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Make Canada Great Again
If Donald Trump can lead America, why can’t a “Shark” lead Canada? US audiences know Kevin O’Leary from his regular appearances on the popular ABC show “Shark Tank.” Entrepreneurs pitch their ideas to O’Leary and three other investors, hoping to gain capital and an influential business partner. While some of the other sharks encourage the struggling presenters and gently offer advice, O’Leary will torch ideas he finds stupid and undercut his fellow panelists at the last second, all the while wearing his Great White grin and calling himself “Mr. Wonderful.”
On Wednesday, O’Leary offered himself as a Conservative Party nominee to become Prime Minister of Canada, his home country. “Canada cannot afford another four years of Justin Trudeau,” O’Leary said. “I am a successful Canadian businessman with a great deal of international experience. I have seen first-hand Trudeau’s gross economic mismanagement, and the effect it is having on our country.”
A big reason O’Leary decided to run? America’s President-elect:
Now, with the election of Donald Trump to our south, Canada’s largest trading partner is headed by a businessman with an aggressive strategy that could hurt the Canadian economy. Trudeau doesn’t stand a chance, and we deserve better.
Canadians need a Prime Minister with a smart plan to kick start the economy; a Prime Minister who supports small businesses, who will fight for hard working Canadians and will stop wasting our money. We need a Prime Minister who is focused on creating jobs.
Canadians are looking for a Prime Minister who is not a career politician; a Prime Minister who will fight for them, and is not afraid to tell them how it is. They also want a Prime Minister who will be inclusive and not lower themselves to use divisive politics.
While he hasn’t amassed the fortune of Donald Trump, O’Leary’s net worth of $300 million shows he’s done very well for himself as a businessman. He founded SoftKey Software Solutions in the mid-1980s, focusing on educational and entertainment products. By the ’90s, he had acquired several rivals and rebranded his organization The Learning Company. Mattel purchased it in 1999, making O’Leary a multimillionaire.
He parlayed this success into regular guest appearances and eventually a hosting role for CBC, and ultimately “Shark Tank,” along with several best-selling books on financial literacy.
“I don’t have a money problem. I don’t have a name recognition problem,” O’Leary told an interviewer. “I want to do what’s right for the party: sell tens of thousands of memberships and then let them decide … who should carry the torch to Ottawa to perform the exorcism we need in this country in 2019 to rid the country of Justin Trudeau.”
The Conservative Party is offering 14 candidates in all and members will vote on their nominee May 27.
Published in General
True story – I once passed him on a Canadian street – quite far away, and then he waved at me as if he’d known me for 20 years. Funny, because I’d never met the man in my life. Somehow, that encapsulates his entire political career:
“Waved at me. Never knew him.”
I’m a regular “Shark Tank” viewer, and O’Leary is the least likable Shark. I get that he’s supposed to be the Simon Cowell of the panel, and I’m sure the show undergoes some editing for effect, but it seems fairly clear that some entrepreneurs avoid making a deal with him, simply because they perceive him as hard to work with. Show footage would be great fodder for opposition advertising.
Color me skeptical. Of course, I thought the same thing about now-President Trump.
Being difficult to work with – or driving a hard bargain? I think we’d rather have a hard-driver looking out for our public interest – rather than soft touch looking out for his political interests.
O’Leary tends to call things as he sees it and doesn’t mince words. He doesn’t see a need to sugar coat things in a day and age when people like things so sugar coated you get diabetes while being rejected. Some folks find his method refreshing. Not a lot, but some do.