Transcript
Zain
0:02
This is The Strategist, episode 987. My name is Zain Velji. With me, as always, Corey Hogan, Stephen Carter. What is going on, guys? Stephen Carter, listen, you are not in traditional surroundings. Do you want to tell us why we're recording at fucking 7.45 in the morning? And also, where are you?
Carter
0:22
We're recording at 7.45 in the morning because I am in Nashville, Tennessee, where I picked up some awards. because I'm pretty amazing.
Carter
0:32
that's why I'm here.
Corey
0:34
Who did you pick the awards up for? And
Carter
0:35
And to drive Corey crazy, you know, as always.
Zain
0:38
First of all, who did you pick up the awards? Good question, Corey. And secondly, Carter, I'm so glad you've adopted the there's no I in team adage. So that's good. You personally, Stephen Carter, have picked up some awards. What did you pick them up for?
Carter
0:50
Best International Campaign for the Jyoti Gandak campaign and Best Direct Mail in Canada for the Jyoti Gandak campaign. So Crystal Reynolds from Crystal Inc. had designed the brochures and the direct mail, and they were spectacular. So we entered them, and I thought, what the hell? I'll enter into the best campaign, and
Zain
1:15
Well, that's great. And I look forward to the official response. Really looking forward to seeing how that
Carter
1:22
that turns out. This is the official response. That is good. Okay, I'm glad to
Zain
1:26
to know that this is the official response.
Carter
1:28
yeah and it looks like i got something hanging up hey my head is hanging here it's just the halo
Carter
1:33
effect i set up the perfect i set up the perfect shot as always for our 17 live stream viewers uh welcome aboard well
Zain
1:42
well congratulations carter that is uh that is a big deal uh and i'm sure it will help uh ensure that steven carter can run more winning campaigns down the road that is actually pretty present inc
Carter
1:52
inc continues uh if anybody wants to hire me i am available available uh have
Zain
1:57
have you checked out the sites in nashville have you got to kid rocks honky tonk have you gone to the the three floor i tell
Carter
2:04
you told me you told me um you
Carter
2:07
you told me that everything was going to be fine and
Carter
2:10
it's not and uh it
Carter
2:13
it i don't like it here if i'm honest it's all drunk people uh listening to country music on scooters that look like they're going to hurt themselves and and if you've ever seen uh people on americans on scooters it's not good it's not good how
Zain
2:29
how is it that i like nashville being who i am and and and a place that i think is tailor-made for someone like you carter i think that's fair to say i
Carter
2:38
i will tell you i'm not a big fan of the middle-aged white people um
Carter
2:42
um not a big fan of them so
Carter
2:45
with you too welcome
Zain
2:46
to the show show cory carter's
Corey
2:49
big problem was he doesn't understand why there's mirrors everywhere in nashville and there's not it's
Corey
2:54
it's just many people
Carter
2:56
people like you talking it's like talking to my whole family like round-faced white people with no hair but i'll tell you i'm feeling pretty skinny i feel good about myself i feel good about my fitness level so that
Carter
3:07
that made me feel better okay
Zain
3:09
cory anything else do you want to tee up before we get started i
Corey
3:13
i don't know i think that this is is a nighttime energy show and now we've got to try morning energy and i don't think we're a morning energy show i
Zain
3:20
are you cursing the show to begin well why would you do that i'm trying to bring some fucking nighttime energy i haven't slept i've
Zain
3:28
i've been up all night i'm bringing some like legit vampire energy to the show this
Corey
3:34
this is actually my day off and stephen carter managed to make me have to record at 7 45 in the morning i
Carter
3:39
i just want i didn't i said we could just fuck over the subscribers and
Carter
3:43
and we didn't promise we
Zain
3:44
we didn't promise them an episode every thursday or every every week
Carter
3:49
we know but but nicole it's not like anything that mattered happened right like the cpc leadership debate like who the fuck cares no let's
Zain
3:56
let's let's use that as our segue and move it on to our first segment our first segment how much cory how much did you like that debate between one to two how much just give me a number how much how
Zain
4:06
how much did you like that you're talking about
Corey
4:08
about the conservative leadership
Zain
4:08
leadership debate how much did you like it on a scale of
Corey
4:11
of 1 to 10?
Zain
4:11
How much? How much? Just a number, Corey.
Corey
4:13
Corey. How much? Like a minus 5. How much?
Zain
4:14
much? Give it a number. Give it a number. A minus 5. You're not supposed to give it a... You know, he can't even commit to the bit, Carter. He can't even commit to the bit. Do you even know what I'm doing there, Corey? Listen,
Carter
4:23
Listen, I've been watching debates for a long time, and people pay me to watch debates. And I get paid to watch debates. Is that one of the services of
Carter
4:31
Stephen Carter Inc.? I get paid to watch debates for Stephen Carter Inc. And I was watching that debate. And yeah,
Carter
4:39
I'm not going to give you a number.
Carter
4:40
Now, you don't deserve a number.
Carter
4:43
I wouldn't give you a number because... You know what, Zane? I'm just going to release a tweet a bit
Corey
4:46
bit later that says, I'm firmly committed to not answering your question. How
Corey
4:51
much though, Carter? Just a number.
Carter
4:54
It's not... The money is not relevant. The ratings aren't relevant. We've been doing this for a thousand episodes now, and we've never really followed the scales, as you know, Zane. And you're not going to force me into some answer I don't want to give.
Zain
5:06
Okay. OK, so what I was doing there, for those who did not know, and which seemed like both Corey and Stephen, Corey
Corey
5:13
was certainly on board.
Zain
5:15
The debate was wild. It was a raucous debate. This was the Manning Center, as now known as the Canada Strong and Free Network, hosted a debate as part of their conference. Patrick Brown, one of the leadership candidates and arguably a friend of the pod, door number eight, was not on stage. But you had other candidates who certainly were, including Pierre Pallieva, Leslyn Lewis, Sean Sharae, amongst Scott Aitchison and Roman Baber. Guys, the debate itself was two hours in format, standard format debate that you'd see. But I have to say, the gloves seem to really be off. And the scorched earth rhetoric that at least the Pallieva campaign has been unleashing online and at rallies found its way on stage. age.
Zain
6:02
Corey, I want to get your initial thoughts. What did you think of that debate when you saw it? Did you watch it in its entirety? Maybe we start there. And what was your takeaway when you did?
Corey
6:15
good chunks of it. I would even say most of it. One of the things that this debate really struck me with is it was a rough watch for the reasons you talked about. I'm sure if this is your cup of tea, it was great. It was like wrestling. Wrestling is not my thing all the the time and
Corey
6:29
and um i found it difficult to sort of carry my way through which made me think like i'm i'm kind of deep in this politics thing right and if i was finding it difficult to watch i have to imagine uh you know a normal canadian would find it difficult to watch because it was uncomfortable it was uncomfortable to see the exchanges between poliev and lewis poliev and charre poliev and brown who wasn't even there uh you know it was just this pugilism that i found around anxiety inducing for a couple of different reasons one is just that awkward being in a room as two people are having a deeply inappropriate conversation and then the other is is this what canadian politics is going to become like i don't want to bemoan a time that
Corey
7:11
that didn't ever really exist dying right like where where is the altruistic politics of the past like when you know jean-christian strangled a guy like where are those good days where we're all so righteous but
Corey
7:21
but um it was because of everything we know about what's gone on in the united states and the trajectory they've been on and how that started and that pugilism that trump brought in 2015 2016 and now we see it like you know we often say canada politics is just america politics on time delay it
Corey
7:40
it it made me really really nervous and it was a tough watch carter
Zain
7:44
carter was it a tough wash for you and and i might double barrel a question was it a good debate uh
Carter
7:49
uh no it wasn't a good debate i mean but but what is a good debate uh to cory's point. I mean, let's not pretend like debates in the past have been this great thing that we all watched and loved and walked away from better people who understood the issues better. That's not what debates are now, and I'm not sure they ever were. So let's not expect that it was going to be a good debate, but I did not expect it to be a tragic train wreck.
Carter
8:16
Ultimately, what you're trying to do is create a theatrical performance that people want to watch. It is a performance that people want to see. And ultimately, you should be building up your party. And unfortunately, for the Conservatives, they've been taking the lessons of the Republican Party and
Carter
8:32
and tearing people down. Now, the Republican Party has a built-in advantage because they have a Senate and they have the ability to gerrymander their ridings. In Canada, we don't gerrymander the ridings quite as badly. I mean, there are some gerrymandered ridings, but nothing like the United States. So we get a much more accurate representation of our votes. But keep in mind that conservatives are winning, you know, getting more popular vote, getting fewer seats because they are getting more and more specifically located within geographic and demographic
Carter
9:04
groups. And this did nothing to step them out of those geographic or demographic groups. The people who like the conservatives, I suspect that Corey and I struggled with it because we don't identify with that party, me anymore, and Corey never. And, you know, I was hoping that Sheree would be better. And I do think that Sheree was the best on that stage for my type of conservatism, which is that old style progressive conservatism, but I'm not sure how that worked for anybody else.
Corey
9:32
Corey, jump in here.
Corey
9:34
Well, was it a good debate? In the sense, do I think it moved the Conservative Party of Canada forward? Fuck no. I mean, you've just created the next five liberal attack ads, regardless of who who wins, right? This is exactly what happened to Stéphane Dion in the leadership debates of the 2006 Liberal Leadership, where on stage he angrily proclaims to Ignatiev, do you think it is easy to make priorities, right? And then we all know what happened after that, that became on repeat for the next two years and defined Stéphane Dion.
Corey
10:08
If it's your jam, like
Corey
10:09
like if you like wrestling, if you are kind of of that worldview and you just want to see people fight bug for the camera and you
Corey
10:15
you know if you cheer for the heel then yeah i think it was absolutely a good debate because it was good it was wasn't
Corey
10:22
wasn't my television but it was it was if it's theater you're after you got theater and there were a lot of people online on twitter who said
Corey
10:31
this is uh you know the most informative debate they've ever seen because people got right into it they didn't hold their punches there were a number number of pundits who said uh they've had never seen a debate at this intensity before. So when you're hitting kind of the high score, if intensity is your thing, then yeah, it was a great debate. But do I think it helped their party or do I think it helped any of their individual campaigns?
Corey
10:54
Absolutely, I do not think it helped their party. And mostly, I don't think it helped their individual campaigns with a couple of caveats. Let's
Zain
11:00
Let's use that as a jumping off point, Carter.
Zain
11:04
Did it help any of the individual candidates from your perspective? And based on your answer, we'll kind of go in that direction.
Zain
11:10
Did what you witnessed, this scorched earth, everyone attacking everyone, Scott Aitchison, kind of the only one really arguing for some civility, but in the least charismatic way possible, did this debate have any individual winners, to Corey's point?
Carter
11:31
again this winners losers metric is is one that the the media have placed on debates i've only ever been involved in one debate i think uh
Carter
11:42
where the candidate is one well i shouldn't say that nahad denchia always used to wipe the floor with his competitors but the guy was like a professional debater and everybody else who was running against him had no skills at all and he was running against like 17 people so it's pretty easy to win the debate but
Carter
11:57
but in this type of situation this reminds me of the alice redford debate after her mother passed and that was the only debate i've ever remembered someone really winning because the other two couldn't win right the other two people could not win because she showed up and that was her victory and you know most of the time we look for that knockout punch you know we're going to see uh mulrooney versus turner or uh you know who was that vice president who took the shit out of dan quayle with the you you are not. I knew JFK. I knew Jack Kennedy, yeah. Lloyd Benson.
Carter
12:31
Lloyd Benson, yeah. That type of knockout blow, first of all, in the moment, it's hard to see sometimes. And secondly, they just don't happen in most of it.
Carter
12:42
did Leslyn Lewis look strong
Carter
12:45
strong standing up for the trucker convoy? I guess. I mean, if that's her jam, and it does appear to be her jam, She was able to position herself as the most lunacy compared to Pierre Palliev. I mean, if you want to stand up for lawlessness and the messages of the truckers, and that's what Lesley Lewis wants, then she looked like she took a piece out of Pierre. And Pierre, you know, but did Pierre take a piece out of Sture? I
Carter
13:14
I don't know. I think all they did was really show how hard it will be to bring together these two halves of this conservative movement. movement. And if they really do hit the half million mark, which is, you know, now the public speculation, if
Carter
13:28
if they can hit that half million mark, I mean, that tells me that it looks like both sides are coming to play.
Zain
13:35
Corey, I want to talk about Pierre Pallieva. And we've got a clip loaded. So let's see if this works. I want to play that first clip of Pierre Pallieva. This is now him attacking Jean Trey. I want folks to listen to this if they haven't had a chance yet. a
SPEAKER_04
13:49
a way when you were working for me either directly or indirectly just the number please how much
SPEAKER_04
13:56
just the number can i mr
SPEAKER_05
13:57
mr shreve talking about the company that stephen harper welcomed into canada please how much 2012
SPEAKER_05
14:04
student council here how much care this is not a student
SPEAKER_04
14:06
student council please this is
SPEAKER_04
14:09
is the security this is country mr
SPEAKER_04
14:11
charade it's not a laughing matter how much did you get from this
SPEAKER_04
14:14
is answer the question this
SPEAKER_05
14:15
company company that was welcomed in Canada by
SPEAKER_05
14:20
in 2012 for the telecommunications
SPEAKER_05
14:23
telecommunications company. How much? How much? And that's what Huawei did. How much did you pay? Welcomed in by a conservative government. How much did you pay? I am very proud of the fact that I also worked to free the two Michaels and to bring them back home. Oh, right. And if you want evidence of that, ask the wife of Michael Kovrig, Veena Najibullah. One
SPEAKER_07
14:41
One at a time, please. One at a time. Huawei paid you
SPEAKER_04
14:43
you to free the two Michaels. Come on. Come on. You've got some swamp land to sell us in Florida, too? Mr. Shrey, if you can continue.
SPEAKER_07
14:51
Mr. Shrey, please, the floor is yours. Thank you. Answer the question.
SPEAKER_05
14:55
Is this the country you believe in where people aren't allowed to talk? I'd like to hear the number. Can I talk? Answer the question. I
SPEAKER_05
15:02
I want to talk about this. How
SPEAKER_04
15:05
Mr. Polyev, let's give Mr. Shrey a chance to respond.
SPEAKER_05
15:11
Thank you very much. Thank you, Jameel. What are you hiding? Thank you, Jameel.
SPEAKER_05
15:15
can i can i ask a question i
SPEAKER_05
15:17
i we've there's been a lot of talk of freedom right now well
SPEAKER_05
15:20
well i have a question for mr buddy f how
Zain
15:22
how much did you enjoy that clip carter how much did you enjoy that clip i i
Carter
15:25
i want to hurt myself every time i
Carter
15:27
i see that just to
Zain
15:29
to that cory cory you were going to jump in there and i want to talk about polyev and i want to use this clip as a jumping
Corey
15:34
jumping off point go ahead it's
Corey
15:35
it's such a rough listen even the second time right i i do find it actually very very frustrating. And in some ways, the clip, I think, it's a bit of a Rorschach test. You're going to see in it what you want to see in it. For many people, they'll say, look at Polyev and the way he's holding them to account. I mean, that would be fucking sociopathic behavior in any office if somebody was having a discussion. Why do we put up with it in politics? Absolutely beyond me. The swipe that Asheray made about we're not on a student council, I don't think does service to student councils which act with far more decorum than uh than i saw polyev act there he's acting like an asshole on a student council not like a student council more generally and um and yet that's what a lot of people are going to be really drawn to how tough he is it seems how aggressive he is how it's not something that he's going to let sheree off the hook on
Corey
16:28
found it hard to watch i found it hard to watch and it didn't make me think better of pierre polyev watching it and
Corey
16:33
and i wonder how many canadians are like me and i wonder how many Canadians are not like me. I think this is the big
Corey
16:38
big open question for the Conservative Party as they move forward.
Zain
16:42
Carter, let's talk about it, to Corey's point, in the confines of this leadership. Do you think this was a winning moment? This was a winning sort of strategy by Polyar? Because this was just a sample, and I'd say this was the most extreme sample of how he acted.
Zain
16:56
But he was pretty much this way the entire debate. He had that we charity interrogation had on in that clip, but he was squashed to earth with Jean Charest, called him a liberal all the time. We'll talk about Jean Charest's answer on that, but I want to talk about the pure sort of effectiveness of what you saw, or lack thereof, or pure polyamory right here. For the confines and the purposes of the leadership, effective, Carter?
Carter
17:21
No, well, I don't think so. I would never, ever advise one of my clients to speak to
Carter
17:26
to another client like that. I mean, I'm looking for a line, I'm looking for a takedown, but
Carter
17:31
but I'm not, you know, if
Carter
17:33
if you were badgering the witness, right? I mean, to Corey's point, where would we see this type of behavior? I mean, go to a workplace and exhibit this type of behavior and tell me how long you last. It would be less than 100 days. I'll tell you that right now.
Corey
17:50
Are we filling in some pictures here or like what's going on? No,
Carter
17:55
It's a joke. I took it. better
Carter
17:57
better me making it than someone else but the the the challenge is um pierre thinks it's a winning strategy and pierre yeah has has been the captain of the boys in short pants club uh and this club has existed for for generations right it goes back to rob anders jason kenny and ezra levant uh back in the first you know the first preston manning days um you know and then it kind of shifts into the conservatives and uh the boys in short pants are the guys who are We're working on, you know, in Harper's office. And they're the ones keeping everybody in line. And no one likes those guys.
Carter
18:33
But they write their stuff for their audience. And ultimately, now Pierre Pallieva has picked up the boys in short pants, you
Carter
18:40
you know, mantle and is carrying that as though he has, as though it's won something. It never has won anything. You know, the guy who is this asshole tends not to win. So he may win this leadership. leadership um we still you know we're we're we're
Carter
18:57
we're hedging on that because we're not sure of the efficacy of his of his of his uh of his tactics um but if he wins this leadership i and behaves like this in the house of commons and i mean i guess everybody behaves like this in the house of commons but it's generally you know uh this
Carter
19:14
this isn't this isn't someone that people are going to feel comfortable as their next prime minister let's
Zain
19:18
let's talk about that cory because that's what what you made mention of earlier stretch
Zain
19:23
stretch your mind from the perspective of what team pierce trying to think in terms of implementing this scorched earth um strategy this hyper assertive one may even call it american style divisive strategy how
Zain
19:39
how do you think they're trying to wrap their mind around how this helps them in a general i i don't i mean or do you think they're even thinking about that
Corey
19:47
that right now thinking about the
Zain
19:48
election they're trying to win right now i've
Corey
19:49
i've I've said this about Polly F before he's, he's good at code shifting. He's good at changing who he needs to be for the room. And he's in a Manning center room. By
Corey
19:57
By the way, the evolution of the conservative party can really be, you know, illustrated by the Manning center becoming Canada strong and free. Explain that.
Corey
20:05
Well, because it went from kind of this, you know, think tank sounding name tied to a stalwart within the party to a slogan, like to an empty slogan that just sounds tough and is ultimately about platitudes. And, um,
Corey
20:20
In that room, he obviously had the room. He had more cheers. He had people booing against Jean Charest, who was a guy who won as a conservative in Quebec, you know, multiple elections. It's just, you know, it's a crazy thing to me that he would get a hostile reception from some of those people on certain comments. I shouldn't overstate, you know, his response.
Corey
20:43
well, look, if you are Poliev and you're in that room and you're trying to win a leadership race you
Corey
20:50
you gave the you gave the crowd what they came to pay for right and so uh the question is is it wise because this stuff is now going to bleed into a general election but i think he's
Corey
21:00
he's taking a one foot in front of the other approach and in some ways i can't blame him because it does seem like that's how you're going to win the conservative party leadership at this point but
Corey
21:09
but uh if if this were his approach in a general and i have no reason actually to believe that
Corey
21:15
it 100% will be, although I think he is who he is. Well, then I think, yeah, he would get absolutely smoked. But we're not in the general election right now. And, you know, the fact that we've talked so much about him relative to the other people on stage right now speaks to the effectiveness of that strategy. We are all reacting to Pierre Poliev today.
Zain
21:33
Of course we are. And he was the lightning rod of that debate, arguably. Carter, jump in here.
Carter
21:38
Well, I just want to remind people that, you know, So Andrew Scheer
Carter
21:41
Scheer and Aaron O'Toole both behaved one way in their leadership and then tried to code shift into
Carter
21:47
into into a different role when
Carter
21:49
when they when they were the leader of the Conservative Party. And it failed because
Carter
21:54
because people, you know, because you get to see the video clip that we just played. In
Carter
21:59
In fact, that's what we have
Zain
22:00
have is arguing against that. I will be the same person through and through. Yeah.
Carter
22:05
Yeah. And I think he thinks that that audience is much larger than it is. The numbers that I see, the numbers that I see in my polls and the work that we do on the election stuff, that doesn't show, right? There is a group of Canadian Conservatives that look very much like the Republican Party in the U.S. It's 10 to 12 percent. The rest of the Canadian Conservatives are less loyal to that particular brand structure, and they need to be won back with every election.
Carter
22:33
They can shift. And it turns out Canadians can shift who they're voting for. You are not held to vote for the party that you voted for last time.
Carter
22:43
So how do you win back not just the people that you need to win to
Carter
22:47
to win a majority, but
Carter
22:49
but how do you win back the people that were drawn to your party in the past? us
Zain
22:53
uh great i want to talk about the built to win guy i want to talk about jean charre but before we jump into him can we use this peer clip that we just listened to that i made you listen to uh which carter loved uh which i know he he loved and adored cory what did you think of his huawei answer jean charre which was ultimately broken down as stephen harper brought this company into canada i will not give you the number i helped save the the michaels and bring them back
Corey
23:21
back to canada those
Zain
23:22
those were elementally i mean amongst the interruptions that the three-part answer that he then gave much more cleanly later on in the debate quality
Zain
23:29
quality of that answer what do you think i
Corey
23:32
i i think they've obviously thought a lot about that they've thought about what would be a good message and uh it was on paper a solid response right at least parts of it i think the stephen harper part was a good rejoinder right like there was a time where huawei was seen as a partner not as an opponent and uh
Corey
23:49
you know times change but the time the context in which he was helping huawei was very different than the context we find ourselves in today the
Corey
23:58
the i will not give you the number answer um i mean i wouldn't expect anything else but part of me thinks he should have just given the number right like what would
Corey
24:07
would you have done carter well
Corey
24:08
well let's say let's say the number is eight hundred thousand dollars eight hundred thousand dollars how
Carter
24:12
how do we know what the number is i mean you we've all worked for companies i mean we never got we
Carter
24:17
never got a chat like we worked for xyz organization
Carter
24:20
organization when we were working with hill and nolton i mean people could dig out the the contracts and the work that we did um they should because they could use that shit against me no no never mind ignore that that's not true jesus christ
Carter
24:36
god we're not alive oh
Carter
24:38
yeah Yeah, thank God. We're going to edit that out, right?
Carter
24:42
But the truth of the matter is, how much money did we make from any one project? I have no fucking clue.
Corey
24:47
Well, sure, because revenue and profit, too, and all of that. Right,
Carter
24:50
Right, I mean, you get a
Carter
24:51
a piece of this, you get a piece of that. How much money did I make from all that?
Corey
24:55
no clue. Why look like you're hiding something? Why look like you're hiding something? Because I literally can't
Carter
24:58
can't answer your question,
Corey
24:59
question, Corey. Well, we got paid for that work.
Carter
25:02
you for your unpaid internship. I can't answer your question because I
Carter
25:04
I was a part of an organization. that organization had a contract with another client. I mean, if you'd ever worked before in your life, Pierre, if you'd ever worked in private enterprise,
Carter
25:15
would have actually learned how private enterprise works.
Carter
25:19
Because you haven't had a job in the real world. You came into politics from the birth canal. And as a result, you haven't actually experienced what real Canadians have experienced. And that is, you work for your employer, and sometimes you do things that you maybe wouldn't want to do. When you get paid for it, and you don't have a number that you can answer so
Corey
25:34
there was a trajectory there you went from good answer to fantastic answer to not so good answer when
Corey
25:39
when you're like sometimes i had to do things i didn't want to do yeah i was gonna ask i
Carter
25:45
i'm just making this up on the spot we can workshop this this is normally how that
Corey
25:49
was so i think
Corey
25:50
think that was a better
Zain
25:50
thank you for creating a safe collaborative space cory carter was big vulnerable with us he was trying to put it out there first draft and you're like this
Corey
25:57
this fucking sucks at the end no i think it was good i think we have um i think we've got a better the answer and that's where charie should go the two michaels thing sounds diluted even if it's true it sounds diluted and so i think he should have dropped that part of it but the the initial part was fine so uh but you know he
Corey
26:16
he didn't even get a chance because he just got like this crazy badgering he
Carter
26:19
he didn't connect the michaels thing properly he
Carter
26:22
he didn't connect it properly didn't explain how it flows and it flows like this my relationship with how way or what you i or whatever the hell i can't even pronounce it because it really you know it doesn't make sense to me it's too many letters um but i i the way he should have connected that
Carter
26:39
yeah i'm in nashville tennessee this is what happens when you're down here um but this this this the challenge is that the relationship that we develop the relationship that we develop with the chinese government actually pays off and
Carter
26:53
and this is why stephen harper invited the chinese Chinese government in to invest in multiple projects, whether it was our oil and gas industry or in our telephone industry. We invited the Chinese in because having a good trading relationship with China is integral to our national security, which enabled me to work on releasing the two Michaels. Because I had that relationship, I was able to make the phone calls that needed to be made. This is essential to having a good relationship with China, uh which trudeau is throwing away trudeau
Carter
27:26
trudeau is throwing that relationship away and we need to have a better relationship with china i can bring that cory
Zain
27:33
cory how did charrette come off overall for you he
Zain
27:35
he clearly didn't win the room but it wasn't his room uh
Zain
27:38
uh but i want to get your sense from how he came up overall and frankly what the stakes for charrette were last night arguably the guy that has underperformed thus far or has seemed to have quite a lethargic campaign where it matters that's far so
Corey
27:53
so between his natural comfort in that kind of setting uh his experience and his ability to answer the questions his ability even to deliver quips when he needed to deliver them and the fact that polio have continually made him his opponent he in some ways he elevated himself you could have made the argument that he was a horse that was fading in a race right now people are talking more about patrick brown's strategy talk about leslin lewis's strategy uh i've
Corey
28:18
i've i got got other thoughts on the other two but i'll hold them for a minute but he
Corey
28:22
he um instead he came off as like one of the two people that this was a the election between um in in all of those different contexts so i
Corey
28:31
i don't think it was a bad night for him obviously he didn't win the room but i think there were a lot of people who were watching this between their fingers you know just saying my god this is dreadful can we let the conservative party become this even non-conservatives and i suspect more than a few of them uh dropped 15 to buy party memberships after that to support quarter.
Zain
28:49
Carter, I want to get you in on a second, but I want to follow up with what Corey said here very quickly so I don't lose it. Corey, was
Zain
28:55
was it a mistake for Polyev to engage directly
Corey
28:58
directly with Sharae, or
Zain
28:59
or did he have to do that for who he is as a person? I mean, Polyev, that is in terms of his interrogation style, his almost dickishness on stage. Did he need a physical opponent there and that engaging with Sharae had to happen, or was it a strategic mistake in your mind to perhaps not elevate a guy that might very well be in third or fourth place, arguably, in membership sales. I don't know, but it's quite possible.
Corey
29:24
Yeah, well, I don't know. I mean, after the fundraising numbers, I'm less likely to think he's in third or fourth place on membership because he came in second in dollars. And there does tend to be a bit of a correlation there. But I'll
Corey
29:34
I'll tell you something.
Corey
29:37
My mind immediately goes to like four-dimensional chess space, right? Which is, if Brown had been on the the stage, maybe Polyev would have seemed less like he was picking Charest. And maybe it was tactically advantageous to both Brown and Charest that Brown was not there because Polyev did not have the option of going against any of the other three people at the stage because of the need for votes to collapse the way they need to collapse. He couldn't truly
Corey
30:00
truly get into a fight with Lesley Lewis. He can defend himself against her accusations, but he can't go on the offensive, right?
Corey
30:07
And one of the things that was wild about this debate for me is that
Corey
30:12
everybody went into it with such a clearly different strategy, right? You know, you had Poliev showing that, like, he's the fighter and he's going to be that darling of the right. And you had Charest trying to stand up for normalcy. And I think that his campaign has shifted away from built to – I mean, there was a lot of built to win. Like, I'm the Bloc Quebecois retirement plan was the line that he kind of flubbed. But it was a good line, I think, substance.
Corey
30:36
substance. substance um and then you had uh lewis who was trying to take the take the social progress or social conservative mantle and suggest that uh poliev can't you
Corey
30:47
you know you're not just trying to be finance minister you're trying to be prime minister you have to answer these questions also a good line of the night atchison
Corey
30:53
atchison was clearly trying to be everybody's third fucking choice you know like when you mark your ballot you know the the alphabet begins with a so you should when When you run out of choices you care about, start with me, right?
Corey
31:06
then Beverly was just trying to remind people that he exists. So it was really interesting to me because they weren't trying to win. I mean, in some ways, that speaks to smart campaign strategy for all of them because they have different things they need.
Corey
31:19
But they were all in a different debate.
Corey
31:22
And that was kind of cool as much as I hated the debate.
Zain
31:25
Oh, that's interesting. Carter, I want to go back to the original question here about Jean Charest. how do you rank,
Zain
31:31
rank, rate, assess his performance from last night? The stakes seem to be higher for him in the sense of like a lot of people saying Jean Charest, you know, just wait till the debates come. That's where Charest, you know, is truly who he is. How do you perform for you, Carter?
Carter
31:47
I thought he looked good. I mean, I think that he looks and sounds like
Carter
31:52
like he's not terrified of that situation. I mean, Pierre Pauliev is not a skilled debater in the in the a sense of true
Carter
32:00
debate, but he is a skilled performer in the realm of a trained SEAL that can yell things.
Carter
32:10
lighting himself on fire and going after Charest, Charest managed that and survived that attack. And I think that this is one of the interesting pieces pieces of it, is that Charest was
Carter
32:25
chosen by Pierre the way I think that Notley was chosen by Prentice in 2015 in Alberta. You know, when you choose your opposition, when you go after someone intently, like- You mean as the front
Zain
32:38
front runner in that sense, or as the perceived front runner?
Carter
32:43
who's in second and who's in third really matters in this format. Because if you're you're in third, you're ultimately choosing the winner, right? Your second place votes move
Carter
32:52
everybody. So if Lesley Lewis, for example, is in third, then
Carter
32:55
then when she drops off,
Carter
32:57
if her votes move predominantly
Carter
32:58
predominantly towards Pierre Pauliev, then Pierre Pauliev will win.
Carter
33:02
If it's Patrick Brown who's in third and
Carter
33:04
and his votes move to Charest, then Charest will ultimately win because that's just the way the math works for the most part. I mean, it could, you know, if he's within two percentage points or something like that then it won't matter but the
Carter
33:20
choosing to make charre number two choosing to
Carter
33:24
say the negative things and and not go after leslin not not you know that's telling me that charre is stronger and by attacking charre he made charre stronger uh if he leveled out across everybody or better
Carter
33:39
better yet not attacked anybody uh
Carter
33:41
uh pierre prolyev could have been in in a much different position where he he would have held the dominant front runner position in everybody's analysis the next day because he didn't attack anybody why didn't he attack anybody because he knows he's going to win he's
Carter
33:54
he's not afraid of anybody well
Corey
33:56
well and he doesn't want to blow up the party he thinks he's going to be leading right
Carter
33:59
right if because you
Carter
34:00
you know i didn't go after charre i mean i certainly saw a lot there's lots of things charre came after me but i didn't go back after him because i want everybody who votes for jean charre on the first ballot to be be there with me at the last is
Zain
34:13
that what you have is that what you would have suggested to peer and then would have been like this guy can't help himself like it's just his brand can't be fully unleashed or it cannot be fully um resonant with the with the population whether in that room or on social media afterwards without being in full attack mode it
Carter
34:33
would have been a fascinating debate if he'd chosen to be a statesman instead of more restrained um
Carter
34:38
um you know if he'd chosen to be the leader would have been fascinating cory
Corey
34:42
yeah i you know for his campaign i think the risk has to be this could be a classic win the battle lose the war thing yes he won the room he maybe even won the conservative membership as it stands with that performance of the debate and
Corey
34:54
and yeah like we said he's he's obviously taking a stepwise approach to this thing but
Corey
34:59
that that was tough not just because the liberals will be creating campaign ads about it carter have alluded to this, but how do you sit there?
Corey
35:08
is as good or as bad in life as you think it is, right? But how do you sit there and think this party is going to be a united party once they choose their next leader? This was fucking crazy. This didn't even seem like it was two people in the same political philosophy, let alone party, right?
Zain
35:23
Speaking of philosophy, Corey, can we play this next clip? It's clip three, where Sheree talks about and defends his liberal past. I want I want to use this as a jumping off point around how much of an issue this is for Charest going forward, but also the content of his answer for that room. So if we're able to play that, Corey. Can I take a moment to lay
SPEAKER_05
35:41
lay to rest this accusation of being a liberal? I know. No, no. But please bear with me. Bear with me. I fought the 95 referendum and I'm in this race because I believe in the unity of the country. I think Western alienation has lasted long enough. And what I see there, I've seen in Quebec, and I ran in 95, I fought in the referendum, and I went to lead a coalition in Quebec of Federalists when there was no Conservative Party of Quebec, ladies and gentlemen, as is the case in British Columbia. And you know what? I was successful. We pushed back on that referendum, and Canada stayed united.
SPEAKER_05
36:23
And believe me, if I was able to fight back the separatists, It's not this guy here on the stage tonight that's going to intimidate me and stop me from defending Canada. That's for sure. That will never happen.
Zain
36:36
Carter, react to that.
Carter
36:38
thought it was really positive. I mean, this is what I'm talking about. He he has the ability to to
Carter
36:45
show on a stage like that, that he has the credentials and he has the ability. Like he's not intimidated by that situation. It would be very easy to be intimidated by Pierre Paulievre doing his, you know, little skippy thing. You know, attack, attack, attack, attack, attack, answer the question, answer the question. You know, you don't get to set the terms of how your question is answered. You get to set the terms of how your question is asked. That's it. it. And Charest pushed back. This was a good performance for Charest. And a core
Carter
37:15
core conservative value is, in fact, keeping Quebec part of Canada.
Carter
37:20
There are the crazy Western separatists. But again, if you want to appeal to that group,
Zain
37:29
react to what you heard from Charest there, both from the perspective of how he presented that answer. And then I also want to talk about the content of that answer as well. Yeah,
Corey
37:36
Yeah, you don't do multiple terms as Premier of Quebec without being tough, right? And I do think that there's something to what he was saying about, I'm not going to be intimidated by this guy. It's a reminder that he's played for bigger stakes than Pierre Poliev ever has, right?
Corey
37:52
right? So there's some subtext there that I think is interesting too. And for a certain group of conservatives, the older group, frankly, you know, if you're probably
Corey
38:00
probably 40 plus, you think about Charest and you think about Charest as the young guy at one point, right?
Corey
38:06
That's going to be a bit of nostalgia and a bit of a reminder of maybe an idealized version of conservatism that we don't see as much of these days.
Corey
38:15
I had a political mentor, Pat Braymaker was her name. She was a leader in liberal politics here in Calgary. and
Corey
38:23
and she always told me the secret to politics was i this stuck with me this is like this is the lesson i think uh being able to walk into a room of people who hate you and smile and i thought that charie did a pretty excellent job of
Corey
38:38
of i don't think that room hated him i mean you can hear the applause at certain points but it wasn't a friendly room either you know he got booze at different points too um
Corey
38:47
he he can live that like he he looked animated he even looked sweaty at times but he never looked like it was the room that was upsetting him it looked like it was like the what the these guys are this guy's an asshole you know but uh but not losing control carter
Zain
39:01
carter i want to talk about um leslie lewis and i'm going to come back to all of the the major candidates in a second but leslie lewis on the far right was stage right uh was on the screen um had a lot of well let's be clear conspiracy theory related comments that she made about you know vaccines and in And frankly, I'd say this debate was very much pro-trucker, anti-mandate. I think that was a through line, that the deeper you were in that wasn't a liability,
Zain
39:33
will be going forward, one would imagine, in a general, but it was an asset on that stage in terms of getting the applause and adulation. But I want to play this exchange with Polyev she had, which was really debating the intensity of both of their commitments to truckers. The
SPEAKER_07
39:47
Democratic Party didn't stand up for freedom during the pandemic. Pierre? there.
SPEAKER_04
39:51
Well, I did stand up for freedom during the pandemic from the very beginning. That's not true. I was among the loudest voices that you
SPEAKER_00
39:57
you were not one of the loudest voices, Mr. Polly. You were not one of the loudest voices. In fact, you did not speak up until Actually, that is not true, Madam Lewis. Judge Ray says this guy should be disqualified for supporting and attending the trucker protest. He also, to Corey's point, has another side debate with another candidate being like, I was fucking there. I was there the whole time. I fucking did. I funded
SPEAKER_04
40:21
funded them. I had a chat there. Literally, I was the most pro-trucker protest. I was there at the trucker protest. I was on the street. I
Zain
40:30
I was in there and supporting. Let's talk about her because I don't want to talk about Pierre anymore in that regard. How does this play for her? And walk me through what you think her strategy is here.
Corey
40:39
Well, she's carving out that social conservative niche. She's carving out the further to the right of Pierre Poliev camp.
Corey
40:45
And I don't know. I mean, I'd be curious to see what their strategy is in terms of who they think is going to be on the last ballot. Because if they think the last ballot is coming down between her and Poliev, but social conservatives are going to carry the balance, where are they coming from if not her? right and if she thinks that the last ballot is going to be her versus charrette doesn't she want to be a little bit friendlier and say we were the only ones standing up but i'm the one who stand it up most you know
Corey
41:11
i like i i would need some time with a whiteboard and with their team to say walk me through why you think this is a good strategy but i think on its most fundamental basic level she's saying there's some blue ocean over here i can be the person who's further right than pierre poliev and that's where i'm going to sell my memberships and that's how i'm going to grow grow my party. And perhaps that's the solution. Maybe the answer is just all of those mechanics I just talked about are irrelevant to her. She's just trying to flood the party with people who have that intensity, that intensity that led them to Parliament Hill, you know, and just
Corey
41:45
just that weird shit that went on in Ottawa. Maybe, you know, she's saying, look how much money they raised, look how many people that got involved in that cause. Every one of them buys a membership for me, this thing's over carter
Zain
41:58
being painted as less right than leslin lewis for peer polygraph doesn't seem like a terrible thing does
Zain
42:04
does it like and i don't want to get into conspiracy theory of what they're doing behind the scenes mo that's not what i'm suggesting but there is some value for peer to be the darling of the right but not be the most right-wing candidate isn't there no
Carter
42:16
no i i don't believe so i mean i think that the best case for him is that leslin lewis um picks up uh you know Comes in third, as I was describing, right? Because if she's the third place candidate and it's Pierre and assuming that he doesn't win on an earlier ballot, then when she drops,
Carter
42:34
you know, he'll pick up the vast majority of her votes or
Carter
42:38
they won't vote for anybody else and he'll still win, right? Because there's no way her voters are moving all the way to Sheree, right?
Carter
42:45
So from his point of view, you know, her being in third is great. There is no strategy where Lesley Lewis picks up any votes. I mean, Corey's hilarious. She doesn't have a strategy. She has an ideology. An ideology and strategy are often incompatible. This particular situation, there is no strategy. She has an ideology. And when you read the tweets
Carter
43:09
tweets and you read the madness of her statements and you read all of these elements,
Carter
43:14
this is crazy to me that she thinks she can win this leadership. but I don't know that she needs to. Here's my boldest prediction. We
Zain
43:24
asked, but here we go, Carter. She's
Carter
43:25
She's going to do worse than she did in the last one. Really? Yeah, because I think that before there was a case of
Carter
43:33
this is a visible minority woman in the Conservative Party that is
Carter
43:37
is bright, has a tremendous upside, could redefine a Conservative movement to a large, large portion of the population. And now we've heard her speak. And we hadn't really heard her speak in the last leadership. I think that she picked up, you know, she was kind of under the radar as O'Toole and McKay battled their mano a mano battle. And Lewis kind of came up, you
Carter
44:00
you know, with the far right. There was no Pierre Pauliev in that race. Now, I think with Pierre there and, you know, again, seeing her more
Carter
44:11
more fully, more completely, I think that she actually drops like a stone. on
Zain
44:15
uh cory i want to play this quick uh clip from patrick brown at the debate yesterday he had a really uh viral moment there we are i
Corey
44:27
i can't was it worth it saying was it
Zain
44:30
worth it it was worth it it was good carter carter did brown kind of now there was actually an explicit question about patrick brown it was actually framed quite quite divisively by by one of the moderators is Jamil Jivani, who said something like Patrick Brown is trying to sow divisions in diaspora communities and could not be here on the stage today or some shit like that. I'm paraphrasing. And then they asked everyone to just take a take a shot at Patrick Brown, who was definitely not on stage.
Zain
44:57
Carter, did Brown kind of win by not being there? Or did you need to be there? Did you need to be in front of those cameras in front of that audience and in front of Canadians? He's He's been running a missing persons candidate candidacy and campaign. No one knows where he is. Very few, if zero, mainstream media interviews and not on the stage. Did he win by not appearing or was this a strategic mistake from your perspective, Carter?
Carter
45:20
Well, the Conservative Party hasn't been putting their candidates into in local debates for years, especially if you're a sitting MP. So their thinking is that you're better off on the doors, you're better off at the events doing the work that you need to do than
Carter
45:33
than to go to a debate. Now, that's
Carter
45:37
that's wrong in the local campaign and it's wrong also in this campaign. Patrick Brown should have been at this event. It gave him the opportunity to showcase himself in third place and
Carter
45:50
and to really even
Carter
45:52
even challenge Sharae for second. second, but it does beg the question, is
Carter
45:57
is Patrick Brown running to win, or
Carter
45:59
or is Patrick Brown running to support his mentor, Jean Charest?
Zain
46:04
Corey, what do you think of Brown not being on that stage? Strategic win for him? We've talked about the gamesmanship of Pierre having no additional choice to knock down outsider Charest in that regard. What did Patrick Brown's absence mean for Patrick Brown?
Corey
46:20
don't again it really depends on what his strategy is it's not inherently a bad idea for in my opinion because as i said the
Corey
46:28
the the liberals have their next campaign ad from this the acrimony between parties raised if he actually thinks he has a shot what's interesting to me is not being there might have been the play because there is no footage of somebody going well i mean there's the footage of the moderator going after him and then one by one but there's not the exchange right right? You don't have like the meek protests or anything along those lines. And you also don't have the acrimony that comes from being in the fight. Like he just sort of tapped out of the fight. He's going to go, he's going to sell his memberships. He's going to do his thing. He
Corey
47:00
He has been so under the radar.
Corey
47:03
And, you know, it's interesting to speculate, is this because he's hoping to just move a bunch of votes to Sharae and say Sharae is my second choice and and flood them in or
Corey
47:12
or is he thinking you
Corey
47:14
know what this is a this is a clown car and at the end of the day somebody's got to put this party together and if i want to be the leader of this party i've got to stay away from this and
Corey
47:22
and i suspect it is neither i suspect it's more this
Corey
47:26
this isn't where i'm gonna win i don't want to get beaten up on this stage i'm just gonna go sell memberships you know there's an occam's razor more of
Zain
47:32
of a conventional strategy rather than this like 3d chess that he's playing yeah
Corey
47:39
don't want to give him too little or too much credit on this front i you know at the end of the day i think he just decided what's the upside
Corey
47:45
it's a room that the manning center's put together that's going to be totally in the tank for uh poliev it's
Corey
47:49
it's going to come off as an absolute fucking shit show the more people on the stage the more of a shit show it's going to look like i'm going to be wrestling with a bunch of midgets uh like atchison to just get airtime so no i'm not i'm not going to bother and
Corey
48:03
and you know I have a hard time having watched most of that debate thinking he made the bad call. I'm not so sure about that. Well,
Zain
48:13
Well, there will be more calls to be made, Corey, so I'll follow up with you on this. If you watch that as Team Brown yesterday, would you say we're sticking with the strategy for future debates of
Zain
48:24
not showing up, I mean, to
Corey
48:25
to be clear? Yeah, I mean, maybe, maybe not. There's also, depends on what you think you can do there, because part of me thinks if If there's an overcorrection and all of a sudden people are like, well, that was bad and we need to behave ourselves, maybe that's the time to jump in and sit and then
Corey
48:38
then almost take credit for the improved debate performance, right? Right, because
Zain
48:42
try to act more civil after seeing
Corey
48:43
seeing the pundit turn
Zain
48:44
turn the company. I mean, I'm really stretching. There's no way. Carter, same question to you. Your team, Brown, this morning, you watched last night. Would you change strategy on debate attendance for your candidate?
Carter
48:57
No, once you've chosen the strategy, you have to stick to the strategy. you got to stick it out and say we're never going to one of these debates that's not what this election is won or lost uh we saw pierre pauliev behave like a lunatic we saw him fighting for um you know lawlessness we saw him attacking jean charre in a baseless fashion uh i'm not participating in that and i don't think anybody else should i mean i can i can wrap my head around we're
Carter
49:21
that he's not attended he
Carter
49:22
he should have gone yeah we're
Zain
49:24
we're gonna leave that segment there move it on to our final segment our over under and our lightning round steven Steven Carter, we do this for you. It all happens because of you. I want to go through each of the candidates and I want you guys to draw a quick one or two sentence go forward plan for how they leverage the debate. It could be the clips, it could be the tone, it could be the lack of participation. Let's start with Jean Charest. Steven Carter, what is Jean Charest doing this Friday morning after the debate? Is he releasing certain clips? Is he putting out a fundraising appeal? Give me the Charest Friday to Sunday strategy on debate leverage. If
Carter
49:57
it were me, I'd be having him call all of the big foreheads of the Conservative Party from the 1980s until today and saying, we're surely to God not letting that clown run this thing. That was a shit show. We saw how bad it was. I need your money. I need your membership lists. I need all the things that you haven't yet given me. I need it all because we're not going to let the Conservative Party be run by that. Yeah.
Zain
50:24
Corey, the Friday to Sunday Jean Charest post-debate strategy, what is it for you?
Corey
50:28
I would do that. I do a bunch of things coming out of that. One of the things I might consider doing is leaning into the fact that there were a lot of those acrimonious attacks, wild audience reactions and whatnot. I could almost envision an ad targeted to blue liberals of him giving his convoy response and being booed and say, you know, he's tough enough to stand up for Canada, no matter how no matter how inconvenient, right? It's tough enough to stand up for the rule of law, civility in politics. Are you tough enough to stand up with him or something along those lines? And just have that audience towards people who are thinking, oh
Corey
51:03
oh God, I don't know. Like, is this really the train track we're on? I think there's opportunity there.
Zain
51:10
Corey, I'm going to stick with you. Pierre Polyarver, what
Zain
51:12
what are you doing the Friday to Sunday post-debate strategy for Pierre? Is it just go ham on social media with some of the clips? I saved you, by the way, I sent you more clips. I saved you some of those other ones. Is it more than that? Is it leaning
Zain
51:28
leaning into it? Is it maybe being a little bit silent, kind of seeing how the response went, cooling your jets a bit? What is the Pierre Pauly-Everest Friday to Sunday post-debate strategy for you,
Corey
51:37
you, Corey? I think you've picked your track. You go on the offensive. You say, we've still not gotten answers on Huawei. Huawei, we still don't have, you
Corey
51:45
you know, a clear understanding of why anybody in their right mind would elect a liberal to run the Conservative Party. Electing liberals is what gets us into trouble. Look at what happened with our last election, blah, blah, blah. You know, you just keep going. It's business as usual. You don't want to overcorrect at this point. You're him.
Zain
52:00
For Carter, I should say the Pierre Paul, you have strategy Friday to Sunday post debate. What is it for you?
Carter
52:05
I like what Corey said. I think that it's reconstructing it into a speech, because obviously, he's not going to walk away from his rally structure. And that new speech is, I couldn't even get an answer, right? I couldn't get an answer. People are trying to question my commitment to freedom.
Carter
52:22
freedom. Well, this campaign is entirely about freedom. I can just rewrite it into a speech that casts him as the hero, which has been his primary tactic from the beginning.
Zain
52:32
Carter, Patrick Brown, what is he up to? Does he wade in at all in terms of what he saw on the stage? Does he make an attack ad or poison the well and say, look at these clowns here i'm going to kind of do my work he's been silent in most like traditional and social media ways for the most part does he wait in at all friday to sunday on what he saw on the stage and what his campaign saw yeah
Carter
52:53
yeah i try and get an op-ed out that says this is why i didn't go right uh the lack of decor and the lack of uh you know uh you
Carter
53:02
you know mr charrette did what needed to be you know was if i if it could have been mr charrette and i would have been at that stage But as soon as you start inviting these lesser lights, and as soon as you start inviting Fyodor Polyaev and his circus,
Carter
53:14
you invite a circus and it turns into a clown show.
Carter
53:19
And I'm not going to be a part of that.
Zain
53:23
Corey, what would your Patrick Brown Friday to Sunday strategy look like? I heard you kind of humming when you saw Carter's op-ed strategy. I wasn't sure if that was an agreement or disagreement. agreement well
Corey
53:31
well i i was intrigued by it until he took it i think further than i would have there because again i don't think it's in his interest to just just shit on everybody right yeah
Corey
53:41
yeah i think it would be more along the lines of saying i didn't go i was disappointed by what i saw i saw a party that forgets that we all believe in the same thing that we need to come together if we're going to be the liberals and
Corey
53:52
and that would be more the approach i would take yeah
Carter
53:55
yeah you could weave that in but if you don't use the line about the clown show i don't know who you are uh
Zain
53:59
uh cory leslin Ellen Lewis, is she just taking that clip of her fighting Pierre on blast? Is that what she's doing? Or what else is she doing if she is doing her Friday to Sunday post-debate strategy? You
Corey
54:11
You know, I don't think so. I mean, she had a few lines that will resonate with her base throughout the course of, what, 90 minutes that was going on there. There will be a bundling. But I also don't believe, to Carter's point about her strong performance last time, that her strategy
Corey
54:26
strategy is not based on debates. I think she wants to be able to have some stuff in the larder to say, I am a stronger candidate than Pierre Poliev. Did you see when I took him to account for not supporting the truckers enough? but
Corey
54:38
uh i don't know i mean are
Corey
54:40
are you really going to make uh poly of your opponent here you you need to use him as almost like your left word like i'm more right than that guy but like a strategy of perpetual attack against him seems like
Corey
54:52
like a bad idea carter
Zain
54:54
carter from your perspective what is les and lewis doing this weekend um
Carter
54:58
um you know sacrificing babies the usual stuff um
Carter
55:01
um you know I think that I really struggle with her because she's so abhorrent to me with what her positioning is.
Carter
55:10
You know, I would imagine
Carter
55:11
imagine that she will take some social conservative positions, you
Carter
55:16
know, grabbing onto Roe v. Wade, maybe saying that we don't have a proper, we still don't have proper rules and regulations on abortion in Canada because no one wants to tackle the issue. you
Carter
55:25
know something like that I mean go
Carter
55:28
go as far right I mean she can go as far right as she wants to and it's still not you know that's her crazy town that's where she belongs Carter
Zain
55:35
Carter you we know that often the work of post-debate is the work that people see but also the work that people don't see it's the intel gathering it's the information gathering it's everything in that category Carter the next question to you what is the PMO and the and the liberals doing this this weekend after watching Thursday
Zain
55:54
Thursday night, after watching that debate? You suspect they probably won't put anything out, but you might suggest otherwise. But what is the work? Because they probably have to do some work. What's their work this weekend?
Carter
56:05
Do not pop the champagne corks. I saw on Twitter yesterday all the memes
Carter
56:11
the PMO office right now. And it's this idea that people People are partying in the streets because, you know, look at these people tearing each other down. I mean, you
Carter
56:21
you know, what happens if Justin Trudeau is up against Pierre, right? What happens of the two people in that stage that could win? I believe it's only Charest and Poliev. Of
Carter
56:31
Of those two people, how does Trudeau beat either of them, right?
Carter
56:34
right? Because the one guy, Charest, I think beats him just on actual skill, competency. competency, and the other guy beats them all in lunacy. Because how does Trudeau stand up to that type of affront, that type of attack from Pierre? And I think that Trudeau needs to be very wary of these
Carter
56:58
these hand grenades that are being thrown in his direction.
Zain
57:02
Corey, question to you. What are the Trudeau liberals, PMO, Liberal Party doing this weekend after watching that Thursday night conservative leadership debate?
Corey
57:11
Stephen's on to something in terms of when I sort of take that debate and I cast forward and say, what if it was Polyev in a general against Trudeau?
Corey
57:20
There's two things I would point out. One is that I think this railroading approach of just trying to talk over him will lead to a stammering prime minister who just looks annoyed, right? Not being able to get his answers out in a cogent fashion. fashion i'm basing that somewhat on when he's had other moments like that in debates i just don't think that that's a dynamic that's going to work for him the
Corey
57:41
the second thing you got to keep in mind is like
Corey
57:46
that kind of like aggressive bulldog approach works pretty well from opposition and that remains true that remains true even when you separate from a context of a debate like this here uh because governments tend to be perceived as arrogant over time liberal governments even more so right and when you see somebody taking down somebody you perceive as arrogant you're not going to react to it the same way as like
Corey
58:09
like let's put it this way if he was the prime minister and he was taking that tone with uh justin trudeau of 2015 the opposition justin trudeau that
Corey
58:18
that would be a bad match but when you're in opposition taking that tone against a government that will be going into well 10 years that's an okay match because people are people kind of want to see that government taken down a bit so i don't know i wouldn't be popping champagne corks that's for sure i do think um you
Corey
58:36
you know you you've been given an awful lot of a gift in this debate in terms of clips that you should be getting ready for public consumption but
Corey
58:45
we're a long way to the next election and at a certain point people will just flip off the liberal government and
Corey
58:51
and it's possible he'll become prime minister just because he's the guy who's in the conservative chair because 10
Carter
58:55
10 10 years is a long time.
Zain
59:00
final question for you.
Zain
59:01
Will Patrick Brown be on the stage for the next conservative leadership debate?
Zain
59:04
Yes or no? Yes, I think so.
Zain
59:06
Carter, will Patrick Brown be on the stage for the next conservative leadership debate?
Carter
59:09
He shouldn't, so he will.
Zain
59:12
Carter, how much? How much did you enjoy that? How much did you enjoy the debate? How much did you enjoy it? How much? How
Carter
59:17
How much? I can't put a number on it.
Carter
59:20
I don't have. How much did you enjoy it? How much? How much did you enjoy it? How much did you enjoy it? Yeah, can I just... How much?
Carter
59:27
Corey, anyway... We'll leave it there. That's
Zain
59:29
That's a wrap on episode 987 of The Strategist. My name is Zane Velgey. With me, as always, Corey Hogan and the award-winning Stephen Carter.
Zain
59:38
And we'll see you next time.