David Krayden: Poilievre the First Conservative Leader in a While to Deal With Media on His Terms

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre speaks to reporters in the foyer of the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Oct. 3, 2023. The Canadian Press/Justin Tang

Commentary

Pierre Poilievre is the first conservative leader in the modern age to effectively deal with the national mainstream media on his own terms—unapologetically, and unassuming that they intend to be fair with you.

Although Poilievre is only the fourth leader of the Conservative Party of Canada (CPC), an analysis of any other PC leader who was truly more conservative than progressive would show that what Poilievre is doing in his relations with the media is truly seminal and singular for a Canadian politician who is right of centre.

Poilievre is not running from the media. He refuses to grovel and apologize for his party’s policies, and demands that reporters substantiate their arguments when they are not asking questions but rather making bogus claims.

Poilievre was quick to castigate the ridiculous arrest of Rebel News journalist David Menzies, who was manhandled by an RCMP officer as he was asking questions to Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland about Canadian policy on terrorism, and then—ironically and outrageously—accused of committing assault.

You may recall how former CPC leader Andrew Scheer had Rebel News banned from election campaign events.

Not so Poilievre, who not only condemned the febrile police action but actually called Menzies a journalist and not a personality, entertainer, or employee, like much of the mainstream media insisted upon describing him.

Poilievre demonstrated that he was going to behave, well, differently, with the media during the now famous “apple interview” last October in B.C. when he sparred with a local journalist who decided to run the Conservative leader through the usual gauntlet of woke insinuations.

Poilievre was asked why he was exploiting a “populist pathway” to become prime minister.

“What does that mean,” Poilievre answered in Socratic fashion as he munched on an apple.

The reporter continued to not really ask questions but reveal his own agenda by claiming the Official Opposition leader was “appealing to people’s more emotional levels, I would guess.”

Poilievre again demanded clarification of that expression and asked the journalist to provide an example.

“Certainly you tap very strong ideological language quite frequently,” the journalist replied.

Poilievre again demanded an example, but his interrogator could not offer one. Conservatives across Canada rejoiced over the brief conversation—as did conservative commentators throughout the United States, who noted that Canada finally had a Conservative leader with the guts to stand up to the often impertinent, rude, and irrelevant media.

But Poilievre really defined his revolutionary media relations policy during a year-end conversation with Rex Murphy. Obviously, Murphy is a sympathetic ear and voice but Poilievre assiduously worked the interview and defined exactly how he would be different from his predecessors.

In a few sentences, Poilievre explained why both he and his supporters did not have to echo and embrace the extremist social policies of woke extremists—such as leaving parents out when it comes to gender ideology in schools—and just how they were going to do that.

“If I were to create a political party from scratch, it would be called the ‘mind your own ... business party.’ People can make the decisions of who they marry, who they date, how they live their lives, but also how they raise their kids,” said Poilievre, who noted most Liberals would have agreed with that statement a few decades or so ago.

With these words, he was essentially saying what a lot of social conservatives like this writer have been articulating for years: that we need less government in our lives, in the economy, in our schools, in our universities, in our museums, in our banks, in our entertainment, and in our media. We need to stop the state from promoting its radical social agenda to our children. We are agreeing with Henry David Thoreau’s dictum, “that government is best which governs least.”

If we are living in a what some claim is a post-Christian world and our government refuses to acknowledge the Judeo-Christian heritage that made it great, then we won’t permit it to promote any worldview in our culture. Let individuals decide.

It’s a very libertarian approach to politics but arguably the only rational and sustainable one in this age. It has enabled Poilievre to define the policy agenda and to refuse to be held captive by the woke ideology that much of the mainstream media insists upon hocking and demands that CPC leaders accept—even if through clenched teeth and at the risk of throwing up.

Poilievre is telling the media and Canadians that you don’t have to bow to the media’s narrative or to the Liberal Party’s current explanation of what is right and wrong. That’s your decision to make.

He must not retreat from this position. He cannot allow the backroom “communications” people in the CPC to convince him that he has to move to the left and look a little bit friendlier towards woke politics or just ignore the questions entirely.

Those same party insiders convinced former Prime Minister Stephen Harper that he could win the media battle by simply ignoring the national media and appealing to community newspapers, radio, and television stations across Canada. These were the same people who somehow convinced him that saying Liberal leader Justin Trudeau was “just not ready” to be prime minister was somehow a winning slogan.

So Poilievre doesn’t need to hide from the media. He needs to keep journalists engaged in a truly honest dialogue that doesn’t exclude, camouflage, or minimize the opinions of conservative-minded people because we can’t disagree with the hegemonic liberal discourse of the hour.

Stop apologizing, stop begging for equal time, stop placating a hostile media—oh yes, that’s exactly what Poilievre is doing, and it’s a winning formula.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.