Transcript
Annalise
0:01
Welcome to episode 1863 of The Strategist. I'm your host Annalise Klingbeil and with you as always Stephen Carter and Zain Velji. What is with that grin already Stephen Carter? What's going on?
Carter
0:13
Oh, I feel really good. They've changed the positioning of my computer and I feel like a child at the adult table. It's pretty exciting. What do you mean,
Zain
0:23
they? It was one instruction for
Carter
0:24
for you to stop
Zain
0:25
stop pointing up to your nose, and it took
Zain
0:29
took you five minutes to follow. They
Carter
0:29
They mentioned my nose hair, which was uncalled for. I got a haircut today and had to have the hair on my ears trimmed, which is always upsetting.
Carter
0:39
I felt like those two guys in the golf commercial.
Annalise
0:41
Exciting day in the lands of Stephen Carter. Oh,
Carter
0:44
Oh, my God. You don't understand the problems I'm facing.
Zain
0:47
facing. Why didn't they just make the ad at the end, we've got a hard-on for Pierre Polyev? It would combine the Cialis ad that many people think it is alongside the pro Pierre ad that it actually is, Carter. Can you explain to me why they just didn't do two and one?
Carter
1:01
Yeah, I'm as much at a loss as you are, Zane. Oh, yeah.
Annalise
1:06
Zane, before you logged on, I watched Carter's live reaction of watching that ad that is meant for him. Like, that's who that ad is for, Stephen Carter. And he had some facial expressions. He said some stuff. it was uh it
Carter
1:23
was really a bad ad how
Carter
1:25
how we're talking about affordability and how our kids can't get ahead and they're talking about paying the down payment i had to pay for stephanie's down payment last year like are you fucking kidding me this is how this is how the cpc sees our world who's
Annalise
1:40
who's down payment are you paying for it carter you've got i'm not paying for fuck all
Carter
1:43
all i got two daughters that need admit
Zain
1:47
you're paying for someone's portion of a down payment admit it it right now on the show i'm
Carter
1:56
son that is correct yeah maybe
Carter
1:58
he does still call you uncle
Zain
1:59
uncle steve and we asked him today who taught you how to ride a bike and the answer is technically no one because he doesn't know how to ride a
Carter
2:05
bike no one because he still doesn't know how to ride a bike but we're gonna try again this year he was a little young he was he was a little young he
Zain
2:10
he does remember he remembers the treats he remembers the treats you gave him like a dog after
Zain
2:15
come to the that's
Annalise
2:18
that's how you train didn't it that's how you you told him carter seriously
Zain
2:21
yes we should expose you're making it sound way worse than it was i don't know i don't know carter brought a bag of gummies and
Zain
2:29
and then as my child strided he
Zain
2:33
he would get you got gummies and
Zain
2:36
and i'm like carter as a guy who does not know how to ride a bike myself i'm like is this how it should be you're like definitely all
Carter
2:41
all the whites do it i also tried all the white yeah this is you didn't respond well to the gummies either i responded very well i didn't have my own bike zane
Annalise
2:50
zane that's that's not how you do it no
Carter
2:54
we're gonna do way better this year i've got a whole different plan i don't think he does i
Zain
2:59
i think it's the same plan no
Carter
3:01
no i've got i'm buying one of those little seats that go on your mountain bike between like that the kid rides oh that
Zain
3:07
sounds like more fun
Zain
3:08
that's where i say i'm
Carter
3:08
i'm gonna buy that and he's gonna get used to riding okay yeah
Annalise
3:12
yeah so he's not gonna learn carter's just gonna do it for him no
Carter
3:15
no he's gonna learn that riding a bike is fun he doesn't know that yet because he's surrounded by zane who doesn't know that riding a bike is fun i'm gonna get one of those big seats for you too bud we're gonna put you on this is gonna
Zain
3:27
gonna be exciting take
Annalise
3:28
take zane around on the back uh
Annalise
3:30
uh guys we've got lots to talk about busy before we start though can we do a plug
Carter
3:35
plug for cory yeah
Annalise
3:36
yeah this whole podcast
Zain
3:38
podcast has been a multi-year plug for cory but fine what's
Zain
3:41
latest okay we've been on
Annalise
3:43
doors what's the latest
Carter
3:44
latest we need the latest I mean I actually did go to the doors which is tragic because I don't do well with people did you get recognized
Carter
3:54
I've been recognized a few times but it's never good like
Carter
3:58
like were you recognized this time you live in the writing
Zain
4:02
writing so you're telling me that when you get recognized by your neighbors it isn't good is that what I'm in fairness it's a very big right it's actually true
Carter
4:11
goes all the way to bone ass Montgomery there's some hood Like local hoodlums, like Annalise. We all live in the riding, right?
Carter
4:19
Which is pretty great.
Annalise
4:21
It's a big riding. Okay, what's your plug? Give us the
Carter
4:23
the plug. We need volunteers. We're in the final pushes, and we're going to do a big day on Saturday. We're going to go and door knock the entire riding on Saturday. We actually set a record for the most door knocks in Liberal Party history two Saturdays ago. when we did the big show zane you remember doing the big show uh so we set a record for the number of door knocks that were done in that day and we want to break the record this saturday and then on sunday we need to put uh door hangers on all the doors of all the known liberals and we're going to need to do about 200 chips bring a buddy day is sunday and then monday get out the vote we got a we got a door door knock and bring the vote out it's going to be epic so where can
Annalise
5:07
how do they sign up they
Carter
5:08
they can sign up on coryhogan.ca and just go to the volunteer button and tara will reach out to you uh within 24 hours okay
Zain
5:16
okay i got a counter program there's
Annalise
5:17
there's no fancy title or name here well
Carter
5:20
well there was but then you guys poo-pooed it and it made me feel paint
Zain
5:23
confet right okay no
Carter
5:24
no we did that is
Carter
5:27
no this is flood the zone this is good name
Zain
5:29
name or bad name zone yeah
Annalise
5:31
i told him i didn't like it i
Zain
5:33
i i mean he's not is he on on any bow river he is on so for definitely for montgomery and for boness flood the zone works because those people are used to that um
Zain
5:43
don't forget the sunny side also yeah no
Zain
5:46
no it's good flood the zone is that i don't mind it i don't mind it um okay three things number one um the
Zain
5:52
the most the most door knocks in a single day yeah
Carter
5:57
sounds like we broke the record We
Zain
5:59
We already talked about this last episode.
Zain
6:01
Sounds like the bar was low. Second, watch the Jagmeet Singh performance in the debate again. He's a revelation. I don't even know why we have an election next Monday. That guy. Okay. Yeah.
Carter
6:14
might be voting directly
Zain
6:14
directly for Jagmeet. I might be writing in Jagmeet Singh.
Zain
6:18
Okay. I might have all the options. In Corey
Carter
6:20
Corey Hogan's writing. I might be writing in
Zain
6:23
Jagmeet Singh. Okay. That's how good I think he was at the debate, ruining Pierre Polyev's clips. Thing number three. Carter, can you, for the broader audience, not the patron audience, on the record, let everyone know that Corey Hogan is going to win Calgary Confederation. Please go.
Carter
6:39
He's doing very well. There's lots of positive. No, you know what? No, I'm not doing it. I'm not doing it, Zane. Do it. It looks really good. He's worked his ass off. What happened to your confidence? You usually go. 400 volunteers. Do it. Epic
Carter
6:55
numbers of door knocks. Carter,
Annalise
6:56
Carter, did you get in trouble? trouble
Carter
7:00
cory gave me a stern talking you got
Annalise
7:03
for your uh your remarks on the last episode cory
Carter
7:06
cory was very angry i
Carter
7:08
i did not expect that you definitely jinxed
Annalise
7:11
everyone go to coryhogan.ca volunteer this week
Zain
7:15
week we'll put in the clip from the patreon episode that's good
Annalise
7:20
what's your prediction steven carter right
Carter
7:23
right now i think that we're in very good shape and likely to win okay
Annalise
7:26
okay on on the record we
Carter
7:31
really did we really need uh we really need some help because apparently i jinxed it and if we lose now it's all my fault okay
Annalise
7:41
good plug guys we've got some new ads to talk about um we can
Annalise
7:48
can you can bring that up you can plug cory as much as you want in this episode steven carter but i want to talk about this golf ad are
SPEAKER_01
7:55
are we really going to give these clowns a fourth term i'm voting conservative there
SPEAKER_01
8:00
there you go yeah it's very change um
Annalise
8:03
um zane i know you've got some thoughts carter watched it for the first time like five minutes ago what carter's thoughts
Annalise
8:09
well okay let's start there carter he's in the demo what's
Zain
8:12
what's the last time an ad has been made for a white dude in
Zain
8:16
the final 10 days of an election what
Annalise
8:19
final days no mention of polyev good ads bad ads golf down payments what did you think i
Carter
8:26
i honestly thought it was one of the worst political ads i've ever seen uh
Carter
8:29
uh i don't know who the demographic of that ad is but
Carter
8:33
white golfing first of all totally get that i mean i i my brother is a is a golfer and he's he's white uh and and uh he might he might find that interesting but the down payment for my my daughter uh was it stephanie stephanie was i had to pay my daughter's down payment
Carter
8:53
i don't know people who can do that i don't know people who pay for people's down payments um sitting at the golf course bragging about it to their friends i had to pay stephanie's down payment how's your son doing sounds like he's in the trash can you know like it was it was a absolutely horrific ad um that you
Carter
9:13
didn't seem to have any direction and finished off with the most forced for a change i think i've ever seen in my life it was an
Carter
9:20
an ad without a target audience an ad without a primary message um are you going to elect those clowns again like is this how we're actually is anybody going to be swayed by calling mark carney and the liberals clowns or is this just a absolute button down the absolute bare bones of the bare minimum for the uh for the actual group i mean it feels to me like they were just trying to um
Carter
9:50
solidify their their base am i wrong zane am i am i totally right as always i
Zain
9:57
i want to do a full hour on this ad uh
Zain
9:59
uh mainly okay so there's this have you guys seen this online where i don't know if it's real but i suspect it is because it was on twitter um
Zain
10:07
um and oh the
Annalise
10:09
the casting ad the casting do you
Zain
10:12
i do think it is real because both the pay seems about right which is shockingly low people are are often surprised that these ads that often get tens of thousands hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars and the rumor on this end not even the rumor today's the 20th we've seen this ad if you're watching the leafs game yesterday uh
Zain
10:28
uh anywhere across the country you've seen this ad and of course if you've been on social media you've seen this ad um
Zain
10:34
um those spots at the leafs game were millions of dollars people are often shocked that these ads don't pay these actors more than what was offered in this in this casting call which you know i'm being sarcastic i don't know if it is true but it was a grand for each for each of the two actors so to speak so i'm of two minds my the first mind is exactly where carter is what the fuck is this is this uh you know many people have said is this a is this a drug commercial is this a cialis ad etc um and that's hacky but it's also true it's got the same vibe same energy same two dudes who could easily be talking about how they can't get it up this weekend like it just like literally has that level of um you know lack of lack of nuance
Zain
11:16
the other part of me is like fuck it carter like what if this is the play they
Zain
11:21
they know they're missing this demo which is by the way like alarm bells like would be fucking alarm bells but let's just say they're are they missing
Annalise
11:28
missing this demo i
Zain
11:29
i don't know okay let's just let's just like follow
Zain
11:32
play watch it yeah
Annalise
11:33
yeah play it out right
Zain
11:34
right 255 plus i'm looking i'm looking at the ad right now let's go 60 plus year old dudes white um affluent thanks because i'm
Carter
11:42
i'm 55 and i felt a little young so 55 plus affluent
Zain
11:45
affluent white um you would think it's a lock demo right like naturally exists within the conservative cohort and if it doesn't exist within your coalition you're totally fucked
Zain
11:56
what if this is the second part of my statement that
Zain
11:59
that they're totally fucked and
Zain
12:01
and that they know that they're totally fucked they're acknowledging that they're totally fucked and that this core demo carter you don't have to guess who the demo is annalee said it to you she's right that this is for the people that you see on screen and then if you're losing these people this is an acknowledgement that we're losing these people and that we need to either get
Zain
12:17
get them back and
Zain
12:19
and or make sure they turn out and
Zain
12:21
and to me the
Zain
12:22
the second mind here is is kind of like well fuck it maybe they're actually trying to solve a problem that they actually have here and this ad isn't all that that terrible. Now, we could go down the creative aspect of it. That interests me less because we can always criticize, as you've said, Carter, we can always criticize people's creative. But what's most interesting to me right here is, is this a strategic miss by the conservatives that they were trying to target one audience and they just failed with this spot? Or is this a strategic hit
Zain
12:49
hit by the conservatives, which is they were trying to target this 55-year-old plus audience and they've nailed it? And neither of those things are good for the conservatives. but i think it's a fascinating strategic conversation to be having on the basis of one single spot and and and extrapolating from there uh
Annalise
13:07
yeah carter you're you're shaking your head so hard as saying rolling your eyes as well what's going on i
Zain
13:12
i could be right that they've acknowledged the problem and
Zain
13:15
and they're going after a carter we
Carter
13:17
we do know that they're that they've lost men over 65 we know that senior men
Zain
13:22
men they have lost like and women especially but but definitely they've lost the seniors cohort in most
Zain
13:27
most aggregates. Which used to
Carter
13:28
to be the core audience
Carter
13:33
audience of the conservatives, right? They could count on winning white seniors writ large.
Carter
13:46
I'm not convinced that anybody who's trying to win back that audience tries to win back an audience using that message structure. you've got other message structures available to you tax cuts um everybody
Carter
13:59
everybody thinks they're middle class so saying tax cuts for the middle class would be a spectacular way to go get them instead they go with an affordability message that's mixed in with a uh a status play i mean you know how i feel about status right like status is one of the great you
Carter
14:15
you know uh things to play with yeah um but but why would you cast two super high status men to try and win back seniors writ large other than just going after the world's smallest? Here's
Zain
14:30
answer to you. Tell us. They're not trying to win over seniors writ large. I actually think they've lost this group. Oh
Zain
14:40
I mean, I'm just trying to follow the law. I don't think Jenny Byrne and team are incompetent, right? Like as much as we'd like to- I'm coming to think that they might be.
Zain
14:49
okay so that's an okay walk me through that line of thinking like how do they get to this spot because i think listen
Zain
14:57
listen a narrow-casted wealthy white dude spot in the final 10 days is going to be written about after this election should they lose like regardless this is why like i jokingly want to do an hour about this because and i'm also not joking when i say when's the last time in the final five days or 10 days of an election have we had an ad for middle
Zain
15:13
middle-aged white dudes or like older white dude like it hasn't happened it's not been a core demo oh
Carter
15:18
oh i remember yeah when's 1993 okay tell us john kretchen and he can't speak properly
Zain
15:22
properly okay sure so right
Zain
15:26
to the attack or was that the attack that
Carter
15:29
that was the attack and then they wound up i don't know if that worked out well and take the i don't think that worked out take the ad down fuck um this is that to me it was the last time they were they were doing that this is this
Zain
15:39
yeah so so So to me, Carter, I think they're trying to solve a problem fundamental
Zain
15:45
fundamental to their base. You could talk about the ad strategy of spending, getting five of those spots on Leaf Games or having it so publicly exposed. It might be one of, and frankly, in their defense, it is one of five new spots that they have introduced. It's just the one that has punched through the most because of how easy
Zain
16:01
easy it is to attack the creative. But I think there's something really fascinating in the final seven days of an election to
Zain
16:08
to think about the conservatives saying fuck we need to plug the hole of rich white dudes holy shit if that is true what
Zain
16:16
what do they know that we that that we also know or that we're starting to get to know or that what do they know about their electoral chances here i
Carter
16:24
i don't know what
Carter
16:26
what did you where did you see the ad i
Annalise
16:29
i saw it on a news story i didn't yeah this is what i'm curious about zane did you you see it like on watching sports i've heard there's a heavy male i
Zain
16:37
i missed most of the sports this weekend but i've heard from people who watched hockey this weekend it was i don't think it was on any of the basketball but it definitely was on like a leafs game this way and i may have even been on a um um jets game this weekend so well
Carter
16:50
well the reason i ask is because ads spill over from demographics right you you know we we can target fairly well on social media but it they they, they spill over on, uh, especially on mainstream media. So for
Carter
17:05
for every white guy that saw this ad, there's going to be what? 0.6 of a female that watches this ad as well.
Carter
17:12
Like you're, you're, you don't get a clean demo on this when you're doing broadcast media. And I can't see the,
Carter
17:20
the, the giant brains of the conservative party, not recognizing there's going to generate some backlash. I mean, maybe this is part of, is this part of the play, right
Carter
17:31
get backlash we get attention and what we need more than anything is just people talking about us in the last week of this campaign yeah
Annalise
17:38
yeah carter walk us through that the the the strategy aspect right to zane's zane's point kind of of filling this problem like what what do you think is the strategy behind this well
Carter
17:49
well i think the strategy behind this is to to win over a voter set um the the problem with it is a broader voter set than
Zain
17:57
than rich white dudes yeah
Carter
17:59
yeah i think that this is an affordability ad that just went horribly wrong because you
Carter
18:05
you know someone was thinking well yeah if we can make it so that even really rich guys are having problems with affordability everybody
Carter
18:11
everybody else will see themselves in this ad i
Carter
18:14
i i just don't understand it and
Zain
18:18
by the way both of these things to my earlier point are bad if true because right
Zain
18:25
this is why like the the question i've tried to ask is how bad is it for the conservatives because you also have polling right now that has them neck and neck tightening up after the
Zain
18:34
bq uh has made a few point gain in in quebec and the seat projections are now we're now using the other m word minority a lot more often over the course of this weekend in terms of where the liberals may land so i'm
Zain
18:47
part of me is like maybe the conservatives feel like they're at 38 and the group that they're losing is white men
Zain
18:54
men and if they can get them back and
Zain
18:57
and if they have a medium to advertise in which is playoff sports then they have a chance at doing something here like i don't want to just do you believe that zane part of me could i
Zain
19:09
i i the data doesn't necessarily prove it but this is what i'm kind of like what by
Zain
19:14
by the way this is like it's it's bad for the conservatives in some ways because like this should be the group that sticks with you so like the logic kind of breaks down for me because this should be the core part of your base the first you know circle right in the middle not the last ring to come on board so where is your strategy at right now either they feel like this is what they need to get back to win the election or things are going so badly on their way to 75 seats that they need to double down and triple down their efforts to this group to to get the you
Zain
19:42
you know to to get their floor like what do they what are they thinking right now is is is my question i think it's i'm not saying what carter saying is lazy and easy to say it is lazy and easy to say right
Zain
19:53
right but i am i am really curious about what the conservatives are up to with this especially with how much money they're putting behind if this was just that's what i'm if this was a social media spot that they put out and then we would shit on it and then they pulled it but fuck man they ran this at least six times this weekend on on sports trying to hit an audience what are they trying to tell us they're trying to tell us something i'm just trying to pick up on it well
Annalise
20:14
well but to the casting point of zane yeah do you like that the the fact that the ad spend on this is
Annalise
20:20
is so large seems
Zain
20:22
seems to seem weird
Annalise
20:23
weird that it would be so rushed together like the dates on the um yeah
Zain
20:28
yeah the casting were part of it
Annalise
20:29
it too like it seemed like it was very rushed together you
Zain
20:31
you you can you can mad libs this but probably someone in the campaign said oh my god either one of holy shit we have to plug this hole or holy shit if we triple down on efforts on these guys who are going soft on us um cialis joke um then we definitely have the opportunity um to to to get them back um and and that can actually be part of our winning strategy to hold carney to a minority or our own version of getting a minority already um
Zain
21:00
yeah it rushed absolutely but
Carter
21:03
but all all ads are rushed in in in
Carter
21:06
in the last week they're all rushed because you're responding to everything so you
Carter
21:11
you know getting getting a casting call getting it turned around getting a good shot and getting it out uh is usually about two to three days probably so what's the what is this responding to carter
Carter
21:23
this is this has to be responding to a failing on some my gut instinct is also something that's
Zain
21:28
that's like that they're they've seen that the hole is actually bigger and wider and like it's moving quicker much more quickly than they thought it would like women are convincing their partners which is like a marginally sexist thing to say but carter you and i've talked about this often about like split households and how women can often drive the vote of the household at a greater rate
Zain
21:48
rate than than men the other way maybe where they're experiencing that in some of the focus group texting or in in the polling. Like, I don't think it's good that there's a world in which it could be for the conservatives and they could come out after Monday and explain to us in their miraculous sort of how they held Carney to a minority or how they themselves got a minority, you know, post debrief explanation. But my instinct is that they're trying to plug a hole rather than to do something offensive, like on the offense from a strategic perspective.
Annalise
22:18
Zane, you mentioned the other ads. I saw the, there's one with a Harper endorsement. Have you you seen any of the others harper
Zain
22:24
harper one is the main one they've got another attack one on on carney which seems to be kind
Zain
22:29
kind of more in their lane of just like trudeau uh on housing um i'm really curious if if the lost liberal decade i mean they've got so many slogans even at the fucking end game it's just crazy right they still are keeping with um time for a change lost liberal liberal decade um just like justin is still in the mix they
Zain
22:51
they have seemed to narrow down on like fourth liberal term which is where they started and i thought would be where they like really push this election like the four strikes or three strikes you're out sort of thing and like don't don't give them the opportunity it seems like they brought that back in um i
Zain
23:05
i am curious what sort of spend they're getting i can't really tell based on the meta ad library and such but this one punches through for obvious reasons both in terms of what the creative is but also where we've seen the spend um to associated with it but
Carter
23:19
but let's let's take let's draw a conclusion from the the fact that stephen harper's doing an endorsement ad that's
Carter
23:26
that's one thing yeah
Carter
23:27
yeah it was one thing to put stephen harper on the on an event stage and have stephen harper uh do a little speech and an endorsement from the event stage because that's earned media and sometimes you need to just earned media but
Carter
23:40
but this this is purchased
Carter
23:42
purchased media where you're taking the leader out of the spotlight both of these spots take the leader out of the spotlight and
Carter
23:51
they put instead paid actors and
Carter
23:55
and the former leader who lost the last election right
Carter
24:01
yeah to to me this This is all defensive posturing, not from a campaign that feels like they just need the last push to get them over the hump, but by a campaign that seems to be, frankly,
Carter
24:14
frankly, far more defensive than the recent polls would indicate that they need to be. I
Zain
24:20
I mean, there is something to be said about that, right? Like the guy that was his own thing that we kind of endorsed and appreciated as being a bit of a prick to the drama teacher is now falling out of favor. And when that happens, he's really had no relationships, i.e. any of the premiers, Ford in particular, to fall back on. and he's really had no other people that he's um raised
Zain
24:44
raised or groomed or kind of kept alongside him as a 1a um
Zain
24:48
um to to really kind of take some of that spotlight and that star away and either soften the blows like there are and we've talked about this in the past there are an incredible amount of talented conservative
Zain
24:59
conservative women running for polyev do we fucking know any of them like you like this This podcast might know Melissa Lansman. Name a second one. I'll wait.
Zain
25:09
Right? Like, the issue is that this guy has been his own thing for the last two years, and it has been the absolute bang
Zain
25:20
But in this perfect storm that has kind of put Mark Carney in favor, the downside of Polyev has not just been personality. It's been the lack of relationships, the lack of social safety net he has from other conservatives. So where does he go? Not to someone on his team who can soften the edges, not to a Rana Ambrose, not even to a Lisa Ray, but he goes back to Stephen Harper because he really has not created any 1A stars within his team that can take the load over the last two years and also have a bit of a light on them. And I think that's actually proving
Zain
25:51
proving to be quite a strategic issue for Polyev. So what happens when the guy that has fallen out of favor that people have seen with high unfavorables, what
Zain
26:03
what happens when in the final 10 days, he can't necessarily be the warm blanket that you need for either bringing you back and or making you feel something, at
Zain
26:15
at least something positive?
Zain
26:17
He's great at making you feel rage, but that's not an endgame strategy. strategy at
Zain
26:21
at least that doesn't seem to be the one that they want to run uh to seal the deal they're actually getting quite a strategic sort of like quagmire here it's it's not a simple problem for them to solve who's a conservative credible name um that can give them something if the leader isn't able to necessarily close
Zain
26:37
close his own fucking campaign so
Annalise
26:40
so zane if if you were advising in these final days final week here on
Annalise
26:45
on an ad is that what you would do i
Zain
26:47
i would i think think harper was a smart idea someone
Zain
26:49
i think harper was go ahead walk
Annalise
26:51
walk us through it despite
Zain
26:51
despite his fucking orban issues despite how he left in the the shitty harper decade which which was shitty like memories are short bush is considered a hero compared to trump harper is considered stability despite um what what that it looks like uh from from a rearview mirror perspective and what it obviously felt like for many people uh during that decade and subsequently thereafter um i think harper's a smart move but it actually shows how short the bench is for paulieff um because he can't he can't carry the day the other reason i think harper's a smart move uh and the mainly the main reason i shouldn't say the other reason harper's a smart move the reason is because this is going to be a 905 election pierre's not going to be competitive in quebec so 905 who's the only conservative outside of well malrooney who's no longer with us who's been able to so you can probably get one of the malroonies and you already got ben going crazy on ryan and carolyn doing what what she can um as part of ford's cabinet who's the other person to kind of really carry the 905 it's been harper um and so i suspect that ad probably finds a lot of 905 voters but then you also add and i'm sorry to keep rambling but you also had another dynamic the 905 extremely fluid politically extremely fluid from an immigration perspective a lot of people there voted for harper 10 years ago a lot of people there never did never have never will um so it's the best shot that they have i think it's smart i don't think it's like a silver bullet though by any stretch i think it's once
Zain
28:17
once again to my earlier point more descriptive of a problem rather than a smart strategic uh sort of offensive strategy carter
Annalise
28:24
carter you're just sitting there shaking your head no tell tell the listeners what what's wrong with what zane is saying well
Carter
28:31
well i don't disagree with uh zane's analysis that it's the 905 election what i do disagree with is cast is moving away away from the principle. The first thing I would say if I was going to be finishing this election is how do we look like a winner?
Carter
28:46
How do we look like a winner? Because people vote for the winner. They're not voting for, you know, Pierre
Carter
28:51
Pierre Polyev and his ideas. They're not voting for affordability. They're not. These are things that they come up with afterwards. What they want to know is who's the winner going to be. And
Carter
29:00
And right now these ads are making Pierre Polyev look like a loser. and
Carter
29:04
that's why i disagree with them i think that ultimately you know the cialis ad uh was was just
Carter
29:13
really over the top i mean it was really it was really a bad ad and more more more to the point it was targeted so poorly that it made it look like they are going to lose and that is contrary
Carter
29:25
contrary to all the polls right right now the polls are what margin of error margin of error plus two yeah like they're not yeah they're not real uh they're not they're not the the seven point down that they were three weeks ago um
Carter
29:40
all of a sudden everything's in play again and
Carter
29:43
if the conservatives could
Carter
29:46
pull it together um
Carter
29:47
um and look like they're going to be a winner i think that they would be in a much stronger position rather than you
Carter
29:53
you know bringing back a fossil in stephen harper uh
Carter
29:57
uh and And, you
Carter
29:59
know, reminding us of all the things that we didn't miss. Let's
Annalise
30:02
Let's say you're advising the Liberals, final six days here. It has been said that they will be spending millions on ads this week. What should their ads look like?
Carter
30:13
They should be looking like ads of the winter. I think that they have Mark Carney walking out into packed crowds where people love him.
Carter
30:20
You know, it doesn't matter the rally size. It matters the rally affection. perfection and you know mark carney's been extremely well received everywhere he's gone i would you know um throw up polls i'd start showing how you know the the liberals are the ones in the driver's seat quote
Carter
30:38
quote every pundit that said that this is going to be a it looks like it's going to be a liberal majority quote
Carter
30:47
put the pedal to the metal and and say, we are the winner already. We
Carter
30:50
We have won this election.
Carter
30:53
That's what wins elections in today's super shallow world.
Annalise
30:57
So Zane, final days, let's say you're advising the liberals. What does your ideal creative look like for them in this homestretch?
Zain
31:06
Carter's not wrong in the sense that they need something that embraces Carney, that shows momentum. But I guess at
Zain
31:15
at the heart of it, it needs to show a couple of other things. um it needs to show um like a like an anthemic sort of vibes right it has to have vibes in it trudeau was great at this you really didn't even need to produce trudeau in the final 10 days because he could just go rally to rally he would speak as if he was shooting an ad every single time
Zain
31:34
you could cut that shit together put some nice music on it um less easy for carney the rooms are not as full the rallies are more technocratic um i'm not saying he's human and Valium, but like, you know, he's a different type of political speaker. So you as a campaign need to engineer momentum. So whether that is showing B-roll, and as I get specific on this particular spot, B-roll of him meeting with people, engaging in community, doing what Carney does well, listening, delivering from a podium, being prime minister, like just do fast cuts. If the guy isn't quick, you make the cuts quick, right? So you do like a bunch of quick cuts to kind of show momentum energy do a recap of the campaign where we've been where it's what it's looking like so even if he's not moving quick with his words which he doesn't even if he's not moving quick with his body which he doesn't you make the cuts extremely quick so it shows it shows momentum in that way you make the music that way so it kind of shows something so that's the sort of anthemic aspect of it the content of it has to do two things in my mind carney's got to tell a story for fucking and sake he can't just show up um to these rallies and start speaking with a bunch of policy solutions
Zain
32:43
um tell me like a 30 second story clip next time scripted in your next rally right i mean we're talking let's just say you asked me this question last week i'd
Carter
32:54
i'd say have a
Zain
32:54
a rally this weekend and add the 30 second spot script which i've done before carter you've done before yeah
Zain
33:00
right add Add two to three versions of it in your next rally speech, and then whichever one comes off cleanest, we can cut, put together. But it needs to be, for Carney's particular sake, it needs to be a story. Tell me what an imagined future looks like in Canada with you as leader, right? It's a Sunday, right? You are doing what? You're safe because of X. Your wallet's full. You're living life. You're doing whatever. You're enjoying things. Tell me a story, whatever that looks like. I have not heard that from Carney. I know it's not a strength from Carney, but we're talking about a set piece here. We're not talking about him having to fundamentally change his personality. We need something that kind of says that. And I think all that leads to like, make people feel something. Make people feel something, which kind of then leads me to saying, Carter's right that this needs to be one of the spots. The second spot though, in my mind, has to be ballot
Zain
33:51
ballot box question, man.
Zain
33:54
Carney's the right choice, but let's remind people what the question is again.
Zain
33:59
man. And I think tariffs are actually a false flag. I think tariffs are actually a red herring. Go back to 51st State. Go back to annexation. Go back to the relationship is over. Go back to America wants to break us so they can own us. Do your version, which is a carny line, by the way. Go back to that. Go back to your thesis statement on that and why you're the best. so the second ad to me is almost like how do you create a prime ministerial spot you're doing one anthemic mark carney momentum spot with a story and then you're doing one spot that tries to tell the story as prime minister about the threat we face and why this guy and using the incumbency advantage i mean not with the podium and everything but you see what i'm you know what i'm trying to say what
Zain
34:46
look like how those sound especially the second one i think you could go through a bit at a debate they've
Zain
34:51
they've got the money that needs to be their end game i think a waste of time would be like a straight up gotv go vote sort of bullshit ad i think people like look at the advance people are knowing what to do like people know what to do you just need to remind them what's at stake again and why the momentum is still on your side as you as
Zain
35:08
as polls tighten like polls are tightening here right like the liberals are not where they were 10 days ago um
Zain
35:15
and so they they need to they need to get to a position where they use their paid creative to try to get help them get there so
Annalise
35:20
so you want you want them hitting people in the feels is what you're saying more
Zain
35:25
more so than they have and i want them to like when i say i want them to feel something part of it is i want them to like people to be like
Zain
35:32
like not emotional about it but like kinda like there's so much like all of this like if you could summarize the liberal campaign right now it should just be canada but
Zain
35:43
but like for some reason it's not right like it should just be canada right now um the trump question is answered by the question canada and the carney question is answered by why are you up ahead why are you winning why are you like what what are you doing this for it's canada so like i would like that back uh i think they put something in a bottle uh
Zain
36:00
uh at the beginning see
Zain
36:02
see if they can do it again i
Zain
36:03
i don't know that would be my thinking i don't know if i'm if
Carter
36:05
you really want to see the The Canada question, get answered. Volunteer for Corey Hogan's campaign on Sunday. There's a whole bunch of Canada happening.
Annalise
36:15
can people sign up there, Carter?
Carter
36:16
Coreyhogan.ca. Volunteer. And Tara, we'll get right back to you.
Zain
36:23
Can they find that email address at floodthezone.ca?
Carter
36:27
I believe they can at floodthezone.ca. So if they go to floodthezone
Zain
36:30
floodthezone.ca, it will open up to a Google Doc, which will send them in the email which will provide them the email address to email is that right yeah
Carter
36:38
yeah i think that's exactly what's going to happen yeah i
Zain
36:40
i feel like that's adding an extra step but i feel like for the purpose of this podcast people like the friction yeah
Carter
36:46
yeah the friction is good the uh slowing them down is what they need they need to be slowed down if
Zain
36:51
if you forget that first website you can also go to like the friction.ca oh
Carter
36:55
oh my god we'll
Zain
36:58
we'll also have all of it Guys, beyond
Annalise
37:00
beyond ads, let's chat more about the timing here, this final week, the final push, the advice, what conservatives need to do, what liberals need to do, what the NDP even needs to do.
Annalise
37:11
Zain, to start with you, just kind of what's your overall advice? You can take that where you want for the final few days here. here uh
Zain
37:21
uh jagmeet singh um has
Zain
37:24
has to try to be honest with himself and it seems like as the weeks have gone on that he's finally getting there the ground game i feel like has always been there but now his his watch where he goes he's going he was in victoria i was in victoria this weekend jagmeet singh was in victoria this weekend spoiler alert victoria should be an ndp stronghold it has been for a very long time it may not go ndp he is on a honest fight to try to save his party official Now, there
Zain
37:51
there is a question in my mind around if official status is overblown for the future of the NDP. Yes, this is where I'm at right now. Like, the win for the NDP will be 12 is amazing, less than 12 is disaster, not percentage seats. So, like, we're at 12 seats right now. They're on a race to get 12 seats. Now, I think party status is overblown as it relates to the remaking of the NDP. My mind is already at the remaking of the NDP right now, federally, in terms of where that goes. But Jagmeet Singh needs to be honest with himself. Mark Carney needs to tell a story and get us back to the ballot box question. And Pierre Poliev, he's
Zain
38:28
he's not going to pivot.
Zain
38:30
He needs to figure out what his offensive strategy is. Because everything I've seen has been defensive, barring the first 40 minutes that we spent bent on these ads and the strategy inherently underneath them which could you know be as simple as the
Zain
38:47
purest defensive strategy you could see if that's the case and if that if carter and i agree whether creative almost outside of the scope of that question what
Zain
38:55
what are you doing on the offense man like the notwithstanding clause i fucking hated it but i saw it i thought that was smart i thought that was interesting but i don't know if it's got a a life beyond where where it was prior to the debates. Is their offensive strategy going after the liberal platform? Maybe. I think releasing their own platform is going to bring a world of hurt to them because you will see how many dollars in public sector cuts they'll ultimately be proposing, and the media will be quick to hit on that. Figure out your offensive strategy in the final week. Because if Carter, one thing, you know, I don't call Jenny Byrne incompetent, but i do she
Zain
39:39
has a track record of doing shit in the final week that's like multiple hail marys at the same time we've
Zain
39:48
we've seen that before conservatives
Carter
39:49
conservatives have a really hard time closing
Carter
39:53
they really do we
Carter
39:54
we saw this with tom flanagan for years especially when
Zain
39:56
when they're behind yeah
Zain
39:58
and so to me if i see a jenny burn hail mary it's actually an acknowledgement that they're behind for the first time it's like another read like tea leaf read right um i haven't seen it yet but i'm i wouldn't be surprised if they do but i would just for whatever it's worth i'd say that's not an hail mary is not an offensive strategy it's like it's exactly what it is it's a hail mary figure out your offensive strategy the other sort of factor i'll just add this onto the is that we're monday 9
Zain
40:23
9 20 p.m advanced voting is done i don't know what percentage you guys think i'm really curious what
Zain
40:29
what do you think a third of canadians have already voted carter yeah
Carter
40:32
yeah i'd say i'd say a third of the people who are going to vote are voters fuck
Zain
40:35
fuck like here we are right like a third are already in the can here so you're only doing this for for two-thirds of the audience of which if you're the conservatives in a in a historic high 38 38 of those people are yours um you're trying to grow them three to four percent man that's a tough targeting exercise when so many people are off the board already um the
Zain
40:53
the advanced vote stuff is a real killer especially if you're the party that could use another day another week another 10 days and that's the conservatives at at this point carter
Annalise
41:02
carter what does the advanced vote stuff tell us do you think what
Carter
41:07
what does the advanced vote tell us it tells us less and less now that we've we've got we've got people who have been trained uh now to vote at the at the advanced polls there used to be kind of a and the advanced poll if it was high it showed really uh negative outcomes for the incumbents but now everybody's targeting their their GOTV get out the vote structures to to
Carter
41:30
to push out the advanced vote a vote that's cast is a vote that you don't have to worry about so everybody's pushing their advanced votes you
Carter
41:40
know people like to you know the most committed voters are making up their minds early and getting out early it's it's become a lot easier you used to have to provide like a note vote. This is why you weren't going to be there, right? You know, it was getting out of class. It was hard. It wasn't easy at all. And now you can just vote whenever the hell you feel like it. You can walk into any elections Canada office and just vote whenever. So it doesn't necessarily make sense that there'd be any advantage or disadvantage. We do sometimes see differences differences between the advance votes and the election day but generally speaking that's because something major has happened in those four days that are five days or six days that
Carter
42:26
that are intervening i
Carter
42:27
don't know that we're going to see anything that's monumental and
Carter
42:30
and zane's point about the numbers is really interesting when you start taking one third of canadians off the table because they're not going to vote at all you take another third of the remaining group and
Carter
42:43
and say well well, they've already voted, you are down to less than half the population that
Zain
42:51
Yeah. In their universe. You know,
Carter
42:52
know, those people are going to vote, but they're also going to make up their vote very late. This is why I'm convinced that the way to approach it is to be going after it and saying, we are the winners. We are the winners. And Annalise, I think that that's where, you know, the conservatives are failing and the liberals are succeeding, is going in and saying we're the winners. and the NDP are non-existent because they're legitimately the only ones who can't make the argument. The Bloc Québécois, they're actually saying we could be the leverage in the middle, and
Carter
43:26
and they're getting rewarded for it in the province of Quebec.
Zain
43:31
polls in your favor, if you're the Conservatives, which they've had in the last week, builds a trend.
Zain
43:38
You can almost like spin a trend this way. They need to spin enthusiasm, right? They need to spin that the tide is turning, come back kid, Christy Clark shit. And I have seen none of that, mainly because it's their pride getting in the way, saying that they've ever been down. You can't come back if you're telling your fucking national party that you've been leading the entire time, right?
Zain
43:58
right? And so there's like inherently something, there's an issue here, where if the conservatives, like from all the reporting that we've seen, to Carter's point, have not acknowledged that they've ever been losing, outside of a few actions, which is why I've spent so much time on the ads because i think it's so fascinating um but they've never acknowledged they've been down right
Zain
44:17
right from a national party perspective if you don't acknowledge you're losing
Zain
44:22
can't have a fucking comeback it's
Annalise
44:25
it's a good point zane
Zain
44:26
zane it is a very elementary point but they have actually let the comeback story in the final seven days of which the raw ingredients are there for them it's
Zain
44:37
it's you know it was one newspaper rap and one marginal win in a debate carter but it was spun into mythology that's our fucking job you
Zain
44:47
you you're telling me you couldn't spend a pretty an a minus debate performance in the main street poll and an abacus tightening into the fact that pyrrha polyevs got got fucking mojo i think you could have done it i think we could have done it if we wanted to but the fact is you're fucking you're never admitting you're down so you don't have the availability to kind of say we're making a comeback a late surge is here to look like the winners to your point and so part of it is like
Zain
45:14
they they don't they're out of moves they're out of like tactical moves not strategic moves because your strategic move is correct they're out of tactical moves because it's like you know it's only been rumored and talked about and only reported by mainstream media but the conservative bubble said no we're up the entire time now they could still surprise us on monday and and you know all of us are eating crow and have egg on our face but if they don't once
Zain
45:38
once again like another made for tv movie that we're going to be watching about what what happened inside the conservative movement so
Annalise
45:45
so given everything that you've just laid out zane seven
Annalise
45:47
seven days left six days left what do they do what do the conservatives do oh
Zain
45:53
oh they need to find their offensive strategy i don't they need to do something right like they
Zain
45:59
they can try to go with the winner strategy that we're winning manufacture something they just seem to be like i said out of tactical moves so they need to go on the offense i honestly like one of the other things they've done poorly which is surprising to me considering the fact that this is really in jenny burn and pure polyads bailiwick is find the soft tissue on mark carney and i'd say after 35 days and frankly let's call it 100 with Carney's end-to-end
Zain
46:26
They've tried and they've missed, like they may have gotten it. Like I said, I could be surprised next Monday. I'm leaving that option open.
Zain
46:33
But at least from a public perspective, I don't see every conservative singing off the same songbook. Instead, I see a bunch of people saying a bunch of crazy things about Mark Carney, everything ranging from the extreme, right,
Zain
46:45
right, to the not so like, oh, he's just like Justin, which I think is the weakest of their arguments. they haven't nailed the negative. This is a reform party bunch that were built, trained,
Zain
47:02
bred on finding the soft tissue of their opponents and just fucking hammering as they did with Trudeau. They should have been able to do this in 100 days. And
Zain
47:12
And the fact that they didn't on Carney, like, you
Zain
47:15
you know, fuck the whole we didn't pivot our campaign.
Zain
47:18
That I could even buy. Like Carter's made a good point on it and I'm starting to believe it that trump was never the conservative question but
Zain
47:24
but bringing carney having mark carney like if there's anything about this campaign that i think is an absolute aberration it's not that the conservatives didn't pivot it's that mark carney ran a campaign where his fucking
Zain
47:38
fucking approval went up rather than down carter
Zain
47:41
carter how many times does someone spend political capital and their approval goes up rather than down do you want to list the amount of times especially during a general election election campaign in a country do you want to list the number of times that's happened before i
Carter
47:55
mean kretchen had it in the first election uh trudeau had it in his first election um but it really is man it really well mulrooney mulrooney in both elections general approval
Zain
48:08
approval going up for mark carney a complete unknown who you had the ability to define for 100 days plus knowing that he was coming and then going to win not being able to nail it and then in the general election 36 days his approval's gone up not down that to me is a real failing here that the conservative machine that is primed to go negative and be the most effective at it didn't
Zain
48:32
but they would would be required
Carter
48:34
required to pivot saying no
Carter
48:35
i don't think you're required to pivot then they didn't
Carter
48:38
didn't know how it's different than
Zain
48:39
than the question of pivoting their campaign strategy they were going after carney they've just missed like
Zain
48:44
like carter they were throwing 15 things at carney none of them have landed they've missed on all of them because
Zain
48:51
because there's too much
Carter
48:53
yeah it was too much they didn't narrow before
Zain
48:55
before they went out i agree
Carter
48:56
agree and and they they they didn't take the time to figure out which punches were going to land and so they threw all the punches at once and they punched themselves and we talked about
Zain
49:04
about them like why are you doing this shit publicly shouldn't
Zain
49:06
don't you have enough money especially in your war chest prior to the election to do this shit privately and what with much more accurate data and and and you know revision sort of focus group testing etc to find a line of attack before you go out throwing spaghetti at the wall with 15 second spots and then we always thought carter we always thought at least i did that
Zain
49:27
they that they knew something we didn't know that
Zain
49:29
that there was no i
Carter
49:29
i never believed that yeah
Zain
49:30
yeah okay i never
Carter
49:33
i'm giving them too
Zain
49:34
too much credit um because
Zain
49:36
because they've been so fucking effective at this until
Zain
49:38
until when it mattered like
Zain
49:40
like it's just crazy i'm
Zain
49:44
I'm not hating it.
Zain
49:46
I'm just, I'm still, I'm still not ready to call it, as
Zain
49:49
as you can see.
Carter
49:52
I'm not prepared to call it beyond the fact that I think that the liberals are going to win the election. I'm certainly not going to call a minority majority. Yeah, I'm not even ready
Zain
50:00
ready to call that shit, Carter. Seriously. I'm
Carter
50:02
I'm ready to call it.
Zain
50:05
don't think there's enough time?
Carter
50:06
Well, I think that they've taken all the pieces off the board.
Carter
50:09
I think that when you're down to half the, you know, probably there's
Carter
50:12
there's no pieces left on the board how are you going to to make a move when you only have half the audience left um you just you just don't have enough play
Carter
50:24
play you're at 38 already what are you going to do go to 41 like is that legitimately in the in the offing for a pierre paliev led conservative party i can't believe he's at 38 yeah
Zain
50:37
yeah 30 it's impressive like it's super
Carter
50:38
super high it's super high and
Carter
50:41
and and and to be in that place uh is fantastic for him but he doesn't know how to use it he doesn't have the capacity to use the tools that he's been given okay
Annalise
50:52
okay guys last thing we will talk about is platforms um maybe this will change some things both the liberals and ndp now have released their full-costed platforms the liberals on saturday of the easter long weekend NDP also released theirs. And Conservatives have yet to release theirs. But say tomorrow, Tuesday, is the day that a costed plan will be released. We've talked about how many people have already voted, how many people there are still to go. Do platforms matter? And I want to get into, Zane, we'll go with you first, the timing of this, of doing it so that the full costing release so late in an already really short, condensed time. uh time yeah
Zain
51:33
yeah i think the first thing is part of it because it's it's short and it's condensed so like it is late but it's also not late there's also no like due date for this exercise and in fact there's also what i would argue um no reason for this exercise this is just like a world of hurt especially for the liberals what the fuck were they doing this weekend i don't know if i don't i don't carter do you agree i don't know if you suspect you're with me on this i
Carter
51:55
i i know no understanding of why anybody would release a platform ever um yeah i'm with you it
Carter
52:01
it is not something that is going to uh take poundings i mean this is where rachel notley was when she released her fully costed platform that included a
Carter
52:12
a tax increase on what was it a tax increase on corporations and uh that became the the rallying cry that ultimately could have cost her the election fucking deja vu
Zain
52:23
vu man when i saw
Carter
52:24
saw that this weekend
Zain
52:27
what are they now once again i am not seeing the conservatives laser like pick up on one thing is
Zain
52:33
is that a weakness or is it to come i mean they don't have time so the advantage for the liberals is that the pope fucking died so
Zain
52:42
so like that's a new story that's not going to be about your costed platform like i'm being serious here like the pope dying is actually super helpful yeah
Zain
52:51
like this could could have been a thing like the liberals have so much fucking shit in there um you know like proud of them they put together policy of course they did they're in government who cares none of this matters like none of this is about trump none of this was about like the headline for me at least the one i saw over and over again was ivf funding great but then i'm also seeing another headline 140 billion carter why do i know that number why
Zain
53:14
why do i know that number i shouldn't know that number that's the whole point why the fuck do i know a number that ends in billion and has so many numbers in it i shouldn't know that number especially from a carney-led uh liberal government right and i get part of it is tax breaks and i want to be fair to the liberals but part of it is about the tax cuts and it's the spending that's needed for you know fighting trump and you know maybe it's a covet era like mindset i don't care i don't care this wasn't necessary right like this
Zain
53:40
this was not no one was looking for this no one was going to vote for this no one needed this um you know uh fucking stick to message stick to plan stick to story uh stick to solution people have all it's you know what it reminded me of carter when you talk about 330 330 this concept of like my
Zain
53:58
my concept is is similar right like is that you know the thing for three seconds 30 seconds three minutes and 30 minutes and you put it out there there's gonna be different audiences for both however what the forum also matters here right when you've sold someone the three second version of yourself do you keep selling stephen carter fuck
Zain
54:17
fuck no no you Stop selling. Stop selling. Mark Carney has sold the 3 and 30 second version of himself. There are no 3 minute and 30 minute Mark Carney buyers out there. Folks, they're all with you already. They're called the New Democrats. They don't care what the fuck you do. They're in a weird headspace. They're not looking for you to write a progressive essay or spend more money in order to come to you. They're at fucking 5% and going lower. Their leader is fighting for party status. What are you doing? Stop selling, Mark Carney. but this weekend they put out a massive what platform
Zain
54:52
platform fully costed fully developed checklist manifest i don't fuck me like it was just really annoying because there's no one to sell this to they've already purchased they've already bought you and now you're in a position where you've kind of left all of this out hanging
Zain
55:08
for for the conservatives to mold and attack you but
Zain
55:13
you know may he rest in peace because i think he was awesome the pope has died
Annalise
55:18
carter why why do parties still go through this exercise of the the detail costage platform like talk to me about this i
Carter
55:27
i don't know somewhere in some campaign manager's handbook they put you must release a fully costed platform in order to win an election i have no idea it has never been a positive turning point in an election it is only a negative turning point and i i have no idea why Why anybody would think that this is actually something that is required in a modern political campaign? No one understands the fullness of government. No one understands all the inputs and outputs of a fully costed platform. I mean, that is utter and complete lunacy. What we need is a platform that is, you know, constructed around electability. and that platform needs to have maybe six or seven planks over a 35 day campaign that actually stand out i mean you you might release 35 different days of 35 different ideas but six or seven ideas are going to be the themes are going to be the things that hold it all together making canada more affordable protecting us from donald trump making sure that we've got a safe supply of eggs and a safe supply of of milk you know that that the united states doesn't have these are things that we can start to trumpet we are actually doing a great job in and it's because of the liberals says the liberal campaign and we could do a better job says the conservative campaign but you don't need to to do a fully costed platform as though it's the but i mean how long is the federal budget zane 800
Carter
57:01
800 000 pages you
Carter
57:04
you know yeah it's not a five page document you
Zain
57:07
you bring up something interesting is that is that while the liberals it's
Zain
57:12
it's really interesting one thing we actually forget about the liberals in this election because of how shitty their polling has been for so long is that their government and we talk about government itis uh attacking you and i have not seen this on this campaign up until now this
Zain
57:25
this is the presence of a group of people at least in part because i I know some of the Carney people are new, but a lot of the Carney people are not, who
Zain
57:33
who have been in government and want to write government platforms, want to write government policy, because that's their job. They're policy people. They want to write policy. And they're smart. They're talented. They're well-educated. They've got great ideas. They're the brokerage part. All of that is correct and true
Zain
57:49
But the problem is, is that the
Zain
57:52
Kim Campbell quote still remains. Like, election is no time for policy, man. Like, hide that shit away, right? This is a time for story and value statements, to Carter's point. And this is the rare moment where I think the campaign caught themselves being a bit of government, despite the fact that the current PM has only been there for so long.
Zain
58:12
This is what incumbent parties often do.
Zain
58:14
They come out with a big policy book, or they don't talk about the art of the possible. They talk about what a budget document looks like. they talk about what a policy brief looks like versus a say
Zain
58:27
say with me carter how many times their friend cory hogan said this a
Zain
58:31
a communications document this was not
Zain
58:33
communications document this was not the kretchen red book this was not the trump defeating mega uh
Zain
58:39
uh playbook this was not the you know and that's probably too harsh of a brand but you know what i mean right yeah like the the keep canada this wasn't this wasn't even called the um canada strong playbook fucking
Zain
58:50
fucking great name right
Zain
58:52
right like whatever that needs to be like this wasn't even that this was
Zain
58:56
the government doing policy on behalf of the liberal party by liberals and it was like it's great i'm sure there's some awesome ideas in there guys tell
Zain
59:03
tell me later once you've won the the election right like um this is not the time for it now does it seem like the conservatives are going to repeat that same mistake tomorrow maybe maybe not like i wonder if they're going to try to go with a completely different tact of what fully costed means and try to go with with a big tax break headline or maybe try to go with our spend is going to be significantly less than their spend and try to make that their final offensive play. I am very curious about what the conservative, because I didn't know that this is coming out tomorrow, Annalise, what their version of this looks like. Because they could be in for a world of hurt too. Or they could have done something that capitalizes on now knowing and seeing the other guy's homework and test results and seeing what they can do differently and how they can present differently. And maybe the The Conservatives will use this as a communications opportunity, not just a, you
Zain
59:52
you know, potpourri of policy.
Annalise
59:54
Carter, is it an opportunity for the Conservatives, given everything that we've been talking about, about what they need to do in the final days? Like what you probably have has says Tuesday is a day that the costed plan will be released. What could this be an opportunity?
Carter
1:00:09
Yeah, I mean, this might be the day that they talk about the best tax cuts in the history of mankind. kind and everybody's going to have them including those two white guys in the on the golf course um but i i i suspect it will be a nothing burger i suspect that we will uh we'll
Carter
1:00:27
we'll be back uh your best case scenario when you release one of these is that people forget about it in my mind
Annalise
1:00:36
to to zane's point the timing of pope dying does that make people forget the the liberal one and And then you have the Tuesday conservative one. Like, who gets hurt by the timing here?
Carter
1:00:50
I mean, sure, the Pope dying is the story of today. So you forget about the story of Saturday. But if it wasn't the Pope dying, it would have been something else. And by Thursday of this week, there would be something else that's going to happen that's going to make us forget about the conservative platform. The truth of the matter is we're goldfish. We don't remember one story to the next story to the next story. We might remember something that forms a narrative, that forms a story that repeats on us. But realistically,
Carter
1:01:24
realistically, you know, the Pope died. That's a day story, day and a half story. You know, two days from now, something else is going to happen that's going to make us forget about the conservative platform. platform.
Annalise
1:01:38
Was there a time when these detailed, um, costed platforms matters? Like to your point about short attention spans, like what, was there a time when they matter? I'm just still stuck on why we do this exercise if there's nothing gained out of it. Yeah.
Carter
1:01:53
Yeah. I think that there was a time when the mainstream media was going to base their, their endorsements and, uh, you know, they had to have documents to base it on, right? Like they were going to do a deep dive as to what's been planned and what's been what's been offered but there there is no you
Carter
1:02:09
you know independent media that's not already chosen their sides uh already i mean there's there's just no upside to it um and then a lot of people used to take the advice of the local media uh and follow and and vote conservative or vote liberal depending on what the the local media uh had said had suggested but those days are so long gone, I mean, I can barely remember them. It's practically back when I was delivering newspapers as a boy. You
Carter
1:02:38
Yeah, I read newspapers.
Carter
1:02:40
I did deliver newspapers. Just
Zain
1:02:42
Pierre Polyev, Jeff Polyev.
Annalise
1:02:46
My granddad also did. Popular job in Calgary.
Carter
1:02:52
That hurt me so
Annalise
1:02:54
I know, I said that just for you.
Annalise
1:02:55
What were you going to say there, not about delivering newspapers?
Zain
1:02:59
I never delivered newspapers.
Zain
1:03:02
never that's a good story um it was it's also it was also
Zain
1:03:09
that's an interesting question like i feel like carter's right around the media endorsements but carter i also think there was a time when there was large advocacy groups that you would try to appease and or win over with your platform and their endorsement of you uh
Zain
1:03:28
uh labor is probably probably like the classic one, right? But like other groups were, and we used to have a lot more of these stakeholder groups that were tightly bound, had control of their membership. They could be religious, they could be workplace,
Zain
1:03:42
workplace, they could be otherwise association-based, would have a lot more control of their members. And those folks used to play a lot more explicitly as well and try to get into the platform. Can we get into the platform? Can we get into the platform? This concept of getting into the platform. having the party that was going to form government or have a chance at forming government acknowledge your group and acknowledge your pain point and then you endorse them because they one party acknowledged it better or had a better solution or copy and pasted the solution you provided to them whether that be on fees or mandatory whatever's and you know um it was also an exercise fully costed and otherwise to try to win over groups and i think as we have fewer and fewer groups as we kind of center around the individual in a much more american-like context that these groups are looking are a and
Zain
1:04:37
and i think to a fault not as strong anymore because i think you can get a lot of fucking great
Zain
1:04:42
shit done if you band together and push for your cause and try to get into the platform as a core goal of an election campaign like there is power there uh
Zain
1:04:49
uh to be honest um but b in the in the absence of a lot of that organization across a lot of of different industries sectors etc it
Zain
1:04:59
actually reduces the value of that costed platform too it's kind of like a chicken and egg sort of situation so there's there's that other piece but i don't know if you agree carter but i think the the banding together from
Zain
1:05:08
from a communal sense of stakeholder groups has actually decreased outside of you
Zain
1:05:12
you know a few of the powerful ones the chambers and the and the more sort of explicit lobby groups zane
Annalise
1:05:17
zane do you think there's something that could like replace a platform like if if if a platform a detailed costage expansive long platform is this like old school thing that is not relevant nowadays yeah
Annalise
1:05:29
is there you're a creative guy like is there some sort of you know thing that could replace it that could build into a campaign this thing that generates headlines for a few days
Zain
1:05:41
yeah my mind goes towards more like like values and and stories again and like who i know the ndp tried something which i think was a bit of a failed experiment but i i think you You don't throw out the entire thing altogether. But Carter, I don't remember if this was the 21 or the 19 election where the NDP kind of said who we're in it for. And then they listed a bunch of groups, almost like tags. And
Zain
1:06:08
then they said, like, based on these tags, you click on these tags and you see, like, what's in it for you. And maybe that's a bit too reductive and extremely transactional. But there's a part of me that would like to see, like, how do you take a platform and distill it into who we're in it for and what we see in you or what we value in you or what we've heard from you sort of thing.
Zain
1:06:32
But at the end of the day, any hit
Zain
1:06:34
hit that comes out of a policy platform, I think is better engineered through single shingle announcements on their own. They don't need to be part of a broader playbook. They're better engineered through creative that you either pay for or that is done through an endorsement class or through other organizations. I don't think putting out a set piece that's about your entire platform, which then ultimately ends up being the hit of the day, that's just like creating, engineering a solution for a problem that doesn't exist. And frankly, that might be the takeaway here. The platform might be a solution for a problem that no longer exists.
Annalise
1:07:13
Carter, do we do away with it completely? Put all those people writing it on the doors? What do we do? Yeah,
Carter
1:07:20
Yeah, I mean, I never understood writing a platform. I liked having planks of a platform that I could spin out, but I don't like the book. I think that, you know, putting out the fully costed platform is just a waste of time and energy. um it keeps uh what 12 eggheads busy during the campaign but that doesn't solve any of your real campaigning issues okay
Annalise
1:07:52
guys let's leave it there that is a wrap on episode 1863 of the strategist i'm your host annalise clingwheel and with you as always stephen carter and zane belgi