Poilievre Lost Carleton Riding. Good: GRAY

Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre was rejected by the people who know him best and are closest to him … the people of Carleton riding.

Those local voters didn’t just want him as their MP, they didn’t want him as prime minister. That’s a stern slap to the face.

It’s one thing to be your MP where you can’t really hurt anything and another thing to take the big step up to prime minister where you can really screw things up, particularly in a crisis as Canada is experiencing now.

Your agent met Poilievre twice. The first time was during his first election campaign in 2004 where a city editor assigned me to walk with the young man through a day on the hustings. As a reporter, I hated covering elections because I was a scribbler who liked to break stories but campaigns are orchestrated and reporters spoon-fed by politician media types. For the most part, you can train a monkey to cover election campaigns. So I was doing chimp work.

Poilievre struck me as a person of average intelligence, trying very hard to be older than his few years and wedded to the party line. A great soldier but not a general. Socially, like many young people, he was awkward. Small talk was painful. Poilievre didn’t look comfortable in his own shoes. You had the feeling he came out of the womb sounding like John Diefenbaker.

Nothing, absolutely nothing, screamed prime minister about him. He had maybe MP as his top end.

The second time was during an editorial board meeting at the Ottawa Citizen. The board was a group of six journalists of varying political stripes who shaped the newspaper policies on issues, wrote columns and, strangely enough, crafted editorials. We also met with major news-makers from all walks of life but mostly a large number of politicians.

I said to Poilievre that the editorial board put a great deal of importance on backgrounds before politics, particularly in the private sector. What was his background in the private sector?

The MP sat there silently for a long time, an extraordinarily long time, trying to find an answer. It was embarrassing for all concerned. Why the long wait? Because he had no background in the private sector other than a very short stint in a limited Conservative communications firm. All Poilievre knows from experience is Parliament Hill and the House of Commons is a dangerous place to be socialized. Better purgatory or hell.

Wonder why the Tories didn’t want reporters on the Conservative plane or were kept from asking questions? They feared Poilievre would freeze as he did in the ed board meeting.

So Poilievre was a politician and that’s all. An actor, just like former prime minister Justin Trudeau for all his limitations and strange machinations. As much as they disliked each other and their platforms were markedly different, Poilievre and Trudeau the younger were remarkably alike. Big words. Little real experience. A veneer of competence.

Poilievre was not just judged wanting by Carleton riding but by his senior peers as well. He had but two short stints as a cabinet minister where his combativeness and doctrinaire nature were off-putting. His manner was divisive rather than cooperative. He spoke in slogans … Change. Axe The Tax … rather than real content. Furthermore, his judgment was lacking. Poilievre played footsie with the truckers in the so-called Freedom Convoy occupation here in Ottawa as those same truckers were breaking the law. Unforgivable.

I truly feared Poilievre as prime minister. He had almost no qualifications and his real-life experience in the private sector was as close to non-existent as is possible. Poilievre touted the private sector but never had a real job. He didn’t know how workers lived but that didn’t stop him from courting them. He didn’t know how executives and small businessmen were constrained by financial reality. In contrast, the House of Commons is the triumph of ideology over the credit card. Nevertheless, that VISA bill eventually comes due.

Poilievre was the wrong man at the wrong time for the wrong job. At a time of crisis, he’s not the person you wanted at the helm. He would be lost.

Had the Tories offered a candidate such as former Quebec premier Jean Charest, a moderate, they had a better chance of winning. Poilievre would have botched the Trump file thoroughly. He would have been putting Canada First and Axing The Tax as the Marines marched up Highway 416.

In Liberal leader Mark Carney, Canadians chose perhaps the ideal man for the Trump crisis … a strong academic background and an economist to boot, superb diplomatic skills, helped lead two G7 nations through grim crises and much real-world experience at the highest levels. And yet, Carney showed a great grasp of the common touch and humour trading quips with comedian Jon Stewart on the Daily Show. Humour is the hardest thing.

Carney might be that rare combination of the correct skill set for an onerous job in a time of crisis.

Let’s hope the crisis isn’t bigger than the ability of a single man.

One thing is certain. Carleton riding was right about Poilievre.

Journalist Ken Gray was an award-winning journalist at five major Canadian newspapers. He is an educator, broadcaster and at present is the editor and founder of the 16-year-old pioneering internet publication, The Bulldog.

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