GUNTER: O'Toole stalls in election campaign's final stretch
Now we can only hope enough voters are fed up with Trudeau’s arrogant, hollow, smarmy ways that on their own they vote Tory and hold Trudeau’s Liberals to a minority, again.
Author of the article: Lorne Gunter
Publishing date: Sep 19, 2021 •
Canada's opposition Conservative Party leader Erin O'Toole speaks during campaign stop at a constituency office in Markham, Ont., Sept. 19, 2021.
PHOTO BY BLAIR GABLE /REUTERS
I’ve sensed ever since the English-language leaders’ debate on Sept. 9 that the wind had come out of Tory Leader Erin O’Toole’s sails.
I’m not saying O’Toole did a bad job in the debate or even that the debate was all that import.
Rather, I don’t think O’Toole did himself any favours.
Thinking back on the two-hour ordeal, I don’t remember a clear moment for O’Toole.
I remember one for Green Party Leader Annamie Paul, when she pierced Prime Minister Justin Trudeau pompous claim to being a gender-equity crusader; “You are no feminist.”
And I recall NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh time and again hammering Trudeau on failed promises – on pharmacare, electoral reform, reconciliation, climate, affordable housing.
O’Toole, however, didn’t make such an impression. He had to look like a prime-minister-in-waiting, instead he look more like a accountant-in-waiting.
It’s not that I am putting a lot of stock on any leader’s performance. Debates in Canada have become too over-rehearsed and over-cautious to be good ways of differentiating leaders.
For all I care, we could dispense with them.
There hasn’t been a knockout punch in a federal leaders’ debate in 37 years, not since 1984 when Liberal John Turner claimed he had no choice in signing off on a raft of patronage appointments put in motion by his predecessor, Pierre Trudeau, immediately before Turner was sworn in as PM.
Turner’s Tory rival, Brian Mulroney, famously replied, “You had an option, sir — to say ‘no’ — and you chose to say ‘yes’ to the old attitudes and the old stories of the Liberal Party.”
O’Toole didn’t land such a punch, but neither did he commit a colossal gaffe. It’s just that that’s been the hallmark of his final two weeks of campaigning.
Safe (cautious even), calm, no waves, no lightning strikes, no standout moments.
It’s as if the Tories’ brains trust assumed the Liberals would keep stumbling – as they had for the first three weeks of the campaign – and all their man had to do was not mess up and he’d be PM on Sept. 20.
Yes, Alberta’s handling of the COVID pandemic has probably helped sink Tory dreams of becoming government – even just a minority government.
But Jason Kenney, the Alberta premier, didn’t do in Erin O’Toole. Erin O’Toole’s stumbling, bumbling, tongue-tied response to questions about how his pandemic fight would differ from Kenney’s is what did O’Toole in.
O’Toole could have said, “I will handle things differently. We’ve seen from the fourth wave that vaccines are even more important than we thought. I will make sure all my caucus is fully vaccinated, and I will recommend to all provinces that visitors to businesses, public buildings and events show proof of vaccination or a recent negative test they have paid for themselves.”
Instead, O’Toole was his own worst enemy. Like Andrew Scheer before him, he failed to workout credible answers in advance to entirely predictable questions he was going to be asked by reporters.
O’Toole has allowed his campaign to stall. He has flooded the Tory engine and no amount of foot pumping was ever going to restart it.
Still, Justin Trudeau has become so unpopular (more than twice as many voters want him gone than re-elected) he was entirely beatable by a Tory leader who offered a credible alternative plan to govern and who kept hammering that plan home until election day.
Now we can only hope enough voters are fed up with Trudeau’s arrogant, hollow, smarmy ways that on their own they vote Tory and hold Trudeau’s Liberals to a minority, again.
Heaven help Canada if Trudeau gets a majority and gets his way on spending, taxes, judicial appointments, climate change, the energy industry, immigration, ethics and more.
I’ve sensed ever since the English-language leaders’ debate on Sept. 9 that the wind had come out of Tory Leader Erin O’Toole’s sails.
I’m not saying O’Toole did a bad job in the debate or even that the debate was all that import.
Rather, I don’t think O’Toole did himself any favours.
Thinking back on the two-hour ordeal, I don’t remember a clear moment for O’Toole.
I remember one for Green Party Leader Annamie Paul, when she pierced Prime Minister Justin Trudeau pompous claim to being a gender-equity crusader; “You are no feminist.”
And I recall NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh time and again hammering Trudeau on failed promises – on pharmacare, electoral reform, reconciliation, climate, affordable housing.
O’Toole, however, didn’t make such an impression. He had to look like a prime-minister-in-waiting, instead he look more like a accountant-in-waiting.
It’s not that I am putting a lot of stock on any leader’s performance. Debates in Canada have become too over-rehearsed and over-cautious to be good ways of differentiating leaders.
For all I care, we could dispense with them.
There hasn’t been a knockout punch in a federal leaders’ debate in 37 years, not since 1984 when Liberal John Turner claimed he had no choice in signing off on a raft of patronage appointments put in motion by his predecessor, Pierre Trudeau, immediately before Turner was sworn in as PM.
Turner’s Tory rival, Brian Mulroney, famously replied, “You had an option, sir — to say ‘no’ — and you chose to say ‘yes’ to the old attitudes and the old stories of the Liberal Party.”
O’Toole didn’t land such a punch, but neither did he commit a colossal gaffe. It’s just that that’s been the hallmark of his final two weeks of campaigning.
Safe (cautious even), calm, no waves, no lightning strikes, no standout moments.
It’s as if the Tories’ brains trust assumed the Liberals would keep stumbling – as they had for the first three weeks of the campaign – and all their man had to do was not mess up and he’d be PM on Sept. 20.
Yes, Alberta’s handling of the COVID pandemic has probably helped sink Tory dreams of becoming government – even just a minority government.
But Jason Kenney, the Alberta premier, didn’t do in Erin O’Toole. Erin O’Toole’s stumbling, bumbling, tongue-tied response to questions about how his pandemic fight would differ from Kenney’s is what did O’Toole in.
O’Toole could have said, “I will handle things differently. We’ve seen from the fourth wave that vaccines are even more important than we thought. I will make sure all my caucus is fully vaccinated, and I will recommend to all provinces that visitors to businesses, public buildings and events show proof of vaccination or a recent negative test they have paid for themselves.”
Instead, O’Toole was his own worst enemy. Like Andrew Scheer before him, he failed to workout credible answers in advance to entirely predictable questions he was going to be asked by reporters.
O’Toole has allowed his campaign to stall. He has flooded the Tory engine and no amount of foot pumping was ever going to restart it.
Still, Justin Trudeau has become so unpopular (more than twice as many voters want him gone than re-elected) he was entirely beatable by a Tory leader who offered a credible alternative plan to govern and who kept hammering that plan home until election day.
Now we can only hope enough voters are fed up with Trudeau’s arrogant, hollow, smarmy ways that on their own they vote Tory and hold Trudeau’s Liberals to a minority, again.
Heaven help Canada if Trudeau gets a majority and gets his way on spending, taxes, judicial appointments, climate change, the energy industry, immigration, ethics and more.
