April 30, 2025 • 47 mins
Garrison breaks down the 2025 Canadian election with the help of Lance from The Serfs. Conservatives snatch defeat from the jaws of victory as anti-Trump polarization gives Liberals another minority government.
Sources:
https://newsinteractives.cbc.ca/elections/federal/2025/results/#/all-parties
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn4jd39g8y1o
https://abacusdata.ca/2025-federal-election-final-poll-of-campaign/
https://newsinteractives.cbc.ca/elections/poll-tracker/canada/
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Alson media.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Dark woke is back, ten more years of liberal supremacy,
bankers in control in the great nation of Canada. This
is it could happen here. I'm Garrison Davis. I'm joined
by James Stout. We are discussing the twenty twenty five
Canadian election, which I maybe slightly exaggerated in the opening there.
(00:27):
But the election did happen yesterday or two days ago
whenever you're listening to this. I was up all day
on on CBC and on elections dot Ca checking in
on all the charts and all the stats to see
how this how this kind of upset election went, and
oh boy did it go. James, how much do you
(00:50):
do you know about Canada and elections?
Speaker 3 (00:53):
But both of the things, the things that I have
some knowledge about. I've been to Canada twice. That's a
fellow common World member.
Speaker 2 (01:01):
I guess. Yeah, we are both citizens of the Commonwealth.
So there we go.
Speaker 4 (01:05):
Just kind of have a queen on the money. Queen
is dead, dead.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Queen Queen is dead, but yes, we do have.
Speaker 4 (01:11):
Queen on money money. So that's another thing I understand.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
We have a parliamentary system like yeah, like do I
say England or like Britain or UK.
Speaker 4 (01:21):
It's a yeah, it's a United Kingdom. I think would
be the institute that Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Well we have one of those two, but it's less
confusing because it's just one country. We don't try to
be three countries like like you in the UK, Britain
and England.
Speaker 4 (01:37):
We're a continent, let a mini continent. That's what we're
going for. We've left Europe. We're on our way to
the Caribbean slowly.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Oops. Yeah, luckily Canada is doing just fine. Uh. The debatable,
but certainly this election has has gone probably slightly better
for global stability and stopping the advance of farign populism
then certainly what it looked a few months ago for
people WO don't know. Yes, Canada has a parliamentary system.
(02:06):
People do not elect the prime minister directly. They elect
the MP in their district, which is called a writing.
It's a first past the post system, so whoever gets
the most votes in each writing they get their representatives.
Since to Parliament, the party with the most representatives they
take control of the government and that is who the
(02:26):
Prime Minister is and the next Prime Minister of Canada
will be Mark Karney, who assumed the prime minister rule
like last month, winning the Liberal election after Justin Trudeau
resigned in January, and before we get into some of
the results, at first, a little bit of an election
kind of background. So Liberals have been in power for
(02:49):
nearly a decade, slowly getting less and less popular as
the cost of living has risen. Last election in twenty
twenty one, the Liberals kept their minority government, but the
leader of their party, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, continued
to decline in popularity. By the end of twenty twenty
four's approval rating was just twenty two percent or net
negative fifty two. Conservatives were up twenty five points in
(03:13):
the polls. It was a near certainty that they would
sweep the next election. Trudeau announced his resignation on January sixth,
kind of the January sixth of Canada if you think
about it. Former banker Mark Karney won the party election
in March or twenty twenty five. Carney quickly called for
an election to write off the peak of anti Trump
sentiment sweeping across Canada. This was following Trump's talk of
(03:36):
annexing Canada. And the global trade war and tariffs directed
at the American neighbor upstairs next door. I don't know, yeah,
downstairs south, No, from America. It's a oh I see, yeah, okay,
yeah from Yeah, got it understand, which is maybe a
northern standpoint. But who cares.
Speaker 5 (03:55):
Now.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
This election or an election, would have happened by oct
Over twenty twenty five regardless. But calling it early was
a smart move by Liberals as this was the first
time in three years that they had led in the polls.
Support for other third parties like the Keebuqua Bloc and
the National Democratic Party the NDP had slowly been shifting
(04:16):
towards the Liberals, and we saw this in the results
Monday night. At this point, the Liberals are projected to
win one hundred and sixty eight seats, falling barely short
of the one hundred and seventy two majority. There's still,
as a time of recording, still a possible path for
them gaining a majority government, but it's fairly unlikely. It'll
(04:38):
probably be a minority government. The Conservatives have won one
hundred and forty four seats, the Blackabiqua twenty three and
the NDP a measly seven, with the Green Party snagging one.
Liberals also secured the largest vote share, forty three point
six percent of the vote compared to the Conservative's forty
one point four percent, though because of a vote efficiency
(05:01):
basically how spread apart certain votes are, this has still
led to much more seats for the Liberals than the Conservatives. Right,
if you have more Conservatives voting in a district that's
going to go Conservative anyway, those extra votes don't necessarily
mean there's going to be more representation in parliament. That's
the vote efficiency idea.
Speaker 4 (05:19):
Yeah, first plus supposed to is a very bad system
as electoral systems go. It leads to an awful lot
of votes not counting for any representation. Like, for instance,
to Garrison Davis, party could have fifty one percent of
votes in all ridings and I could be there at
forty nine and I would get zero MPs.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Basic, Hey, sounds fine.
Speaker 4 (05:41):
Sounds fine by me, Garrison Davis in control.
Speaker 2 (05:45):
Well, this is kind of what happens in Canada. The
election system in Canada is pretty swayed towards the Liberals
because of how much more dispersed they are versus you know,
most Conservative supporters in the western Provincesaskatchewan, Alberta in BC
and a growing presence in ont But yeah, the Liberals
kind of always get a bit of a boost in
the election. Now, we did have record high early turnout
(06:08):
in Canada seven point three million people cast their vote
early during Easter week. The full turnout is higher than
it was the past few elections. But it matches pretty
much to the twenty fifteen election. So to get a
majority government you need one hundred and seventy two seats.
This allows you to not have to worry about like
no confidence votes which trigger new elections, and you don't
(06:30):
need to work with other parties to pass legislation. Now,
this will probably be a minority government with the Libs
having to work with a small number of remaining and
DP and Block seats to run the government, which one
could consider a good thing in terms of being pushed
maybe towards some better policies rather than just like liberal supremacy.
(06:53):
But it also in its government will be more unstable
and it kind of gives the Conservatives more room to wiggle.
So it's definitely a mixed bag. As reporting first came
in for Atlantic Canada, it showed that this would be
a tighter race than what the Liberals were hoping for.
During election night, it seemed Conservatives were on track to
pick up two seats in Newfoundland, though in the end
(07:16):
the Liberal incumbent barely kept their seat, beating the Conservative
challenger by twelve votes. In Terra Nova the Peninsulas. The
Libs did fare much better in Quebec, though they flipped
eleven seats. This was the best performance by Liberals in
Quebec in years now. Conservatives gained some seats from the
Liberals in Ontario under Doug Ford, with Conservatives flipping seats
(07:40):
around the Toronto suburbs. One of the biggest stories of
this election was just the complete NDP collapse the progressive
kind of democratic socialist New Democratic Party. They're currently projected
to lose seventeen of their twenty four previously held seats.
The NDP basically gave Carny this election. Jack met Singh
(08:02):
lost his seat. That's the leader of the NDP. He
lost his seat to Wade Chung, a Liberal, and stepped
down as leader on Monday night. Part of what makes
this such a big setback for the NDP is that
because they failed to win at least twelve seats, they
actually lose official party status in Parliament. Parties have to
(08:24):
win at least twelve seats to be recognized as an
official party in the House of Commons. Official parties get
to have offices in Parliament, extra staff, They get to
ask questions in legislative sessions and can sit on committees. Now,
the NDP did previously lose party status in nineteen ninety three,
winning only nine seats in that election, but this performance
was slightly worse, getting only seven. So this is going
(08:47):
to be a big shake up. The NDP is going
to have to be forced to rebuild, which is maybe
necessary based on kind of a degree of NDP stagnation
the past decade. They're kind of caught in like twenty
seventeen politics in my opinion, though saying did lead them
to pass some significant legislation and progressive policies do have
(09:09):
a degree of popularity in Canada. The NDP was polling
about the same as the Liberals just three months ago.
The movement that we're seeing is from NDP voters scared
of Polyev and Trump, so they moved to Carney to
avoid splitting the left vote, as Carney was seen as
more capable of beating Polyev than the NDP leader sing
and certainly Justin Trudeau.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
Now.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Funnily enough, some of this quote unquote strategic voting actually
did end up splitting the vote in a place like
be seen specifically Vancouver, which recently has gone strongly NDP.
But this year the Conservatives were able to snag three
seats because enough previous NDP voters ended up going liberal
in an attempt to gain a Liberal majority, but that
(09:55):
resulted in neither the NDP nor the Liberal candidate actually
individually getting an enough votes to win the riding. Let's
talk about vote share compared to the last twenty twenty
one election, so Liberals did fairly well this election, especially
compared to previous ones. They gained over ten points compared
to the last election in twenty twenty one. Conservatives also
(10:18):
didn't do badly, actually like they actually did. Okay, this
certainly wasn't the result they were wanting, but they did
not do bad. They gained over seven and a half
points this race. Reliable conservative voters still voted conservative and
they were able to siphon off some support from other parties,
with Conservatives doing slightly better than what polling predicted, but
(10:42):
a lot of very close races across key districts. Now
where all those extra votes or vote movement is coming
from is all of the third parties. The Green Party
and the Blackapiqua both dropped over a point, The far
right People's Party dropped four points and the NDPP eleven
point six huge huge losses for the NDP. Most of
(11:04):
those voters probably going liberal, although some may just not
have voted. One of the more interesting parts about this
election is that the Conservative Party leader Pierre Polyev lost
his parliamentary seat. He lost to Liberal Bruce Fanjoy by
about four thousand votes. Oh damn, four point six percent
(11:27):
of the vote. So this is going to probably cause
a bit of an upset in the Conservative Party. There
might be some maternal conflict over whether Polyev should continue
as party leader, though he did not step down from
that position during his concession speech Monday night, James, do
you do you have any thoughts here before we pivot
to ads.
Speaker 4 (11:46):
It wouldn't be such a like scene of such a
humiliation for the Conservatives if it wasn't for all the
polling until maybe like a couple of months ago.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
Right, Yes, The reason why it's such an upset. Is
because they were like a destined to wear as almost
like divinely written into fate like three months ago, and
the fact that they fumbled this is gonna be like
a massive like historical footnote, not even a footnote. This
is like a historical topic. Is how conservatives fumbled this election?
Speaker 4 (12:17):
Yeah, like people.
Speaker 3 (12:18):
The thing is that the Liberals want despite people having
been pissed off with them for a long time and
wanting something different.
Speaker 4 (12:25):
Yeah. Yeah, because people would just like mad at Trump.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
And we will talk more about the background of the
lead up to this race and in those dynamics that
James mentioned in the next segment after these ads, Okay,
(12:49):
to talk more about the lead up to this race
and Trump's influence on this election. I talked with Lance
from the Serfs of fellow Canadian who talks politics just
as much as I do. So here is that interview
that I recorded just a few hours before the polls
closed in Canada.
Speaker 6 (13:10):
Hey, my name is Lance. I run a number of
different channels, usually under the banner of the Serfs. There's
YouTube dot Com, Slash, the Surf Times and at the
Serf TV. On most other social media, I cover news, politics,
internet slop, usually from a dumpster fire like perspective.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
And you're Canadian importantly, Yes, I am, I am. I
am Canadian, but I have been resigned to living in
the States for quite a while. I actually just had
some Canadian family visit me, and they kept making fun
of me for living in the States, specifically because the
States are trying to, you know, take take Canadian territories seemingly.
So now I'm getting a lot of hate for my
(13:47):
Canadian family members for living in America, which is interesting.
Speaker 6 (13:52):
I was going to say, it's got to be a
scary time to be living in the United States as
a Canadian citizen a little bit.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
I am I am dual, but we'll see how long
that matters. So I want to talk talk a little
bit about kind of the background of this election, because
I think this is maybe the most interesting Canadian election
in the past ten years, specifically because of how much
the results have always felt it inevitable, but the actual
(14:18):
results have like flip flop three months ago, four months ago,
I'm sure that me and you may have predicted probably
something resembling a conservative sweep. Not to put words in
your mouth.
Speaker 6 (14:32):
Well, minority or majority government led by the Conservatives, know
no question, that was where all the major polling was trending,
and then the exact opposite on this.
Speaker 5 (14:42):
Roller coaster election in both directions.
Speaker 6 (14:45):
I think it's it's pretty easily explainable, especially to your
American listeners who might have been wondering what was happening. Essentially,
the country had a combination of burnout on Justin Trudeau
and the person who replaced Justin Trudeau, Mark Carney, effectively
took the number one campaign. It was the actual campaign
slogan of the Conservatives away from him immediately after being
(15:06):
crowned the new leader of the Liberal Party, which was
ax the tax, which is what you know, fascist Millhouse,
who we call Pierre Pollievro over here. That was his
big campaign promise, The Conservatives were going to ax the
carbon tax, and that had a lot of people excited,
a lot of people didn't like Justin Trudeau. And then
along comes Mark Carney and he takes both of those
things away from the Conservatives. He's not Justin Trudeau, and
(15:27):
he acts the tax and so they had to kind
of completely reset. And this was before the wild card
of Trump shows up, ye, which of course now is
caring not only Canada but the world. I would say
like most countries now are kind of having to completely
reset how they think and want to do geopolitics into
the future because of his policies.
Speaker 2 (15:46):
Well, and I know, like a decent chunk of the
Alberta economy is now in great jeopardy because they can't
sell fuck Trudeau merchandise.
Speaker 5 (15:55):
Which was dropping up the entire economy outside of the way.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
Yeah, well, you know if you go to the oil,
which will probably be fine.
Speaker 5 (16:02):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
I guess could talk a little bit about kind of
what led to this universal hatred of Justin Trudeau in
like the past like like five years, just like ever
so briefly.
Speaker 6 (16:12):
Yeah, for conservatives, a lot of it really became increasingly
more intense with COVID, and I think internationally there was
an association with very basic safety protocols and tyranny. So
I guess some people the United States and Canada both
saw the idea of wearing a mask g having to
wash their hands as some sortom of dictatorship akin to
(16:33):
some of the worst war crimes ever committed on any population.
That made a schism happen, where the sentiment kind of
really started accelerating towards less of you know, blaming Trudeau
for everything, kind of like Obama that used to be
a joke, like Trudeau to actual fuck Trudeau merchandise, and
the idea of you know, Trudeau being an enemy of
the state and a communist dictator that was on the
(16:55):
right side of things. On the left side of things,
everyone got burnt out from Trudeau because the performer of
progressive politics of his entire character, he was very vocal
about standing up for a lot of issues that on
one end he would you know, pretend to care about,
such as indigenous rights, land backs, stuff like that, and
then he would be suing the survivors of residential schools
in federal court to try and prevent them from getting
(17:16):
too much money from the federal government. So there was
a lot of Trudeau seems to performatively enjoy being perceived
as someone who's enlightened and progressive and trying to steer
the society in a good direction, where his policies are
effectively exacerbating wealth and equality very rapidly, because that's effectively
what you get with neoliberal centrists.
Speaker 5 (17:34):
Right.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
Yeah, I like to go back to that COVID thing
like I was in Calgary and like spring of twenty
twenty two, and I was getting made fun of in
like bars and clubs for like wearing a mask at
that point in time, like and that is that is Alberta.
But yeah, no, that was definitely like strong. We certainly
saw degrees of that here in the States as well,
(17:57):
but yeah, you know, it's a little bit of that.
Like general anti incumbent sentiment was growing so much last year,
which which you saw levied against the Democrats in the
States and certainly against the Liberals. And the way that
the Liberals in Canada have kind of been able to
maneuver away from that in the way that like the
Democrats haven't is super interesting. It's not necessarily like replicable,
(18:17):
especially for US politics, but it's still as interesting. I guess.
Like on the Conservative side, their leadership changed in twenty
twenty two, right.
Speaker 6 (18:27):
Yeah, I think so it was it was twenty two
or twenty three, but I believe it was it was around.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Them that's when plivertcame became leader of the Conservative Party,
which is like you know, closed ranks and like coalesced
the past ten to five years or so, and they've
been they've been gaining a large it had been gaining,
you know, a large degree of popularity the past two
three years, not necessarily because of who their party leader is,
(18:54):
but because they are simply not the Liberal Party. At
least that's kind of what it seemed like to me,
because like approval ratings for Paul of Aara's never been
like great, but the Conservative Party has still been gaining popularity,
at least previous to the past few months.
Speaker 6 (19:08):
Yeah, I don't want to play, you know, give the
far right any kind of kudos or points, but I
think from an analytical standpoint, something that people should realize
is that within the last i'd say year and a
half or so, Pierre was really really effective at doing
faux populism in a way that a lot of people
were starting to get very worried about, Yeah, and that
he was starting to see a lot about the working class,
you know, the housing crisis in the country and the
(19:31):
fact that the Liberals are out of touch elites who
only care about enriching themselves, and you know, a lot
obviously you'd have a lot of the right wing kind
of nebulous terms like woke ideology being tied into that
kind of stuff. But he was for a long time
kind of starting to gain a lot of ground in
traction as more of a moderate style conservative who was
(19:51):
concerned with helping the working class, which is astonishing considering
the man is a lifelong.
Speaker 5 (19:58):
Politician like that, that is who he is.
Speaker 6 (20:00):
He was making fun of people like the leader of
the Social Democrats here drug meet Singh. He was making
fun of him for just working for a pension and
not even caring about the people or the working class.
The man is never marched with the union I'm talking
about here. He's never marched with the union. He is
a you know, his voting track record is decidedly anti worker,
it's decidedly exacerbating wealth in the quality. Has worked his
entire life to make houses more expensive. But marketing and
(20:23):
branding really work, especially like you know, there's compilation clips
of him saying things that are JK rallying tier in
terms of both their nonsensicalness, Like talking about how electricity
is crafted by harnessing the power of the lightning bolts
into the wire that the electrician holds up.
Speaker 5 (20:41):
Very cool, Yeah, very cool, four like powers.
Speaker 6 (20:45):
I'm on board, but like, unfortunately that's just not how
we usually generate power in this but like it works
on some people. They like to see a man who've
fakes owan like different kinds of wood and tools, you know,
like at Tucker Carlson esque.
Speaker 5 (20:59):
Yeah, I've got a would shop in my back and
it's like that.
Speaker 6 (21:02):
Well, no, I think this is the first time you've
ever seen that lumber, sir. But as you know, again,
some voters, they really started his rebranding in that respect
actually worked pretty successful for yeah, the last year and
a half against Trudeau.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah, he had a pretty substantial makeover the past the
past few years to make himself like presentable in this way. Yeah,
very like carlsonesque, very like Ben Shapiro goes to home
depot and gets some wood. Yes, it's definitely pulling from
that vein, although maybe a bit more successfully and like,
at least from my perspective, it feels like the degree
to which Pierre kind of hitched himself to like the
(21:36):
Trump populist wagon the past few years, especially like with
like sentiments like growing in like the Western provinces, that
kind of mirrors some of the Trumpian rhetoric. That type
of stuff was getting popularity. And now because he put
if not all his eggs, but some of his eggs
in the Trump basket. This is like backfired in like
popular opinion when it comes to his ability to succeed
(21:57):
as like a politician and like gaining support because we've
seen so much anti Trump polarization based on like the
fifty first state stuff based on the tariffs, and like
Carnie has been able to weaponize that pretty effectively against
against Pierre. Absolutely like it. Initially, like the way like
popularity points shifted was like by like twenty points, which
(22:18):
was like huge. Those have gotten closer, But.
Speaker 6 (22:21):
I think it's one of the biggest reversals or if
not the biggest reversal in Canadian political history. Was the
dominating lead they had from having it almost an assured
majority to now perhaps losing to a liberal majority, which
again is unheard of. Yeah, one thing that people are
also kind of missing is that he also really closely
started associating himself with Elon Musk.
Speaker 5 (22:41):
Prior to Leader of you know, the US or whatever
you want to call him, the real.
Speaker 4 (22:48):
President of the United States.
Speaker 6 (22:49):
But he had a number of rallies and on the
record praising Elon Musk prior to Elon Musk. This was
pretty Elon Musk overt Nazi era kind of more just
like Nazi light eraser.
Speaker 5 (23:01):
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 6 (23:03):
But around that time, Pierre was asked, like, what do
you think about being endorsed and praised by Elon Musk,
And you know, he started making jokes about how his
kids want to go to Mars, so that's pretty cute,
and started talking about how he wants Elon Musk to
build more factories and plants in Canada. Well that's all
really coming back to hurt him now, because the very
idea of there being a stronger TESLA presence in the
(23:24):
country is decidedly rejected by the populace. Like, you know,
the protests that are going on in the United States
against tesla's are going on here as well. Maybe not
as large scale or perhaps as fire based, but a
lot of them are occurring here, and so like that
I think is also really hurting him. So there's been
this really funny, strange political dance that's kind of happened
in the last couple of months where everyone is trying
(23:46):
to say Trump loves you more. It's like a circular
firing squad. Like at one point the Conservatives were trying
to market themselves to saying Trump was making fun of
Pierre in this clip, so look he hates Pierre More. Yeah,
And then another it was like, oh no, no, look he's
talking a lot of smack about Mark Karney. He hates
Mark Carney Moore. So that that has actually become a
(24:07):
very strong dynamic of the Canadian election is who exactly
does Trump like more? And that's not going to be
good for you if it turns out you're the one.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
I guess I'd like to talk a little bit now
at the end here about Mark Kearney himself and kind
of what this means for like the Liberal Party. He
was the Governor of the Bank of Canada, starting into
as an eight Then he became governor of the Bank
of England and managed them through the Brexit fiasco. Brexit
was not his idea. He was not pro Brexit, but
he just happened to be holding the reins of the
(24:35):
of the Bank of England during that time period. Returned
to Canada, has served as like an informal advisor to
Trudeau and now is the is the leader of the
Liberal Party. He's a very I don't know, he tries
to like project this sense of like he's like a
like like a reasonable man, which which which he you know,
in some ways is like he's like he's like kind
(24:57):
of boring. He works in banking. He's not like overtly charismatic.
But he doesn't have like the the like youthful, like
bumbling presence of like Trudeau. Like he just he seems
he seems kind of basic. I don't know.
Speaker 6 (25:16):
Yeah, I mean that's a good way of putting it. Yeah,
you're totally right. I mean we're talking about a lifelong banker.
I mean, he's even worked for gold Mill Sacks. He
has a yes, a very long and started well. I mean,
in some view, it depends on your worldview. Right, if
you are as a person who thinks that the solution
going forward, especially in the face of actual manifesting fascism,
(25:37):
is more neoliberal policies, austerity and measures, then you might
be very, very excited to perhaps get your own, like
honestly Joe Biden style election here where we are once
again going to be choosing center to center right economic
policies that are going to undoubtedly exacerbate wealth and equality more.
They are not going to solve the housing crisis. The
(25:58):
housing crisis of Canada, while it is portrayed constantly as complex,
really goes down to fundamentally there are a lot of houses,
but there are also a lot of houses being built
in luxury markets that most people can't afford. Speculation is
not addressed, and so speculation usually gets blamed on foreign investors,
which in turn kind of brings up the whole immigration fears,
which are very successful. But with Carney, I mean, I
(26:21):
don't see anything dramatic. Not only did he acts the
carbon tax when he was in power initially, and that
was again, I think, strategically to remove the power the
Conservatives had on that policy. He also is getting rid
of the capital gains tax, which again is just going
to be funneling more money towards the ultra wealthy in Canada.
So the problem for me is that, if anything, I'm
happy that p here it looks like he might not win.
(26:43):
I don't know what by the time people are listening
to this, what the results are. But I also recognize
that this does not solve these crises. For simply putting
band aids on a pause before finally a Trump of
our own gets elected and then yes, people after the
facts start realizing, oh, Oh my god, he's doing a
lot of the horrifying things that he promised he would do.
He's actually trying to enact Project twenty twenty five. All
(27:05):
these terrible things are happening.
Speaker 5 (27:06):
Yeah. Well, I mean, if this was an election.
Speaker 6 (27:08):
Where it looked like Pierre was going to win, I
would say he is going to follow through on all
the aggressive measures and more that he's promising right now,
which include, you know, suspending the Canadian Charter of Rights
and Freedoms to people that he deems should be worthy
of receiving freedoms. Specifically because, like Donald Trump, he wants
to begin silencing people for their speech in relation to
protesting against Israel and their genocide of Palacidians, especially if
(27:30):
you are an immigrant or someone on a student visa,
and these policies you can see they're a disaster after
the fact, and people I think wake up to them
like Americans are right now when they realize Trump's actually
doing it. But you know, make no mistake, it doesn't require,
you know, too long of the increase in out wealth
and equality for people to look for an answer because
(27:51):
they're not being listened to by the libs or the
liberals here.
Speaker 2 (27:53):
No it is interesting that how much this election has
almost mirrored the American two party system with the Black
Keebuquah as well as the MDP, like probably most likely
right this is before the results, but probably going to
be losing seats to both the Liberals and the Conservatives.
And like, I think like a big part of this
election I think is similarly looking back in the past
(28:14):
ten years, is how much I think the NDP is
frankly fumbled and probably needs to do a major overhaul
to really regain trust in the voters. And yeah, it's
going to be tough because I think, like for the
Progressives in Canada, it's kind of been convenient for the
Liberals to have a minority government because then they need
to work with ENDPT.
Speaker 6 (28:31):
And they've gotten the law accomplished to be fair to
Chuck meet Seeing and you know, they're for American listeners,
the Social Democratic Party of Canada, they accomplished some great
things working in a minority government setting, including a pharmacare program,
including a federal feeding program for children, a school lunch program,
you know, working on paid family sickly even extending it.
(28:51):
So they've done a lot of good in sort of
enacting progressive policies. But it's the Liberals who are also
equally as good at taking credit for all the things
that people have come to really like, such as having
dental care for the first time and having cheaper firementcare
and stuff like that.
Speaker 2 (29:04):
Thanks to Lance again for talking with me about the
Canadian election. It's time for one more ad break and
we'll come back to discuss the future of the Canadian government. Okay,
(29:24):
we are back. Let's talk a little bit more about
Trump's undue influence in the twenty twenty five Canadian election,
because it is a little bit odd for a foreign
leader to be exerting this much influence in the votes of,
you know, a separate country. Now, this was an election
that was previously about liberal stagnation and wanting change in
(29:49):
economic policy. This was kind of leading the conservative popular
support the past two three years, and very suddenly this
whole election changed and it became about to who Canada
trusted to oppose Trump and who Canadians wanted to be
like the face of Canada in this new global trade
(30:09):
war and this fight against a hostile neighbor. And Trump
did not help this. On election morning, Trump released a
statement basically endorsing himself as the leader of Canada.
Speaker 4 (30:25):
Oh great, saying quote.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
Good luck to the great people of Canada. Elect the
man who has the strength and wisdom to cut your
taxes in half, increase your military power for free to
the highest level in the world. Have your car, steel, aluminum, lumber, energy,
and all their businesses quadruple in size with the zero
tariffs or taxes. If Canada becomes the cherished fifty first
state of the United States of America, oh no more.
(30:52):
Artificially drawn a line from a many years ago. Look
how beautiful this land mass would be. Free access, with
no border, all positives, with no negatives. It was meant
to be. America can no longer subsidize Canada with hundreds
of billions of dollars a year that we've been spending
in the past. It makes no sense unless Canada is
a state.
Speaker 4 (31:11):
Man Trump the border appelationist.
Speaker 2 (31:15):
This is the rhetoric that really produced a liberal victory,
and Trump did kind of back off this stuff in
the past few weeks, and it's very funny to see
him go like full throttle the morning of the election,
in case anyone was like on the fence about whether
they really was worrying about like Trump. This just this
says like such a crazy hell, Mary. And we can
(31:37):
see this in some polling stats. On Trump's inauguration day,
the Conservatives in Canada were leading forty four point eight
percent in the polls compared to the Liberals twenty one
point nine percent to end the NDP's seventeen point six
But as Liberals searched for a new leader and as
Trump took office, the Conservative lead slowly started to slip.
(31:59):
The CID began referring to Canada as the fifty first state,
called the Prime minister quote unquote governor, and threatened to
impose huge tariffs to stop a non existent fentanyl smuggling
crisis through the Canadian US border. By April, the Conservative
lead had fully flipped over to the Liberals, who rose
to forty four percent in the polls, Conservatives falling to
(32:21):
thirty seven percent and the NDP around eight point five.
And these are pretty close to the final results. This
number is very accurate for liberal support. Conservatives got a
little bit more than thirty six percent of the vote
and NDP got a little bit less than this eight
point five. This is according to data from CBC and
Abacus this was very much a leader's election, meaning that
(32:46):
one of the biggest factors driving votes was who people
wanted the prime minister to be, and Mark Carney is
much more popular despite being kind of an unknown figure,
which kind of actually helps in popularity, Carney's was so
much more popular than Polyiev. The past three months, Carney
has steadily gained in popularity, getting forty six percent approval,
(33:07):
whereas Polyiev has slowly declined in popularity. I talked about
this a little bit with Lance, but the degree to
which he's aligned himself with this like anti woke, like
far right populism rhetoric really bit him in the ass
these past few months. He would have done fine against Trudeau, certainly,
he was really writing off that like anti incumbent wave,
(33:29):
but he is not like a loved figure across Canadian politics,
even among some conservatives. The two most important factors driving
Canadians vote, according to Abacus, was reducing cost of living
and dealing with Donald Trump. Younger voters seem to be
more focused on cost of living and changing policy, around
fifty seven percent of voters eighteen to twenty nine, while
(33:51):
older voters around fifty six percent of boomers were more
concerned about stopping Trump. The very first topic in the
Canadian Prime Minister debate was tariffs and US threats to
Canadian sovereignty. This is seen as like a very real
issue up there, and like hatred against the US is
genuinely growing, like like people are very upset. Canadians are
(34:15):
very upset about what Trump and the US has been doing.
It's being seen as like a genuine like like intense betrayal.
The by Canada movement's been gaining a lot of support
with people trying to only purchase Canadian products and this
has resulted in a real cultural moment in Canada united
against the United States.
Speaker 4 (34:33):
It's genuinely remarkable. Like the Canada, the US have always
had pretty good relations for it. Well not a waste
they have.
Speaker 2 (34:42):
Well ever since that one, that one, yeah, yeah, yeah,
they thinks they've improved it in and like it's what's remarkable.
Speaker 4 (34:51):
It seems to be having an effect in Australia as well.
And if you've seen that, but like I think I
saw an ad the other day that just said Duston
wants to make Australia like America, Like straight up you
know that this is our Trump and able to align
with Trump, Like, yeah, it's incredible.
Speaker 2 (35:06):
The degree which Trump doing this global trade war has
catalyzed negative sentiments around this, like far right populism, glo
global wave that we've been seeing has really been a
boon to neoliberal htch enemy the past few ys.
Speaker 3 (35:20):
You'll see like any I mean obviously, like I take
voter interviews in like legacy media with a huge pinch
of salt right, it's pretty easy to find someone who
wants to say what you want them to say. And often,
you know, certainly some of the US voter interviews have
just been ridiculous, but like people saying, oh, I just
want to go back to how it was, Like I
want to go back to, you know, the things that
(35:41):
we're used to. And obviously Trump is training that for
a lot of people, and like in a very negative way.
And so you and as Garrison said, like the politics
of personality is becoming more important, like voting specifically for
individuals who they think will have like the negotiating ability
or just break or like whatever it is to stand
(36:02):
up to Trump.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
Right, Yeah, And like in Canada, I think it's less
personality driven. Like actually Canadians are very against personality politics. Yeah,
it's more like competency driven. And this is where Carneie
was really able to succeed. It's because he's not a
compelling personality, but he is like a professional and that
is why he was elected. Carneie helped Canada whether the
(36:24):
two US and eight financial collapse better than almost any
other Western nation. He is genuinely good at his job
of being like a neoliberal like bank economy guy, and
specifically with these tariffs. This is the guy that you
want to handle this global trade crisis because this is
like what he has done his entire life. He's never
been elected to office before. He is just an economy guy.
(36:47):
And we saw this in like head to head matchups
with Carnie versus Polier rating certain things like finding common
ground to solve a dispute, where carne was twelve points
ahead adding up to a bully Carney's eight points ahead.
Managing household expenses Carney six points ahead. Sitting beside you
on a long airplane flight Carneie six points ahead. Captaining
(37:11):
a ship through a rough storm Carneie five points ahead.
Speaker 4 (37:14):
That's what you need. You need a seafarer only five
ahead on seafaring.
Speaker 2 (37:19):
Hosting the best party Carney one point ahead, and we'll see.
Speaker 4 (37:24):
This is reminiscent of that, Like was it like Tim
the plumber shit from like the bush pail in election?
Like the people I would want to have a beer with.
Speaker 2 (37:33):
Well, this is the funny thing is is the concerns
are still better in like those types of like physical
things like putting out a kitchen fire, polyb is up
to and putting up a shelf. Polyv's up six. There's
the only two one speasured where the conservative candidate edged
out the liberals is putting out a kitchen fire and
(37:54):
putting up a shelf. But all other things like solving disputes,
standing up to bullies, managing like expenses like household expenses.
Carnee Carney came out. I'm going to read a few
lines from Carnee's celebration acceptance speech here, and I'm just
gonna read them and not play clips because he blends
English and French and that's going to be annoying. No
(38:14):
offense to our French speakers out there. Yeah, Garrison, it's
gonna be annoying to play for a podcast. It's not
gonna do for the kbra Qua crowd quote. America wants
our land, our resources, our water, our country. These are
not idle threats. President Trump is trying to break us,
so America can own us. That will never happen. We
(38:35):
are once again at one of those hinge moments of history.
Our old relationship with the United States, relationship based on
steadily increasing integration, is over. The system of open global
trade anchored by the United States, a system that Canada
has relied on since the Second World War, a system that,
while not perfect, has helped deliver prosperity for a country
for decades, is over. But it is also our new reality.
(39:00):
We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but
we should never forget the lessons. We have to look
out for ourselves and above all, we have to take
care of each other. When I sit down with President Trump,
it will be to discuss the future economic and security
relationship between two sovereign nations, and it will be with
our full knowledge that we have many, many other options
than the United States to build prosperity for all Canadians.
(39:22):
We will strengthen our relations with reliable partners in Europe,
Asia and elsewhere. And if the United States no longer
wants to be in the forefront of the global economy.
Canada will unquote and yeah, this is the type of
rhetoric that's going to be I think successful in Canada
right now and probably in the next few decades. Is
Canada is going to try to take the spot that
(39:43):
America used to hold as like the center of like
global power, especially with climate change, with you know, crop
crops slowly slowly needed to be moved north. I think
as as as global warm progresses, Canada is in a
spot to be like a new emergent like world power.
And with the degree to which America is just kind
(40:04):
of giving up that role under Trump, remarkable, someone like
Carney is very interested in in gaining that degree of superiority.
Now I'm gonna I'm gonna read a few comments from
our listeners who I asked to send over their thoughts
on the Canadian election. And yes, this is a limited sample,
(40:24):
sask It's based on the politics of people who listen
to this show. But I still think there's some interesting
points here outlining what's happened in this election. Quote Mark
Karney might not be far enough left for my tastes,
but he immediately made gas cheaper, a tangible improvement for
my brokeass, and with the way he's been pulling, I'm
settling on voting for him to keep the Conservatives out
(40:47):
with their stated anti woke agenda parenthesis bigoted. Not like
I have much choice. I would have loved to be
picking here about my vote, but I don't feel confident
in the NDP or the Greens to come out on
top of the cons Another person said, quote, I can't
believe the country seems to be rallying around a neoliberal
central banker in the face of American fascism, But our
(41:08):
resentment to the US seems to kind of override all
other political considerations. So much of the way this election
is panning out is a display of our culture's profound
inability to take necessary risks. We're running scared to the
serious administrator, man in the blind hope things will be
safe and normal again. When he fails, will take a
late and stupid risk again. Unquote. And this is something
(41:30):
I've seen other people express, is like with this kind
of Obama esque, you know, serious man in charge, this
like return of neoliberalism. Will this just set the stage
for like the material conditions for someone like Trump to
emerge in the next ten years. This is a fear
that I've seen people express. I don't think it is
an inevitability, because this is not America in twenty twelve
(41:52):
or twenty sixteen. This is Canada in twenty twenty five.
The world is different, but I can understand this fear. Lastly,
I'll read one other comment or from Blue Sky quote.
I understand the drive to keep the Conservative Party out
of office, but I'm also terrified of what the Liberal
Party will do to this country if they can keep
campaigning on that very basis in perpetuity. It's good that
(42:15):
we will probably avoid the worst. It's terrible that progress
is on hold until the Conservative Party is no longer
a contender, which could take decades. I also do not
expect the Liberal Party to meaningfully change the conditions that
are pushing voters towards reactionary politics. To be again with
unquote so kind of a similar sentiment there. I think
that the role for progressives in Canada right now is
(42:36):
either to rebuild the NDP or infiltrate the Liberals, probably
rebuilding NDP in most cases because they are going to
have to have new leadership and seriously reevaluate their strategies
going forward. James Any notes here, I guess, yeah, I.
Speaker 4 (42:53):
Think like I guess kind of to echo what a
lot of those people said, Like in the US, we
had Biden for four years, right, essentially because he was
elected on not being Trump, and he was able to
get away well, he thought he could get away with
more than he actually was able to get away with
as it turns out, electorally. But like we were admonished
to vote for the person who wasn't Trump, right, and
(43:14):
what we got is open air detention for migrants. What
we got is inflation, and what we got is a
genocide in Gaza, right. And this fear that a lot
of other nations in the global north right, like these
liberal economies are feeling, is going to lead to lots
of that, like, yes, we need a serious man like
we needed, we need a statesman to stand up to Trump,
(43:37):
and that's going to reinforce a lot of that neoliberal orthodoxy,
and that's going to make it very hard to make
any meaningful progress to electoral politics in those countries for
the next few years, which sucks.
Speaker 2 (43:48):
I think this is why some people are excited about
the minority government, although it is less stable. Yeah, they
could be swayed by some more of the progressive agendas
from the NDP because they'll need an NDPU or block
cooperation to run the government.
Speaker 4 (44:01):
Yeah, they can't do a by the date which like
I mean.
Speaker 2 (44:04):
Also like Carney isn't Biden like and in the Canadian
Liberal Party is is not necessarily the like American Democratic Party.
Like that, they're they're different. Stuff on Gaza is different,
like that the Canadian Liberals have have restricted arms, arms
trades and arms deals to Israel the past year. Carney
is not thrown trans people under the bus the same
(44:26):
way some Democrats have the past year. Like these are
these are different people. I think, you know, Canada is
a different country than the United States. And I think
what we can see here is that this Canadian election,
although it was close, it still was a rejection of
Trump's style polities. Most Canadians do not want Canada to
(44:46):
go the way of America. There's there's been a subset
of Canadians, especially in Alberta and and and Saskatchewan, who
have been trying to push for this like mega style
like Canada first rhetoric and and this was denied I
think you were seeing more support for conservatives under Doug Ford.
With this more like moderate conservatism. I think that's something
(45:07):
to like watch out for more. But like this, this
Trump style of politics was was rejected across the country
and and Carney was able to figure out a way
to make people trust him to be a genuine like
combatant against against Trump and and usher in a new
a new golden age of neoliberal trade in the face
of Trump's Trump's chaotic and and anti market sentiments.
Speaker 3 (45:32):
Hopefully it does put an end to like this, this
tendency among liberals, especially in the US but also in
the UK, to like feel that they need to engage
on right wing culture war talking points and like I
guess quote unquote give some ground, Like we've seen that
in the UK right with like really transfer big ship
commit at a labor party, and like I would hope
(45:54):
that like people can see where this leads to and
that they're not going to vote for liberals who go
throw trans people under the bus and like that that
will be like a deciding factor in their support.
Speaker 4 (46:06):
But I guess that's just my hope right now. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:10):
Well, and frankly, you know, a better liberal party or
a liberal NDP coalition would would be would be willing
to engage with the idea of like taking trans refugees
from these extremely hostile countries, which is just something they've
they've not like, you know, publicly talked about. But as
as things get worse in the States, we will, we
will see. So yeah, but that is what I have
(46:32):
to say as a as a Canadian who lives in
the United States. My thoughts on the Canadian election, you know,
it could have been worse. Is it is odd to
see Canada almost accidentally replicate America's two party system. So
even if this was a rejection of Trump style politics,
this this this climate of fear did result in replicating
(46:53):
America's two party system, which is kind of interesting the
amount of which, like the third parties lost support, with
support going just towards conservatives and liberals. That is, you know,
one of the big stories of this election. The the
NDP blowout one of the big stories and pauliev losing
his seat. I think is it is at least the
(47:13):
very least a nice cherry on top for this for
this election.
Speaker 1 (47:20):
It could happen. Here is a production of cool Zone Media.
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media. Visit our website
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iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you.
Speaker 5 (47:31):
Listen to podcasts.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
You can now find sources for it could happen here,
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Alson media.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Dark woke is back, ten more years of liberal supremacy,
bankers in control in the great nation of Canada. This
is it could happen here. I'm Garrison Davis. I'm joined
by James Stout. We are discussing the twenty twenty five
Canadian election, which I maybe slightly exaggerated in the opening there.
(00:27):
But the election did happen yesterday or two days ago
whenever you're listening to this. I was up all day
on on CBC and on elections dot Ca checking in
on all the charts and all the stats to see
how this how this kind of upset election went, and
oh boy did it go. James, how much do you
(00:50):
do you know about Canada and elections?
Speaker 3 (00:53):
But both of the things, the things that I have
some knowledge about. I've been to Canada twice. That's a
fellow common World member.
Speaker 2 (01:01):
I guess. Yeah, we are both citizens of the Commonwealth.
So there we go.
Speaker 4 (01:05):
Just kind of have a queen on the money. Queen
is dead, dead.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Queen Queen is dead, but yes, we do have.
Speaker 4 (01:11):
Queen on money money. So that's another thing I understand.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
We have a parliamentary system like yeah, like do I
say England or like Britain or UK.
Speaker 4 (01:21):
It's a yeah, it's a United Kingdom. I think would
be the institute that Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Well we have one of those two, but it's less
confusing because it's just one country. We don't try to
be three countries like like you in the UK, Britain
and England.
Speaker 4 (01:37):
We're a continent, let a mini continent. That's what we're
going for. We've left Europe. We're on our way to
the Caribbean slowly.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Oops. Yeah, luckily Canada is doing just fine. Uh. The debatable,
but certainly this election has has gone probably slightly better
for global stability and stopping the advance of farign populism
then certainly what it looked a few months ago for
people WO don't know. Yes, Canada has a parliamentary system.
(02:06):
People do not elect the prime minister directly. They elect
the MP in their district, which is called a writing.
It's a first past the post system, so whoever gets
the most votes in each writing they get their representatives.
Since to Parliament, the party with the most representatives they
take control of the government and that is who the
(02:26):
Prime Minister is and the next Prime Minister of Canada
will be Mark Karney, who assumed the prime minister rule
like last month, winning the Liberal election after Justin Trudeau
resigned in January, and before we get into some of
the results, at first, a little bit of an election
kind of background. So Liberals have been in power for
(02:49):
nearly a decade, slowly getting less and less popular as
the cost of living has risen. Last election in twenty
twenty one, the Liberals kept their minority government, but the
leader of their party, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, continued
to decline in popularity. By the end of twenty twenty
four's approval rating was just twenty two percent or net
negative fifty two. Conservatives were up twenty five points in
(03:13):
the polls. It was a near certainty that they would
sweep the next election. Trudeau announced his resignation on January sixth,
kind of the January sixth of Canada if you think
about it. Former banker Mark Karney won the party election
in March or twenty twenty five. Carney quickly called for
an election to write off the peak of anti Trump
sentiment sweeping across Canada. This was following Trump's talk of
(03:36):
annexing Canada. And the global trade war and tariffs directed
at the American neighbor upstairs next door. I don't know, yeah,
downstairs south, No, from America. It's a oh I see, yeah, okay,
yeah from Yeah, got it understand, which is maybe a
northern standpoint. But who cares.
Speaker 5 (03:55):
Now.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
This election or an election, would have happened by oct
Over twenty twenty five regardless. But calling it early was
a smart move by Liberals as this was the first
time in three years that they had led in the polls.
Support for other third parties like the Keebuqua Bloc and
the National Democratic Party the NDP had slowly been shifting
(04:16):
towards the Liberals, and we saw this in the results
Monday night. At this point, the Liberals are projected to
win one hundred and sixty eight seats, falling barely short
of the one hundred and seventy two majority. There's still,
as a time of recording, still a possible path for
them gaining a majority government, but it's fairly unlikely. It'll
(04:38):
probably be a minority government. The Conservatives have won one
hundred and forty four seats, the Blackabiqua twenty three and
the NDP a measly seven, with the Green Party snagging one.
Liberals also secured the largest vote share, forty three point
six percent of the vote compared to the Conservative's forty
one point four percent, though because of a vote efficiency
(05:01):
basically how spread apart certain votes are, this has still
led to much more seats for the Liberals than the Conservatives. Right,
if you have more Conservatives voting in a district that's
going to go Conservative anyway, those extra votes don't necessarily
mean there's going to be more representation in parliament. That's
the vote efficiency idea.
Speaker 4 (05:19):
Yeah, first plus supposed to is a very bad system
as electoral systems go. It leads to an awful lot
of votes not counting for any representation. Like, for instance,
to Garrison Davis, party could have fifty one percent of
votes in all ridings and I could be there at
forty nine and I would get zero MPs.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Basic, Hey, sounds fine.
Speaker 4 (05:41):
Sounds fine by me, Garrison Davis in control.
Speaker 2 (05:45):
Well, this is kind of what happens in Canada. The
election system in Canada is pretty swayed towards the Liberals
because of how much more dispersed they are versus you know,
most Conservative supporters in the western Provincesaskatchewan, Alberta in BC
and a growing presence in ont But yeah, the Liberals
kind of always get a bit of a boost in
the election. Now, we did have record high early turnout
(06:08):
in Canada seven point three million people cast their vote
early during Easter week. The full turnout is higher than
it was the past few elections. But it matches pretty
much to the twenty fifteen election. So to get a
majority government you need one hundred and seventy two seats.
This allows you to not have to worry about like
no confidence votes which trigger new elections, and you don't
(06:30):
need to work with other parties to pass legislation. Now,
this will probably be a minority government with the Libs
having to work with a small number of remaining and
DP and Block seats to run the government, which one
could consider a good thing in terms of being pushed
maybe towards some better policies rather than just like liberal supremacy.
(06:53):
But it also in its government will be more unstable
and it kind of gives the Conservatives more room to wiggle.
So it's definitely a mixed bag. As reporting first came
in for Atlantic Canada, it showed that this would be
a tighter race than what the Liberals were hoping for.
During election night, it seemed Conservatives were on track to
pick up two seats in Newfoundland, though in the end
(07:16):
the Liberal incumbent barely kept their seat, beating the Conservative
challenger by twelve votes. In Terra Nova the Peninsulas. The
Libs did fare much better in Quebec, though they flipped
eleven seats. This was the best performance by Liberals in
Quebec in years now. Conservatives gained some seats from the
Liberals in Ontario under Doug Ford, with Conservatives flipping seats
(07:40):
around the Toronto suburbs. One of the biggest stories of
this election was just the complete NDP collapse the progressive
kind of democratic socialist New Democratic Party. They're currently projected
to lose seventeen of their twenty four previously held seats.
The NDP basically gave Carny this election. Jack met Singh
(08:02):
lost his seat. That's the leader of the NDP. He
lost his seat to Wade Chung, a Liberal, and stepped
down as leader on Monday night. Part of what makes
this such a big setback for the NDP is that
because they failed to win at least twelve seats, they
actually lose official party status in Parliament. Parties have to
(08:24):
win at least twelve seats to be recognized as an
official party in the House of Commons. Official parties get
to have offices in Parliament, extra staff, They get to
ask questions in legislative sessions and can sit on committees. Now,
the NDP did previously lose party status in nineteen ninety three,
winning only nine seats in that election, but this performance
was slightly worse, getting only seven. So this is going
(08:47):
to be a big shake up. The NDP is going
to have to be forced to rebuild, which is maybe
necessary based on kind of a degree of NDP stagnation
the past decade. They're kind of caught in like twenty
seventeen politics in my opinion, though saying did lead them
to pass some significant legislation and progressive policies do have
(09:09):
a degree of popularity in Canada. The NDP was polling
about the same as the Liberals just three months ago.
The movement that we're seeing is from NDP voters scared
of Polyev and Trump, so they moved to Carney to
avoid splitting the left vote, as Carney was seen as
more capable of beating Polyev than the NDP leader sing
and certainly Justin Trudeau.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
Now.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Funnily enough, some of this quote unquote strategic voting actually
did end up splitting the vote in a place like
be seen specifically Vancouver, which recently has gone strongly NDP.
But this year the Conservatives were able to snag three
seats because enough previous NDP voters ended up going liberal
in an attempt to gain a Liberal majority, but that
(09:55):
resulted in neither the NDP nor the Liberal candidate actually
individually getting an enough votes to win the riding. Let's
talk about vote share compared to the last twenty twenty
one election, so Liberals did fairly well this election, especially
compared to previous ones. They gained over ten points compared
to the last election in twenty twenty one. Conservatives also
(10:18):
didn't do badly, actually like they actually did. Okay, this
certainly wasn't the result they were wanting, but they did
not do bad. They gained over seven and a half
points this race. Reliable conservative voters still voted conservative and
they were able to siphon off some support from other parties,
with Conservatives doing slightly better than what polling predicted, but
(10:42):
a lot of very close races across key districts. Now
where all those extra votes or vote movement is coming
from is all of the third parties. The Green Party
and the Blackapiqua both dropped over a point, The far
right People's Party dropped four points and the NDPP eleven
point six huge huge losses for the NDP. Most of
(11:04):
those voters probably going liberal, although some may just not
have voted. One of the more interesting parts about this
election is that the Conservative Party leader Pierre Polyev lost
his parliamentary seat. He lost to Liberal Bruce Fanjoy by
about four thousand votes. Oh damn, four point six percent
(11:27):
of the vote. So this is going to probably cause
a bit of an upset in the Conservative Party. There
might be some maternal conflict over whether Polyev should continue
as party leader, though he did not step down from
that position during his concession speech Monday night, James, do
you do you have any thoughts here before we pivot
to ads.
Speaker 4 (11:46):
It wouldn't be such a like scene of such a
humiliation for the Conservatives if it wasn't for all the
polling until maybe like a couple of months ago.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
Right, Yes, The reason why it's such an upset. Is
because they were like a destined to wear as almost
like divinely written into fate like three months ago, and
the fact that they fumbled this is gonna be like
a massive like historical footnote, not even a footnote. This
is like a historical topic. Is how conservatives fumbled this election?
Speaker 4 (12:17):
Yeah, like people.
Speaker 3 (12:18):
The thing is that the Liberals want despite people having
been pissed off with them for a long time and
wanting something different.
Speaker 4 (12:25):
Yeah. Yeah, because people would just like mad at Trump.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
And we will talk more about the background of the
lead up to this race and in those dynamics that
James mentioned in the next segment after these ads, Okay,
(12:49):
to talk more about the lead up to this race
and Trump's influence on this election. I talked with Lance
from the Serfs of fellow Canadian who talks politics just
as much as I do. So here is that interview
that I recorded just a few hours before the polls
closed in Canada.
Speaker 6 (13:10):
Hey, my name is Lance. I run a number of
different channels, usually under the banner of the Serfs. There's
YouTube dot Com, Slash, the Surf Times and at the
Serf TV. On most other social media, I cover news, politics,
internet slop, usually from a dumpster fire like perspective.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
And you're Canadian importantly, Yes, I am, I am. I
am Canadian, but I have been resigned to living in
the States for quite a while. I actually just had
some Canadian family visit me, and they kept making fun
of me for living in the States, specifically because the
States are trying to, you know, take take Canadian territories seemingly.
So now I'm getting a lot of hate for my
(13:47):
Canadian family members for living in America, which is interesting.
Speaker 6 (13:52):
I was going to say, it's got to be a
scary time to be living in the United States as
a Canadian citizen a little bit.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
I am I am dual, but we'll see how long
that matters. So I want to talk talk a little
bit about kind of the background of this election, because
I think this is maybe the most interesting Canadian election
in the past ten years, specifically because of how much
the results have always felt it inevitable, but the actual
(14:18):
results have like flip flop three months ago, four months ago,
I'm sure that me and you may have predicted probably
something resembling a conservative sweep. Not to put words in
your mouth.
Speaker 6 (14:32):
Well, minority or majority government led by the Conservatives, know
no question, that was where all the major polling was trending,
and then the exact opposite on this.
Speaker 5 (14:42):
Roller coaster election in both directions.
Speaker 6 (14:45):
I think it's it's pretty easily explainable, especially to your
American listeners who might have been wondering what was happening. Essentially,
the country had a combination of burnout on Justin Trudeau
and the person who replaced Justin Trudeau, Mark Carney, effectively
took the number one campaign. It was the actual campaign
slogan of the Conservatives away from him immediately after being
(15:06):
crowned the new leader of the Liberal Party, which was
ax the tax, which is what you know, fascist Millhouse,
who we call Pierre Pollievro over here. That was his
big campaign promise, The Conservatives were going to ax the
carbon tax, and that had a lot of people excited,
a lot of people didn't like Justin Trudeau. And then
along comes Mark Carney and he takes both of those
things away from the Conservatives. He's not Justin Trudeau, and
(15:27):
he acts the tax and so they had to kind
of completely reset. And this was before the wild card
of Trump shows up, ye, which of course now is
caring not only Canada but the world. I would say
like most countries now are kind of having to completely
reset how they think and want to do geopolitics into
the future because of his policies.
Speaker 2 (15:46):
Well, and I know, like a decent chunk of the
Alberta economy is now in great jeopardy because they can't
sell fuck Trudeau merchandise.
Speaker 5 (15:55):
Which was dropping up the entire economy outside of the way.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
Yeah, well, you know if you go to the oil,
which will probably be fine.
Speaker 5 (16:02):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
I guess could talk a little bit about kind of
what led to this universal hatred of Justin Trudeau in
like the past like like five years, just like ever
so briefly.
Speaker 6 (16:12):
Yeah, for conservatives, a lot of it really became increasingly
more intense with COVID, and I think internationally there was
an association with very basic safety protocols and tyranny. So
I guess some people the United States and Canada both
saw the idea of wearing a mask g having to
wash their hands as some sortom of dictatorship akin to
(16:33):
some of the worst war crimes ever committed on any population.
That made a schism happen, where the sentiment kind of
really started accelerating towards less of you know, blaming Trudeau
for everything, kind of like Obama that used to be
a joke, like Trudeau to actual fuck Trudeau merchandise, and
the idea of you know, Trudeau being an enemy of
the state and a communist dictator that was on the
(16:55):
right side of things. On the left side of things,
everyone got burnt out from Trudeau because the performer of
progressive politics of his entire character, he was very vocal
about standing up for a lot of issues that on
one end he would you know, pretend to care about,
such as indigenous rights, land backs, stuff like that, and
then he would be suing the survivors of residential schools
in federal court to try and prevent them from getting
(17:16):
too much money from the federal government. So there was
a lot of Trudeau seems to performatively enjoy being perceived
as someone who's enlightened and progressive and trying to steer
the society in a good direction, where his policies are
effectively exacerbating wealth and equality very rapidly, because that's effectively
what you get with neoliberal centrists.
Speaker 5 (17:34):
Right.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
Yeah, I like to go back to that COVID thing
like I was in Calgary and like spring of twenty
twenty two, and I was getting made fun of in
like bars and clubs for like wearing a mask at
that point in time, like and that is that is Alberta.
But yeah, no, that was definitely like strong. We certainly
saw degrees of that here in the States as well,
(17:57):
but yeah, you know, it's a little bit of that.
Like general anti incumbent sentiment was growing so much last year,
which which you saw levied against the Democrats in the
States and certainly against the Liberals. And the way that
the Liberals in Canada have kind of been able to
maneuver away from that in the way that like the
Democrats haven't is super interesting. It's not necessarily like replicable,
(18:17):
especially for US politics, but it's still as interesting. I guess.
Like on the Conservative side, their leadership changed in twenty
twenty two, right.
Speaker 6 (18:27):
Yeah, I think so it was it was twenty two
or twenty three, but I believe it was it was around.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Them that's when plivertcame became leader of the Conservative Party,
which is like you know, closed ranks and like coalesced
the past ten to five years or so, and they've
been they've been gaining a large it had been gaining,
you know, a large degree of popularity the past two
three years, not necessarily because of who their party leader is,
(18:54):
but because they are simply not the Liberal Party. At
least that's kind of what it seemed like to me,
because like approval ratings for Paul of Aara's never been
like great, but the Conservative Party has still been gaining popularity,
at least previous to the past few months.
Speaker 6 (19:08):
Yeah, I don't want to play, you know, give the
far right any kind of kudos or points, but I
think from an analytical standpoint, something that people should realize
is that within the last i'd say year and a
half or so, Pierre was really really effective at doing
faux populism in a way that a lot of people
were starting to get very worried about, Yeah, and that
he was starting to see a lot about the working class,
you know, the housing crisis in the country and the
(19:31):
fact that the Liberals are out of touch elites who
only care about enriching themselves, and you know, a lot
obviously you'd have a lot of the right wing kind
of nebulous terms like woke ideology being tied into that
kind of stuff. But he was for a long time
kind of starting to gain a lot of ground in
traction as more of a moderate style conservative who was
(19:51):
concerned with helping the working class, which is astonishing considering
the man is a lifelong.
Speaker 5 (19:58):
Politician like that, that is who he is.
Speaker 6 (20:00):
He was making fun of people like the leader of
the Social Democrats here drug meet Singh. He was making
fun of him for just working for a pension and
not even caring about the people or the working class.
The man is never marched with the union I'm talking
about here. He's never marched with the union. He is
a you know, his voting track record is decidedly anti worker,
it's decidedly exacerbating wealth in the quality. Has worked his
entire life to make houses more expensive. But marketing and
(20:23):
branding really work, especially like you know, there's compilation clips
of him saying things that are JK rallying tier in
terms of both their nonsensicalness, Like talking about how electricity
is crafted by harnessing the power of the lightning bolts
into the wire that the electrician holds up.
Speaker 5 (20:41):
Very cool, Yeah, very cool, four like powers.
Speaker 6 (20:45):
I'm on board, but like, unfortunately that's just not how
we usually generate power in this but like it works
on some people. They like to see a man who've
fakes owan like different kinds of wood and tools, you know,
like at Tucker Carlson esque.
Speaker 5 (20:59):
Yeah, I've got a would shop in my back and
it's like that.
Speaker 6 (21:02):
Well, no, I think this is the first time you've
ever seen that lumber, sir. But as you know, again,
some voters, they really started his rebranding in that respect
actually worked pretty successful for yeah, the last year and
a half against Trudeau.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah, he had a pretty substantial makeover the past the
past few years to make himself like presentable in this way. Yeah,
very like carlsonesque, very like Ben Shapiro goes to home
depot and gets some wood. Yes, it's definitely pulling from
that vein, although maybe a bit more successfully and like,
at least from my perspective, it feels like the degree
to which Pierre kind of hitched himself to like the
(21:36):
Trump populist wagon the past few years, especially like with
like sentiments like growing in like the Western provinces, that
kind of mirrors some of the Trumpian rhetoric. That type
of stuff was getting popularity. And now because he put
if not all his eggs, but some of his eggs
in the Trump basket. This is like backfired in like
popular opinion when it comes to his ability to succeed
(21:57):
as like a politician and like gaining support because we've
seen so much anti Trump polarization based on like the
fifty first state stuff based on the tariffs, and like
Carnie has been able to weaponize that pretty effectively against
against Pierre. Absolutely like it. Initially, like the way like
popularity points shifted was like by like twenty points, which
(22:18):
was like huge. Those have gotten closer, But.
Speaker 6 (22:21):
I think it's one of the biggest reversals or if
not the biggest reversal in Canadian political history. Was the
dominating lead they had from having it almost an assured
majority to now perhaps losing to a liberal majority, which
again is unheard of. Yeah, one thing that people are
also kind of missing is that he also really closely
started associating himself with Elon Musk.
Speaker 5 (22:41):
Prior to Leader of you know, the US or whatever
you want to call him, the real.
Speaker 4 (22:48):
President of the United States.
Speaker 6 (22:49):
But he had a number of rallies and on the
record praising Elon Musk prior to Elon Musk. This was
pretty Elon Musk overt Nazi era kind of more just
like Nazi light eraser.
Speaker 5 (23:01):
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 6 (23:03):
But around that time, Pierre was asked, like, what do
you think about being endorsed and praised by Elon Musk,
And you know, he started making jokes about how his
kids want to go to Mars, so that's pretty cute,
and started talking about how he wants Elon Musk to
build more factories and plants in Canada. Well that's all
really coming back to hurt him now, because the very
idea of there being a stronger TESLA presence in the
(23:24):
country is decidedly rejected by the populace. Like, you know,
the protests that are going on in the United States
against tesla's are going on here as well. Maybe not
as large scale or perhaps as fire based, but a
lot of them are occurring here, and so like that
I think is also really hurting him. So there's been
this really funny, strange political dance that's kind of happened
in the last couple of months where everyone is trying
(23:46):
to say Trump loves you more. It's like a circular
firing squad. Like at one point the Conservatives were trying
to market themselves to saying Trump was making fun of
Pierre in this clip, so look he hates Pierre More. Yeah,
And then another it was like, oh no, no, look he's
talking a lot of smack about Mark Karney. He hates
Mark Carney Moore. So that that has actually become a
(24:07):
very strong dynamic of the Canadian election is who exactly
does Trump like more? And that's not going to be
good for you if it turns out you're the one.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
I guess I'd like to talk a little bit now
at the end here about Mark Kearney himself and kind
of what this means for like the Liberal Party. He
was the Governor of the Bank of Canada, starting into
as an eight Then he became governor of the Bank
of England and managed them through the Brexit fiasco. Brexit
was not his idea. He was not pro Brexit, but
he just happened to be holding the reins of the
(24:35):
of the Bank of England during that time period. Returned
to Canada, has served as like an informal advisor to
Trudeau and now is the is the leader of the
Liberal Party. He's a very I don't know, he tries
to like project this sense of like he's like a
like like a reasonable man, which which which he you know,
in some ways is like he's like he's like kind
(24:57):
of boring. He works in banking. He's not like overtly charismatic.
But he doesn't have like the the like youthful, like
bumbling presence of like Trudeau. Like he just he seems
he seems kind of basic. I don't know.
Speaker 6 (25:16):
Yeah, I mean that's a good way of putting it. Yeah,
you're totally right. I mean we're talking about a lifelong banker.
I mean, he's even worked for gold Mill Sacks. He
has a yes, a very long and started well. I mean,
in some view, it depends on your worldview. Right, if
you are as a person who thinks that the solution
going forward, especially in the face of actual manifesting fascism,
(25:37):
is more neoliberal policies, austerity and measures, then you might
be very, very excited to perhaps get your own, like
honestly Joe Biden style election here where we are once
again going to be choosing center to center right economic
policies that are going to undoubtedly exacerbate wealth and equality more.
They are not going to solve the housing crisis. The
(25:58):
housing crisis of Canada, while it is portrayed constantly as complex,
really goes down to fundamentally there are a lot of houses,
but there are also a lot of houses being built
in luxury markets that most people can't afford. Speculation is
not addressed, and so speculation usually gets blamed on foreign investors,
which in turn kind of brings up the whole immigration fears,
which are very successful. But with Carney, I mean, I
(26:21):
don't see anything dramatic. Not only did he acts the
carbon tax when he was in power initially, and that
was again, I think, strategically to remove the power the
Conservatives had on that policy. He also is getting rid
of the capital gains tax, which again is just going
to be funneling more money towards the ultra wealthy in Canada.
So the problem for me is that, if anything, I'm
happy that p here it looks like he might not win.
(26:43):
I don't know what by the time people are listening
to this, what the results are. But I also recognize
that this does not solve these crises. For simply putting
band aids on a pause before finally a Trump of
our own gets elected and then yes, people after the
facts start realizing, oh, Oh my god, he's doing a
lot of the horrifying things that he promised he would do.
He's actually trying to enact Project twenty twenty five. All
(27:05):
these terrible things are happening.
Speaker 5 (27:06):
Yeah. Well, I mean, if this was an election.
Speaker 6 (27:08):
Where it looked like Pierre was going to win, I
would say he is going to follow through on all
the aggressive measures and more that he's promising right now,
which include, you know, suspending the Canadian Charter of Rights
and Freedoms to people that he deems should be worthy
of receiving freedoms. Specifically because, like Donald Trump, he wants
to begin silencing people for their speech in relation to
protesting against Israel and their genocide of Palacidians, especially if
(27:30):
you are an immigrant or someone on a student visa,
and these policies you can see they're a disaster after
the fact, and people I think wake up to them
like Americans are right now when they realize Trump's actually
doing it. But you know, make no mistake, it doesn't require,
you know, too long of the increase in out wealth
and equality for people to look for an answer because
(27:51):
they're not being listened to by the libs or the
liberals here.
Speaker 2 (27:53):
No it is interesting that how much this election has
almost mirrored the American two party system with the Black
Keebuquah as well as the MDP, like probably most likely
right this is before the results, but probably going to
be losing seats to both the Liberals and the Conservatives.
And like, I think like a big part of this
election I think is similarly looking back in the past
(28:14):
ten years, is how much I think the NDP is
frankly fumbled and probably needs to do a major overhaul
to really regain trust in the voters. And yeah, it's
going to be tough because I think, like for the
Progressives in Canada, it's kind of been convenient for the
Liberals to have a minority government because then they need
to work with ENDPT.
Speaker 6 (28:31):
And they've gotten the law accomplished to be fair to
Chuck meet Seeing and you know, they're for American listeners,
the Social Democratic Party of Canada, they accomplished some great
things working in a minority government setting, including a pharmacare program,
including a federal feeding program for children, a school lunch program,
you know, working on paid family sickly even extending it.
(28:51):
So they've done a lot of good in sort of
enacting progressive policies. But it's the Liberals who are also
equally as good at taking credit for all the things
that people have come to really like, such as having
dental care for the first time and having cheaper firementcare
and stuff like that.
Speaker 2 (29:04):
Thanks to Lance again for talking with me about the
Canadian election. It's time for one more ad break and
we'll come back to discuss the future of the Canadian government. Okay,
(29:24):
we are back. Let's talk a little bit more about
Trump's undue influence in the twenty twenty five Canadian election,
because it is a little bit odd for a foreign
leader to be exerting this much influence in the votes of,
you know, a separate country. Now, this was an election
that was previously about liberal stagnation and wanting change in
(29:49):
economic policy. This was kind of leading the conservative popular
support the past two three years, and very suddenly this
whole election changed and it became about to who Canada
trusted to oppose Trump and who Canadians wanted to be
like the face of Canada in this new global trade
(30:09):
war and this fight against a hostile neighbor. And Trump
did not help this. On election morning, Trump released a
statement basically endorsing himself as the leader of Canada.
Speaker 4 (30:25):
Oh great, saying quote.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
Good luck to the great people of Canada. Elect the
man who has the strength and wisdom to cut your
taxes in half, increase your military power for free to
the highest level in the world. Have your car, steel, aluminum, lumber, energy,
and all their businesses quadruple in size with the zero
tariffs or taxes. If Canada becomes the cherished fifty first
state of the United States of America, oh no more.
(30:52):
Artificially drawn a line from a many years ago. Look
how beautiful this land mass would be. Free access, with
no border, all positives, with no negatives. It was meant
to be. America can no longer subsidize Canada with hundreds
of billions of dollars a year that we've been spending
in the past. It makes no sense unless Canada is
a state.
Speaker 4 (31:11):
Man Trump the border appelationist.
Speaker 2 (31:15):
This is the rhetoric that really produced a liberal victory,
and Trump did kind of back off this stuff in
the past few weeks, and it's very funny to see
him go like full throttle the morning of the election,
in case anyone was like on the fence about whether
they really was worrying about like Trump. This just this
says like such a crazy hell, Mary. And we can
(31:37):
see this in some polling stats. On Trump's inauguration day,
the Conservatives in Canada were leading forty four point eight
percent in the polls compared to the Liberals twenty one
point nine percent to end the NDP's seventeen point six
But as Liberals searched for a new leader and as
Trump took office, the Conservative lead slowly started to slip.
(31:59):
The CID began referring to Canada as the fifty first state,
called the Prime minister quote unquote governor, and threatened to
impose huge tariffs to stop a non existent fentanyl smuggling
crisis through the Canadian US border. By April, the Conservative
lead had fully flipped over to the Liberals, who rose
to forty four percent in the polls, Conservatives falling to
(32:21):
thirty seven percent and the NDP around eight point five.
And these are pretty close to the final results. This
number is very accurate for liberal support. Conservatives got a
little bit more than thirty six percent of the vote
and NDP got a little bit less than this eight
point five. This is according to data from CBC and
Abacus this was very much a leader's election, meaning that
(32:46):
one of the biggest factors driving votes was who people
wanted the prime minister to be, and Mark Carney is
much more popular despite being kind of an unknown figure,
which kind of actually helps in popularity, Carney's was so
much more popular than Polyiev. The past three months, Carney
has steadily gained in popularity, getting forty six percent approval,
(33:07):
whereas Polyiev has slowly declined in popularity. I talked about
this a little bit with Lance, but the degree to
which he's aligned himself with this like anti woke, like
far right populism rhetoric really bit him in the ass
these past few months. He would have done fine against Trudeau, certainly,
he was really writing off that like anti incumbent wave,
(33:29):
but he is not like a loved figure across Canadian politics,
even among some conservatives. The two most important factors driving
Canadians vote, according to Abacus, was reducing cost of living
and dealing with Donald Trump. Younger voters seem to be
more focused on cost of living and changing policy, around
fifty seven percent of voters eighteen to twenty nine, while
(33:51):
older voters around fifty six percent of boomers were more
concerned about stopping Trump. The very first topic in the
Canadian Prime Minister debate was tariffs and US threats to
Canadian sovereignty. This is seen as like a very real
issue up there, and like hatred against the US is
genuinely growing, like like people are very upset. Canadians are
(34:15):
very upset about what Trump and the US has been doing.
It's being seen as like a genuine like like intense betrayal.
The by Canada movement's been gaining a lot of support
with people trying to only purchase Canadian products and this
has resulted in a real cultural moment in Canada united
against the United States.
Speaker 4 (34:33):
It's genuinely remarkable. Like the Canada, the US have always
had pretty good relations for it. Well not a waste
they have.
Speaker 2 (34:42):
Well ever since that one, that one, yeah, yeah, yeah,
they thinks they've improved it in and like it's what's remarkable.
Speaker 4 (34:51):
It seems to be having an effect in Australia as well.
And if you've seen that, but like I think I
saw an ad the other day that just said Duston
wants to make Australia like America, Like straight up you
know that this is our Trump and able to align
with Trump, Like, yeah, it's incredible.
Speaker 2 (35:06):
The degree which Trump doing this global trade war has
catalyzed negative sentiments around this, like far right populism, glo
global wave that we've been seeing has really been a
boon to neoliberal htch enemy the past few ys.
Speaker 3 (35:20):
You'll see like any I mean obviously, like I take
voter interviews in like legacy media with a huge pinch
of salt right, it's pretty easy to find someone who
wants to say what you want them to say. And often,
you know, certainly some of the US voter interviews have
just been ridiculous, but like people saying, oh, I just
want to go back to how it was, Like I
want to go back to, you know, the things that
(35:41):
we're used to. And obviously Trump is training that for
a lot of people, and like in a very negative way.
And so you and as Garrison said, like the politics
of personality is becoming more important, like voting specifically for
individuals who they think will have like the negotiating ability
or just break or like whatever it is to stand
(36:02):
up to Trump.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
Right, Yeah, And like in Canada, I think it's less
personality driven. Like actually Canadians are very against personality politics. Yeah,
it's more like competency driven. And this is where Carneie
was really able to succeed. It's because he's not a
compelling personality, but he is like a professional and that
is why he was elected. Carneie helped Canada whether the
(36:24):
two US and eight financial collapse better than almost any
other Western nation. He is genuinely good at his job
of being like a neoliberal like bank economy guy, and
specifically with these tariffs. This is the guy that you
want to handle this global trade crisis because this is
like what he has done his entire life. He's never
been elected to office before. He is just an economy guy.
(36:47):
And we saw this in like head to head matchups
with Carnie versus Polier rating certain things like finding common
ground to solve a dispute, where carne was twelve points
ahead adding up to a bully Carney's eight points ahead.
Managing household expenses Carney six points ahead. Sitting beside you
on a long airplane flight Carneie six points ahead. Captaining
(37:11):
a ship through a rough storm Carneie five points ahead.
Speaker 4 (37:14):
That's what you need. You need a seafarer only five
ahead on seafaring.
Speaker 2 (37:19):
Hosting the best party Carney one point ahead, and we'll see.
Speaker 4 (37:24):
This is reminiscent of that, Like was it like Tim
the plumber shit from like the bush pail in election?
Like the people I would want to have a beer with.
Speaker 2 (37:33):
Well, this is the funny thing is is the concerns
are still better in like those types of like physical
things like putting out a kitchen fire, polyb is up
to and putting up a shelf. Polyv's up six. There's
the only two one speasured where the conservative candidate edged
out the liberals is putting out a kitchen fire and
(37:54):
putting up a shelf. But all other things like solving disputes,
standing up to bullies, managing like expenses like household expenses.
Carnee Carney came out. I'm going to read a few
lines from Carnee's celebration acceptance speech here, and I'm just
gonna read them and not play clips because he blends
English and French and that's going to be annoying. No
(38:14):
offense to our French speakers out there. Yeah, Garrison, it's
gonna be annoying to play for a podcast. It's not
gonna do for the kbra Qua crowd quote. America wants
our land, our resources, our water, our country. These are
not idle threats. President Trump is trying to break us,
so America can own us. That will never happen. We
(38:35):
are once again at one of those hinge moments of history.
Our old relationship with the United States, relationship based on
steadily increasing integration, is over. The system of open global
trade anchored by the United States, a system that Canada
has relied on since the Second World War, a system that,
while not perfect, has helped deliver prosperity for a country
for decades, is over. But it is also our new reality.
(39:00):
We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but
we should never forget the lessons. We have to look
out for ourselves and above all, we have to take
care of each other. When I sit down with President Trump,
it will be to discuss the future economic and security
relationship between two sovereign nations, and it will be with
our full knowledge that we have many, many other options
than the United States to build prosperity for all Canadians.
(39:22):
We will strengthen our relations with reliable partners in Europe,
Asia and elsewhere. And if the United States no longer
wants to be in the forefront of the global economy.
Canada will unquote and yeah, this is the type of
rhetoric that's going to be I think successful in Canada
right now and probably in the next few decades. Is
Canada is going to try to take the spot that
(39:43):
America used to hold as like the center of like
global power, especially with climate change, with you know, crop
crops slowly slowly needed to be moved north. I think
as as as global warm progresses, Canada is in a
spot to be like a new emergent like world power.
And with the degree to which America is just kind
(40:04):
of giving up that role under Trump, remarkable, someone like
Carney is very interested in in gaining that degree of superiority.
Now I'm gonna I'm gonna read a few comments from
our listeners who I asked to send over their thoughts
on the Canadian election. And yes, this is a limited sample,
(40:24):
sask It's based on the politics of people who listen
to this show. But I still think there's some interesting
points here outlining what's happened in this election. Quote Mark
Karney might not be far enough left for my tastes,
but he immediately made gas cheaper, a tangible improvement for
my brokeass, and with the way he's been pulling, I'm
settling on voting for him to keep the Conservatives out
(40:47):
with their stated anti woke agenda parenthesis bigoted. Not like
I have much choice. I would have loved to be
picking here about my vote, but I don't feel confident
in the NDP or the Greens to come out on
top of the cons Another person said, quote, I can't
believe the country seems to be rallying around a neoliberal
central banker in the face of American fascism, But our
(41:08):
resentment to the US seems to kind of override all
other political considerations. So much of the way this election
is panning out is a display of our culture's profound
inability to take necessary risks. We're running scared to the
serious administrator, man in the blind hope things will be
safe and normal again. When he fails, will take a
late and stupid risk again. Unquote. And this is something
(41:30):
I've seen other people express, is like with this kind
of Obama esque, you know, serious man in charge, this
like return of neoliberalism. Will this just set the stage
for like the material conditions for someone like Trump to
emerge in the next ten years. This is a fear
that I've seen people express. I don't think it is
an inevitability, because this is not America in twenty twelve
(41:52):
or twenty sixteen. This is Canada in twenty twenty five.
The world is different, but I can understand this fear. Lastly,
I'll read one other comment or from Blue Sky quote.
I understand the drive to keep the Conservative Party out
of office, but I'm also terrified of what the Liberal
Party will do to this country if they can keep
campaigning on that very basis in perpetuity. It's good that
(42:15):
we will probably avoid the worst. It's terrible that progress
is on hold until the Conservative Party is no longer
a contender, which could take decades. I also do not
expect the Liberal Party to meaningfully change the conditions that
are pushing voters towards reactionary politics. To be again with
unquote so kind of a similar sentiment there. I think
that the role for progressives in Canada right now is
(42:36):
either to rebuild the NDP or infiltrate the Liberals, probably
rebuilding NDP in most cases because they are going to
have to have new leadership and seriously reevaluate their strategies
going forward. James Any notes here, I guess, yeah, I.
Speaker 4 (42:53):
Think like I guess kind of to echo what a
lot of those people said, Like in the US, we
had Biden for four years, right, essentially because he was
elected on not being Trump, and he was able to
get away well, he thought he could get away with
more than he actually was able to get away with
as it turns out, electorally. But like we were admonished
to vote for the person who wasn't Trump, right, and
(43:14):
what we got is open air detention for migrants. What
we got is inflation, and what we got is a
genocide in Gaza, right. And this fear that a lot
of other nations in the global north right, like these
liberal economies are feeling, is going to lead to lots
of that, like, yes, we need a serious man like
we needed, we need a statesman to stand up to Trump,
(43:37):
and that's going to reinforce a lot of that neoliberal orthodoxy,
and that's going to make it very hard to make
any meaningful progress to electoral politics in those countries for
the next few years, which sucks.
Speaker 2 (43:48):
I think this is why some people are excited about
the minority government, although it is less stable. Yeah, they
could be swayed by some more of the progressive agendas
from the NDP because they'll need an NDPU or block
cooperation to run the government.
Speaker 4 (44:01):
Yeah, they can't do a by the date which like
I mean.
Speaker 2 (44:04):
Also like Carney isn't Biden like and in the Canadian
Liberal Party is is not necessarily the like American Democratic Party.
Like that, they're they're different. Stuff on Gaza is different,
like that the Canadian Liberals have have restricted arms, arms
trades and arms deals to Israel the past year. Carney
is not thrown trans people under the bus the same
(44:26):
way some Democrats have the past year. Like these are
these are different people. I think, you know, Canada is
a different country than the United States. And I think
what we can see here is that this Canadian election,
although it was close, it still was a rejection of
Trump's style polities. Most Canadians do not want Canada to
(44:46):
go the way of America. There's there's been a subset
of Canadians, especially in Alberta and and and Saskatchewan, who
have been trying to push for this like mega style
like Canada first rhetoric and and this was denied I
think you were seeing more support for conservatives under Doug Ford.
With this more like moderate conservatism. I think that's something
(45:07):
to like watch out for more. But like this, this
Trump style of politics was was rejected across the country
and and Carney was able to figure out a way
to make people trust him to be a genuine like
combatant against against Trump and and usher in a new
a new golden age of neoliberal trade in the face
of Trump's Trump's chaotic and and anti market sentiments.
Speaker 3 (45:32):
Hopefully it does put an end to like this, this
tendency among liberals, especially in the US but also in
the UK, to like feel that they need to engage
on right wing culture war talking points and like I
guess quote unquote give some ground, Like we've seen that
in the UK right with like really transfer big ship
commit at a labor party, and like I would hope
(45:54):
that like people can see where this leads to and
that they're not going to vote for liberals who go
throw trans people under the bus and like that that
will be like a deciding factor in their support.
Speaker 4 (46:06):
But I guess that's just my hope right now. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:10):
Well, and frankly, you know, a better liberal party or
a liberal NDP coalition would would be would be willing
to engage with the idea of like taking trans refugees
from these extremely hostile countries, which is just something they've
they've not like, you know, publicly talked about. But as
as things get worse in the States, we will, we
will see. So yeah, but that is what I have
(46:32):
to say as a as a Canadian who lives in
the United States. My thoughts on the Canadian election, you know,
it could have been worse. Is it is odd to
see Canada almost accidentally replicate America's two party system. So
even if this was a rejection of Trump style politics,
this this this climate of fear did result in replicating
(46:53):
America's two party system, which is kind of interesting the
amount of which, like the third parties lost support, with
support going just towards conservatives and liberals. That is, you know,
one of the big stories of this election. The the
NDP blowout one of the big stories and pauliev losing
his seat. I think is it is at least the
(47:13):
very least a nice cherry on top for this for
this election.
Speaker 1 (47:20):
It could happen. Here is a production of cool Zone Media.
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media. Visit our website
cool Zonemedia dot com, or check us out on the
iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you.
Speaker 5 (47:31):
Listen to podcasts.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
You can now find sources for it could happen here,
listed directly in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening.
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Robert Evans
Garrison Davis
James Stout
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