Mark Carney steps into an unprecedented moment
Donald Trump has scrambled the playing board and rewritten the ballot question
Into this unprecedented moment, enter Mark Carney.
In the more gossipy corners of Ottawa, this has been a long time coming. At least as far back as the summer of 2012, an eager group of Liberals tried and failed to woo him. That same year, according to Carney, Stephen Harper asked him if he wanted to be finance minister. Justin Trudeau seemingly made multiple attempts to bring Carney in.
"Certain people want things to happen … the political world, it seems to me, is a world for optimists," Carney told the Globe and Mail in 2012. "I'm in a world that's a world for realists."
Carney now has two feet planted firmly in the political world, but he and everyone else is faced with a reality that would have been scarcely imaginable in 2012 — an American president who poses a real and multi-faceted threat to Canada.
"I'm not the usual suspect when it comes to politics but this is no time for politics as usual," Carney said at his campaign launch, just seven short weeks ago, neatly trying to turn his lack of retail polish into a virtue. After the highly emotive reign of Justin Trudeau, it is indeed a bit jarring to hear the Liberal Party led by a central banker.
A 59-year-old father of four, Carney has a long list of formers: governor of the Bank of Canada, governor of the Bank of England, deputy minister in the Department of Finance, UN special envoy for climate action, chairman of Brookfield Asset Management, banker with Goldman Sachs.
But he is the 14th leader of the Liberal Party and he will soon become the 24th prime minister of Canada. The question now is how long he will occupy that office — whether he is the man for this moment or a man who will only momentarily be prime minister.
The cautionary tales of Turner and Ignatieff
Though this moment is incomparable, there are at least two cautionary tales that could be said to hang over Carney's ascent: John Turner and Michael Ignatieff.
The last time the Liberal Party of Canada replaced a member of the Trudeau family, the unlucky winner was Turner. And the last time Liberals gravitated toward a figure who had built an international reputation outside politics, they (eventually) went with Ignatieff. That ended badly too, except insofar as it indirectly led the Liberals back to a Trudeau.
Ignatieff has long been the easiest point of comparison to Carney. The son of a Canadian diplomat, Ignatieff was a celebrated intellectual and author who was smart and worldly and decent and interesting. But he failed to master politics and couldn't provide the leadership, organization or vision the Liberals desperately needed when he took the helm in 2008. The subsequent election in 2011 was the worst result in the party's fabled history, surpassing the previous low established by Turner in 1984.
Carney's political abilities — how he handles the constant poking, prodding and parsing — are still being tested. But he has been involved with government at the highest levels and he would already seem to have a clearer idea than Ignatieff of what he wants to do in politics — namely, a focus on strengthening the Canadian economy. And he has now won an overwhelming victory in his first electoral contest, his share of the vote surpassing even the total won by Trudeau in 2013 against lesser competition.
With Justin Trudeau's government worn down by the wages of time and the cost of inflation, the Liberals entered this leadership race in desperate need of something different. And among the leading contenders to replace Trudeau, Carney was in the best position to represent change — a word he used half a dozen times in his remarks on Sunday night. His unique resumé added a sense that he was a serious person for a serious time.
"Canadians know that new threats demand new ideas and a new plan," Carney said. "They know that new challenges demand new leadership."
On that note, he announced the carbon tax would soon be cancelled.
For all intents and purposes, this race might have been over the moment Carney appeared on The Daily Show and seemed comfortable under the glare of American television. The new Liberal leader came into Sunday's victory parade with the endorsement of 90 Liberal MPs, including 28 members of cabinet. Even more important are the polls that suggest Carney gives the Liberals a real chance to win the next election.
Like Carney, Turner seemed to revive Liberal fortunes after a long period in office. He was a former finance minister, but he came from outside the government with business-world credentials. In the spring of 1984, Turner comfortably bested Jean Chrétien, a trusted lieutenant of Pierre Trudeau. Buoyed by favourable polls, he proceeded directly to an election.
And that's when it all fell apart. Whatever chance Turner ever had, he was undone by disorganization, a party that wasn't ready to wage a campaign, a hostile press, a patronage scandal and his own mistakes (including a bad debate and a "bum-patting" controversy). The better-organized and better-funded Progressive Conservatives won a massive majority.
Turner's time as prime minister was over after a scant 79 days, the second-shortest stint in history.
Pierre Poilievre's Conservatives have already begun throwing everything that isn't nailed down in Carney's direction, if only to see what might stick. The attack ads began airing on television well before Sunday.
In one case, Carney has already learned how easy it is to stumble in politics. His attempt to split hairs over the decision to list Brookfield in the United States turned what could be a minor issue into a multiple-day story.
If all else was equal, the Conservatives would be heavily favoured to win the next election after nearly a decade of Liberal rule — and perhaps the Conservatives still should be. But what defies comparison now — what is without precedent in the history of Canada and Canadian elections — is the presence of Donald Trump and the standing threat he personifies.
Is Carney the answer to a new ballot question?
A report in the New York Times this weekend enumerated a list of grievances on the part of the American president that includes not only this country's dairy sector, banking regulations and national sales tax, but the very border that separates Canada and the United States. The president has reportedly threatened the Five Eyes intelligence network, the North American Aerospace Defence Command (NORAD) and the agreements that govern the Great Lakes.
For good measure, the Globe and Mail reported that Trump has raised the Columbia River Treaty.
Next week could bring a new round of tariffs. Or the full weight of Trump's trade agenda might land on April 2 — by which point Canada may be in the middle of an election campaign.
It is impossible to know what the American administration might do from one day to the next — as evidenced by the on-again, off-again trade war — but Canadian leaders are obligated to take all of it seriously. And while Trump's presence does not suspend the laws of politics, it has scrambled the playing board and rewritten the ballot question.
On Sunday, speaking to a national television audience, Carney pressed the case that not only was he well suited to this moment, but that Poilievre was uniquely unsuited — that the Conservative leader wouldn't just fail to stand up to the American president, but that his politics were similar to what Canadians have watched play out in the United States.
"Donald Trump thinks he can weaken us with his plan to divide and conquer," Carney said. "Pierre Poilievre's plan will leave us divided and ready to be conquered."
Highlighting his own experience in the private sector — and Poilievre's lack of same — Carney needled the Conservative leader's faith in the free market.
"I know how the world works," Carney said.
After "change," Carney's second-favourite word Sunday night was "build." Hinting at what sounded like a wartime effort, he said "we will have to do things we haven't imagined before at speeds we didn't think possible."
Carney may still be new at politics, but he at least grasps the value of a slogan. His apparently will be "Canada strong" — no doubt a rejoinder to Poilievre's "Canada first."
Canadians will now see how well Carney can carry that banner at this heaviest of moments.
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