What Pierre Poilievre did in answering trick media questions about how to deal with Donald Trump is teach a seminar in how it’s done.
“I think the first thing that president Trump should do when he gets into the Oval Office is to send a big bouquet of flowers to the Liberal government in Ottawa,” Poilievre told reporters at a news conference in British Columbia on Thursday.
Poilievre made it clear when he’s prime minister, Trump won’t be sending any more flowers because Canada will be run differently.
The Conservative Leader said “by blocking pipelines and LNG (Liquefied Natural Gas) plants in Canada, the Liberals have forced Canadians to sell almost all of our energy to the United States, giving President-elect Trump massive leverage in making these tariff threats.”
It effectively means the United States is getting Canadian oil at a discount, which counts as a subsidy and explains the trade surplus Trump references.
This, promises Poilievre, will change when he’s prime minister.
Poilievre said had the Trudeau government allowed “the energy east and northern gateway pipeline to go ahead, had they rapidly approved LNG plants to sell the natural gas that Japan, Greece, German and other countries were looking for us to sell them directly, we wouldn’t have to give almost 100% of our hydro carbons to the Americans at discount prices.”
Talking tough, Poilievre made it clear that if things had have been managed differently Canada would have been able to “go around the Americans” and “sell our energy directly” to other counties, “but that’s something that the Liberals would not let us do.”
He also reminded Canadians that Chrystia Freeland, who is expected to enter the race with Mark Carney to replace Trudeau, “supported killing the energy east pipeline which would have moved a million barrels of western oil to the St. John refinery and off to Europe, which by the way would have helped defund Putin.”
Poilievre was on fire in Delta, B.C., on the same day Carney was in Edmonton, Alb., to launch his campaign, which, if he is successful, may make him prime minister before the Conservative Leader even gets a chance at running in an election.
Make no mistake, while unorthodox with no Liberal leader and no firm vote date, this election campaign full steam ahead.
Whether it’s Carney getting millions of hits from his appearance on The Daily Show or Poilievre getting millions more on Dr. Jordan Peterson’s podcast – or the believed to be political hoax of somebody sending a white Rolls Royce replica stretch limousine to the Carney kickoff venue – this is shaping up to be a nasty, heavyweight battle.
While the limo would have made for a fun story saying ‘move over Marxist Maserati Jagmeet Singh and welcome the Limousine Liberal,’ its appearance looks like election tomfoolery to make a statement on Carney’s reputation as a one per cent elitist who jet sets with the billionaire class of the World Economic Forum.
While clever in its attempt, Carney didn’t appear to have anything to do with this limo.
But what it did show is how mean the campaign trail already is.
Another example was the clinging to power Liberals showed they are not fooling around on who they allow to get close to their potential new leader – calling Edmonton Police to throw out conservative independent media representatives from True North, The Western Standard and the Counter Signal.
Still, the Brookfield Asset Management Chair, Carney, was able to tell the approved media he intends to fix Canada’s failing economy.
“The Prime Minister and his team let their attention wander from the economy too often,” Carney told more than 100 supporters. “I won’t lose focus … If you remember one thing I say today – I am going to be completely focused on getting our economy back on track.”
Poilievre, meanwhile, tried to remind Canadians that Carney is no outsider but an insider who steered the Liberal’s wandering.
“Trudeau’s Chief Economic Advisor, Carbon Tax Carney, and former Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland supported this job-killing tax increase, which is further driving billions of dollars out of our country right as we face President Trump’s tariff threats,” said Poilievre. “This Liberal job and investment killing tax was a bad idea before President Trump’s tariff threat, it is outright insanity now.”
When it comes to Trump and his threatened 25% tariff, Poilievre was robust on his approach Thursday.
“We need to stand strong,” said Poilievre. “My message to President Trump is this: Canada will never be the 51st state and not only that, the free ride is over. The era of Liberal tax increases and anti-development policies that have driven a half trillion dollars of our money south of the border is over. ”
Poilievre promised he “will be cutting taxes, removing red tape and unleashing free enterprise to bring home hundreds of billion dollars of production and pay cheques to this country. We will be a free enterprise economy that delivers powerful pay cheques to our people. That will allow anyone from anywhere to achieve anything.”