On Pierre Poilievre’s first day as leader of the Opposition, eleven months ago, the Liberals’ best available minister sought to frame the battle ahead.
“We are going to see two competing visions over the course of this session,” Randy Boissonnault said, largely ignoring Poilievre’s first question.
“The first is our government’s plan to support Canadians and those who need it most. The second is that of the Conservative Party and members of Parliament who would leave Canadians to their own devices.”
Boissonnault’s answer struck me at the time as the best available information about the Trudeau Liberals’ plan for Poilievre. It’s worth revisiting.
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At the time, late in September 2022, Poilievre had won a resounding victory over the rest of the Conservative leadership field. The Trudeau government had an opportunity to influence votes’ perceptions of the Liberals’ latest opponent. Many observers assumed the Liberals would do this through some sort of ad campaign, as Stephen Harper had done against Paul Martin, Stéphane Dion and Michael Ignatieff, and tried to do against Trudeau, always well ahead of an election.
Boissonnault was announcing the Liberals wouldn’t do this. The main parties’ “two competing visions” would become clear throughout “this session,” in the venue where life is divided into sessions: Parliament. (My procedure-wonk friends will remind me that a “session” isn’t a school year, it’s the space between a Throne Speech and a prorogation or dissolution. Still, a year is a good time for an interim check-in, and plainly things are happening.)
I’m going to say it hasn’t gone well for the Liberals. A stack of polls tells me so, but we don’t only need polls. The Cabinet has gathered in Charlottetown to hear from an academic who calls the state of housing in Canada “a crisis.”Meanwhile the guy who ran economic policy for Justin Trudeau’s government for seven years is calling affordable housing “the urgent economic need of today.” Imagine how many urgent economic needs we’ve heard about since 2015. Maybe the urgent economic need all along was to resist the urge to treat every need as urgent. Anyway the Liberals expected they could govern by picking issues that would work to their advantage. Instead an issue has been picked for them.
Poilievre made no secret of his own plan to use housing shortages to illustrate “two competing visions.” Every time he stood that day he repeated that housing prices had doubled under Trudeau. Boissonnault’s response was, in some cases, to ignore the question (“Mr. Speaker, let us talk about how people can pay their bills with our new dental plan”) and in others, to mention the day’s latest government policy: a one-time top-up to the Canada Housing Benefit, which would be worth $500 for people whose family income was under $35,000. The top-up began two months after Boissonnault spoke and ended three months after that, in March of this year. After that, Boissonnault and his colleagues would leave Canadians to their own devices, we might say.
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Why has the parliamentary session, as glimpsed since last September, been a bad choice of venue for the Liberals’ narrative of two competing visions? A few reasons.
First, most Canadians ignore Parliament. This trend has accelerated in the last eight years. Partly because the audience for just about any given thing in our society has declined as attention spans fragment. Partly because it’s increasingly obvious that the House of Commons no longer provides even occasional surprise. Stephen Harper and Jean Chrétien used to say surprising things. Not often. But they’d reveal a conversation they’d had, or announce a decision, or cleverly sabotage a question’s intended effect. This crew is earnest and general. Always.
Second, Poilievre likes Parliament more than Trudeau does. Not in the sense that he respects it as an institution. Neither of them does. The whole notion is quaint. But Poilievre looks forward to Question Period, rehearses for it, relishes its limited opportunities. Trudeau, who systematically demotes naysayers, has never believed he should have to put up with any in the middle of his workday.
It’s easy to understand a guy disliking Parliament. But disliking Parliament makes Parliament an odd choice of venue for making any kind of important case.
The third problem with the notion that an ordinary governing year would define Poilievre is that it allowed Poilievre to specialize while the government generalized. Any Canadian government has to manage the normal array of dreary files, the bilateral relationship with the U.S., the post-pandemic recovery, ports and bridges and health transfers and public-sector strikes. Not every day can be a message day, even for a government that tries to make its every act a message. That’s why governing parties often prefer to put the “governing” and “party” parts of their mission under distinct command structures.
It’s often said that in making his campaign team his governing team, Trudeau limited the effectiveness of his government. It’s increasingly clear the problem goes the other way too: How can a Prime Minister’s Office think clearly about politics?
The upshot is that while the Liberals have been fitfully defining their opponent he has been diligently defining them. It has gone better for him than for them. A new poll, by Abacus for the Toronto Star, shows that “more [respondents] think Poilievre is genuine than phoney, strong instead of weak, down to earth instead of elitist.” This will be vexing news for readers who think the Conservative leader is phoney, weak and elitist, but in politics the goal isn’t to believe your own beliefs really hard, it’s to get other people to believe them. Here the Liberals’ problem is much like their problem on housing: It’s as though they just realized they have a job to do.
A note to readers as an election approaches, whether that election happens in 2023, 2024 or 2025. If you have a strong emotional investment in anyoutcome in that election, this newsletter will certainly disappoint you. I’m not here to help Poilievre. I’m not here to defend Trudeau. I see qualities and flaws in each. I might even amaze everyone by mentioning the NDP, once or twice. This isn’t an artificial stance born of some mandate for “objectivity” or, worse, “balance.” I’m selling my opinions here. But my opinions don’t line up cleanly with the party lines in most elections and they won’t in this one.
Readers who are inclined to work fulltime to correct other readers’ opinions should remind themselves that the election won’t be won or lost in the comment board of the Paul Wells newsletter. Thanks, as always, for your support and interest.
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Following an alarming rise in fentanyl deaths in recent years, President Donald Trump is taking another step in cracking down on the deadly drug seeping its way onto American streets by designating it a weapon of mass destruction.
The president signed the executive order Monday during an event in the Oval Office, saying the illicit drug “is closer to a chemical weapon than a narcotic.”
The designation comes on the heels of the administration’s increasing military presence in the Caribbean, targeting narco-terrorists and “successful” meetings with Chinese leaders, who have vowed to crack down on the production of precursors of the drug.
Critics of Trump’s move want to address the fentanyl crisis through a different way. For example, a 2024 bill from attorneys general asking former President Joe Biden to do the same thing expressed concerns about political optics and the language akin to military. Overreach and blurred lines in domestic actions, such as rounding up users.
The order would provide the secretaries of the Department of War and Department of Homeland Security to “update all directives regarding the armed forces’ response to chemical incidents in the homeland to include the threat of illicit fentanyl.”
Trump said the fentanyl drug trade “threatens” national security by fueling “lawlessness” in the Western Hemisphere. This is the area of North America and South America, and the islands near each.
“The production and sale of fentanyl by foreign terrorist organizations and cartels fund these entities’ operations – which include assassinations, terrorist acts, and insurgencies around the world – and allow these entities to erode our domestic security and the well-being of our nation,” the order says in part.
Trump said two cartels are predominantly responsible. The Sinaloa Cartel and the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, known also as CJNG, are based in Mexico.
The Drug Enforcement Agency said last December that in 2023, more than 107,000 people died from drug overdoses, with nearly 70% attributed to opioids, like fentanyl.
In late February, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention via its National Vital Statistics System predicted a 24% decline in drug overdose deaths for the 12 months ending in September. The finding was based on 87,000 drug overdose deaths from October 2023 to September 2024, down from 114,000 the year prior.
Trump declared opioid overdose a public health emergency in 2017 during his first term.
If we force a transition that increases the cost of living, threatens grid reliability, and denies developing nations the dense energy they need to rise out of poverty, what have we actually achieved?
Finance expert warns that political timelines for transition defy the laws of physics and economics while threatening living standards.
In the polarized world of energy policy, it is becoming increasingly difficult to find conversations that prioritize practical reality over political idealism. We are often presented with a binary choice: either you are for the planet, or you are against it. But as I often find when digging deeper into these issues on the Power Struggle podcast, the real world is far too complex for such simple narratives.
I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Jerome Gessaroli to strip away the rhetoric and look at the hard numbers. For those who don’t know him, Gessaroli is a finance professor at the British Columbia Institute of Technology, a senior fellow with the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, and a valued member of the Resource Works Advisory Council. He is a thinker who deals in data, not daydreams.
Stewart Muir with Jerome Gesaroli on Power Struggle Podcast
Our conversation focused on a topic that makes many policymakers uncomfortable: the widening gap between our energy transition targets and the physical capacity to meet them.
The Fundamental Equation
We began with a premise that should be obvious but is frequently forgotten in the halls of government in Ottawa or Brussels. Gessaroli laid it out as a fundamental fact that underscores every economic decision a nation makes.
“There is a direct link, a direct correlation, between energy consumption and living standards,” Gessaroli told me. “And so if we expect to improve our living standards in the future, then we will likely be expending more energy.”
This is the inescapable equation of modern life. In the West, where we have enjoyed stable grids and abundant fuel for a century, we sometimes delude ourselves into thinking we can maintain our prosperity while shrinking our energy footprint. But globally, the trend is moving in the opposite direction.
Gessaroli pointed out that while we debate carbon taxes and caps here, the majority of the planet is focused on survival and advancement.
“A lot of the growth in energy consumption will be through the Third World,” he explained. “They’ve just got a huge population, and they want to pursue economic growth, have a better standard of living, and that will require a lot more energy.”
The View from the Developing World
To illustrate this, Gessaroli drew on his observations from India. He described seeing farmers burning dung to create heat and energy—a practice born of necessity, but one that traps populations in poverty and creates localized health hazards. The path out of that poverty isn’t found in wishful thinking; it’s found in density.
“Now, if they expect to have a better standard of living in the future . . . they’re going to be looking at more intensive sources of energy, like coal, natural gas, nuclear, whatever,” Gessaroli said. “They need to use more energy in order to raise their living standards.”
This brings us to one of the most contentious points in the global climate dialogue. We often hear Western politicians ask, with a mix of confusion and frustration, why nations like China and India are still building new coal-power plants. If the technology for wind and solar exists, why aren’t they leaping straight to it?
I found Gessaroli’s answer to be a necessary dose of realism. It isn’t that these nations hate the environment; it’s that they love stability.
“They know how to do it extremely efficiently. They have the local domestic sources,” Gessaroli noted, referring to coal reserves. “There’s a source of energy security in that they don’t have to import the product.”
In an era of geopolitical instability, energy security is national security. Relying on domestic coal provides a safety net that imported fuels or intermittent renewables cannot yet match. As Gessaroli put it: “The type of power that is generated by a coal plant, for instance, is stable, reliable power.”
The Timeline Mismatch
This doesn’t mean the world isn’t changing. It is. Gessaroli was quick to acknowledge that the green energy sector is booming. Innovation is happening. But there is a massive disconnect between the pace of engineering and the pace of political promises.
“There is a lot of growth in terms of other types of energy production. They’re growing quite rapidly and they’re improving over time,” Gessaroli said. “But it’s just not in line with the time frames that our politicians and policymakers are telling us that the targets have to be met by.”
This is the crux of the “power struggle.” We are being sold a vision of the future with a delivery date that defies the laws of physics and economics.
The EV Challenge and the Scale of Site C
Perhaps nowhere is this disconnect more visible than in the push for electric vehicles (EVs). Governments are setting aggressive target dates to ban the sale of internal combustion engines. On paper, it looks like a victory for the climate. But as a finance professor, Gessaroli looks at the balance sheet of power generation.
“What they don’t realize is the activity, the investment, required to actually make that happen,” he said. “Where is all that extra power going to come from?”
This is not a rhetorical question. It is a logistical nightmare. To put it in a local context, we looked at British Columbia. We have just spent years and billions of dollars completing the Site C hydro dam, a massive engineering project designed to secure our grid for the future.
However, Gessaroli’s calculations suggest that the new power demand from a full EV transition alone means we would need two times the amount of power currently generated by the new Site C hydro dam.
Let that sink in. It took us decades of planning, regulatory hurdles, and construction to build one Site C. To meet the government’s EV mandates, we effectively need to build two more, immediately. And that doesn’t even account for the rest of the economy.
“If we want to decarbonize mines and other industrial projects as well, then we’re going to have to find the extra power,” Gessaroli added.
If we cannot build the generation capacity in time, the demand will simply outstrip supply. Prices will skyrocket, and reliability will plummet.
The Unintended Consequences
Towards the end of our discussion, Gessaroli posed a question that has stuck with me. It challenges the moral high ground often claimed by the most aggressive climate activists.
If we force a transition that increases the cost of living, threatens grid reliability, and denies developing nations the dense energy they need to rise out of poverty, what have we actually achieved?
It all leads to his key question: What if the green revolution is hurting the people it aims to protect?
It is a question that deserves an honest answer, not more slogans. As we look toward a future of increased energy demand, we need to listen to experts like Gessaroli who understand that you cannot legislate your way around the laws of thermodynamics.
