The 2017 Conservative Party leadership contest was the most exhilarating period of my career as a political commentator.  In light of the direction later taken by the candidate I supported at the time, it was also one of my worst miscalculations.  For that reason, to say nothing of my non-residence, I will not support any candidate in the 2020 contest as passionately as that one.  And if my name is still lurking somewhere in the bowels of the Conservative data mining operation, I expect it to be expunged.

That said, we do have a fairly lengthy list of confirmed and potential candidates.  And it just wouldn't be a proper holiday celebration if I didn't say something pithy about each one of them.

Bryan Brulotte, organizer/CEO of MaxSys Staffing: Save your money, Bryan.  Save your money.

Pierre Poilievre, finance critic/MP for Nepean—Carleton, ON: Poilievre or Grimey, as he likes to be called is one of the most instantly dislikable people in a chamber designed to attract instantly dislikable people.  Known more for his Question Period antics than his policy gravitas or grasp of basic economics, Poilievre's constant, seething contempt for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau seems less like that of a political opponent and more like that of a guy who still isn't over his high school girlfriend dumping him for the captain of the basketball team.  While provoking disgusted groans in some quarters, the possibility of his entry has earned praise from others who believe the next voice for Canada should sound remarkably like a deflating balloon animal.

Michelle Rempel Garner, industry critic/MP for Calgary—Nose Hill, AB: If not for Poilievre, Rempel Garner would earn the strongest ew from me.  She is reliably pro-LGBTQ, and her work for the cause of Yazidi refugees has been exemplary.  However, her combative approach to Western concerns diminishes her appeal outside Alberta and Saskatchewan.  Worse, her combative approach to herself diminishes her appeal to anyone who considers hotheadedness a drawback in this job.

Candice Bergen, House Leader/MP for Portage—Lisgar, MB: I'm told she was very good on Murphy Brown, but my parents know that show a lot better than I do.  I did like her on Sex and the City, though.

. . . Sorry, what?  Wrong Candice Bergen?  Oh.  Yeah, I don't know what this one's deal is.  Next.

Michael Chong, democratic institutions critic/MP for Wellington—Halton Hills, ON: Pundits agree that the next iteration of the Conservative Party must be fully modernized on LGBTQ issues, reproductive choice, and perhaps climate change.  Don't expect them to modernize enough that they'll accept a leader who supports a carbon tax.  A pity for those of us hoping for a respectably pro-market platform.

Erin O'Toole, foreign affairs critic/MP for Durham, ON: He seems like a nice enough guy.  He has military experience.  He's from Ontario.  Other than that, he comes off purely functional, like a towel rack or a mixing bowl.  The party could do worse, but they could certainly do better.

Jean Charest, former premier of Quebec/former federal Progressive Conservative leader: A leader from Quebec seems like an obvious solution to one of the party's most serious electoral deficiencies.  Charest has been on the scene long enough to have access to a wealth of political talent.  Unfortunately, he may have been on the scene too long to enjoy whatever success might have been his 10 or 20 years ago.  Plus, this.

Peter MacKay, former . . . lots of things: A similar problem faces Canada's own Moai, to a lesser extent.  Had he decided to run for leadership in 2017, he likely would have taken it in far fewer than 12 rounds of voting.  As he is one of two names being bandied about as a good idea, the likelihood is still there.  But, as the scion of a provincial political dynasty with occasional ethical problems who is often portrayed as having lifelong leadership ambitions, it won't be easy to frame him as a corrective to Trudeau.

Rona Ambrose, former interim leader: But it would be easy to frame her as a corrective.  Confident, but not hotheaded; loyal to her party, but more so to her country's best interests; Alberta-born, but federal-minded; and a woman, which makes it much easier for her to counter Trudeau's hollow feminism.  Best of all, she is the only person on this list to meet my most important prerequisite: My respect for her outweighs my contempt.  All this may be moot if Trudeau offers her a diplomatic post, which he would have been wise to do a month ago.  She has enough of a sense of national duty to put her own prospects aside and take it.

Stephen Harper, former prime minister: Don't let the fact that Michael Harris wrote the accompanying article stop you from mulling this one over.  Some of my Tory friends have expressed their hope that Harper will make a comeback.  Which is the worst idea I've ever heard.

Photo Credit: CBC News

Written by Jess Morgan

We close the 2010's as we opened them here in Canada: superannuated ex-politicians eating the young, centrism as dominant as ever, a precarious economy, a non-existent culture, endless re-litigation of regional grievances, and voters who compensate for the fact that they have no power to change anything by viciously squashing any threat to the status quo.

Nowhere is this state of affairs more apparent than in the contrast between the US Democratic Primary and the something-approaching-a-leadership-race that the Conservative Party of Canada is about to drag itself through, assuming the potential candidates don't just meet at an Ottawa pub and play a hand of euchre to decide the next leader of the Opposition first.

Down in the States, the Democrats are engaged in a passionate struggle over what their party stands for as they gird to take on Donald Trump next year.  Will the Democratic Party be ruled by the stumbling nostalgia of Joe Biden?  The unabashed socialism of Bernie Sanders?  The high-handed wonkishness of Elizabeth Warren?  Or perhaps the bloodless technocracy of Pete Buttigieg?

Up here, the question has become, "Who can restore the Conservative Party of Canada to its ancestral location of being a right-leaning branch of the Liberals the fastest?"

After a decade of Stephen Harper and the Scheer interregnum, the perpetual cries for a kinder, gentler conservatism that marches in gay pride parades and shuns low, base partisanship to deliver a truly PROGRESSIVE conservatism appear to finally be winning out.  The path to power is clear: "modernize the party" by finally, once and for all, dealing with those pesky concerns about how the right doesn't really care about climate change and the rights of minorities.

This is done by electing the Right Leader, a leader whose character is so utterly unimpeachable that all they have to do is stand erect with their hands on their hips, capes fluttering in the wind, and Liberal attacks will bounce right off their chests like bullets bouncing off Superman, with a comfortable 200+ seat majority in the HOC the inevitable result.

Now, if we are actually keeping score at home, we know that some of the greatest disasters in Canadian Conservative history stem from these bluebloods assuming that this is a viable electoral strategy.  John Tory's faceplate as Ontario PC Party leader in 2007.  Kim Campbell's vaporizing of the old federal PC Party in 1993.  Patrick Brown's 2018 implosion after his repudiation of the so-cons and totally unbelievable greenwashing.

But this is not about facts or history.  The persistence of this narrative owes itself to Central Canadian grandees not wishing to dirty themselves through interaction with the common folk or having to endure the chiding of their Liberal friends at dinner parties about Doug Ford's latest inelegant turn of phrase.  Were it not for their inability to accept, as the Liberals do, that the rule of law must be a distant second to attaining and maintaining political power, they would have crossed the floor a long time ago.

Because they must convince themselves and others that they are good despite being enormously corrupt, obscenely wealthy, and barely capable of dressing themselves, they must take pains to never fight the Liberals on their own territory, be seen to expend effort justifying their own existence, or taking any real responsibility for their failures.  They have much in common with the odious Jeremy Corbyn, who was carried out on his shield utterly convinced that "winning the argument" should be enough for the true believers, and that anyone who isn't satisfied should blame some other culprit those conniving Remainers, the media who repeated the other side's campaign of lies.

And so, since we apparently have to re-learn the lesson every generation that you cannot out-Liberal the Liberals, especially if you don't try to campaign like them or fight dirty like them, I say let us give the Red Tories free reign this time around.  If John Diefenbaker himself is resurrected with a lightning bolt, I say we let him pick up right where he left off.  Let there be banking services at local post offices, and let infrastructure funding be returned to the provenance of the Bank of Canada, and most of all, let us be content to suffer forever under the yoke of our betters, for that is our duty as Canadians, apparently.

Photo Credit: Saskatoon Starphoenix

Written by Josh Lieblein