Trump is quickly becoming Pierre Poilievre's worst nightmare

Pierre Poilievre had the right plan and made the right moves, but Donald Trump changed the game.

Picture this: a young teen sets his sights on becoming leader of a nation, planning, and working his entire adult life to achieve it. The stars in his eyes may have dimmed slightly as he began to understand the importance and dignity his achievement will bring, but still, he is determined; even hungry.

He carefully calculates the opportunity, waiting until he’s certain that the political favour will be his alone. He strikes swiftly at the leader, felling him before he could draw a weapon, then deftly takes down each of his rivals with a national campaign that leaves them all far behind. His win is decisive, his margin of support massive. He made it look easy.

Over the next few years, he can feel the momentum behind him, and proudly watches as it drains from the next, and last, opponent he will face; the final battle is coming and he knows it is his to lose.

He revels in the bubble — though it is a massive bubble — of support. He has friends and allies in Ottawa, and at the highest levels of the provincial governments. They are all on his side. They are all cheering him on.

He has built his team with precision and brought in members who have close ties to the incoming American administration. He surveys his position and he’s certain he made the right decision to court Canadians who traitorously fly flags decorated with the emblem of another nation and the name of its president-elect.

He’s never felt stronger, or more destined to win.

He probably imagines that, together, he and the orange menace from the south will jointly build a free-market, capitalist utopia that turns the shackles of the welfare-state to dust. He’s anticipated and blocked every move by his opponent thus far, barely even considering him a worthy challenger at this stage.

Then, BAM!

Another player wants in on the game and starts shaking the board.

With less than a year until he is crowned leader, a treacherous-looking path now appears before him: tariffs.

Huge tariffs that could plummet the economy he is to inherit.

Yet, there is a glimmer of hope; the orange menace says that if Canada stops the leaky border and protects the neighbouring nation, all will be as it was before.

Upon further inspection, the road doesn’t look as difficult as he first imagined and Poilievre thinks he’s been given a gift.

He has spent countless hours denigrating his country as “broken”, and gleefully heralded the coming downfall of his soon-to-be-predecessor. There is no need to rethink his strategy, for he can charge ahead with the gifts the orange menace has promised to keep giving.

The orange menace, however, cannot be trusted. Unbeknownst to Poilievre, Donald Trump wants to watch them run through the maze he’s creating and he has yet to decide if it will actually lead to an exit, or simply a dead end.

Poilievre may soon realize that his success is becoming tied, perhaps irrevocably, to the player he was only too happy to leave behind.

It’s just a joke

It began harmlessly enough.

When incoming president Donald Trump told Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that Canada should consider becoming the 51st state, it probably received a surprised, maybe even forced laugh from the Canadians around the table at Mar-a-Lago. Maybe it received a bigger laugh from the Americans.

The point is that they laughed.

Online, from the wood-paneled, shag-carpeted, depths of his mother’s basement, a keyboard warrior shares an AI rendition of the incoming president standing tall, gazing out over his domain with a Canadian flag planted beside him. Trump, his ego only too primed for the gratification, shares the image on his social media.

It’s funny; only liberals wouldn’t get the joke.

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith can’t stop telling everyone with a microphone how “hilarious” Donald Trump’s joke is. She’s a thirsty puppy begging for a pat on the head. She gets the joke, too, Mr. President. She thinks you’re hilarious, Mr. President. Did you see her talking about how funny you are, Mr. President?

She’s not the only one.

Far too many Canadian Conservatives, including their leader in Ottawa, have become so attuned to the anti-Trudeau dog whistle that they come running, panting and drooling, to join the steaming pile, each hoping they will find their way to the top of its glorious peak.

Making people laugh feels fantastic. It’s even more of a rush for someone who is tragically, but not comically, unfunny; they will keep finding new ways to tell the joke, even if it comes to them nine days later when most of their audience is asleep.

And, if they suddenly find themselves a new audience for the joke, some corner that they didn’t even realize was listening? Well, buckle up, because now we’re going to see what this baby can really do.

Ello, gov’na

When my third child was just over a year old, he was standing on a chair at the kitchen table while his two older siblings sat across from him, colouring. He tooted, rather loudly, and his siblings burst into giggles. Seeing this, the youngster decided to do it again, and was rewarded with bigger, and louder, laughter, which also made me laugh. He maybe managed two or three more before his face began to get red and his efforts started to look like they might produce a far different result than he intended.

Personally, I was more concerned he might have an aneurysm and quickly distracted him.

Trump’s face isn’t red yet, but it’s possible that Poilievre is on his way to finding himself in the same position I was — it was funny, at first, but then it starts to look concerning.

When the joke seemed to deliver, and the target of the joke was the same one Poilievre and friends had been pointing at for years, it probably seemed like a good idea to grab some of that ammunition for themselves.

And it usually is — right up until the target stopped being the person whose position Poilievre coveted and instead became the office he desperately wants to occupy.

When Trump’s “joke” could be used to insult Trudeau the person, it worked perfectly with Poilievre’s campaign against the Liberal leader. Weakening the public’s image of Trudeau, and his party, along with his “alliance”, helped Poilievre build the anti-Trudeau support he needs to propel him into the office.

But once Trump demeaned the office by referring to the Prime Minister of Canada as a Governor of a territory within his country’s dominion, it was no longer about Trudeau, but the office and position he holds.

The office and position that Pierre Poilievre has been dreaming of making his own.

It’s possible the joke will die down, but it’s equally possible that Trump will keep finding ways to poke fun, and that all the seeds of anger and humiliation that Poilievre planted for Trudeau will be blown right back into his face by the bag of wind down south, where they may take root around his own feet.

Worse yet, Poilievre will be helpless as those who once propped him up, but never had any personal investment in succeeding to the role, trample over him as they continue to chase the anti-Trudeau euphoria that Poilievre nurtured into the behemoth he’s about to lose control of.

If Trump spends the next year undermining and sullying the role and office of the Prime Minister, the position that Pierre Poilievre succeeds to will be of utterly diminished value; even to him.

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