Category: Chairman’s Desk

The federal NDP Leader can be more effective over the next two years travelling the country than sitting in the Commons.

New NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh does not need a seat in the House of Commons.

There was a time when the Commons was both the symbolic and functional home of Canadian politics, but it matters less today than it ever has before.

These days, proposed legislation is introduced at photo-ops that are both televised and streamed and instantly made available on voters’ social-media accounts.

In Ottawa and in the provinces, legislatures have become home to drive-by smears and gotcha politics; places where the behaviour of members, on each sitting day, diminishes respect for both the institutions and the members themselves.

Singh has been leader of the New Democratic Party since Oct. 1. Since then, he has not indicated any plans to run for a seat in Parliament before the next federal election, which won’t take place for another two years.

You may ask whether this is a good strategy for a new, relatively unknown leader who needs to introduce himself to Canadians, become relevant and make a substantive policy impact.

In fact, staying out of the House of Commons will help.

Former NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair was lauded as an excellent orator and the most prosecutorial and effective opposition leader in Parliament in a generation.

In the end, this had very little effect on the 2015 election results because the political arena has effectively moved outside of traditional, official legislative settings.

The election of U.S. President Donald Trump is emblematic of this. Unlike former presidential hopefuls, Trump garnered support on Twitter, at town hall meetings that resembled rock concerts, and, of course, on the cable news circuit.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, too, has perfected the art of playing politics outside of the House of Commons.

Rather than showing up for Question Period, Trudeau answers questions on the shores of the Gaspé, greets factory workers in London or meets everyday Canadians at an event on Vancouver Island. The prime minister and his team know well that these opportunities appeal to his base and network of millennial voters.

In a competitive media landscape, the supper-time news matters less today than ever, and the 30-second news clip from Question Period buried in that newscast has little significance.

Selfie opportunities, viral moments and authentic human experiences are more captivating and better suited for a generation that is increasingly distracted and uninterested in the everyday workings of government.

Trudeau‘s tears over Gord Downie’s death, his photobombing weddings and his wearing silly socks to meetings with world leaders appeal to his voters and also attract the attention of others.

Singh knows this kind of thing works. That’s why he doesn’t want to be tied down by having a seat in the House of Commons.

Singh can travel the country on his own time and by his own rules. This opens the door to more fundraising and important time with regional media outlets. And he’ll have time to focus energy on attracting star candidates to improve the NDP’s odds in 2019.

In that campaign, Singh will find himself fighting two very organized opponents. Both the Liberals and the Conservatives have a vast network of disciplined volunteers, fundraisers and strategists. The NDP ground game is far behind. To succeed, Singh will need to spend time diligently strengthening this capacity.

And he will need money. Lots and lots of money. Much of the money he raised during his leadership campaign came from the 905 area around Toronto. But a federal election campaign is very different from a leadership contest and to be successful, Singh will have to raise money from all corners of our country.

And there’s one more crucial thing to consider: there are risks to Singh running in any of the by-elections next month to fill four vacant House of Commons seats. Only one – in Scarborough-Agincourt – is in Ontario, Singh‘s home province, and a riding where he spent his formative years. The seat was left vacant by the death of Liberal MP Arnold Chan, whose wife, Jean Yip, is now the Liberal candidate and favoured to win.

If Singh were to run in a by-election and lose, his party’s chances in 2019 would be materially compromised.

It’s becoming increasingly apparent that the risks of running are far greater than the rewards.

Yet another shoe has dropped in the investigation into Russia’s involvement in the last U.S. presidential election.

Close associates of President Donald Trump have been indicted, including his former campaign manager, Paul Manafort.

Many view the Russia inquiry, overseen by special counsel Robert Mueller, as the silver bullet to the Trump presidency. These opponents believe that a finding of collusion will end the regime and bring Trump down.

They reason that, much like the Watergate scandal, the lies and resulting coverup will reveal a deeply compromised president whose tenure will be irreparably damaged.

But critics who think that way continue to be naive to our new political world.

Even if Mueller finds hard evidence of collusion, it may not be enough to bring down a president who remains buoyed by his supporters. Perhaps even more problematically for these opponents, a successful impeachment may represent a long-term setback for their own side.

There are a multitude of reasons for this, but among the most prominent is President Trump‘s remarkable ability to obfuscate and confuse stories. Aided by a network of conservative media outlets, the president has managed to refocus and deflect allegations by constantly relaying messages on irrelevant or tangentially related issues.

For instance, on the same day that the media – CNN the lead among them – were breathlessly reporting the indictment of Manafort for suspicious activity with the Russian government, Trump began tweeting about Hillary Clinton‘s relationship with a mining company acquired by a Russian corporation.

The issue had nothing to do with the Mueller investigation. Nonetheless, it successfully gained traction on a number of platforms, including much of television news. The problem is that most consumers of news do so casually, at best.

If you had watched the news or skimmed the headlines that day, it would be difficult to not conflate Clinton, Russia, collusion and Trump.

None of this is a coincidence. The Mueller investigation is extremely complicated and the president’s messages only make the issue more difficult to follow.

Trump seems to have a mastery of this communication strategy. He and his White House allies, aided by the 24/7 media cycle, have managed to noticeably turn the dial and intentionally confuse the issue on Russia’s election involvement.

To the well-read and focused reader, it seems rather obvious that the Trump campaign – or at least some of those embedded within it – worked with agents of the Russian government to release information that would hurt Clinton in the election.

And yet, the general population has far less understanding of this issue. And that will be critical for Mr. Trump‘s survival when the inevitable fallout from Mr. Mueller’s investigation occurs.

Trump has a dedicated following that has demonstrated considerable resistance to abandoning the president, and it seems unlikely that the complicated Russia issue will dissuade them any further.

If, in the end, the issue is not a cut-and-tried accusation that has direct ties to the president, it is unlikely that those who have not yet abandoned him will all of a sudden head for the doors. The issue has now been around long enough and has become confused enough that the media apparatus that supports Trump will prove, once again, to be his biggest asset.

As we have seen all year, Trump‘s appeal to a loyal base places considerable pressure on Republican members of Congress to remain loyal to the president.

Further to the practical challenges of the Mueller inquiry, it remains a question if it is even advisable to try to tackle the president in this way. Trump was elected to drain the Washington swamp and attack the entrenched Washington interests that voters revile so much.

Should the president be removed from office by the Congress, aided by investigations undertaken by federal agencies, it is almost certain that it would be seen as a coup by his supporters. Trump would claim, and would likely be supported by the conservative media network, that his ouster was the inside-the-Beltway crew yet again protecting itself.

Such an outcome could be disastrous for those who revile Trump‘s presidency. Their attempt to eject him from office could well backfire and, instead, inspire a backlash in the next election.

Those opponents of Trump who are watching the investigation unfold with glee need to beware. It is a road filled with traps, detours and blind spots. And while many want to storm down that road with little caution, heed must be paid to the many unforeseen consequences that lie ahead.

The summer and fall have certainly not been breezy for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. He has faced ministerial mishaps, legislative breakdowns and accusations of an increasingly centralized PMO.

An article last week declared that Justin Trudeau was Stephen Harper 2.0. That is, without a doubt, in the mind of the media, the worst insult they could throw at the prime minister. After all, Trudeau was elected mostly because he wasn’t Harper.

Indeed, based on the apparent furor that has been going on in recent weeks, one would expect a government that was facing significant political headwinds with the voters. But recently, signs have emerged that suggest the outcry may be more of a tempest in a teapot.

The recent byelection in the Quebec riding of Lac-Saint-Jean was a surprise victory for the Liberals, who garnered 39 per cent of the vote. The Conservatives – who were the incumbents – had a dismal showing, with just 25 per cent of the vote. The NDP ended up with only 12 per cent of the vote.

We know that byelections often favour opposition parties. So much for the theory that nails were being pounded into the Liberal coffin.

Even though the Conservatives and the New Democrats now have leaders in place, those parties failed to gain momentum in the Quebec byelection, and support for the Liberals in Quebec has only grown since their surprisingly large margin of victory in La Belle Province in 2015.

The problem is that Quebec now holds 78 seats – a significant portion of the House of Commons. It can be a stumbling block for many political leaders. Indeed, the government of Pierre Trudeau should serve as a warning for the opposition parties.

With only marginal popularity in much of English Canada, his government was kept afloat in successive elections by resounding support in Quebec paired with mixed-to-middling results in the rest of Canada.

The map does not look all that different today.

Simply put, to have any chance of success in 2019, the Conservatives and New Democrats will have to break what could be a Liberal stranglehold on Quebec.

What is going on here?

First, the opposition is making a lot of noise, but has been largely focused on issues that aren’t as important to Canadians. The criticisms they have been lodging regarding Trudeau’s tax changes and deficits simply aren’t moving the dial.

The government’s fiscal update centred around a projected deficit cut from $28.5 billion to $19.9 billion. In response, the Conservatives focused on talk about the evils of running a deficit.

This was just what the Liberals wanted to happen.

If the 2015 election campaign taught us one thing it was that, right now, opposition to deficits simply doesn’t move votes.

The Conservatives should have ignored the deficit chat and asked Canadians if they personally felt economically stronger today than they did two years ago. Instead of wading into a numbers game, they should have positioned themselves as tax-cutting, money-saving champions.

Second, the Ottawa echo chamber – where journalists and opinion leaders talk among themselves about the issues they deem worthy of attention – is getting louder and louder.

To be fair, it’s a democratic echo chamber. Anyone with a Twitter account can engage a journalist, celebrity or member of Parliament.

But the problem is that most Canadians simply aren’t interested in the minutiae that consumes political Twitter. Canadians don’t care about the proceedings of a committee or the amendment process on legislation.

In order to affect voters, an issue must be easily explainable and have resonance in the lives of Canadians.

Evidence suggests that the accelerated news cycle, our hyper-shortened attention spans and the relentless focus on micro-issues turns Canadians off.

Canadians especially don’t seem to care about a more centralized PMO or a poorly disclosed villa in France.

There are serious implications here. Andrew Scheer and Jagmeet Singh both have challenging but possible paths to 24 Sussex Drive in the next election.

But to get there, they must find those issues, those pocketbook issues, that matter to hardworking, everyday Canadians. The kind of issues that make a difference, a direct difference, in everyday life.

What’s more, they will need to find issues that have particular resonance in Quebec.

On top of that, they need a little luck to find issues that not only wedge the Liberals, but also wedge the other guy.

If either one succeeds, the next election will be one to watch. If they don’t, their view from the opposition benches in the House of Commons won’t change.