How do you develop a strategy to win both reality based and reality denying voters at the same time? Any strategy based on what non-conservative voters recognize as reality is unacceptable to their base. But any message based on their base’s delusions by definition is going to be incoherent to anyone else.
One thing i would add to your US versus Canada analysis, is that most of our smallest provinces lean relatively left (and all of the ones with disproportionate representation do). It would be as if you took Wyoming, the Dakotas etc and replaced them with more Vermonts. Also, all of rural America was available to trump, but Quebec's rural areas are not available to PP to the same extent. That in turn makes the CPC very reliant on the urban areas they do do well in, and likely why PP hasn't gone anti immigration like similar right wingers elsewhere. Good luck in Edmonton and Calgary (and increasingly Regina and Saskatoon) if he goes that route.
Poilievre's handlers need to school him on the difference, and how to act in a Press Scrum versus Question Period. I thought he would've been smart enough to answer the CP question in French leaving him self some wiggle room. He also seems to have provided content for a campaign video with a French voice over pointing out the he didn't answer the CP question.
The problem with the Cons is that if they told the truth about what they really want to do, they would have even less seats. Each "leader" since Harper is a dud. Scheer was diluted vanilla, O'Toole was a doughy, undercooked dinner roll, and PP is sour milk. The lies just keep coming. I'm no longer upset by the bullshit. I assume that everything out of their mouths is a lie until proven otherwise. The Liberals will win the next election with JT at the helm. If they had had just over 16,000 more votes, they would have had their majority and that is with competition from the NDP and Bloc which the US doesn't have. I am mostly happy with the Liberals for the things that are important. Ford and his minions get on my nerves. Con premiers are not helping their federal counter-parts and vice versus. I find PP, Scheer, Cooper...all of them unlikeable. Their lack of talent and women is telling of a party that is lost in the past.
You nailed it! Canada is not the US. In so many parts of Canada, CBC (radio & TV) are the only choice. - like our expansive north. CBC also carries so much Aboriginal programming as well. 'De-funding' the CBC is such a lame Policy in the grand scheme of things important to a country like Canada. PP continues to broadcast how out-of-touch with Canadians he is.
That's a really good point about defunding English CBC but not French Radio Canada, and how that would play out in the West.
You are also right that the Conservatives dodged a bullet by not picking Jean Charest as leader.
But I think that there is a huge hole in the center of the Canadian political spectrum, and no party to fill it. The Conservatives are too libertarian. While I'm a libertarian myself, I recognize that many people find reliance on free markets to be too scary to contemplate. On the other hand, not enough Canadians are "woke". The concepts may play well in certain downtown cores, and in the media/academia/corporate elites, but my sense is that the vast majority don't like it.
Any party who tries to move into the center has a decent chance of winning. But, because of their base, no party can bring itself to do it. So we are f**ked.
“But I think that there is a huge hole in the center of the Canadian political spectrum, and no party to fill it.”
I somewhat disagree. The Liberals are solidly in the center. They just have so little credible opposition that they have no pressure to actually be good at governing. There’s no consequences to them for keeping around flawed policies and incompetent people, so they do.
The complaints about the Cons and NDP are typically some flavor of wondering what the hell they’ve been smoking. The complaints about the Liberals are about how terrible they are at doing their actual jobs. The disappointment levels are similar, but I think the distinction is important
Incompetent people? Name one? The Liberal bench is a rock star line up. Compare it to any other party. I noticed you spelled "flavor" the US way. Are you American?
Not American. Just not fighting my phone’s autocorrect
And I am comparing it to every other party. The fact that every other party isn’t fit to run a dinner party, let alone a political one, doesn’t excuse the fact that the liberals have a huge execution problem. Issue after issue they roll out half baked legislation and then spend their time fighting in the procedural weeds. We deserve better, even if there’s not currently a better offering
They have a worse problem. Or maybe it’s the root of your question.
https://mobile.twitter.com/VoiceOfFranky/status/1645612558324322304
How do you develop a strategy to win both reality based and reality denying voters at the same time? Any strategy based on what non-conservative voters recognize as reality is unacceptable to their base. But any message based on their base’s delusions by definition is going to be incoherent to anyone else.
One thing i would add to your US versus Canada analysis, is that most of our smallest provinces lean relatively left (and all of the ones with disproportionate representation do). It would be as if you took Wyoming, the Dakotas etc and replaced them with more Vermonts. Also, all of rural America was available to trump, but Quebec's rural areas are not available to PP to the same extent. That in turn makes the CPC very reliant on the urban areas they do do well in, and likely why PP hasn't gone anti immigration like similar right wingers elsewhere. Good luck in Edmonton and Calgary (and increasingly Regina and Saskatoon) if he goes that route.
PeePee never asks "What would be the consequences?" or "Why hasn't this been done already?" I hope he never does.
Poilievre's handlers need to school him on the difference, and how to act in a Press Scrum versus Question Period. I thought he would've been smart enough to answer the CP question in French leaving him self some wiggle room. He also seems to have provided content for a campaign video with a French voice over pointing out the he didn't answer the CP question.
The problem with the Cons is that if they told the truth about what they really want to do, they would have even less seats. Each "leader" since Harper is a dud. Scheer was diluted vanilla, O'Toole was a doughy, undercooked dinner roll, and PP is sour milk. The lies just keep coming. I'm no longer upset by the bullshit. I assume that everything out of their mouths is a lie until proven otherwise. The Liberals will win the next election with JT at the helm. If they had had just over 16,000 more votes, they would have had their majority and that is with competition from the NDP and Bloc which the US doesn't have. I am mostly happy with the Liberals for the things that are important. Ford and his minions get on my nerves. Con premiers are not helping their federal counter-parts and vice versus. I find PP, Scheer, Cooper...all of them unlikeable. Their lack of talent and women is telling of a party that is lost in the past.
You nailed it! Canada is not the US. In so many parts of Canada, CBC (radio & TV) are the only choice. - like our expansive north. CBC also carries so much Aboriginal programming as well. 'De-funding' the CBC is such a lame Policy in the grand scheme of things important to a country like Canada. PP continues to broadcast how out-of-touch with Canadians he is.
That's a really good point about defunding English CBC but not French Radio Canada, and how that would play out in the West.
You are also right that the Conservatives dodged a bullet by not picking Jean Charest as leader.
But I think that there is a huge hole in the center of the Canadian political spectrum, and no party to fill it. The Conservatives are too libertarian. While I'm a libertarian myself, I recognize that many people find reliance on free markets to be too scary to contemplate. On the other hand, not enough Canadians are "woke". The concepts may play well in certain downtown cores, and in the media/academia/corporate elites, but my sense is that the vast majority don't like it.
Any party who tries to move into the center has a decent chance of winning. But, because of their base, no party can bring itself to do it. So we are f**ked.
“But I think that there is a huge hole in the center of the Canadian political spectrum, and no party to fill it.”
I somewhat disagree. The Liberals are solidly in the center. They just have so little credible opposition that they have no pressure to actually be good at governing. There’s no consequences to them for keeping around flawed policies and incompetent people, so they do.
The complaints about the Cons and NDP are typically some flavor of wondering what the hell they’ve been smoking. The complaints about the Liberals are about how terrible they are at doing their actual jobs. The disappointment levels are similar, but I think the distinction is important
Incompetent people? Name one? The Liberal bench is a rock star line up. Compare it to any other party. I noticed you spelled "flavor" the US way. Are you American?
Not American. Just not fighting my phone’s autocorrect
And I am comparing it to every other party. The fact that every other party isn’t fit to run a dinner party, let alone a political one, doesn’t excuse the fact that the liberals have a huge execution problem. Issue after issue they roll out half baked legislation and then spend their time fighting in the procedural weeds. We deserve better, even if there’s not currently a better offering