Opinion

“Well, it’s really impressive that the deputy prime minister and the prime minister are attending really important meetings in Japan and the United States with really important people around the world. We’re talking to the common people right here in Canada who can’t pay their bills, Mr. Speaker” — Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre

“The Conservatives are insinuating today that there is something elitist, that there is something that goes against the interests of regular Canadians, when Canadian leaders attend G7 meetings and I want to ask Canadians, do they think it’s wrong for the prime minister to go a meeting with the president of the United States? The prime minister of the U.K.? The prime minister of Japan?” — Deputy PM Chrystia Freeland.

“No, we just wish he’d remember the real people who pay the bills actually live right here in Canada” — Poilievre, May 15, 2023, in the House of Commons.

Populism works.

We are in a populist era where people on the left and right make the extra effort to sound like they are the voices of the common people.

As readers know by now, that my parents were part of the great Canadian hard-working immigrant story. We never had to impersonate common Canadians.

We never had the tourist view of poverty, like Pierre Poilievre and many others who apply the populist makeup every morning.

But for his Liberal opponents, the painful truth is that Poilievre’s populist game is much crisper than Chrystia Freeland’s. His populist wrist shot finds the net more frequently than Justin Trudeau’s.

Abacus Data this week told us Poilievre is significantly ahead of Trudeau on key Canadian character questions. Who has better judgment? Trudeau or Poilievre? PP beats the PM by 15 points. Who understands what life is like for people like you? Once again, it’s PP over PM by 15.

Six weeks ago, pollster Nik Nanos broke the news that Poilievre, after months of effort, was three points ahead of the PM on the all-important question “Who do you prefer as prime minister?”

You don’t need be on The National’s “At Issue” panel to understand the fragile nature of the proposition that Justin Trudeau can win a fourth straight term, something his predecessor and others since the days of Laurier failed to do. And Laurier started his streak more than 125 years ago.

In the populist world, Justin Trudeau has been the high-flying rock star for as long as Mick Jagger. That’s, of course, not even close to true. But the populist mind cares not a lick about precision-only perception.

When Deputy PM Chrystia Freeland asks Canadians whether we want the PM on the world stage with the leaders of the U.S., the U.K. and Japan, the collective Canadian answer is “Yes, we do.” But in populist hockey, she’s giving up the puck to Poilievre.

As long as she is seen talking about the prime minister’s priorities on the world stage, Poilievre gets to remind her about the little people back home paying the bills for the expensive hotel suites where the PM puts his head on pillow.

Does anyone expect Justin Trudeau to overnight on the outskirts of town at the No Tell Motel? Of course not.

But populism doesn’t pause for reality. It’s always how things look that matters — not how things are.

When Brian Pallister, the former premier of Manitoba, moved to a big home on Winnipeg’s Wellington Crescent, I thought it was a mistake. There was no doubt in my populist mind that some day if there was any kind of crisis, Pallister would be seen as the out-of-touch guy living in his mansion on the river.

Feel free to throw sand in my spokes for telling you in a recent column about my allergy to class envy. My words reflect my feelings. But I don’t pretend that populism isn’t much bigger than me — and that it’s far more powerful than my personal feelings.

Pierre Poilievre always smirks after he feels he has buried the puck in the Liberal net. It’s the preen of the populist peacock.

Ordinary Canadians, my people, the common people know that his connection to the common life is fictional.

But it’s blarney that voters are buying. If there is anything I have learned over the course of half a century, selling many millions of dollars worth of products and services, the customer is never wrong. They want what they want.

At the moment, Canadians are less inclined to be governed by a prime minister who vacations at the Caribbean estates of the uber wealthy.

Billionaire’s Beach is the perfect populist urinal.

Charles Adler is a longtime political commenter and podcaster. charles@charlesadler.com