KRUGGEL: Where was this guy last year?

Where was this Pierre Poilievre during the 2025 campaign?

I have listened to Pierre Poilievre for years, going back to his early days in Stephen Harper's government. I've written many times that he is a great orator. Tom Mulcair has said the same thing.

But during the 2025 campaign we had a guy that lacked passion most of the time, sure he had a few moments, but at times he seemed completely out of place. His Leaders' Debate performance was weak and considering it was against Jagmeet Singh, an average orator, and a novice in Mark Carney he should have won outright. He came up short in that debate with a lackluster non-Poilievre caliber performance.

Hearing that he did the Joe Rogan podcast I was apprehensive. I didn't expect much. Let me just say, the opening lines on MAiD and depression were terrible and showed two men speaking on a topic they clearly did not understand. So that was a bad start for me. Full disclosure: I have a relative that suffers from severe depression and in some cases depression is un-treatable. I had to learn about this topic in detail many years ago.

So, I shook my head and successfully fought the urge to stop listening. That was good because it did get better.  

Poilievre showed some genuine humanity, some passion, and he made some great points talking with Rogan. Rogan did a good job interviewing and he threw good questions at Poilievre like "How the Hell did you lose?"

Poilievre's answers were political but solid and he explained how our system works well enough.  

What worked well, and it was mostly a softball interview, was that Pierre Poilievre showed his humanity, his intellect, and his ideas. At times he was even funny. This is a side of the man that was mostly absent from the 2025 federal election campaign.  

I think anyone watching this would be asking: "Where was this guy last year?" His occasional use of a curse word was actually welcome.

That guy might not have won the 2025 election but he would have gotten even more seats, and it would have been a heck of a lot closer. That guy was someone I wanted to listen to more. Of course I didn't agree with everything he said, but at least I didn't mind listening to him this time.  

And that is the biggest part of politics and political campaigns that 98% of people discussing politics do not get. 

 

Political campaigning is a sales pitch. Politicians are selling their party, their ideas, and themselves. A good politician has to be persuasive and connect to the largest market of voters possible.  

How they do that is going to depend on a lot of factors.

 

Mark Carney talks about how great Canada is, what our challenges are, and the Liberal plan. His voice is almost always very reassuring, measured, and professional sounding. He knows how to pivot to being light-hearted too with a grandfatherly aw shucks kind of a demeanor.  

Listening to Pierre Poilievre talk with Joe Rogan saw a shedding of the old Poilievre where he sounded stilted and overly partisan. Poilievre is an attack dog, he always has been, and he's usually really good at it. But being a national leader means a person has to embrace a reality: a national leader must represent everyone including those that do not support them.

Perhaps the best part of the interview was listening to Poilievre talk about Canada and all the great stuff here. That's a big shift from his regular talking points where everything is broken. 

Canada has problems and no one is denying that. Times could be better. But there is still a lot of great stuff in this country and Canada isn't broken. It will persist and it is something that the world likes and many nations want.  

Talking up Maple syrup for example was cool. Hearing Poilievre saying to cut it out on the annexation talk was great because he was emphatic just enough to get the point across. When he talked about all the great stuff in Canada, and when he corrected Rogan on the Castro-Trudeau conspiracy theory, that was when Poilievre sounded like a national leader.  

Defending an opponent, or a former opponent, from a conspiracy theory, or whatever when the information is false, is the morally and ethically right thing to do. That is the Pierre Poilievre that the Conservatives need. 

He's got work to do but if he puts in the time he can do it. As it stands, the next election will happen around March 2029.  

So my advice to Pierre Poilievre is to keep engaging with the media and have every Conservative MP engage with the media provided they stay on script and don't say something bigoted. Sorry, but given some past comments from Conservatives that has to be said. 

My closing line, I am not sold on Pierre Poilievre, but am I willing to give him a third chance? Maybe. I will hear him out just like any other Canadian political leader.