Canada’s deciding who gets to confront Donald Trump for the next few years. The election’s going to be April 28; the prime minister announced it on Sunday. Liberals and Conservatives are neck-and-neck, according to CBC pundits; the other parties are being passed by. Apparently voters want somebody to speak for the country, to be fully in charge. Because of Trump we’re having an election about how to stay independent, and voters want to find Mr. Canada. Two choices stand out: the investment banker who runs the Liberal Party, or the debate-me bro who runs the Conservatives.
I pick the banker, otherwise known as Mark Carney. He’s been Canada’s prime minister the past couple of weeks, and now he and the Liberals will try to keep him that way. Fine. I won’t vote Conservative; Canada has its MAGAs and that’s the party they favor. So it’s Carney and the Liberals, if you don’t want the MAGA influence but do want a possible majority government. Admittedly, as Mr. Canada the banker’s a stretch; he has no career in politics, no experience persuading millions of people. Pundits say he’s proving snippy with reporters. Snippiness isn’t un-Canadian but neither is it a strength. Worse, we’re finding out now how he stands regarding this trait. We’re just waking up with him.
A lot has to go wrong before a country finds itself with a prime minister and doesn’t know if he can talk to people. What happened was that Justin Trudeau’s government lasted longer than it should have; then it shuddered and fell down. Liberals induced Trudeau to announce his retirement, after which they replaced him with somebody who never worked for Trudeau, with a wise man who stayed clear of the Trudeau messes. This was Carney, whose gold star in public life came from abroad: the Brits hired him to lead the Bank of England, and in that post he helped Britain get through Brexit. Dealing with Trudeau, Carney’s limit had been economic advice; he never joined the government or even Parliament.
Good enough. Eighty-five percent of the Liberal membership voted for him as their leader, after which he duly succeeded Trudeau as prime minister. That’s how you get a prime minister and you don’t know if he can talk to people.
Rival. Pierre Poilievre, leader of the Conservatives, is supposed to be the politician who’s radioactive with the press. He takes a hard-edged, slashing approach; a MAGA approach, if you like. He’s got a voice like a drill, an impatient, know-it-all drill designed to set straight entire roomfuls of people, hallways of them, anybody within range. The nasal annihilator doesn’t win people over. He opens his mouth and they submit; then he’ll be quieter. Listen to him and it’s like Ron DeSantis climbed out of a manhole and escaped Florida, went looking around, and now he’s here.
For months Poilievre and the Conservatives were well ahead in the polls; the country’s had a decade of Trudeau, and the Covid disruptions are resented. But with a Trump election, the Conservative lead has dwindled fast. A MAGA tinge looks bad when the MAGA King talks about annexing your country. Trump’s added that he doesn’t like Poilievre and he says really the Liberals are easier to handle because they’re so feeble. But people don’t always believe Donald Trump.
Man on hand. Poilievre debates; pundits say Carney may not be used to debate. When he speaks he may not be listened to right off; we’ll see how he copes with that. As long as he stands up to Trump. A Quebecois pundit, a journalist from Radio-Canada, reported wonder stories of support for Carney. When journalists started nosing around Carney’s financial deals, callers said to never mind that stuff. When Carney’s not-too-passable French was faulted, callers said to lay off, he was trying. The pundit’s own father, apparently a devoted separatist, astonished his son by talking happily about “the Carney cut” now available from a local barber. A hero is needed and he’s the one on hand.
People with opinions about Brexit say Carney did a good job. They also say that about Gordon Brown and Hank Paulson. They don’t say any of these men has a gift for leading the electorate. Carney’s life devotion: from way high up, to keep the world’s money operating as it should, to do his part in this enterprise. Now Canada and the world economy are being mugged by Trump. Carney descends among us. Wiry, bob-chinned, crinkled; a man of crisp lapels and firm-crested haircuts, of brisk walks to and from helicopters. What he knows is money and how to make it run. But he’s going to be our leader.
Personal declaration. Typically, voting for the Liberals means voting for a socially conscious but clubby governing operation that repeatedly goes bust at the seams because of old-boy corruption. Now something else has been added: national freedom and self-respect. When I vote for the clubby operation and the banker, I’m voting for the best means I see for keeping Canada a free country, and for the MAGA way to fail.
I might have voted Liberal even if Trump weren’t around. But now it feels like an accomplishment. Blame any virtue signaling on him. The reason my workaday little vote has so much virtue is that his choices put it there.