Andrew Scheer seems like a nice young man. But is he “the next Prime Minister of Canada”?
That’s how he was introduced at a recent Conservative gathering at the West Vancouver home of former MP John Weston to cheers and applause. In his introduction, Weston made the point of saying that the newly minted Tory leader has been underestimated since he first defeated NDP warhorse Lorne Nystrom in his Regina riding back in 2004, the implication being: sure, here’s a guy who has yet to see his 40th birthday and has been little more than a politician since he emerged from the egg, but count him out at your peril.
So, there I was at the aforementioned Conservative gathering challenging myself not to do any premature out-counting.
First, let me say that I’m uniquely qualified to recognize Scheer’s particular political genus and species. My very first job in journalism involved driving around the back roads of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, interviewing Prairie farmers who were up-and-comers in their various grain and livestock organizations. And as Andrew Scheer talked about the things that unite us, I could see them standing up and cheering.
In his 10-minute speech, he talked about three things that unite us “whoever we are or wherever we’re from”:
1) A belief in individual liberty and freedom.
2) An understanding of where prosperity comes from.
3) The belief that we must leave the next generation something better.
The prairie farmers might phrase it a little differently:
1) Get yer God damn government out of my/our business.
2) Build that God damn pipeline and get our goods to export toot sweet.
3) No deficit, no how.
This robust prairie conservatism is honest, almost poignant, because it makes the whopping assumption that we all think this way or at least we would if only we had any sense. Prairie conservatives are big on sense. The best kind is the common kind, but sadly (if you’re a Prairie farmer), there’s nothing common about it east of Brandon or west of Chilliwack.
Andrew Scheer is the embodiment of this uncommon Prairie sense, and he holds out the promise that if he really is the next prime minister of Canada, Job #1 will be point #2: to get that God damn pipeline built. To be clear, that’s the one in our North Shore’s backyard.
Scheer is staunchly dedicated to protecting the Canadian economy from “a small group of people funded by foreign organizations that have a political interest in hurting our natural resource sector and they shouldn’t trump the billions of dollars worth of economic benefit and the hundreds of thousands of Canadian jobs that depend on that sector.”
Of course, that small group of people includes the government of British Columbia and the people who voted for it in the last election, but Scheer seems to think they can be put in their place by a constitutional reference before the Supreme Court and the elimination of the regulatory barriers introduced to protect the B.C. coast from a pipeline or tanker spill.
That’s kind of like believing in magic. For, as Prairie conservatism is rooted in good Canadian dirt, so protest and civil disobedience are rooted in the great Pacific rainforest. Remember Clayoquot Sound?
Whatever you think about Justin Trudeau, he has at least tried to sell us all a unified energy program that includes a way of reducing greenhouse gas emissions while getting Canadian oilsands product to market. And he’s tried a lot harder than his old man Pierre, who once asked prairie farmers: “Why should I sell your wheat?” No wonder they vote Conservative.
Andrew Scheer has no patience with Justin Trudeau’s attempt at consensus. He considers Ottawa’s purchase of the pipeline to be a kind of ploy to keep the project from expiring before the next election, tricking sensible voters into signing up for four more years of Liberal profligacy.
Andrew Scheer has no patience with civil disobedience, either. It’s simply not fair. You never see those Greenpeace guys blocking the St. Lawrence to protest the import of foreign energy, only our exports, our life’s blood. What’s with that?
We all have a world view. Andrew Scheer has come by his honestly. There’s little doubt it will play at the Prairie end. But if he doesn’t want to be underestimated, it’s going to have to play at this end too.
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