Big news this week is Pierre Poilievre’s impromptu visit to a far-right protest about the usual stuff. Nobody cared what the protest was about; the discussion was about the wisdom or stupidity Poilievre’s interaction with the radicals.
The Background
In order to understand what’s going on here, we need to dig a bit into the functioning of a modern political party. Incipient leaders, especially for the federal Conservatives. always have a triple agenda that plays out to three different audiences as the election timetable rolls along.
First, Win the Leadership
This is the easy part of the public relations job. A right-wing leader can play to the radicals, as long as he doesn’t make any promises that might come back to haunt him. If the pollical pendulum is swinging to the right, he can win the nomination with the help of the radicals and ignore the more moderate members.
Then, Raise Money
Once he is Leader of the Opposition, he can use that pulpit to make all the business-friendly moves that will fill the party coffers. Business leaders don’t care about the social messaging; they just want regulations eased and taxes lowered. They’re ready to pay for favours they’ll call in later.
Last, Win the Election
Once the writ is dropped, the incipient Prime Minister has to back-track and soft-pedal frantically, because the soft Liberals, the Red Conservatives and the dreaded Undecideds have no use for the Radical Right and their bigoted views.
Poilievre’s Mistake (or not)
Pierre is far ahead in the polls, and maybe he’s getting a little too cocky for his own good. He needs to pay attention to that old election timetable.
He is now at a sweet spot for the Leader of the Opposition. The electioneering hasn’t really ramped up yet. He can play the usual pointing-finger game and rant and rave about anything the government does. He doesn’t have to come up with any answers himself, which is a good thing, because Axing the Tax is not going to play well to many Canadians. After all, 50% of the voters are of above average intelligence, and they have the smoky whiff of another fiery summer in their nostrils.
The ruling party is just at the point where a lot of high expectations are not looking to be fulfilled, and the populace is tired of the same old same old from a lackluster Prime Minister.
Poilievre has proved adroit at switching stories when the time is ripe. The question is whether his play to the radicals at this stage was a misreading of just where on the timeline he sits. Several commentators noticed that he seemed to realize about halfway through the photo op that he had come to the wrong ballroom, and really would rather sit this one out.
The Bottom Line
A year from now when the election gets started, if the Liberals have accomplished anything they can point to with pride and the Conservatives have come up with a platform for voters to critique, I think the polling numbers will tighten up. At the moment, one bad move by either party leader could start the ball rolling in either direction.