The Thursday Question 2:47: Yahoo!
Politics and Stampede
It’s that time of year again. Time for Ottawa reporters to write up stories about why the Calgary Stampede is a magnet for politicians. The standard answers will be duly reported in central Canadian news outlets. The Stampede always gets big crowds and politicians love a crowd. The Stampede is fun, and politicians really like big crowds when they’re having fun. There’s music and beer and a lot of business that gets done in the tents and hospitality suites. All that is true, but to my mind fall a bit short of the mark. There’s a bigger reason the Stampede attracts politicians from across Canada.
Most corners of our great dominion have summer or fall events that attract crowds with fun and the odd carbonated malt beverage. But at least in English Canada, there is only one city-wide civic festival on a massive scale, an event so big that it shuts down regular business for ten days and lets everyone reconnect with history and the excellence of sports competition. That’s The Greatest Outdoor Show on Earth, held where the Elbow meets the Bow River. Only Calgary brings the planet’s best rodeo athletes, the best chuckwagon crews, the nations of Treaty Seven and every last local organization together to celebrate the city’s greatness and welcome all comers to join us. The only event that matches the Stampede is Quebec’s Winter Carnival, which is why Bon Homme has an honoured place in the Stampede Parade and why Quebec City is our twin city. Maybe someday the Stanley Cup will return to Canada and the winning team’s will get a civic celebration. In the meantime, we have to admit it. Politicians from across Canada come to the Stampede because they wish their city, town or village was more like Calgary. Mr. Carney is here for the weekend. Maybe he can figure out a way to organize a civic festival for Nepean.
When big political change is in the air, the political side of Stampede becomes a high-stakes partisan show-down. My first Stampede - or maybe it was my second one in 1992 - featured a ballsy move by Reform. They scheduled their BBQ on the first Saturday of Stampede, at the same time as Bobbie Sparrow’s PC BBQ. The move forced right-leaning Calgarians to pick a team. Those who had risen to power with Mr. Mulroney showed up for Ms. Sparrow. A new generation of political leaders went to see Mr. Manning. The division was not repaired for two decades.
My first political BBQ was the 1994 Reform BBQ. I think it was held at Simons Valley Ranch. My parents had driven out from Toronto to see the Stampede, Banff, and Lake Louise. I got us tickets to see Mr. Manning’s speech. Reform had won 52 seats in the previous fall, and the mighty PCs had won only two. The theme of Mr. Manning’s speech was branding. It’s important to heat up a unique brand and sear your symbol of ownership on the sides of your cattle, he explained. Then he asked every new Reform MP to stand one by one while he explained how they would sear the ownership of Canadians on the side of their parliament. I don’t know who wrote that speech - I suspect Mr. Manning wrote it himself. Thirty-one years later I still wish that any speech I ever wrote was half as good. My parents drove back to Toronto and told everyone who would listen that this Reform guy was for real.
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At some point, the Reform BBQ became the Conservative BBQ and the Heritage riding association moved it to Heritage Park. The event still runs on the Saturday night that was once contested by Ms. Sparrow and Mr. Manning. I skipped last year’s BBQ. I like seeing all the old timers - the Hulberts, John Weissenberger and his wife Angela - and Heritage Park serves a good meal. And on the way I pay homage to R.B Bennett’s statue (it’s hidden on the Heritage Park grounds). But the event is held in a tent, and I don’t like sitting in tents. So it’s the speech that makes me attend the BBQ, and I knew last year’s would lean heavily on themes I could already recite by heart: axe this, build that, stop the other thing, fire someone. Tickets were in demand and I thought it best to let someone else take the seat I would otherwise have occupied.
I am going tonight, however. I hope to see the Hulberts, of course, chat with the Weissenbergers, and make the Bennett pilgrimage. But, I am going to see the speech that will mark the launch of Mr. Poilievre’s third leadership race. He ran for the leadership in 2020 and withdrew long before the ballots were printed. He ran again in 2022 and that time swept the party in an historic, national mobilization. He now faces a leadership review in January. It will take place here in Calgary only a few miles from Heritage Park. Tonight marks the start of the campaign to win that race.
I set out my assessment of the leadership review on a recent episode of Kathleen Petty’s podcast, West of Centre (https://www.cbc.ca/listen/cbc-podcasts/407-west-of-centre/episode/16153842-whats-next-for-pierre-poilievre-and-the-conservatives). Leadership reviews are tough, brutal affairs. I was a young ‘un for the epic battles of 1981 and 1983 that eventually toppled Joe Clark, so I only saw bits of the war. In 2005, I had a more central role defending Mr. Harper’s leadership. That review is not remembered as particularly brutal because we fought a hard campaign and won it handily. But it was also a war. If Peter Naglik and Doug Finley were still with us, they could tell some stories. Instead, you’re stuck with Tom Flanagan, Mike Donison and a few others who should remain unnamed. Our lips are sealed.
Mr. Poilievre’s team will not take the coming battle for granted. Tonight’s speech won’t be the final version of the one he will deliver on the Friday night of January’s convention, but it will set out the basic themes of the case for his continued leadership.
Many in the audience will want to hear _how_ he plans to take Conservatives to victory, the victory that seemed so certain a year ago but was denied to us in the spring. Mr. Poilievre might offer up some hints. But for my part, I will be listening for the _why_. A year ago, Mr. Poilievre had a compelling _why_ . He had to rid the country of an out of touch lightweight who had held back Canadians from their potential for nearly a decade and left the country weaker. Relegating Mr. Trudeau to the history books was a mission worthy of the party’s effort, a mission of genuine nation building. But the Liberals completed that mission and Mr. Poilievre had to shift. Eventually, he completed an important but more limited mission - to serve as the tribune of the plebeian classes, those who struggle to afford groceries and housing and the necessities of life. Those who owned voted Liberal, trusting them to fend off Trump. Those who did not own voted Conservative, hoping to get a path back to the middle class.
But being a fighter isn’t enough to keep someone in politics. Voters always say they want to elect someone who will fight for them, but there are many jobs that let you be a fighter, and most don’t involve the burdens of leading a party. Open line radio hosts are fighters. The leaders of grassroots organizations are also fighters. Anyone with a Substack or a YouTube channel can be a fighter. So “fight for you” isn’t quite enough of a _why_ when it comes to launching a leadership campaign. There are easier ways to be a fighter than leading a party.
In a leadership race, the _why_ has to be bigger. No one thinks that Mark Carney ran to lead the country because he needed a paycheque or a pension or a sense he had accomplished something with his life. He didn’t need the official residence or the car and driver. He’d already gotten to know the King and most of world’s business and social and political leaders. His _why_ was to power Canada ahead to new heights of success. His _why_ was greatness, a word that has come into disrepute of late. But the need for greatness remains the key motivator of successful political leaders.
Having had sure victory taken away from him, Mr. Poilievre has a new chance to set out his _why_ before January. Sure, he’s a fighter. But does he desire greatness for himself and his country? And if so, what does it look like? I am looking forward to hearing that speech, and soon.