🎧 Liberal Leadership & Conservative Strategy

Just my thoughts on what's ahead, as of Thursday January 16th...

Press play to listen to my thoughts…

🎧 AUDIO TRANSCRIPT:

Okay, it is Thursday, January 16th, and I'm just turning on my mic to see where this takes me today. I was sharing today on my Instagram feed my thoughts around Christia Freeland's announcement that if she becomes the leader of the Liberal Party that she will axe the consumer carbon tax. And what I was drawing attention to is a point that I made back in December on my Substack account around how dicey of a position the Conservative Party's strategy is leading into an election, which we are hopeful that will happen this year, unless the Liberals pull a fast one and make us wait until 2026.

But knowing that we have been so hinged on The [00:01:00] carbon tax, the economy, 30 year olds living in their basement. We've from a conservative strategy standpoint, we've pigeonholed ourselves into a very narrow space, which means that it's easy for a competitor to say, what would disarm my competitor? What would weaken their position?

And in my sub stack, I shared, what if carbon tax Carney ends up winning the liberal leadership race and says, Hey, I'm actually going to axe the tax. We've got to get our economy straightened out. I know what it's like to take our nation through a recession. I was the governor of the Bank of Canada. I understand.

How to make this happen. All it would take would be for Carney or Freeland, whoever ends up winning the race, have a feeling it'll be Carney. All it would take for one of them is to say something along the lines, in order to also keep [00:02:00] their left voter base intact, say, listen, the carbon tax is the right thing to do.

It is. Putting money back into the bank accounts of Canadians through our carbon tax rebate. It is contributing to initiatives in order to save our planet and reduce our carbon emissions here in Canada, because we are a leader in climate change. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Pander to their, to their. But now is not the time we are in a historic, economic decline due to many reasons that were outside of our control.

Things like a pandemic and, Instability and other nations that have caused us to have to step in as a great partner country to contribute money to these other nations in order to help them, you know, resolve these conflicts and get past these [00:03:00] wars and save lives. But now's not the time. This is something that we will revisit because it is the right thing to do, but now's not the time.

And so we're not going to move forward. With the carbon tax initiative, and it's for the purpose of giving Canadians back. financial power so you can live your lives, not have to worry about the cost of goods, not have to worry about whether or not you're going to be able to pay your grocery bill, not have to worry about whether or not your children are going to be able to be enrolled in extracurricular activities and sports that we know cost families.

You don't have to make those financial decisions anymore, like on and on and on. It would be so easy for them to disarm the conservative strategy because it has been so hinged on the very clear economic spectrum, spiralling downfall [00:04:00] our nation is in. And so my Substack was merely saying, Hey, if any conservative is listening, reading this, anybody that is, you know, a part of the party or, or a strategist that has an ear to the party, we may want to be ready for them to throw a curve ball and sure enough, Thursday, January 16th, Freeland was the first one.

To pop up as she will be a contender in the liberal leadership race, say, Hey, I'm actually not going to move forward with the consumer carbon tax. So listen, the, the, the feedback is mixed. A lot of people want to believe that. Our Canadian community here is not foolish enough to fall for the fact that Freeland has arguably been one of the worst things that has happened to Canada, [00:05:00] especially economically speaking.

She definitely has a track record to show why she should not be trusted when it comes to any type of economic initiative, let alone party leadership. We'd like to think that the average person will remember the decisions that she has made, the stuff she has pushed, pushed the press conferences. She has held in great support of carbon tax initiatives.

We'd like to think that people won't forget those things. We also have to be realistic and remember that not long ago America's worst rated VP in America, Lowest rating of acceptance or approval. That's the word I'm looking for. Lowest approval rating, worst track record, lowest approval rating, Kamala Harris, [00:06:00] VP under the Biden administration, very silent for a very long period of time.

The media kind of forgot about her. She just became so irrelevant because the pulse out there for her was so poor. And then overnight they turned her into a media sensation. And while it didn't work because I think the Trump Support is just so massive and significant in America that it didn't work.

To the point of a win for the Democrats. But we also can't deny how much support she had. And I'm not talking about celebrity support because I don't actually believe that any of that was genuine. And I think that there's other reasons why a lot of those people were all of a sudden having to step up to the plate and publicly endorse her.

I won't get into that on this episode, but we can't deny how much momentum Kamala was able to gain from the [00:07:00] public. And how much support she had on social media, how many people were rallying for her not necessarily showing up to her rallies, those seem to be quite dismal, but from a social media standpoint, it appears though there was a significant amount of support and she did in the, in the final vote have a significant amount of support just wasn't enough to be able to beat someone like Donald Trump.

So we do have to be realistic that the media and powerful public relations campaigns do have the power to take somebody who is arguably incredibly undesirable, like Christy Freeland, or someone like Mark Carney, who is incredibly concerning. and turn them into a sensation and saviour for the Liberal Party of Canada.

That's a great possibility here. And we can [00:08:00] already see, even though today is Thursday, I'm anticipating a formal announcement from Carney. Word on the street is that he's going to be making this announcement in Edmonton, Alberta. Which to me tells me the seat that he will probably run in, would be Randy.

Boston O's seat. Again, whole other story for a whole other conversation, which a lot of people are confused how the heck can a non MP run for the Liberal leadership? You can. It's just in the best interest of the longevity of the party and the trust of the public for that person to then win a seat as fast as humanly possible in order for, them to actually be able to lead from the House of Commons and not out in the hallway.

And. That means that if Carney does win the liberal leadership race without being an MP, he will absolutely run in either the fastest by election or the next election, depending on when the next election is [00:09:00] officially called, in order to win a liberal stronghold, basically an area where they can win.

rest with the utmost certainty that the Liberals will win that riding no matter what. And that's where they'll place him. So I have a feeling that's why he's launching in Edmonton. But anyway, regardless of who ends up winning the leadership race, we do have to be prepared for the ignorance of the Canadian voter public to be on full display yet again.

And I'm not saying that the Conservatives are perfect. I'm not saying that Polyev is the best. Person for the job out of every single person that could possibly be fit for that job, but that's who we've got. We do have to be ready for the reality. That we have a lot of swing voters in this country [00:10:00] and swing voters, my definition of a swing voter, the definition, but my definition, definition of a swing voter is a voter who votes on a person and not the party, which means that when there is a better party leader.

On the other side, they vote for that person or they vote for, the, the, the talking points, as opposed to fully understanding party ideology, longevity of what the, the party's trajectory is, the history of what the party has done, and there, there's really just a lack of information that that person is using in order to come to the conclusion of who they're going to vote for, which means they can ping pong back and forth from, you know, from either side of the spectrum based on the person and what people fail to realize because we will see this like it or not we will see [00:11:00] Momentum start to stir up again for the Liberal Party.

I believe that in order for that to happen, that Mark Carney is their guy to be able to do that in the eyes of the public. I don't think Freeland is the right choice if their mission is to get people excited and reinvigorated again about the Liberal Party. Christy Freeland's too tied up in it.

She's lost too much faith in the eyes of the public. She doesn't have a lot of credibility. She did a pretty good job of launching Trudeau under the bus on her departure as the finance minister, which I think gained her some points, which was important. Solid strategy move on her place to get ahead of him, likely canning her in that position.

So she, she has done a couple things right in order to make people go, Oh, Hey, maybe, maybe she could be our leader. I just don't think that she has the power that [00:12:00] Carney has and the power that the media has to support Carney in, a bid for, for the next election to become the prime minister again.

Now, the reality is. The Liberal Party is still the Liberal Party, regardless of what leader you put in place. The problem is the average Canadian, and I will give the average Canadian a hell of a lot more credit in 2025 than I did in 2021. That's for damn sure. We have come a long way with our political efficacy, our involvement, our engagement, our discussions, our learning and understanding and education.

It's, it's night and day difference, but there's still en masse, a problem with. You know, swapping out one charismatic, dazzling character for another and people believing that that will make the problem go away and that will solve the, the issue of, [00:13:00] of the liberal party and in turn make people feel safe voting for them again.

When we don't understand party politics, which again, a whole other conversation could be had around the pros and cons of party ideology because party ideology on the inside of the party can also be harmful for MPs to be able to fully express themselves truthfully and say and do the things that they want to do because of party politics.

So I'm not. When I say we got to pay attention to party ideo all party ideologies at the poll, I'm not necessarily endorsing party ideology and party politics on the inside of the party because then, then MPs, for lack of a better word, end up censored. This is also why when people ask me all the time if I'd ever engage in politics like formally as opposed to just ranting about it on the internet like I do, the answer is absolutely not.[00:14:00]

And I talk about this on the non negotiable podcast too, but my short and sweet answer when I was asked this question, will you run? The answer is absolutely not, not in the current system. This system is so twisted and archaic and corrupt that that's not something that I'm willing to entertain. spending my life getting involved with in that capacity.

And number two, I would have to run as an independent. So even though at the polls, I will be voting conservative, I would not actually be able to run as a conservative, which does provide internal conflict for me, if I'm being totally honest, because I know that that party wouldn't actually accept me as, as a, as an MP candidate.

Because of things that I would all of a sudden not be allowed to share because of party politics. And that's, that's [00:15:00] just not something I would ever entertain or condone. The moment that I can't speak my truth is the moment I am completely disengaged from a person or a place or a thing. And so the, the reality is, I think we will see momentum stirring with liberal support.

I do. I think it will freak a lot of people out because as with anything, the media, presents itself as speaking on behalf of Canadians when we know that the media by day is losing power and credibility and viewership and ratings because we just don't trust it anymore. There's just such a sickening twist on, information.

And it's so misleading. And we also have to recognize that the media, it's in their best interest to do everything in their power to support a liberal win because the conservatives have made it clear that they will defund the CBC. [00:16:00] So will their jobs be gone in a conservative win? That, that definitely causes a person to, whether consciously or unconsciously, make moves to ensure that their jobs are safe.

Which means that there's just going to be a greater. likelihood that they're going to want to see more public support in favor of a liberal, comeback. So we can expect a, a shit storm for lack of a better word of media frenzy, of brilliant PR campaigns, of a lot of leftists who have. Otherwise gone quiet on socials because they, they too have been, you know, felt maybe embarrassed or ashamed of supporting a party that, [00:17:00] is being so tarnished by someone like Justin Trudeau.

I, we will see a resurfacing of people having the courage to throw their, their support behind the Liberal Party again. So it's going to appear as though the conservatives are, are going to be given a real run for their money when. You know, just a handful of weeks ago, the confidence was through the roof that this wasn't even anything that was going to need to be worried about.

So my point in sharing this is that we have to be realistic about what we're going to see in the coming weeks and months as a liberal leadership gets underway. And then we figure out when an election is going to be held. Is Jagmeet Singh going to stay true to his word? And is the block going to stay true?

To their word, that when Parliament is recalled, they will be voting non confidence on the Liberal Party to continue leading the government [00:18:00] and dissolve the Parliament and then go to an election, I don't know. Is Jagmeet Singh going to have a moment of reality set in for how, how doomed that party is, especially if there is a strength returning in the, in the Liberal Party?

Which arguably the Liberals have lost, you know, a lot of support also further left on the political spectrum. So people who've left the party who haven't gone to the right have arguably pushed further into the left, maybe looking at getting behind. The NDP, which would confuse the hell out of me because Jagmeet Singh arguably is solely responsible for the continuation of Justin Trudeau's leadership.

But it's possible that with, public faith back [00:19:00] in a liberal leader, that the, the people that left the Liberal Party and then started to turn their attention more towards the NDP might start saying, Oh, okay, now we don't have to vote NDP. I feel better about voting Liberal again. I have confidence in the party again.

So, Would, would Jagmeet Singh have a moment of reality or maybe a tap on the shoulder from God only knows what? level of power and from where, say, get out of the way, uh, and merge with the liberals. Who knows? Will we see a formal coalition form on the left? A lot of people referred to the relationship that the NDP and the liberals had as a formal, as a coalition, but it wasn't actually a formal coalition.

It was a supply and confidence agreement, which is, I refer to it as like a notch below. a formal coalition because they still operated as two separate and distinct parties with party leaders and their own party ideologies and and party politics. They just had an [00:20:00] agreement and so they acted as one on a number of key issues including non confidence votes.

Now a formal coalition would mean an actual merger of the NDP into and the Liberals into one New party, which means that people on the left would no longer be in a position to have to choose between NDP and liberal because then they could just say, well, we're voting for the left party unless they're going for green or independent.

So, I mean, there's a, there's a number of, of what ifs issue. This is all just purely speculation, by the way, I'm just, tossing ideas out there so that we don't sit in ignorance and sit back and think that everything's gonna be okay because Justin Trudeau, decimated the party so badly that means that we must be safe.

[00:21:00] Where do I stand on what I think is going to happen in an election? I do wholeheartedly believe we will see a powerful conservative win and I'm also not naive enough to think that we're going to have to get over quite a few bumps in order for people to, not in order for people to, to see, but in order for the Conservatives to win, we're going to have to allow ourselves to see that there's actual possibility in a, in a shift in momentum for the Liberal Party.

There's an actual possibility that we could see the left merge together. and create a super left party. There's just so many, there's so many things to consider. Anyway, that's, that's my take on this Thursday. And all I can say is just keep your eyes open, keep your ears open. Don't dismiss things. as nothing to worry about.

And on the other side of the spectrum, don't get so [00:22:00] riled up about stuff that you lose your own cool and, and you lose your ability to focus on things that, that you can directly control in your own life. And I know that sometimes the things that I say are upsetting and they do cause people to think, Oh my God, is this going to happen?

Uh, what's the likelihood of this? What do we need to be worried about? My, my purpose is to not get you riled up. It's just help us be stronger in our awareness. And if we do get riled up, then it's an invitation, always. to bring ourselves back into a more grounded state so that we can make more grounded and stable decisions and be of a higher level of credibility when we're engaging with other people in, in some of these more volatile political discussions.

So we're in the school of life right now. My friends, politics is the thing that is, pushing us all right now [00:23:00] to, to face a lot of fears, To figure out what's important to us in our lives, to understand the extent at which we have allowed our government to intervene on our lives up until this point understand where we may have allowed ourselves to become way too dependent on things in society, on, on government, provisions and, and things of that nature. And so if nothing else, we've been given this grand opportunity to reflect on, on how we're leading our own lives, regardless of which political party or leader is in power, who wins what leadership race.

It all does come back to what are we allowing in our own life? What are the choices we're making and what are the actions we're taking? That's the thing that we have 100 percent control over all the time. And it's super, super easy to lose sight of that when we can get [00:24:00] into the, the loud distracting noise of the world of Canadian politics.

So it's only going to get more loud and distracting as we move into the year. Just don't lose sight of what is within your control. And also don't kid yourself that. Politics doesn't matter, guys. This is an opinion I combat all the time, and I'm happy to continue combating it, not to be divisive, but to just speak the truth that regardless of whether or not we, we want the government to control us or save us or have anything to do with our lives, A lot of people say it doesn't matter who's in power.

A lot of people say, I'm not engaging, I'm not voting, government can't do anything about my life. There's a lot of truth to that. And we also have to recognize the truth that while we are a Canadian citizen, which that word alone is problematic, [00:25:00] we are paying taxes. We are owning a home or paying a mortgage, paying property taxes, paying taxes on our home.

Offer paycheque, you know, your paycheque gets scrubbed for taxes before it even gets dumped in your account like Participating in in in government funded things like health care the education system You were just going to get your driver's license guys. That is a government intervention Provincially, but it's still a government intervention.

We we just have to be really honest honest and aware of just how thick government infiltration already is in our society and how interwoven our lives are already in it. We have to recognize this. That's the downside to being in an air quote, first world country or an air quote developed [00:26:00] nation. That's an epiphany I've had over the last few years.

That to me, a first world nation or, or what's referred to as a developed nation just means that there's more government order slash control in that, in that nation. Now. Is it a good thing? Is it a bad thing? There's pros and cons as always. I mean, order is a great thing. Having order in society, I think is important, but we have absolutely encroached into the point of we, we can't really go anywhere in life here in Canada without running into some sort of government intervention.

So we do have to recognize the, the depth of government that, that swarms around us at all different levels, municipal, provincial, federal, and my point in saying this is to just wrap up my point about. Not engaging in politics and elections because we think that it doesn't affect us everywhere we go, we are [00:27:00] affected by the government here in Canada.

And so by us continuing to disengage, if that is your choice. That, that just means that more, the government gets bigger and bigger and bigger, and I think if you're listening to this podcast, you're, you're probably on the same page that we'd prefer to see the government leave us alone a lot more and, and be very mindful and recognizing that when there is true dependence, when people truly do need.

services because there, there, there's either an incapacity, an inability, something has happened in that individual's life that is beyond their control and they, they need that type of support or, or program, social funding, things, things of that nature. I believe in those things. The problem is we have created a dependence on those things by, by creating situations that cause people to need more help from the government and to the government [00:28:00] just keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger.

Anyway. I'm rambling now. I'll wrap it up. Those are my thoughts. Let me know what you think. If you enjoyed listening to this episode and found it beneficial to help you just kind of extrapolate your thoughts and ask yourself some key questions, I'd love for you to tag me. Tag me on your socials.

Instagram would be awesome (@iamsarahswain). And let me know what you thoughts. Thanks everybody. See you next time.