A couple of people have asked whether subscribing to the Substack means you get a free copy of the book. Nope! Subscribing to the Substack means, as always, that you get full access to the Substack. Buying the book means you get a book. Subscribing to Sutherland Quarterly means you get several books. Three different pipelines to good times.
For a repatriated Canadian who has been entrenched in the shit show with our neighbors, and who has been embarrassed by the Trudeau amateur-hour, but seeing the need to catch up on Canadian politics, this could not have come at a better time.
Would love to support you by buying this, but I’ll admit I loathe him so much that I can’t summon the interest to read about him. Seems to me he’s the not very intelligent son of a very impressive father who is only in power because of his name and his hair. To the extent the he has what could only loosely be described as ideas, they consist mostly of woke virtue signaling (where he gets to call others extremists, while maintaining that he’s the purveyor of sunny ways). He’s also so incompetent that the country is demonstrably worse off than when he was first elected.
I dislike Poilievre as much as you dislike Trudeau, but I always find Paul's takes on both very interesting and worth reading. I think it's good to try to understand why people might find the other side appealing beyond "this guy is bad and other people are bad and that's why they like him". To say nothing of the fact that Paul tends to be a bit hard on prime ministers, especially this one---I haven't read the book yet, but I would expect that you'll see a lot of "so incompetent that the country is demonstrably worse off" in there.
Don’t disagree in principle; still can’t bring myself to read about this feckless idiot (that, and I have so much other reading to do for work and pleasure).
Yeah, that's reasonable. I recently picked up the new-ish book about Mike Harris, for example, and when I looked at the table of contents, I realized, "Hey, I don't want to read about that guy, I hate that guy." So I can't throw stones on this one. Life is too short to read about people we don't want to read about.
Well, I hope writing it proves to be time well spent but I would prefer that you turn your attention to the latest on Harper, Manning et al. I just re-read Storming Babylon and Right Side Up. Rather than reducing this to a WWF dissfest Canadians need to get serious about GOP fallout.
I'm a little confused by this, Jim. Want to say more?
I'm a Liberal, but I respected Harper as PM - I thought he was a guy with some dark impulses who tried very hard to keep them in check because he though that was the PM's job. (I know many people think he didn't keep them in check, and that others think he kept them in check out of political expediency - but I honestly think he was trying to be a good PM for all of Canada. Whether he got there is a different question.)
Then I recently read his book, and, wow, dark impulses all over the place. This man really dislikes people like me. And, sure, we're seeing more of that side of him in retirement than I personally saw when he was PM. Granted.
But Paul is a journalist, not a polemicist; like all of his books, his newest is about "the prime minister", not about "Justin Trudeau" (or whoever), and how "the prime minister" is leading Canada. I don't see what Stephen Harper has to do with anything in 2024. The man's been unemployed for nine years. What have I missed? How is he relevant right now?
Whenever I get sucked into some House of Commons punchup clickbait on Youtube or wherever, I feel like I’m watching a couple of NHL enforcers waltzing it out for their fans. What gets drowned out in the choregraphy are the critical debates over policy that should be in the public domain, (eg. if needle sites and partial decriminalization of street drugs don’t reduce overdose deaths, why would Ottawa double down?)
Good journalists avoid the appearance of picking sides by picking the facts that lead to the conclusion they’re looking for. Wells is very good at showing why Trudeau does the best he can with who and what he’s got on his team. Fair but enough.
My point was that Inthink it’s time to get specific about the other team and their backers.
I hear Harper is still very much in the thick of things. He anticipated the pushback against globalization, worldwide autocracy eruptions and the cascade of new polarizations. He has a wide range of involvements and speaking gigs, not all of them conservative. He’s an important component of Polievre’s brain trust, so who are the others and who are they talking to?
The stock Liberal response to Tory attacks tends to the hysterical and the hyperbolic. (Diagenon! Trucker Conspiracy! Assassains of Democracy!) It’s the Parliamentary version of taking a dive to fool the ref. I think most Canadians have tuned it out.
Hey, we 100% agree - that's always nice to see! Thanks for clarifying.
I see two big problems with the stock Liberal response to Tory attacks:
1. It's...stock, and you get into crying-wolf territory. Poilievre strikes me as a genuinely dangerous guy in a way that Harper, Scheer, O'Toole, etc., never did. But there's nothing Liberals will say about him that they wouldn't say about Jean Charest or Peter MacKay. Conservatives know how to strike at someone's specific vulnerabilities - that Stephane Dion was not a gifted videographer, that Michael Ignatieff was a tourist, that Justin Trudeau has nice hair. Liberals execute the same playbook every time - "This guy's an extremist, just like the last guy!" There are going to be diminishing returns on that.
2. Maybe the one thing this PM has in common with Donald Trump: he's exactly the same guy every time he talks. He doesn't seem to have different moods. If he comes out and says in his weatherman voice, "I know I said Erin and Andrew were bad, but hey, I mean it this time," people won't listen.
Don’t forget the Tories also went through three leadership contests to elect PP. Under Harper’s tutelage he’s shucked a list of wacko positions. More to the point, he’s learning what doesn’t play without having to incur political cost. Who is going to remember Bitcoin or canning Tiff Maclem when taxpayers are constantly reminded of the other party’s improv?
Please buy the book, and enjoy reading the book. Paul was very fair in his observations and his writing. The book is not a hatchet job, as im sure a many Canadians would have loved and enjoyed immensely. You may discover some insights about the current Priminister.
I have your book on Justin Trudeau and am looking forward to reading it. I thought the excerpt from it in the Star was informative and fair, especially about how he has always attracted attention because of his appearance and background regardless of circumstances. I believe that at base, regardless of his misguided actions and undelivered promises, he has the well-being of Canadians at heart.
The fact that you recommended books by Jonathan Manthorpe gives me some confidence about your own books. A record of events and analysis is helpful. What we hear about Trudeau is often corrupted with personal animosity. Not helpful. Your book is on my list to check out. Thanks.
I went to my local bookstore and mentioned the Indigo thing, which I picked up on from your substack notes. Just starting my second read .I'm finding it quite interesting; a different and (finally!) coherent look at this particular government.
The book tour is getting notice on social media. Just now on Mastodon:
When staunch Conservative pundits are coming out of the woodwork to warn Canadians about Pierre #Poilievre, this isn’t something anyone should take lightly.
Yesterday Paul Wells dropping warnings over Poilievre, today well-known Conservative Tim Powers physically "contorts, cringes & recoils to put some sort of spin on Poilievre’s latest repugnant misstep."
“I don’t think a lot of us are entirely prepared for what this guy is going to try to do if he wins power.” -Paul Wells
Paul, I'd love to see a list of your favourite writers/substackers/journos. I very much appreciate your balanced, non partisan analysis. Sadly, I can count on the fingers of one hand other writers of your ilk I have found. And still have fingers left!
There's so much personality and drama in politics, when I just want policy.
Trudeau pretty much gets my loyalty-for-life because of ONE policy change that changed my entire emotional makeup, eliminating decades of anxiety of the Knock on the Door. Meanwhile, the opposition were still doing "this is your brain on drugs", 1980s messages, during that election. When these changes make it through, whole worlds change; mine certainly did, and tens of thousands of people in real legal jeopardy changed far more, eliminating great misery. But! Just not a news story. I don't recall a SINGLE news story about somebody's life getting a lot better because of legalization, a remarkable journalistic failure.
Parliaments must both legislate and be the Executive, but that should never be considered more than general policy direction; blaming people who've never been in the military for the Afghan pullout was INSANE. Not one story blamed the military or intelligence experts tasked with the job - can anybody name a General who screwed up in Afghanistan? Not me.
Stories tend to be about Executive performance, not policy legislation, because that's when you can call people out as confused or flailing or surprised or in some way, un-dynamic...when I don't even want dynamic. The civil service should manage execution. I want policy.
Deciding an election on whether Trudeau or any other politician is "feckless" or "defensive" is like picking a basketball player for her personality; you either get the child-care, school-lunch, diabetes, dental policies you wanted to pay for, or you don't. Again: the policies above will eliminate oceans of misery from hundreds of thousands of lives. They're all that really counts.
I've only gotten the policies I wanted out of the Liberals as needled and pushed by the NDP; and Trudeau can fecklessly hold all-blackface acid raves at the shell of 24 Sussex, as long as I get them.
I have said ti before and will say it again: if Justin Trudeau honestly and sincerely said 'hey, I've actually screwed some things up,' not only might he not lose the next election he'd also almost immediately become a much more capable Prime Minister.
The arrogance of his PMO and its inability to consider that it might be wrong has been possibly the biggest obstacle to good governance during his term.
Axelrod was referencing the re-elect campaign ‘contrast’ Obama’s campaign guru David Plouffe did in by the character Mitt Romney. ‘He had no core’ and ‘corporate raider, killer of American jobs’.
Such a quaint time in comparison to today. We’ve evolved (or devolved) since.
Just yesterday, the contrast was stark when Plouffe revealed he was going to co-host a new podcast with KellyAnne Conway. I wondered if Romney’s character is still something Plouffe would contest from his new vantage point. What’s the view like when you’re scraping garbage can bottoms?
A couple of people have asked whether subscribing to the Substack means you get a free copy of the book. Nope! Subscribing to the Substack means, as always, that you get full access to the Substack. Buying the book means you get a book. Subscribing to Sutherland Quarterly means you get several books. Three different pipelines to good times.
People actually asked that? lol
Is or will there be a "Kindle Edition" - which is how I acquire books these days, since I have run out of space for the physical variety?
We're looking into that. There's got to be one, but there seems to be some technical hitch. I'll report back.
For a repatriated Canadian who has been entrenched in the shit show with our neighbors, and who has been embarrassed by the Trudeau amateur-hour, but seeing the need to catch up on Canadian politics, this could not have come at a better time.
Would love to support you by buying this, but I’ll admit I loathe him so much that I can’t summon the interest to read about him. Seems to me he’s the not very intelligent son of a very impressive father who is only in power because of his name and his hair. To the extent the he has what could only loosely be described as ideas, they consist mostly of woke virtue signaling (where he gets to call others extremists, while maintaining that he’s the purveyor of sunny ways). He’s also so incompetent that the country is demonstrably worse off than when he was first elected.
I dislike Poilievre as much as you dislike Trudeau, but I always find Paul's takes on both very interesting and worth reading. I think it's good to try to understand why people might find the other side appealing beyond "this guy is bad and other people are bad and that's why they like him". To say nothing of the fact that Paul tends to be a bit hard on prime ministers, especially this one---I haven't read the book yet, but I would expect that you'll see a lot of "so incompetent that the country is demonstrably worse off" in there.
Don’t disagree in principle; still can’t bring myself to read about this feckless idiot (that, and I have so much other reading to do for work and pleasure).
Yeah, that's reasonable. I recently picked up the new-ish book about Mike Harris, for example, and when I looked at the table of contents, I realized, "Hey, I don't want to read about that guy, I hate that guy." So I can't throw stones on this one. Life is too short to read about people we don't want to read about.
If only there were more time to read more books!
Craig, did we go to grad school together?
Well, I hope writing it proves to be time well spent but I would prefer that you turn your attention to the latest on Harper, Manning et al. I just re-read Storming Babylon and Right Side Up. Rather than reducing this to a WWF dissfest Canadians need to get serious about GOP fallout.
I'm a little confused by this, Jim. Want to say more?
I'm a Liberal, but I respected Harper as PM - I thought he was a guy with some dark impulses who tried very hard to keep them in check because he though that was the PM's job. (I know many people think he didn't keep them in check, and that others think he kept them in check out of political expediency - but I honestly think he was trying to be a good PM for all of Canada. Whether he got there is a different question.)
Then I recently read his book, and, wow, dark impulses all over the place. This man really dislikes people like me. And, sure, we're seeing more of that side of him in retirement than I personally saw when he was PM. Granted.
But Paul is a journalist, not a polemicist; like all of his books, his newest is about "the prime minister", not about "Justin Trudeau" (or whoever), and how "the prime minister" is leading Canada. I don't see what Stephen Harper has to do with anything in 2024. The man's been unemployed for nine years. What have I missed? How is he relevant right now?
You’re right, I didn’t make myself clear.
Whenever I get sucked into some House of Commons punchup clickbait on Youtube or wherever, I feel like I’m watching a couple of NHL enforcers waltzing it out for their fans. What gets drowned out in the choregraphy are the critical debates over policy that should be in the public domain, (eg. if needle sites and partial decriminalization of street drugs don’t reduce overdose deaths, why would Ottawa double down?)
Good journalists avoid the appearance of picking sides by picking the facts that lead to the conclusion they’re looking for. Wells is very good at showing why Trudeau does the best he can with who and what he’s got on his team. Fair but enough.
My point was that Inthink it’s time to get specific about the other team and their backers.
I hear Harper is still very much in the thick of things. He anticipated the pushback against globalization, worldwide autocracy eruptions and the cascade of new polarizations. He has a wide range of involvements and speaking gigs, not all of them conservative. He’s an important component of Polievre’s brain trust, so who are the others and who are they talking to?
The stock Liberal response to Tory attacks tends to the hysterical and the hyperbolic. (Diagenon! Trucker Conspiracy! Assassains of Democracy!) It’s the Parliamentary version of taking a dive to fool the ref. I think most Canadians have tuned it out.
Hey, we 100% agree - that's always nice to see! Thanks for clarifying.
I see two big problems with the stock Liberal response to Tory attacks:
1. It's...stock, and you get into crying-wolf territory. Poilievre strikes me as a genuinely dangerous guy in a way that Harper, Scheer, O'Toole, etc., never did. But there's nothing Liberals will say about him that they wouldn't say about Jean Charest or Peter MacKay. Conservatives know how to strike at someone's specific vulnerabilities - that Stephane Dion was not a gifted videographer, that Michael Ignatieff was a tourist, that Justin Trudeau has nice hair. Liberals execute the same playbook every time - "This guy's an extremist, just like the last guy!" There are going to be diminishing returns on that.
2. Maybe the one thing this PM has in common with Donald Trump: he's exactly the same guy every time he talks. He doesn't seem to have different moods. If he comes out and says in his weatherman voice, "I know I said Erin and Andrew were bad, but hey, I mean it this time," people won't listen.
Don’t forget the Tories also went through three leadership contests to elect PP. Under Harper’s tutelage he’s shucked a list of wacko positions. More to the point, he’s learning what doesn’t play without having to incur political cost. Who is going to remember Bitcoin or canning Tiff Maclem when taxpayers are constantly reminded of the other party’s improv?
Please buy the book, and enjoy reading the book. Paul was very fair in his observations and his writing. The book is not a hatchet job, as im sure a many Canadians would have loved and enjoyed immensely. You may discover some insights about the current Priminister.
I have your book on Justin Trudeau and am looking forward to reading it. I thought the excerpt from it in the Star was informative and fair, especially about how he has always attracted attention because of his appearance and background regardless of circumstances. I believe that at base, regardless of his misguided actions and undelivered promises, he has the well-being of Canadians at heart.
Interesting. I’ve always been under the impression that Justin has always been in it for Justin, Canadians be damned.
The fact that you recommended books by Jonathan Manthorpe gives me some confidence about your own books. A record of events and analysis is helpful. What we hear about Trudeau is often corrupted with personal animosity. Not helpful. Your book is on my list to check out. Thanks.
I finished reading your new book yesterday. An interesting read about a frustrating PM. Thanks for it.
I went to my local bookstore and mentioned the Indigo thing, which I picked up on from your substack notes. Just starting my second read .I'm finding it quite interesting; a different and (finally!) coherent look at this particular government.
Get some sleep
The book tour is getting notice on social media. Just now on Mastodon:
When staunch Conservative pundits are coming out of the woodwork to warn Canadians about Pierre #Poilievre, this isn’t something anyone should take lightly.
Yesterday Paul Wells dropping warnings over Poilievre, today well-known Conservative Tim Powers physically "contorts, cringes & recoils to put some sort of spin on Poilievre’s latest repugnant misstep."
“I don’t think a lot of us are entirely prepared for what this guy is going to try to do if he wins power.” -Paul Wells
Paul, I'd love to see a list of your favourite writers/substackers/journos. I very much appreciate your balanced, non partisan analysis. Sadly, I can count on the fingers of one hand other writers of your ilk I have found. And still have fingers left!
There's so much personality and drama in politics, when I just want policy.
Trudeau pretty much gets my loyalty-for-life because of ONE policy change that changed my entire emotional makeup, eliminating decades of anxiety of the Knock on the Door. Meanwhile, the opposition were still doing "this is your brain on drugs", 1980s messages, during that election. When these changes make it through, whole worlds change; mine certainly did, and tens of thousands of people in real legal jeopardy changed far more, eliminating great misery. But! Just not a news story. I don't recall a SINGLE news story about somebody's life getting a lot better because of legalization, a remarkable journalistic failure.
Parliaments must both legislate and be the Executive, but that should never be considered more than general policy direction; blaming people who've never been in the military for the Afghan pullout was INSANE. Not one story blamed the military or intelligence experts tasked with the job - can anybody name a General who screwed up in Afghanistan? Not me.
Stories tend to be about Executive performance, not policy legislation, because that's when you can call people out as confused or flailing or surprised or in some way, un-dynamic...when I don't even want dynamic. The civil service should manage execution. I want policy.
Deciding an election on whether Trudeau or any other politician is "feckless" or "defensive" is like picking a basketball player for her personality; you either get the child-care, school-lunch, diabetes, dental policies you wanted to pay for, or you don't. Again: the policies above will eliminate oceans of misery from hundreds of thousands of lives. They're all that really counts.
I've only gotten the policies I wanted out of the Liberals as needled and pushed by the NDP; and Trudeau can fecklessly hold all-blackface acid raves at the shell of 24 Sussex, as long as I get them.
Loved Ken Whyte's summation of our beloved PM. A boy playing the role of PM. Well, he was a substitute drama teacher.
Got my copy on order from Amazon. I am absolutely looking forward to reading this. We’ve got an important election coming.
I have said ti before and will say it again: if Justin Trudeau honestly and sincerely said 'hey, I've actually screwed some things up,' not only might he not lose the next election he'd also almost immediately become a much more capable Prime Minister.
The arrogance of his PMO and its inability to consider that it might be wrong has been possibly the biggest obstacle to good governance during his term.
You should know that the Sutherland pages on Shopify make no mention of “digital access to the first six”.
At least none that I could see.
Was prepared to subscribe but now need clarification.
If you could pass my note on to Mr Whyte I would be greatful.
Ken White of Sutherland Press has a substack of his own that you might like.
Axelrod was referencing the re-elect campaign ‘contrast’ Obama’s campaign guru David Plouffe did in by the character Mitt Romney. ‘He had no core’ and ‘corporate raider, killer of American jobs’.
Such a quaint time in comparison to today. We’ve evolved (or devolved) since.
Just yesterday, the contrast was stark when Plouffe revealed he was going to co-host a new podcast with KellyAnne Conway. I wondered if Romney’s character is still something Plouffe would contest from his new vantage point. What’s the view like when you’re scraping garbage can bottoms?