Martin Lukacs
It’s an effort to dress up hard-right market fundamentalism — which is really just a more extreme version of our governing ideology — as a maverick, antiestablishment rebuke to the system. That’s a hard thing to pull off. But for a while, Pierre Poilievre did that better than just about any right-wing pseudo-populist politician in the world — until Donald Trump’s tariff attacks upended politics in Canada and handed a reprieve to the Liberal Party. And I think it’s especially impressive considering his record as a lifelong politician, who during his time in the Conservative government of Stephen Harper was a battering ram against the labor movement, the least antiestablishment role imaginable.
He really stands out among Canadian Conservative politicians for his hard-line ideological commitments, incubated through his training in the Fraser Institute, the Calgary School, and the Reform Party. His intellectual guru is Milton Friedman. But while he likes to do the odd Friedman meme — Elon Musk–style — his belief in abolishing any role the government might play in progressive taxation or the public provision of health care, education, or housing is deeply studied and deeply held. During the Stephen Harper years, he actively organized on the right wing of the Conservative Party — in a group called Khmer Bleu, a nod to the ruthless Cambodian regime — to push Harper rightward and carry the torch for no-holds-barred neoliberal capitalism. Poilievre has never made his peace with the welfare state and all the progressive post-WWII social gains. His goal is to ultimately take a blowtorch to all of them.
Part of his project is the strategy he learned from Reform Party leader Preston Manning, who understood that a radical free market agenda could only succeed in Canada if it was disguised and tethered to popular discontent….
Auteur: Martin Lukacs
