Today's News: Poilievre is just "hysterically harsh" now

Following Poilievre's apparent rejection of Trudeau's request for a united front against Trump, I'm reading some commentary about Poilievre and it ain't pretty:

Andrew Coyne / The Globe and Mail

Poilievre fumbles the Trump crisis: a missed opportunity to show himself as a prime minister-in-waiting

... it is hard to fault the Prime Minister for trying. It is easy to say that the effort was doomed...

But to many people the Prime Minister will nevertheless have looked practical, reasonable, adult, in all, prime ministerial. It is not a given that Mr. Trump’s bullying will be to Mr. Trudeau’s disadvantage, politically. Mr. Trump’s unreasonableness is well known. If Mr. Trudeau is seen to have gone the extra mile, or 1,300, to deal with him; if he then is forced to take retaliatory measures, painful as they may be, the public may conclude that he has made the best of a bad hand....

If Mr. Trudeau’s appearance with Mr. Trump struck you as cringeworthy, try to imagine how Mr. Poilievre would look next to him. Would he look like – behave like – a prime minister? Would he conduct himself with the dignity and the self-confidence that the job requires, knowing when to speak up and when to stay silent, when to show his hand and when to keep his cards in reserve?

Or would he look boyish, callow, too eager to impress; talk too much, give away too much, signal insecurity throughout? It’s difficult to say, of course. All one can do – all the public can do – is draw inferences from what we already know of Mr. Poilievre’s character and judgment, extrapolating from his comportment to date to predict how he will behave in future.

And what we have seen of him to date has been, not a future prime minister, but a perpetual opposition critic, someone who is seemingly incapable of taking the high road, who never misses the opportunity for a partisan cheap shot, who is always, always in attack mode, no matter the issue, the setting or the situation.

...Mr. Poilievre has, from the day the tariff threat was issued, sounded almost hysterically harsh. At times he has seemed to take Mr. Trump’s side in the controversy, even appearing behind a podium with the slogan “Fix The Broken Border.”

His rhetoric, too, has sounded vaguely … Trumpian. “The Prime Minister,” he said, “has vacated the border and turned it open to anyone who wants to come in.” He is “weak,” “weakened,” “unbearably weak.” He has “lost control of everything.” And this flourish: “With our border in chaos, our economy collapsing and everything broken, we need real, responsible leadership from a strong, smart prime minister who has the brains and backbone to put Canada first.”

Canada First, you say. Yup. The phrase, which I have not heard him utter before the last week or so, has cropped up repeatedly. “We need a plan … to put Canada first on the economy and on security.” “I only care about Canada. I want to put our country first.” And so on.

I’m not sure what he thinks he is accomplishing with this. Perhaps he worries that the Prime Minister will get a lift out of the crisis, a rally-round-the-flag effect often seen in public polling. Perhaps he is afraid that sections of his base, many of them vocal on social media, are inclined to side with Mr. Trump, especially on border issues, and might stray into the People’s Party fold. Maybe he is betting the public believes Canada will be treated better with someone more in sync with Mr. Trump in charge.

Or maybe it’s just that that’s the only gear he’s got. Mr. Poilievre is already unusual in a political leader for being his own attack dog, a task generally assigned to talented thugs and burner MPs. Until now I had been inclined to assume this was strategy of some kind, a matter of zigging while others are zagging.

But it may be that Mr. Poilievre is genuinely unable to strike any other note – that his experience and personality permits no other. ..

Max Fawcett / National Observer

Pierre Poilievre’s problem with the truth

...Is he really the person we want to represent our interests in dealing with the Trump administration? Even if the next federal election doesn’t happen until October 2025, that would leave three full years — including the inevitable renegotiation of the USMCA agreement in 2026 — with Poilievre and the Conservatives at the helm.

The early signs here aren’t exactly encouraging — not, at least, if you care about things like Canada’s ability to resist the gravitational pull of Trump’s black hole of bullshit. He essentially accepted the premise of Trump’s tariff argument, which is that it was being used to pressure Canada to tighten its border and prevent the flow of drugs and migrants to the United States. Standing in front of a placard saying, “fix the broken border,” Poilievre suggested that “the reality is that [Prime Minister Justin] Trudeau has lost control of the deficit, of immigration and of our border.”

The facts tell a different story here, as they often do with Poilievre’s statements about Trudeau. Last year, according to data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the northern border of the United States accounted for 0.08 per cent of all fentanyl seizures. The previous year, it was even lower at just 0.02 per cent of all fentanyl seizures. And while irregular border crossings from Canada have risen in recent years, the direction of flow could easily switch with the Trump administration’s plans to deport millions of illegal migrants. Then, there’s the issue of guns, which are being smuggled into Canada from America in huge volumes. As Toronto Police Service spokesperson Stephanie Sayer told Postmedia, “Of the crime guns seized this year that have been successfully sourced, 84 per cent came from the United States.”

Canada can, and probably should, dedicate more resources to its side of the border, especially when it comes to intercepting the flow of American guns. It might also want to reverse the cuts that the last Conservative government made to the Canada Border Services Agency in 2012. But we’d do well to remember that Trump’s entire tariff threat is premised on the falsehood that Canada is somehow responsible for its fentanyl problem. Rolling over on this one, as Poilievre seemed almost anxious to do, will only invite other falsehoods about our country — and other threats against it.

This is the real risk of a Poilievre government, one that has multiplied in scale with Trump on his way to the White House. His utter indifference to the truth, and his willingness to weaponize deceit for his own purposes, are traits he clearly shares with Trump. But they will not endear him to the U.S. president, and they will not spare us from his administration’s inevitable wrath. Surrender, after all, doesn’t deter a bully — it encourages him. And every concession to deceit, no matter how small, makes the bigger lies that much easier to get away with. Pierre Poilievre's disregard for the truth has been on full display of late, including in his response to Donald Trump's tariff threat. Why that should be raising questions about his fitness to lead Canada, and what it could mean if he ever does.

The best way to protect our cultural and political sovereignty right now is by defending reality, inconvenient as it may seem at times....

Some respond by asking why I show his speech.

Well, just as I do with clips from #QP, I give context. One question, one answer.

So here, I wanted to show what #PierrePoilievre was stating before he took off.

I did not show his full 6+ minute speech of slogans.

It'd be nice if… https://t.co/j5hCvAS4im

— Jason Pugh 🇨🇦 🏳️‍🌈 (@TheJasonPugh) December 5, 2024

Being Trump’s surrogate in Canada is not a winning strategy.

“Mr. Poilievre’s amplification of Mr. Trump’s criticisms left the impression he’s willing to side with Mr. Trump against Canadian interests as long as it helps to attack Mr. Trudeau.” https://t.co/tK010ZnTPk

— Mark Marissen 🇨🇦 🇳🇱 (@marissenmark) December 5, 2024

"Or maybe it’s just that that’s the only gear he’s got." I think that's right. Poilievre was raised in a very specific faith, and has existed in the role of an attack dog for his entire adult life. And if anything, Coyne *understates* how badly, how callowly, Poilievre fumbled the response.

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— Bruce Arthur (@brucearthur.bsky.social) December 4, 2024 at 3:25 PM

Poilievre’s new slogan “the border is broken” reminds us that when last in power his government slashed border security:
*every agent that tracked child porn
*19 dog-sniffing drug teams
*half the intelligence agents who track terrorists and gun & drug traffickers.
Great work, PP.

— Alison Creekside (@CreeksideAlison) December 5, 2024

Just to follow up on the "51st state" nonesense:

Canadians: there is much to worry about. Annexation by Trump's US is not one of them. Things to worry about: -tariffs -asylum requests by those Trump is targeting -Trump's reaction if Canada provides asylum -end of NATO but not annexation.

— Steve Saideman (@smsaideman.bsky.social) December 3, 2024 at 6:53 AM