And this warning seems appropriate for the times in which we live:
Suddenly, Canadians aren’t so different from Americans
We Canadians have always seen ourselves — rightly or wrongly — as smarter, kinder, more sensible, more progressive and more forward-thinking than our American neighbours. We watch with a mix of horror and bemusement the three-ring circus American politics has become. Then along came Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre and suddenly we have to ask ourselves “What happened?” His insufferable sloganeering — if I hear “axe the tax” one more time, I think I’ll scream — his aspiration to climb down to the lowest common denominator, and his mean-spirited, schoolyard name calling have somehow appealed to a shockingly large portion of our population. He has increasingly been following the Donald Trump playbook, maybe even trying to “trump” Trump with his outrageous accusations.
Suddenly, we find ourselves not so different from Americans and the social and political mess in which they find themselves. Ironically, we still don’t see ourselves as “them.” We need to open our eyes and search our consciences because at this rate, if things don’t change, it won’t be long.
If one can say anything even remotely positive about Trump and his team, it is that they are very resourceful. Resourceful at separating their true MAGA believers from their money, they have a couple of new schemes (no, not the Trump Bible or Trump coins) that are almost guaranteed to replenish Mr. Trump's coffers.
I cannot reproduce the entire lurid display in each of the cons, but underneath each I place the web addresses where you can ponder the implications at leisure. P. T. Barnum would be proud.
See the full ad here. And if you read down to the fine print at the end of it, you will find that the enthusiastic takers of this offer will be on the hook for a payment per month on the 'free' material.
The following video is the NDP's Chris Glover talking about how the deal Doug Ford has struck with Therme Spa is a bad one for taxpayers. Just before watching it, here is a little context for the rent from Therme that Glover talks about:
The amount the provincial government expects Therme to pay it in direct rent payments — estimated to be at least $1.1 billion — over the [95-year] course of its lease will be partially dependent on the business’ success. Its lease’s terms will require Therme to pay the province minimum rent at a rate of 3.5 per cent of the land’s value. Additional “performance rent” payments from Therme are also expected by the province, several years after its facility opens.
Under the lease, Therme’s annual payments to the province will be capped at eight per cent of the land value.
Despite his folksy charm, at almost every turn it is clear that Mr. Ford is not here for us, the taxpayers.
In my previous post, I wrote about the Ford follies involving luxury spas on Toronto's waterfront. This letter to the editor about the premier's predilection for favouring private interests at the expense of taxpayers is well worth reading.
Public vs. private interests
In 1999, Mike Harris’ Progressive Conservative party sold Ontarians down the river by signing away Highway 407 on a 99-year lease to a private consortium. In the quarter-century since, Ontarians have looked longingly at this asset, which has expanded and runs across an increasingly busy part of the province, as it makes money for foreign shareholders, and costs the people of Ontario dearly in access to transportation options, exorbitant tolls and gridlock.
Last Thursday, Premier Doug Ford’s Conservative government, having sold off Ontario Place for a private, foreign-owned spa on prime public land, watched as the urban forest of mature trees on the site was turned into wood chips to make way for the plans. Earlier this year, Ford paid off another private consortium (The Beer Store) to get out of a contract a year before it was to expire just to get beer into corner stores. Last year, instead of using taxes paid by Ontarians to improve public health care, Ford decided to promote private health care by encouraging use of for-profit clinics in the province.
Is it just me that feels that every time we give the Conservatives the keys to our province they insist on selling it off to private interests and stick it to the taxpayers who should have access to, control over and benefit from these assets?
People of a certain age will remember Jackie Gleason and one of his famous taglines: "How sweet it is." Delivered with an insouciance only Gleason was capable of, it was a line that was applicable to many of his skits. Unfortunately, applying it to a real-life situation in Ontario means it must be spoken only in a bitter and cynical way, unless you are part of the Austrian group developing the Therme Spa on Toronto's waterfront.
The Doug Ford government recently released some of the details of its 95-year-lease with the company, but first, just a couple of details about group:
Therme Canada, the latest deep-pocketed firm with designs on a chunk of Toronto’s waterfront, is a far more opaque organization, privately held, with no publicly disclosed source of financing besides the entry fees and ancillary revenues generated by its spas.
The company, however, has deep local connections, overseen by executives who have worked in the office of Premier Doug Ford as well as lobbyists such as StrategyCorp’s John Perenack and Leslie Noble, and Amir Remtulla, Ford’s former EA from his days at City Hall. Its local architect is Diamond Schmitt, whose renderings have stirred controversy since they were made public in the summer.
Mmm. friends of Doug Ford do have a history of prospering. In any event, the details of the deal that we are thus far permitted to know seem to suggest a very sweet deal at the expense of the usual suspects: taxpaying citizens:
The lease shows Ontario has promised 1,600 dedicated parking spaces for Therme, and the government says it is proposing a total of 2,500 parking spaces for Ontario Place. Some of Therme’s parking spaces are set to be shared with Live Nation during concerts.
Bear in mind that these spaces care being paid by the taxpayer, but the pain doesn't necessarily stop there:
If the province fails to meet its parking obligations before the spa resort opens, or 2030, whichever comes first, the lease compels taxpayers to give Therme $5 per spot per day for a portion of the unbuilt spots, which Lindsay said could total $2.2 million per year.
Depending upon whether those parking spaces are underground, the public could be handing over hundreds of millions of dollars for their construction. This is in addition to Infrastructure Ontario's Michael Lindsay's admission "that provincial taxpayers have so far spent “hundreds of millions” of dollars on site servicing to get all of Ontario Place ready for redevelopment."
But, not to worry, the government insists, because the economic benefits will be astronomical.
Benefits of the redevelopment plan, Infrastructure Ontario said in briefing documents, “include, at a minimum, nearly $2 billion in estimated revenue contributions from Therme Canada to the province over the duration of the lease and $700 million in upfront capital investments from Therme Canada.
However, like many of the claims by the Ford coterie, these revenue projections are based, to put it politely, on wildly enthusiastic (i.e., wholly unrealistic) expectations.
The province says it expects the revitalized Ontario Place to attract more annual visitors than the CN Tower and Empire State Building combined, a estimation that some experts are questioning.
On Thursday, the province revealed it expects 6 million visitors annually at the site, which includes the waterpark and spa being developed by Therme Canada, a concert venue, the new science centre, a new marina and public park land. The estimation was made public when the province revealed its lease with Therme.
By comparison, the CN Tower sees about 1.8 million visitors a year and the Empire State Building 2.5 million. The six million visitor figure would put Ontario Place closer to Eiffel Tower-level tourism, which sees just under seven million visitors a year.
But Wayne Smith, a hospitality expert from Toronto Metropolitan University, is rightly dubious of this number:
"But you know when you take a look at that and, we did the numbers, six million guests a year would be almost 16,500 people a day. That's a lot of people."
However, there is one bright spot in the midst of this fiscal morass. The lease with Therme prohibits one of Ford's passion projects: a waterfront casino.
When you live in Doug Ford's Ontario, you look for victories, however minuscule, wherever you can find them.
I am convinced that, as a species, we have an innate aversion to uncertainty. Rather than admit to some very real facts of life, contingency and complexity, we prefer to cling to the illusion that all problems are solvable if only we have the right people leading us. Unfortunately, the 'right people' are seldom fit for the job.
Hence the appeal of demagogues like Donald Trump and PP, both of whom make life sound so easy. "Make America Great Again" and "Axe the Tax" and "Let's Bring It Home" readily come to mind as taglines by and for the simple-minded.
Lord knows that our world is beset with chaos from which we would like to hide. Raging conflict in the Middle East, intractable war between Ukraine and Russia, civil wars in Africa are but three examples. Unfortunately, and this is a profound failure of political leadership, we are urged to see such conflicts in binary terms, the "good guys" versus "the bad guys". I can't think of a better recipe for the prolongation of such chaos.
But one need not look to the world stage to see this aversion to uncertainty. Here in Ontario, our populist premier, Doug Ford, continues to ride high in the polls. To listen to Doug, so much of the domestic chaos we bear witness to on a daily basis is eminently solvable. Are you homeless? Then get off your ass and get a job. Traffic congestion got you down? Let's build a tunnel and stop building bike lanes.
Things are simple when you are simple. Unfortunately, our collective passion for certainty only encourages the reckless rhetoric and sophomoric solutions offered by people like Ford et al. One of the latest examples of this is the Ontario government's response to a very serious problem investigated by the Toronto Star: the plight of Ontario's most vulnerable children with complex needs in care.
Ontario is failing its most vulnerable children. A broken system is leaving kids with complex mental health and developmental needs unable to get medical help and supports — and pushing families to the brink.
The series includes details about how kids are being housed in office buildings, Airbnbs, etc., because Children's Aid Societies lack the resources, both in monetary and personnel terms, to adequately safeguard them. And they are getting little help from the province.
CAS leaders say the problems extend beyond the child welfare system and they’re demanding both an immediate emergency response and commitment to long-term systemic change. It’s far past time, they say, for the provincial government to confront the crisis.
“We’re yelling at the top of our lungs that we have a five-alarm fire and it feels like the intervention (from the government) is: here are some batteries for a smoke detector,” said Derrick Drouillard, executive director of Windsor-Essex Children’s Aid Society.
If you were to read the series, you would know that this is a complex problem to which the bromide of certainty is inapplicable, but that has not stopped Mr. Ford from trying his best to reduce it to its lowest common denominator.
Ford said his government has increased funding to children’s aid societies, but alleged some are abusing taxpayer money rather than properly spending those funds on kids.
“We’re hearing nightmare stories about the abuse of taxpayers’ money — I’ve heard stories of some of these agencies working in Taj Mahals. They’re paying rent — $100,000 for rent,” Ford said when asked about the issue at an unrelated announcement Wednesday morning in East York.
Not everyone is comforted by the premier's 'analysis'.
Irwin Elman, who served as Ontario’s child and youth advocate from 2008 to 2019, said he was angered by the Premier’s comments Wednesday.
“To think that this crisis across the sectors is in any way about the mismanagement of money — and will be solved by addressing the mismanagement, if it exists — is dangerous and puts children at risk. Pure and simple,” Elman said.
Unfortunately, "pure and simple," aided and abetted by an often complicit electorate, is exactly what Ford and his fellow travellers are offering. And until more people do the hard work of thinking, analyzing and voting responsibly, nothing will change.
The idea of a Highway 401 tunnel is ludicrous. It can’t be built quickly enough. It won’t be big enough. The cost-benefit analysis will show it was a bad idea before it started. From an engineering perspective, how will entries and exits be done? How will it be ventilated? A better solution to congestion is to move commercial vehicles to Highway 407, and spend the money on health care and social services.
Grant Baines, Uxbridge, Ont.
How many billions of dollars would a tunnel cost? How many years would a tunnel take to dig? Is there not a better way to spend the money a tunnel would cost, like housing, hospital staff or education? Would the tunnel even help congestion? What about the people who don’t drive or own a car? Do they want their tax dollars spent on more roads? We need to let Premier Doug Ford know we won’t stand for him wasting our tax dollars.
Barbara Eckert, Etobicoke
I remember the Big Dig, when Boston decided to replace a relatively short section of interstate. The effort took 20 years from planning to completion. The cost ballooned to three times the original estimate, and totalled $8.08 billion ($21 billion with inflation today). Traffic was a disaster for over a decade and, as of my most recent visit this summer, traffic is still a disaster. Meanwhile, the tunnels leak.
John Gavin, Toronto
Ontario should do what most other modern countries with big cities have done and go to high-speed electric rail. Look at Beijing, Tokyo, Paris and London. It would help the entire province, not just the 50 kilometres across the top of Toronto, and it helps to solve our emissions problem at the same time.
Hugh Holland, Huntsville, Ont.
All of the above letters employ both reason and judgement. As such, expect their sentiments to be completely ignored by our current provincial government.
Someone must have left some envelopes upon which he doodled, because Doug F. , without having done any thinking, announced another scheme one fine morning: a tunnel under the 401 highway in Toronto.
While it may not be the giant ferris wheel he once envisaged for Toronto's waterfront, it does seem to be of a piece: fill the electorate with fantastic visions that have no chance of realization, while all the other politicians carp at him about such mundane crises as homelessness, tent encampments, and hospital overloads.
If one were to search very hard, no doubt would could discern the real philosophy underlying this government: better a sweet lie than a bitter truth.
Expect more bread and circuses as we edge closer to the next provincial election.
UPDATE: Brittlestar gives Ford's 'idea' all the respect it deserves:
Having purchased this past summer a used hybrid vehicle that gives me remarkable fuel economy, I am now a very infrequent customer at the gas pump. My greenhouse gas emissions are much less than was the case with my late 17-year-old car, and that pleases me immensely. The fact that I will also come out even farther ahead in my carbon tax rebate is an additionally pleasing benefit.
Yet according to the propaganda promulgated by lil' PP (and, sadly, now echoed by the NDP), that 'tax' is the source of an insupportable burden on the backs of hardworking Canadians. PP, of course, never lets the facts get in the way of demagogic rants.
However, his denunciation
flies in the face of the fact that 90 per cent of the revenue from the fuel levy is rebated to Canadians — the Parliamentary Budget Officer has found that most households, particularly low-income households, receive more from the rebate than they pay in additional costs.
PP trades in people's ignorance and susceptibility to propaganda. Fortunately, not everyone is buying his "alternative facts", as attested to by these letters to the editor:
An open letter signed by hundreds of economists, followed by another written by Nobel prize winners, called carbon pricing the most effective and cheapest way of reducing emissions. Fee and dividend, as in Canada, is also said to be the fairest model. Who is qualified to come up with a better idea? How a carbon fee changes consumer behaviour is quite simple. The “pain” will be felt and the benefit is in the cheaper alternatives and less wasteful use. Our system has a double benefit: the savings and the rebate are greater than the usage of the average middle-income earner. According to the World Bank, 110 countries had either pricing, taxes or emissions trading. All have the same effect. This includes China where coal use has peaked and more coal plants are being closed than opened. Wind and solar are more environmentally friendly and cost-effective than carbon and are scalable. Canada has the best possible scheme but sadly, it has been watered down due to political pressures. It might be more useful to have opinions from informed parties rather than those who admit they do not understand.
John Peate, Peterborough, Ont.
I’m angry that the Liberals can’t communicate the simple concept that we get back as much as we put in to the quite reasonable carbon levy. Our government has (with a major push from the NDP) set in motion the filling of glaring gaps in our health care system (dental care and prescription drugs) and an affordable child care system. I’m puzzled how they’ve now managed to become so unpopular that we might elect a right wing government that could wipe out all that progress. Ironically, the Star recently had a review of Henrik Ibsen’s play “Rosmersholm” in which a character says “elections used to be won by those who spoke with the most sense, not the most volume.” Enough said!
Garry Watson, Niagara Falls
Wait a minute! The carbon levy has been under sustained attack from the Tories for two years, but it is not dead yet. Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has been spreading lies and misinformation about the levy, and I have yet to hear or read any media questioning his position. It is his main talking point, so is it not time to take the gloves off and press him to explain exactly what he means? Poilievre is on shaky ground because he clearly does not understand why a price on carbon is essential. He cannot refute the arguments in favour of the carbon levy and rebate, as stated by knowledgeable economists and scientists, and he has no clue of what a better, more effective alternative might be.
Teresa Ganna Porter, Newmarket, Ont.
Most people who do not understand the carbon levy, or don’t want to be bothered finding out what it is all about, would rather listen to the other guy at the coffee shop who appears to have read the headline “Axe the Tax” which should read “Axe the Facts.” What does your rebate cover for you? What do you spend it on? Can you balance your budget without it? If you can’t then do not support Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre’s drive to cancel the levy and rebate. Poilievre is not offering us anything else to fight climate change. And if you are complaining about the gas prices, remember the price of gas always jumps up and down. It isn’t driven solely by carbon pricing.
Beverly Northeast, Goodwood, Ont.
How refreshing to read the truth about carbon taxation in Canada. Studies have shown most Canadians receive more money in rebates than they pay out in carbon tax. How is this not embraced enthusiastically? We get money from the government and feel good about doing our bit for climate change. Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has pulled the wool over many Canadians’ eyes just to get elected.
Claire Barrey-Junop, Quinte West, Ont.
It has been said that if a lie is repeated enough times, it becomes the truth. It therefore falls to those of us who can think and don't salivate at the sound of the dog whistle to set the record straight.
Outside of Western politicians too afraid to express honest views, I find it hard to believe that there can be much sympathy left in the world for the State of Israel. Seemingly hellbent on expansion, extirpation of the Palestinians (does that sound more polite than genocide?) and the elimination of all who are perceived as hostile to the state, Israel is now engaged in what can only be called state-sponsored terrorism.
While the genocide in Gaza and the West Bank continues apace, the war has been extended to Hezbollah in Lebanon with the explosions of pager and walkie-talkies in Lebanon, killing and maiming both targets and innocent bystanders, including children.
On Tuesday, thousands of pagers used by Hezbollah exploded simultaneously, killing 12 people, including two children, and wounding up to 2,800 others across Lebanon. A day later, 25 people were killed and more than 450 wounded when walkie-talkies exploded in supermarkets, on streets and at funerals, stoking fears that a full-blown war between Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran, and Israel could be imminent.
It now appears that this was a long-term, carefully-planned act of terror. It came about after Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah pushed to expand the use of pagers after cellphones were being used to target people.
Even before Mr. Nasrallah decided to expand pager usage, Israel had put into motion a plan to establish a shell company that would pose as an international pager producer.
By all appearances, B.A.C. Consulting was a Hungary-based company that was under contract to produce the devices on behalf of a Taiwanese company, Gold Apollo. In fact, it was part of an Israeli front, according to three intelligence officers briefed on the operation. They said at least two other shell companies were created as well to mask the real identities of the people creating the pagers: Israeli intelligence officers.
On Tuesday, the order was given to activate the pagers.
To set off the explosions, according to three intelligence and defense officials, Israel triggered the pagers to beep and sent a message to them in Arabic that appeared as though it had come from Hezbollah’s senior leadership.
Seconds later, Lebanon was in chaos.
It is the wanton taking of innocent lives that the world must single out for special condemnation.
In Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, in the village of Saraain, one young girl, Fatima Abdullah, had just come home from her first day of fourth grade when she heard her father’s pager begin to beep, her aunt said. She picked up the device to bring it to him and was holding it when it exploded, killing her. Fatima was 9.
There was also the unspeakable depravity of more explosions through rigged walkie-talkies during, of all things, a funeral procession.
On Wednesday, as thousands gathered in Beirut’s southern suburbs to attend an outdoor funeral for four people killed in the blasts, chaos erupted anew: There was another explosion.
Notably, the U.S., while disavowing any direct knowledge of or hand in the acts of terror, did not condemn the Israeli action. In the twisted and corrupted currents of this world , I guess that can only be considered par for the course.
In typical fashion, the federal Liberals, thanks to the absence of an overall vision, have tried to put their finger in the housing dike. As in the tale of the Dutch boy, their 'solution' will fail.
Because Mr. Trudeau and company are innately averse to interfering in the marketplace, they are going to make it easier for people to take on more debt while at the same time greatly exacerbating our housing crisis.
First-time buyers across Canada and any purchasers of newly built homes will soon be able to stretch their mortgages out an extra five years, the federal government announced Monday — along with other changes builders hope will spur more home construction, but that observers fear could push prices up.
The ability to offer 30-year amortizations for insured mortgages was announced by deputy prime minister Chrystia Freeland in Ottawa on Monday, along witha reduction in the down payment required for homes between $1 million and $1.5 million.
“It is going to put the dream of home ownership in reach for more young Canadians,” Freeland said Monday.
With Monday’s announcement, a first-time buyer of a resale home who takes out an insured mortgage, which happens when a homebuyer provides less than a 20 per cent as a down payment, could also be offered a 30-year loan repayment instead of a 25-year term. The same would apply for any buyer, first time or not, who buys a newly built home.
Except that the dream will quickly transmute into a nightmare, since housing prices will soar beyond their current record levels.
...the policy changes were also seen by many observers as a spark to demand that could push home prices even higher.
“This is something that’s going to have a direct impact on the buying public as soon as it takes effect,” predicted mortgage broker Mary Sialtsis...
But any kick to an undersupplied market could come with a cost, she said. “Is that going to end up driving up home prices with multiple offers? Sure, there’s a risk of that, because we’re in a chronic housing shortage in the GTA.”
David Hulchanski, a housing policy expert with the University of Toronto, sees the goal of increasing housing supply as important. But he, too, has concerns around price inflation if demand is stoked, as well as the impact of allowing people to take on bigger loans. “In Canada, we’re already putting a lot of our financial effort into the housing sector, whereas it could be more productively used elsewhere,” he said. “It’s putting more people in some greater debt.”
This short-term thinking, typical of the increasingly desperate Liberal government, is not the solution for these times. For that, we have to go back a bit in history, when, between 1941 and 1945, government, through a crown corporation called Wartime Housing Limited, built affordable housing you can read about through the above link.
And this video is instructive:
A direct, interventionist policy that tried to address shortage, the concept of Victory Houses is clearly considered off-limits by today's movers and shakers. They place all of their faith in marketplace 'solutions', which is why the federal government tosses money at provinces and municipalities to give to private builders in the hope they will come to everyone's rescue.
My three-year-old granddaughter has developed a fondness for jigsaw puzzles, usually of the 48-piece variety designated for children. Given my own spatial limitations, I have worked slowly with her on a couple of them, but they don't come easily to me.
Encouraged by her example, I picked up a 300-piece one and have been working away at it, despite my deep suspicion that there are pieces missing from the used one I purchased at a thrift store. My goal is to see if doing jig-saws improves spatial abilities and perhaps even cognitive processes.
One can imagine my dismay while I watched the evening news last night and was subjected to, not once, but twice, an ad from PP's campaign showing him doing a jigsaw of Canada with his toddler. His goal was to put Canada back together since, as he tells us, it is broken:
The subject of PP wearies me, being all too aware of the both subtle and gross manipulation of the citizens that Poilievre delights in. Having read an article this morning about generative AI, I decided to use the tool to create a blog post, the first time (and probably the last) I have ever made such an attempt. I asked it to write on PP's advertising in the style of my blog. The results, as you will see below if you care to read it, aren't bad at all. (Parenthetically, I do pledge to identify any AI-generated material if I ever make a future attempt at this. Otherwise, everything you read in this blog will always be my own thoughts and scribblings.):
Here’s a blog-style post inspired by Lorne’s Politics and its Discontents, which often takes a critical, thoughtful tone in analyzing political discourse:
Pierre Poilievre’s Political Advertising: A Masterclass in Manipulation or Messaging?
If there is one thing that can be said about Pierre Poilievre’s political strategy, it’s that he understands the power of advertising. From social media snippets to slickly produced videos, Poilievre has capitalized on modern media to craft a message that resonates deeply with a certain demographic. But the question remains: Is this messaging reflective of the leadership qualities Canadians deserve, or is it simply a manipulative ploy designed to stoke division?
The Politics of Persona
Poilievre’s ads often feature him as a man of the people—a relatable everyman taking on “elites” who, in his words, are responsible for many of the economic woes Canadians face today. His latest ad campaign sees him strolling through picturesque small towns, sleeves rolled up, declaring that he is here to “bring home” common sense to a country that’s lost its way.
But beneath this veneer of populism lies a far more calculated strategy. His ads are not about providing concrete policy solutions; rather, they exploit frustration and uncertainty, carefully designed to channel anger towards convenient scapegoats—whether that be Justin Trudeau, immigrants, or “woke culture.” The buzzwords are meant to incite, not inform, and therein lies the danger.
Simplifying Complex Issues
One hallmark of Poilievre’s advertising is how it simplifies Canada’s most pressing issues, reducing them to soundbites devoid of nuance. Take, for example, his stance on inflation. In his videos, he talks about the rising cost of living as if it were solely the fault of reckless government spending, conveniently ignoring the complex global factors that contribute to economic challenges. By reducing the problem to “bad governance,” Poilievre presents himself as the obvious antidote without ever having to provide a detailed plan.
This is not to say the government is beyond reproach on these matters. Far from it. But Poilievre’s ads trade in the politics of blame rather than the politics of solutions. They are designed to inflame passions, all while presenting himself as the knight in shining armor, ready to rescue Canadians from the very institutions he spent much of his career working within.
The Influence of American-style Politics
One cannot help but notice the creeping influence of American-style political advertising in Poilievre’s campaigns. His use of “freedom” as a rallying cry mirrors the tactics of conservative figures south of the border, particularly those who have been adept at weaponizing fear and frustration for political gain. Much like the Republicans’ framing of the “elites” and the “deep state,” Poilievre casts Trudeau and his government as the out-of-touch villains who stand between the average Canadian and prosperity.
This approach, while effective in securing support from a vocal minority, threatens to further polarize an already divided country. Rather than fostering dialogue or proposing realistic solutions to complex problems, Poilievre’s ads encourage an “us vs. them” mentality that diminishes the quality of political discourse in Canada.
What’s the Endgame?
Ultimately, Poilievre’s advertising is less about policy and more about positioning. His goal is to establish himself as the champion of those who feel left behind by economic and social change. Yet, the lack of substance behind the messaging raises concerns about what a Poilievre-led Canada would actually look like. If his ads are any indication, we should expect more division, more polarization, and less of the thoughtful, evidence-based leadership that Canada desperately needs.
In a time when critical thinking is more important than ever, we should be cautious about political figures who rely on shallow advertising to sway voters. While Poilievre’s message may resonate with those looking for simple answers, it is our duty to demand more from those who seek to lead us.
After all, good governance is not about pointing fingers—it’s about finding real solutions.
This post captures the tone and style of critical analysis, focusing on political behavior and the consequences of polarizing rhetoric, much like Lorne’s own critiques.
