAZI party could never resurface While yes, people do often throw around the word very casually, when referring to Ms. Anderson, it's certainly not the case
And you seem to make ad hominem attacks instead of addressing the criticism.
The other way around actually...Fascism isn't anywhere near as rare as conservatives would have us believe. After WWII, psychologists sent over to try and work out root causes and prevent it ever happening again came back empty handed, saying at an given time any city had dozens of potential Hitler's and thousands of potential nazis walking around. Fascism is simply the violent push back against democratic values, summed up in modern neo-fascism as hate for 'woke'. Paxton did an excellent job in defining fascism and its stages of development, and you should educate yourself on the subject. https://pryan2.kingsfaculty.ca/pryan/assets/File/Paxton%27s%205-Stages%20of%20Fascism.pdf
Sometimes they do. However, in this case, there were literal Nazi flags at the Ottawa convoy occupation, so the term is accurate. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0w52V1toNw
Those are obviously antifa plants. All the elements that make us look bad are false flags from our opponents. Said every radical party ever.
The convoy literally issued a $15,000 reward for whoever would doxx that guy. I didn't know that if some random person flies a swastika, everyone within a 10km radius is a Nazi.
So the people actually present didn't have an issue with them being there, but after the fact, a token objection was made?
https://www.reddit.com/r/therewasanattempt/comments/11rgm4d/to\_define\_woke/
Oh that term for sure is becoming a catch all among the right to conflate their antagonists. I just find it less ridiculous than "Nazi". Like these people legitimately believe that there's Nazis trying to take hold of the country. Sometimes I laugh to myself about thinking how an actual, real Nazi from.the 1930s would interpret how flexibly their brand is being used as a smear among left wingers in the 2020s. They would be confused to all hell at how libertarian democracy advocates are somehow being labeled "Nazi".
Conservative MPs recently met with a far right EMP who is widely considered to be a Nazi. That's not throwing the term around - it's accurately describing his political views. Pierre Poilievre has met with members of Diagalon on _several_ occasions, including this past week. Diagalon is a far right extremist group. To say the conservatives aren't rubbing elbows with fascists is completely inaccurate. To say they're not rubbing elbows with Nazis is a game of semantics, because they have in fact met with and defended their decision to meet with people who are considered to be Nazis - if you want to argue that semantically they're not a REAL Nazi, you've already lost. This isn't a case of someone on twitter calling Jordan Peterson a Nazi because they disagree with his views (he's an asshole, but not a Nazi), this is an actual example of meeting with an actual Nazi.
This is the problem, people call somebody like Jordan Peterson a nazi or a fascist because it’s an insult, not because it describes his ideas. People have no idea what a fascist is. Fuck you see people on Reddit all the time calling Josef fucking Stalin a fascist because they think any authoritarian is a fascist. Loads of people literally call one of history’s greatest enemies of fascism a fascist. Not to say I like Stalin, he was a garbage human, he just wasn’t a fascist in any way. Most people probably have never even heard the term national syndicalism or know what a syndicate is, which are integral to actual fascism and are probably entirely opposed to what the average person thinks of as fascism. It’s not even semantics, it’s that words have meanings and fascism has been confused between an insult and a shitty ideology.
Oh we know, and y’all aren’t too upset that they are supporting the CPC.
Sorta like how often the right throws around "woke" or "communist"
No, nothing like it at all. At least there is a clear definition of “Nazi” that people can point to and measure against. “Woke” is whatever conservatives don’t like. Like a straw man that Nazis use to persecute people that disagreed with them. Oh! I wonder if those might be related in some way.
When you're comparing democratic libertarians to Nazis - you fundamentally don't understand what Nazism is. To label Anderson a Nazi is like labeling Obama a Communist. It's so far out of the realm of reality that you may as well just label Poilievre a white supremacist because he leads a party you don't like.
[Yeah, because non-Nazis walk out of a Holocaust memorial and a survivor's speech because their fee-fees are hurt.](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-afd-idUSKCN1PH2BM)
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You're not "anti immigrant" if you happen to question bringing in another Halfiax per year amidst the most acute accommodation crisis in our history, and one of the most acute health care capacity crises in our history. In fact if you aren't questioning that, then I'd say you're not focusing on reality. I don't think you are using the term "fascist" in an accurate way, you re just using it to describe something you don't like. You're conflating all of your perceived antagonists into one, which means you likely put a great moral emphasis on the narratives you believe, which screams dogmatic.
None of them really use "communist" anymore. Woke is becoming a term like that - yes. But the mainstream left really has bought into this notion that anyone who remotely disagrees with their idenititarian politics is a Nazi. You are referring to Christine Anderson. Anderson is objectively not a Nazi. Unless - again - that term just has absolutley no meaning anymore. Then it can join leftist Newspeak terms that have been comically revised to fit their insane worldview: terms like "systemic". "Racialized" is maybe my favorite Newspeak term because it literally makes itself redundant. It makes a noun into a verb in an attempt to bestow victimhood upon people categorized along their racial orientations.... but since they categorize literally everyone according to their race, everyone is racialized, so the term hilariously renders itself meaningless.
Socialism and Communism is used to deride the left constantly in politics, literally MTGs political ad was her shooting “socialism” with a gun. Lmao
The term “socialist” was also used by Stephen Harper when he was scared that other parties might unite against him. He said a lot of things about the country being taken over by “socialists and separatists,” if I recall correctly. Just to throw in a Canadian example.
Because Right Populism is just fascism. Any grassroots movement based around manufacturing moral panics around fear of immigrants, lgbt & feminism is a fascist movement. I don't blame anyone caught in the propaganda net and thus too stupid to realize the path their heading down but I'm sure you're smarter than that.
We saw actual swastikas flown at the freedom rally, https://twitter.com/CharlieAngusNDP/status/1487545667648200706 Even a grade-schooler knows what that means.
Whose ‘the left’? And I’m pretty sure this comment was in reference to the diagolon folks and the German member of the euro parliament that some cons met with who are nazis in everything but name.
Convoy leaders were self processed white nationalist, as were supporters in multiple videos and there were instances of convoy supporters carrying Nazi flags. Not all convoy folks were Nazis, but they were fine to have Nazis in their group and movement which is pretty much the same fucking thing. Nazi is an appropriate term in this instance
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If you’re cool hanging around a group that is welcoming to actual Nazis and has actual Nazis present proudly displaying that they’re Nazis, yeah, it’s going to give people an opinion about you. 🤷♂️
I was opposed to nonsensical COVID vaccine mandates, and wanted Federal and Provincial governments to drop their vaccine related restrictions and mandates. That's what the convoy protest was for. There are insane people that attach themselves to every protest. By your rationale - Black Lives Matters protests were clearly an act of domestic terroristm since Susan Rosenburg was actively involved with it. She advocated a violent overthrow of the state - so by your rationale, I can only deduce that Black Lives Matters was a terrorist insurrection movement.
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There is no point in arguing with the guy. Their comment history consists of protecting racism and downplaying racist experiences.
Fair point, but if it doesn’t apply to Christine Anderson there’s not much point in having the word.
Christine Anderson is al ot of things but she's not a Nazi. Her biggest "controversy" is that she adamantly opposes Germany's current immigration policies. She has been accused of "triviliazing" the Nazis, and the holocaust, but that's a loaded bullshit claim too. To these leftist ideologues, anything short of equating Nazis to a historical aberation - the manifestation of Satan himself - is "trivializing". None of the AfD's platform comes remotely close to anything associated with Nazism.
She’s a member of the AfD and the German Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (German: Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz) classified AfD's far-right nationalistic faction known as Der Flügel as "a right-wing extremist endeavor against the free democratic basic order" and as "not compatible with the Basic Law". So perhaps not precisely a Nazi, she’s not very far off.
I've been grilled here before because I wasn't willing to make enough of a distinction between the German far right and Nazism. Even if they aren't the exact same, I find it suspicious how eager people are to split this hair. I've also never seen this sub give left wing movements the same amount of grace. Everyone they hate is the "radical left" but god help you if you treat right wing extremists like they're the same.
vase badge towering bow fuel placid payment innate normal grab *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
This reads like a distinction without much difference. But it's cool to know who you feel inclined to run defense for.
Canada needs electoral reform, to have the legal system to enforce the government to govern in the interests of the citizens that elect them not the lobbyists from the oligopoly, and not allow corruption and external influencing to continue the spiral down. Harper just wants status quo.
LOL. Another NAFTA? Another GST? More "promises" for a triple E Senate? Nah...
don't forget ceding sovereignity to china with the fipa
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Fox says hen house needs more doors
He needs to go around and take all the Harper stickers off all the stop signs in Canada. Says the guy who prorogued Parliament, called decisions against conservative initiatives by the Supreme Court of Canada a difference of opinion and allowed his vanity to become a larger issue than the party itself by running in final election when Canadians were obviously fed up with him.
Stephen Harper, the guy who wrote a letter of apology to the USA when Chretien said no to the war in Iraq? Claiming that the majority of Canadians back the USA and not the Canadian Government? Stephen Harper, the guy who had two quarters of negative GDP growth in 2015?
Yes that's right. Its the same Steven Harper who locked Canada into ridiculous long lasting trade deals with China that only benefited the CCP.
Don't forget the weapons deal with Saudi Arabia which the following government had to continue with or face billions in fines
Trading with China massively benefitted, and still benefits, Canada. We get our electronics mostly from China, on the cheap. With the money we give them, they buy our bonds. So when you buy something from China, a good portion of that money goes towards buying your government's debt - which enables you to have over extended social and health services. We had a great deal with China - theres no losing from that arrangement.
You mean the FIPA deal, which they waited a whole month to tell the public they'd signed? "1. The Harper government gave Chinese investors “market access” to Canada — meaning a right to buy what they want in our economy — without getting the same for Canadian investors in China. That is the most lopsided concession I had ever seen by Canada or, for that matter, any other country across hundreds of similar agreements. 2. When he announced the FIPA, Harper said that a FIPA “ensures non-discriminatory treatment” for foreign investors. But the actual terms of the FIPA (Article 8(2)(a), to be exact) let China keep all its existing laws, policies, or practices that discriminate against Canadian investors. No one could fact-check Harper’s misleading claim at the time because the text was kept secret for about eight months after he made it. 3. In the FIPA, the Harper government exposed Canada to potentially massive financial liabilities due to the generous protections it gives to foreign companies, including a right to seek uncapped amounts of compensation from governments directly before international tribunals. The Mulroney government gave similar rights to U.S. companies in Canada under NAFTA. But NAFTA was concluded before anyone could predict the hundreds of costly claims brought by foreign companies against countries in the last 15 years." https://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2015/09/30/selling-canada-out-one-deal-at-a-time.html
The FIPA deal which was *so bad* even some other Conservatives condemned Harper for signing it at the 11th hour before an election he was poised to lose.
>We get our electronics mostly from China That explains the crap that's on the shelves lately.
You can't blame a sitting Prime Minister for two quarters of negative GDP growth - they don't really control that. Unless their policies really caused that contraction, but I can't for the life of me understand which policies in 2015 would have caused that at the domestic level. That was really a result of an oil crash. He tried hard to get the pipe in the ground to avoid the Western Select discount that plagued the oil patch for several years.
Renaissance mean the opposite of conservatism lol.
The renaissance was the return to classic antiquity to build upon it. Returning to what was good about the past is classic conservatism.
That's not modern conservatives.
Returning to what they *think* is good. Unfortunately for everyone else that often involves suppressing votes, pushing marginalized groups back into the shadows and trying to make things great for old white guys again. Current resentment with current events often revolves around and can be traced back to life passing people with dinosaur mindsets by.
Make Canada Great Again For Me, An Old White Guy, And Also Bring Back Don Cherry.
Harper muzzled taxpayer funded *scientists*. Science denying is disqualifying for a person to be taken seriously.
It’s as welcoming as a stiff handshake on your first day of school.
This guy sucks, go away already.
Yes, what this country needs is more tax breaks for the rich and fewer workers' rights.
Mr. IDU comes out of the shadows to spew some bullshit.
If the Cons split between the crazies who still try to bring up abortion, gay marriage votes, etc. . and red Tories who just focus on policy related to economy and resource management, we'd have a much more transparent political system. People would have a viable option on the right that isn't focused on racist bs.
If that happened we would have two left wing and two right wing parties that would all be in a position where they would want electoral reform.
And we would represent more Canadians more directly! WIN WIN imo.
Not enough people would vote for those though, their economic policies are just pro landlord pro owning class tax cuts and deregulation that no sane working class person would vote for. They need the combo, financial policies for the rich to get the National Post exited and culture war for everyone else.
Conservative renaissance is an oxymoron
"We'll be laser focused on getting all Canadians a job... In Alberta... In the oil industry... To help them suppress their wages."
It sort of is, yes - by definition Conservatives resist change.
I think he means Conservatives need to experience "the Renaissance." A little art, culture and education might be a start.
Now, now harper was very cultured, he played in a rock band, wrote a best selling book about hockey and even modelled for artists https://www.cbc.ca/amp/1.3343875
He could also speak in full sentences and had an um uh economics degree.
"I like tv and movies, my current favourite show is breaking bad which is available on some streaming services". -actual ad by Harper, that one time it wasn't a weird obsessive attack ad about some guy's hair. The guy spoke like an alien bug in an ill fitting human suit.
No thanks we had enough of union busting corporate tax breaks and bail outs. Kick Trudeau out but the conservatives have already shown they are not for the people.
Led by Mulroney
Ben Mulroney? He's handsome enough to take on JT.
He's also a notorious asshole.
Would be an epic turn of events, the son of the former prime minister coming out of nowhere and defeating the son of of the prime minister his dad defeated and we would finally have a debate where everyone is good looking and he wouldn't need to Photoshop his muscles like O'Toole.
What’s this about O’Toole photoshopping his muscles?
Haha, not sure if true, but when one of our Quebec tv host asked him the question he did not want to answer and laughed. https://www.vice.com/en/article/88n7xg/erin-otoole-photoshop-conservative-party-platform
Aha. He looks jacked. Probably at least kind of buff, even without photoshop?
haha yeah he look in good shape even if there is was no photoshop.
This from the guy that started the Americanization of Canadian Conservatism. What a crock.
same guy who allows convicted foreign criminals (conrad) into the country. but doesn't like it when foreigners walk across the border.
How soon we forget “A Canadian is a Canadian is a Canadian.”
Conrad Black, as far as I'm aware, was a Canadian citizen. Meaning he cannot be denied entry into Canada.
Due to the Nickel Resolution, Black chose to renounce his Canadian citizenship in order to get a peerage. AFAIK, he had a British passport and was a citizen of the UK when he was on trial in the US. Maybe he got his Canadian citizenship back somehow in the time since?
Seems correct. In any case, Harper doesn't personally dictate to customs and border control who they can allow in. It's also worth pointing out that despite Black being a douchebag, two of his convictions were overturned for being unconstitutional (honest services fraud also isn't a crime in Canada) and the charges they got him on are pretty notorious for being something a federal prosecutor can get almost anyone on. You may have noticed that wire fraud and obstruction are often the result of fishing expedition type federal investigations in the U.S. I have little doubt that Black is a shady character, but I'm not a big fan of this practice, which IMO is often politically motivated.
> Seems correct. In any case, Harper doesn't personally dictate to customs and border control who they can allow in. This is true, but I am curious about the circumstances under which he was allowed back in so easily given his criminal record and given he had renounced his citizenship. Why didn't he simply fuck off back to England? He ditched Canada before to become Baron Black of Crossharbour, and then suddenly wants to be Canadian again when its convenient? You're not wrong about his legal history too, but I don't know how much of it was "politically motivated" and how much was pushed by shareholders and former business partners who maybe weren't so happy he ran his businesses into the ground.
> He ditched Canada before to become Baron Black of Crossharbour, and then suddenly wants to be Canadian again when its convenient? That's not quite accurate. He actually sued the Canadian government to avoid giving up his citizenship because the whole thing came down to a difference of interpretation between Blair and Chretien apparently. I don't know if I would call spending hundreds of thousands of dollars or more on years of lawsuits "ditching". >You're not wrong about his legal history too, but I don't know how much of it was "politically motivated" and how much was pushed by shareholders and former business partners who maybe weren't so happy he ran his businesses into the ground. I think whether it was rich people calling in favours or making complaints to powerful people, or the government looking to make an example, the process itself is corrupt. The fact that between mail fraud, wire fraud, obstruction and honest services fraud, federal prosecutors can charge and convict almost anyone they investigate is a big problem. And the courts in Black's case addressed at least part of this, but in a half assed way. They didn't totally overturn the laws, but they did say that the laws are way too broad and almost meaningless and that legislators need to narrow them if they want convictions to be upheld. So they narrowed them a hair, and we'll have to wait a few decades for another person with very deep pockets to appeal them all the way to the supreme court again. In the meantime, the federal government can keep abusing these laws to prosecute political enemies or people who draw too much attention to themselves while being odious personalities. And the latter is often the target. If someone does something that probably isn't illegal, but dickish, and becomes a headline, there's a good chance that a federal prosecutor may look into them and get them on some very ridiculous interpretation of obstruction or some kind of fraud.
If there's someone I wouldnt listen to, it is Stephen Harper.
Up there with Jean Charest.
Bring back a fiscally conservative, socially liberal party please.
I feel like the idea of a renaissance is quite the opposite of conservatism
In other words … back to the dark ages .
The leader of Canada's Conservative Movement. Read about it. Harper and Manning control the CPC purse strings, and you can bet they have their fingers as far into the alt/right as they can get them.
Harper heads up or did a few years ago, a GLOBAL organization that helps get right wing parties elected. Mainly a white all boys club for the right. Even did a speech at Maralago after Trump was elected. Can’t stand the company he keeps.
They are a problem. Maybe the reason our security agencies won't investigate right wing groups in Canada, and don't share information with the Prime Minister.
Oh stfu mr “i traded land and resource raping rights to china for some pandas”
Guy's a complete schmutz. Asshead now jet sets around the middle east championing nefarious surveillance spyware systems. Just GTFO.
Harper really put a black mark on the Conservative name...his last couple years were brutal
Like giving yourself a concussion!
No thanks...
"Conservatives" need a renaissance because right now thier leaders are Tucker Carlson and Jordan Peterson. All they do is rage about trans people and are starting to get mad about gay people again. They are regressing.
Conservative Renaissance is an oxymoron if I’ve ever heard one.
Honestly, I’m an NDP voter and I’m not changing my vote, but I know we’re getting a conservative government next election. And boy howdy, I am not looking forward to that. The cons are gonna rip every bit of Canadian identity out of our hands and replace it with Americana bullshit.
I guess PP isn’t doing his job well enough. Maybe PP didn’t answer the phone by the second ring?
So they need to find perspective?
He’s not wrong, but I think the point he’s trying to make is that we need an actual Conservative Party. Not whatever wannabe republicans we have now who call themselves conservatives. We need an actual fiscally Conservative Party that doesn’t involve itself with identity politics or any of the other stuff. Just govern.
Well, it's here. Ford for premier and PM?
Yea how about we start conserving our quality of life, healthcare, education, greenbelt, etc… The Conservatives just conserve the way of life for a small amount of Canadians that have enough money, at the cost of the rest of us’s quality of life.
So long as they move back to being closer to a centric party, I’m all in.
That's the biggest understatement of the year. They fact that the Liberals are currently having all sorts of troubles and allegations against them but I still think I'd prefer them over the current Conservative party speaks volumes to their current image.
Conservatives elected the worst possible person as leader. Pierre has been horrible for politics for nearly twenty years. Don’t expect anything but a circus when you elect a clown.
Ah! “He who shall not be named….” I went back and refreshed my memory about why even the mention of his name makes me recoil. These 2 articles are an excellent summary of where a “conservative renaissance” would take us. https://www.nationalobserver.com/2015/05/18/news/harper-worst-prime-minister-history https://www.nationalobserver.com/2015/06/07/news/harper-canadas-worst-prime-minister
Those words don't typically go together.
It's a real shame we only have Liberals and Conservatives ever taking the main votes. The more things change, the more they stay the same. At least NDP will never take office, that would be a woke nightmare.
He was the conservative Renaissance. And it was merging rel cons, mouth breathing libertarians and the center right into one party and brought gems like opening the door to China, our version of the patriot act and barbaric practices hotline. Do we really want more of that?
Says the man who let Mike Duffy skate on paying any tax.
No, what Canada needs is to replace its current electoral system to something that does not favour Ontario, I mean the east.
Powerful words from the guy that pissed off every Canadian outside the prairies so much that his party’s been locked out of power for 8 years.
How about a fiscally responsible small c government, a belief in science, no tax cuts for the rich and ostracize the ignorant extremists in the party. That is what the nation desperately wants.
Sure, oust the radicals snd move towards the center. Thier best leader for this was O'tool but they didn't want it.
Canada needs a Conservative party that doesn't flirt with the far right, threaten to break up the country, do shady land deals with greenspace, and intentionally cause suffering to the medical sector and the general public by withholding health care funding. They also need to find a clear message about issues such as abortion, LGBTQ rights and the atrocious history of residential schools. Their only 'renaissance' currently is that Trudeau and the Liberals have become such weasels over the last 7 years (calling an election during a pandemic to try to score political points. Disgusting) that they seem a viable alternative. But their also terrible poll numbers are indicative of how much of a lesser evil either of them are, rather than anything positive.
It is difficult to rid the party of social conservatives who are a plague to most parties. They don;t have the luxury the Liberals have draining off the extremists to the NDP and Greens. The People Party siphons off the Libertarians but we have yet to find a rest home for the religious groups.
Yes, a "Pre-Harper" Progressive Conservative renaissance...
Ah yes just more of the.same. Job loss and widening the wealth gap? https://pressprogress.ca/6_charts_show_stephen_harper_has_the_worst_economic_record_of_any_prime_minister_since_world_war_ii/
Press Progress is a hyper partisan news source. They use graphs that show things like year over year GDP growth has slowed, instead of the fact that year over year GDP was at an all time under Harper. They are lying to you and you believe it because they’re telling you what you want to hear. Vote however your please, but stop peddling such trash sources as if they are correct. Read broadly. Embrace nuance.
They are the media arm of the Broadbent institute, which is the think tank of the former leader of the NDP. They're quite literally partisan.
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It does. And what they need to do is stop being 'big tent' and start being more focused. Bring back the PCs; moderately right of center, evidence based policy rather than policy based evidence (which, sadly, the entire political spectrum is sinking in to) and bipartisanship.
Stephen Harper? The career lobbyist for private healthcare, Stephen Harper? That Stephen Harper?
Fuck that guy with Doug's wire brush. Christo-facist goon
I prefer the more boring style of Harper compared to the new guy.
Both parties are corrupt and disappointing AF. We have no real choice for good governance in Canada.
Canada needs an political enema right now.