More on Poilievre + Lewis and Brown

Walt has had some adverse comments (on Disqus) to "The problem with Poilievre", WWW 30/4/22. Seems like a lot of Canadian conservatives (with and without a big C) are jumping on the "Poilievre for Prime Minister" bandwagon. He's drawing huge crowds -- in the 1000s -- wherever he goes, in spite of the fact that the Conservative Party of Canada leadership vote is months away, and that it's only a contest to choose a new leader, with no election in the offing until 2025.

What seems to be surprising the lickspittle Canuck meeja is the large numbers of young people -- teens and twenty-somethings -- turning out to hear PP. Agent 3, who's closer to the action than I am, says Mr Poilievre is tapping into the massive, frustrated energies of a disillusioned electorate that has dismissed the idea that there is some duty to vote. For them, it's like being told you have a duty to buy a new car, and then offered a choice between a Chev and a Ford. [This should not be taken as a comment on the impending Ontario election. Ed.]

The secret of attracting and turning on a crowd is getting turned on by the crowd. Pierre Poilievre is the only candidate for the Tory leadership who seems to understand this. He's the only one who can connect with people on some kind of visceral, instinctive level that is both above and below "traditional politics" In this he resembles... wait for it... President Donald J. Trump.

That's great, but the nub of the Poilievre Problem, IMHO, is that in reality he's just another good, big-C Conservative, more interested in power than in principle. The Conservative Party of Canada is an atavistic entity, hopelessly old-fashioned, still trying to be all things to all people, the Natural Alternative to the Natural Governing (read: Liberal) Party. There is no hope of beating the Liberals, let alone accomplishing anythning genuinely new or different in Canadian politics, until the Conservative Party is put out of its self-inflicted misery.

Before I run out of space [again. Ed.] let's take a look at the leader wannabes trailing Mr Poilievre and his not-too-close competitor, Jean Charest.

With just over 3% support in recent polling, Patrick Brown, the mayor of Brampton ON, is in fourth place. For Mr Brown, this is a grudge match. He was elected as a Conservative Member of Parliament in 2006, and, seeing no future on the Harper back benches, jumped into Ontario provincial politics in 2014, and was elected leader of the oxymoronically named Progressie Conservative Party of Ontario in 2015.

Under Mr Brown's leadership the PCs won five by-elections, and seemed poised for success. But the shithammer struck early in 2018 when he was me-tooed by two women, dating back to the time he was a federal MP. Brown denied the allegations and initially refused to step down, but you know how it goes these days. Canada's CTV admitted, in March of this year, that there were "innacuracies" in its report, and, errr, the two women weren't under age after all. 

But the damage had been done. Mr Brown was booted out of the PC caucus and quit provincial politics for the brownfields of Brampton where he landed with him bum in the butter, elected Mayor in October of 2018. To understand how that happened, just look at the picture at left.

All ye need to know about Brampton is that Canadians of European descent account for about 25% of the population. Another 20% or so are black, but are to busy with other pursuits [word chosen carefully. Ed.] to bother with politics.

The majority of Bramptonians are from south Asia, and the majority of those are Sikhs. All you  have to do get elected in Brampton (as a whitey) is get yourself declared an honorary Sikh, turn up for the Khalsa day parade, support an "independent Khalistan", etc, and you're in like Flynn Singh. 

Works in Toronto too, and since Patrick Brown is the only leadership candidate from the GTA, he seems to be counting on the BIPOC vote to see him in the Leader's chair. Walt gives him two chances....

Slightly ahead of Mr Brown in the early polling is Leslyn Lewis, the only woman and the only person of colour in the field. I didn't go for the cheap "dark horse" joke, because Ms Lewis deserves to be taken seriously. She is the the favourite of the social conservative wing up the party, and -- unlike Messrs Charest and Brown -- is a Member of Parliament, representing the southwestern Ontario riding of  Haldimand-Norfolk. Getting elected as a black woman in white-bread country is an achievement in itself.

Last week, Ms Lewis released two major platform updates. In "No Hidden Agenda", posted on her campaign website, she writes:  "I am pro-life. I am not ashamed to say it.... These are issues that concern us all. When we are afraid of talking about important topics, we don't do anything to improve life for Canadian women. That’s why I put forward a 'no hidden agenda' platform on abortion in the 2020 race. I stand by those policies and would put forward the same four if elected leader now."

Her platform reads as follows: "I will fight for the value of every girl through banning the misogynistic practice of sex-selective abortions. I will protect vulnerable women by criminalizing coerced abortions. I will increase funding for pregnancy centres. And I will end abortion funding overseas and focus Canadian funding on actually helping women and girls overseas thrive."

Leslyn Lewis stands on principle. Walt says, good for you and God bless you! Mind you, her chances of winning the CPC leadership are not much better than those of Patrick Brown. But if you call yourself a social conservative, and eligible to vote in the Conservative leadership, you should vote for her!

Here's why. Pierre Poilievre is the acknowledged front-runner in the race, and lots of people will vote for him because they think (mistakenly) that he's a true conservative. Patrick Brown is a liberal, a "progressive consesrvative", even more so than Jean Charest. Every vote for Leslyn Lewis will come off Mr Poilievre's pile. If Mr Brown fizzles, as seems likely, and if Ms Lewis runs a good third, Jean Charest might just squeak through.

But (Walt hears you say) hang on! Is that what you want? Do you want another pinko leading the alt-liberal party? Answer: YES, because this time real conservatives like Ms Lewis (and maybe even Mr Poilievre) should realize the truth of what I wrote above about the CPC, and quit the Party. 

They might even join Max Bernier's People's Party of Canada, to offer a real choice to fed-up Canucks in 2025. That would be my strategy. If you have a better suggestion, do click on the headline to open the comments window, and let us hear about it!