US Conservatives Could Take a Play or Two from the People’s Party of Canada

 

Maxime Bernier says he will not be taking the Covid-19 vaccine. He is the only political party leader in Canada to do so. 

An initial Google search of Maxime Bernier directed me to an article about his arrest in 2021 for attending a protest against the nation’s Covid-19 policies and a shiesty story about his not taking the vaccine. I was also directed to the website for the People’s Party of Canada–which Mr. Bernier founded.

On the website is a page with the heading “Aren’t You Tired of Lockdowns?” The article cites the increased joblessness and declining mental health of Canadians, specifically Canadian youth, while asking the question we have all been asking, “Do lockdowns even work?” Bernier wishes to institute a more  “compassionate and effective approach” by protecting the elderly and allowing everyone else to return to a level of normalcy. 

What stands out to me the most on this particular page is the critique of Canada’s Conservative Party. (Do you think they call it the “CCP?”)

“Conservative Party politicians are so scared of criticism, they refuse to act as a check on the approach Justin Trudeau is taking,” says Bernier. “Experts are opposed to the direction the Federal Government is giving the provinces, but Erin O’Toole is nowhere to be found, even though he leads the official opposition.”

Indeed, since the beginning of the pandemic, the Conservative Party has been unwilling or unable to hold the government accountable, not just for their response to the Pandemic, but for silencing critics and suffocating dissent.

“The Liberals want to keep us locked up while they use the crisis created by their own measures as an excuse to expand the welfare state and explode the deficit, and the Conservative Party is happy to march along with them,” says Bernier.

Sound familiar?

I was intrigued at this point, so I continued to explore the website. Here is the party platform:

  • FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION: Protecting Canadians from Censorship and Discrimination
  • PUBLIC FINANCE: Balancing the Budget in Two Years and Cutting Taxes
  • ECONOMY: Encouraging Investment and Productivity Growth
  • INDIGENOUS ISSUES: A New Relationship Based on Mutual Respect
  • VETERANS: Standing behind the men and women who sacrificed for our country
  • CANADIAN IDENTITY: Ending Official Multiculturalism and Preserving Canadian Values and Culture
  • REFUGEES: Ending Open Borders Policies and Prioritizing Persecuted Groups
  • IMMIGRATION: Reducing Overall Levels and Prioritizing Skilled Immigrants
  • PIPELINES: Allowing our Oil and Gas Industry to Grow
  • FOREIGN POLICY: Focusing on the Security and Prosperity of Canadians
  • GLOBAL WARMING & ENVIRONMENT: Rejecting Alarmism and Focusing on Concrete Improvements
  • SUPPLY MANAGEMENT: Making Dairy, Poultry, and Eggs More Affordable
  • INTERNAL TRADE: Getting Rid of Interprovincial Trade Barriers
  • HEALTH CARE: Giving Provinces the Incentives to Deal with Wait Times and Rising Costs
  • FIREARMS: Respecting Legal Firearms Owners and Targeting Criminals
  • EQUALIZATION: Fairness For All Provinces

I am not going to sit here and pretend I am some kind of Canada expert. I went to Niagara Falls once when I was 16. I had one Canadian friend in college who told me that Canadians call their currency “Loonies and Toonies,” which seem to fall perfectly in line with every Canadian stereotype I had ever heard. But at first glance at the platform, I was feeling refreshed. If the People’s Party can “walk the talk,” then they may have my hypothetical “vote.”

I have always thought of Canada as the country of happy syrup makers who never go to war and have to wear big jackets, but as of late it has been deemed the “woke capital.”

In 2018 the government tried to deny summer job funding (a program that subsidizes businesses to hire summer employees) to “anti-choice” organizations–protecting abortion as a “human right.” Apparently, they changed the language but the Founder and Executive Director of the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada described the changes saying, “It still achieves the same aim of ensuring that groups that are primarily against human rights, like anti-choice groups, are not going to be eligible for funding still, and it appears to satisfy the concerns of religious groups and churches.”

In 2017, the government passed C-16 — a bill adding “gender identity and expression” to the Human Rights Code and to the hate crime section of the Criminal Code. The passing of this bill opened up the possibility of fines, “sensitivity training,” even jail time for “misgendering” someone. Jared Brown of Brown Litigation did not feel the bill clearly leads to jail time but admitted, “The path to prison is not straightforward. It’s not easy. But, it’s there.”

The Equality Act anyone?

American Progressives have good cause to gaze longingly at the nation of Canada as the Canadian government redistributes wealth, cracks down on “misinformation,” and prioritizes climate change policies.

Should Maxime Brenier come to power, it seems we can kiss the world’s Progressive utopia goodbye. The People’s Party promises to remove the country from the Paris Accord, abolish the carbon tax, expand the oil and gas industry, repeal C-16, reduce Canada’s UN presence to a minimum, secure their borders, and, dare I say, put “Canada First.”

I can anticipate a few comments to this post:

“If you like Canada so much, move there.”

“I guess I’m moving to Canada.”

Slow down, my fellow Patriots.

If anything, the People’s Party of Canada is the promising cousin of American ideas. Should they be true to their promises, I wish them quite well.

But back to America. If Canada can do it, we can do it. 

We can surely relate to an establishment party sitting on its hands as basic freedoms are eroded. Just this week Mayor de Blasio of NYC established our nation’s first vaccine passport — ”The Key to NYC.” As of August 4, 55 percent of NYC residents have been vaccinated. Everyone else can’t eat indoors or go to the gym, thanks to Mayor de Blasio. 

Where are our political leaders willing to get arrested for this overt government overreach? Since when have Canadians had more guts than we do?  (No offense Canadians. I have only known one Canadian in real life, and he was awesome. Also, Jordan Peterson is Canadian, so “mad respect” for Canada, as the kids say.)

But seriously, how is the People’s Party of Canada sounding more American than America?

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  1. DrewInWisconsin, Oaf Member
    DrewInWisconsin, Oaf
    @DrewInWisconsin

    Mikayla Goetz:

    What stands out to me the most on this particular page is the critique of Canada’s Conservative Party. (Do you think they call it the “CCP?”)

    “Conservative Party politicians are so scared of criticism, they refuse to act as a check on the approach Justin Trudeau is taking,” says Bernier. “Experts are opposed to the direction the Federal Government is giving the provinces, but Erin O’Toole is nowhere to be found, even though he leads the official opposition.”

    Indeed, since the beginning of the pandemic, the Conservative Party has been unwilling or unable to hold the government accountable, not just for their response to the Pandemic, but for silencing critics and suffocating dissent.

    “The Liberals want to keep us locked up while they use the crisis created by their own measures as an excuse to expand the welfare state and explode the deficit, and the Conservative Party is happy to march along with them,” says Bernier.

    Sound familiar?

    Yes. Oh yes.

    • #1
  2. ToryWarWriter Coolidge
    ToryWarWriter
    @ToryWarWriter

    Yeah hes still a loser, and he can have all the good ideas you like, but hes less effective than Ron Paul in the 1990s.

    This man would be Prime Minister right now, if he just learned to shut up.  He would certainly be leader of the opposition.

    But he doesnt even have his own seat.  To the vast majority of conservatives in Canada he is a figure of ridicule.  I am going to be likely doing a video on this buffoon sooner rather than later.  

    • #2
  3. Stad Coolidge
    Stad
    @Stad

    I just wish they had a better name.  Whenever I hear the word “people’s” in a political party title or a country’s name, I think of something socialist or worse . . .

    • #3
  4. Ben Sears Member
    Ben Sears
    @BenMSYS

    My wife and I honeymooned in Vancouver in 2002 and after a particularly amazing dinner we went back to our hotel armed with a few (more) bottles of wine and got (more) giggly. For whatever reason we kept calling it Canadia and laughing stupidly. It’s still Canadia to me so forgive me when I say that if Canadia adopts the agenda as laid out above then Canadia will be more American than America. If you doubt that they can do it, and you should, take heart that they just put themselves at the pinnacle of North American women’s soccer which is a pretty American thing to do. 

    • #4
  5. Mikayla Goetz Member
    Mikayla Goetz
    @Mikayla Goetz

    ToryWarWriter (View Comment):

    Yeah hes still a loser, and he can have all the good ideas you like, but hes less effective than Ron Paul in the 1990s.

    This man would be Prime Minister right now, if he just learned to shut up. He would certainly be leader of the opposition.

    But he doesnt even have his own seat. To the vast majority of conservatives in Canada he is a figure of ridicule. I am going to be likely doing a video on this buffoon sooner rather than later.

    @torywarwriter  please let me know when the video is up! I would love to watch. 

    • #5
  6. ToryWarWriter Coolidge
    ToryWarWriter
    @ToryWarWriter

    Mikayla Goetz (View Comment):

    ToryWarWriter (View Comment):

    Yeah hes still a loser, and he can have all the good ideas you like, but hes less effective than Ron Paul in the 1990s.

    This man would be Prime Minister right now, if he just learned to shut up. He would certainly be leader of the opposition.

    But he doesnt even have his own seat. To the vast majority of conservatives in Canada he is a figure of ridicule. I am going to be likely doing a video on this buffoon sooner rather than later.

    @ torywarwriter please let me know when the video is up! I would love to watch.

    Sure.  My mom is in town, so it will be a couple days before I can make it.

    • #6
  7. RushBabe49 Thatcher
    RushBabe49
    @RushBabe49

    Canada has turned into a COVID police state, dragging pastors off to jail, on camera. If the border ever fully opens, we might go back to Victoria to celebrate our anniversary. Ray refuses vaccination, so it might be a while. 

    • #7
  8. GeezerBob Coolidge
    GeezerBob
    @GeezerBob

    Whatever the merits of all the other points on this list, the balanced budget item is a guaranteed loser. What have Republicans been campaigning on for, oh I don’t know, the last century? Then, during the Clinton administration, that goal was reached. The deficit was eliminated and the budget was balanced. What happened when the Republicans gained control with Bush II? That’s right. As George Will so succinctly put it, Republicans began “spending like drunken Democrats.” (This was before his epiphany in which he discovered that  the Democrats were the last great hope for mankind.)

    The bottom line is that a balanced budget as a campaign item is a chimera. It will not be believed and will gain no support for conservatives. Yes, the budget is out of control but because of unhindered spending on dubious projects with illusory results. I believe that the people will support sensible spending on useful projects that are recognizably constitutional. But a balanced budget? They are more likely to take you up on that Brooklyn Bridge offer.

    • #8
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