CHARBONNEAU – Tory support has been shaken by Trumpquake
(Image: Facebook)
CONSERVATIVES FELT the ground shift beneath their feet with the election of Trump and the resignation of Trudeau.
Support for the federal Conservatives has been in freefall ever since.
There are two problems facing the Conservatives: the leader is not popular and they are not ready to deal with a U.S. president they identify with.
All Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre had going for him was that he was less unpopular than Trudeau. But his net favourability ratings have been negative from the start.
With Trudeau gone, voters are now comparing him with a new Liberal leader and he has been found wanting.
Placed side by side with Liberal contender Mark Carney, Poilievre comes up short. His sophomoric style of stupid rhyming slogans, his attack-dog persona, and his endless supply of cheap shots fail to project a man of the gravity necessary to face the assault on our sovereignty from the orange man.
Poilievre’s appeal to ignorance and paranoia remind too many non-Conservative supporters of Trump.
And Conservative supporters find it hard to find fault in Trump.
An Abacus Data poll from January, 2025, found that 25 per cent of Conservative supporters are open to Canada becoming a 51st state – twice that of average Canadians.
Conservative supporters backed the man who would be Emperor of Canada in the last election; 45 per cent of Conservatives backed Trump over Biden in the last presidential election.
Can Poilievre effectively attack Trump when many of his own supporters approve of the president’s attack on woke liberals?
More than 50 per cent of Conservatives supported the freedom convoy of 2022.
Freedom convoyers have a warped sense of patriotism. Borrowed from their U.S. counterparts, they superficially wrap themselves in the flag of Canada.
Their use of our flag was not out of true patriotism but a gimmick to support their ideas of freedom –freedom not to be vaccinated, for example, in the face of a global pandemic not seen in a hundred years.
Patriotic Canadians don’t wrap themselves in the flag. We have a steely brand of patriotism that mirrors the grit of living in true north.
Freedom convoyers’ idea of patriotism is to climb in their trucks and drive around, blocking bridges and border, horns blaring, shouting F**K Trudeau.
True patriotism is not some shallow flag-waving event. It requires solidarity behind the government in power, the government of Canada.
Patriotism is not throwing a wild party as when they occupied Ottawa with the goal of raising a ruckus and having fun at everyone else’s expense.
One of the organizers, Pat King, told an inquiry into the use of the Emergencies Act: “I’ve never seen anything more loving and peaceful in my life. It was Woodstock.”
It may have been a lovefest for the freedom convoyers but the all-night noise was hell for the citizens of Ottawa.
Sure, freedom convoyers will occasionally rally the troops to get in their trucks and stir things up; like the so-called Election Convoy called for in January, 2025, to create nation-wide traffic jams.
The whole thing fizzled, according to ConvoyWatch.
Conservatives weren’t ready for the seismic shift in politics and will pay for their frivolity.
David Charbonneau is a retired TRU electronics instructor who hosts a blog at http://www.eyeviewkamloops.wordpress.com.
ArmchairMayor.ca 
I have never voted conservative and the “orange man.” approach to Canada clashes with my broader Canadian ideal. If you want peace, you can’t fund a war, and if this is a start for unity of humanity from the “orange man” or Poilievre or Carney this is something worthy to support.
You frame Poilievre’s unpopularity as his Achilles’ heel, by calling his style “sophomoric” with “stupid rhyming slogans” and “cheap shots” feels more like a personal dig than a substantive critique on issues. What’s the alternative? Yes, I like Carney but you don’t say he is inherently better for tackling sovereignty issues especially when Trump’s bombast arguably thrives on the opposite.
Here’s where the article muddies the well you don’t prove Poilievre is pro-Trump, just that his fans might be. Guilt by association is a stretch unless you’ve got Poilievre on record cozying up to the “orange man.”
Then there’s the Freedom Convoy detour. You imply they’re tethered to this crowd, over 50% support, you say, but don’t connect the dots to policy or strategy. It’s more a roast of a subset of supporters than a takedown of the party’s core issues.
Dismissing the convoy as a “wild party” skips over the deeper anger driving it, which, fair or not, resonated with a chunk of the population.
The well’s poisoned when you linger on their flaws (real or perceived) instead of dissecting their readiness for a Trump-shaped challenge. What’s Poilievre’s plan for U.S. relations? How’s Carney’s seriousness any better? You hint at a seismic shift but don’t nail down why the Conservatives are doomed beyond their loudmouth leader and rowdy fans. It’s a fun read, but it’s more heat than light.
LikeLike
This is coming from the very same person who published an article on the Armchair Mayor site with the title “Safer Supply Drug Diversion is Greatly Exaggerated”, with quotes like “It’s untrue that there is a large diversion of safer supply drugs because the numbers don’t support it” and “But the scale of the problem is being inflated to suit the needs of ill-informed politicians”.
The numbers didn’t support it because the BC government wasn’t keen on providing the actual numbers, to the point they purposefully avoided a mechanism to track the diversion. Finally after exhausting every opportunity to deflect, hide and minimize, they admitted diversion is a massive problem, and subsequently changed their minds about the efficacy of handing out free pills to anyone that asked for them – no strings attached.
We seem to have lost the notion of the pursuit of truth in journalism. Rare is it these days to read journalism that is not dripping with political bias of the writer.
When dogmatic and entrenched political stances influence your writing to the point where they champion untruths as truths, and attempt to bury truths as untruths, all you’re doing is contributing to creating wedge issues, further dividing society and encouraging tribalism.
Read your article on safe supply and ask yourself, who here is peddling in “alternative facts”?
LikeLike
All of Mr. Charbonneau’s articles are opinion pieces, not as you suggest: journalism.
Journalism is when reporters go out, boots on the ground, to cover stories, talk to people, etc. Also, journalists do not do their research on the internet.
The good thing about opinion articles is they inspire conversation by giving ideas that may be different from your own.
LikeLike
Journalists have taken a professional exile from telling the truth and have become just dust—opinion. This makes them derelicts in that duty. Just imagine how many lives would have been saved if they had told the truth about Iraq and for that matter Ukraine with sound reporting rather than parroting the wire services who are in bed with power.
The purpose of present-day media is to keep the unsayable unsaid. This blog is an influencer and when op-ed articles, opinions as you call them, appear omitting the facts, we need to ask what is their agenda but to protect their vibe or brand when they dodge hard questions. For me Media figures didn’t invent that lie, but they don’t exactly fight it either—they kept the unsayable (like “this might be bullshit”) unsaid.
LikeLiked by 1 person