KINSELLA: Poilievre looks and sounds like PM material during campaign stop

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Before the tariffs hit, before Donald Trump kicked off his three-ring circus in the White House lawn, my genial colleague Brian Lilley suggested I come with him to see the Conservative leader speak to the elite of Bay Street.

So I did. I watched at the back.

His tone was right. Pierre Poilievre looked and sounded like you would expect a Prime Minister to look and sound. His economic plan, and his plan for dealing with the tariffs, seemingly made sense.

But as I stood there at the back observing the guy, it was obvious that he could not bring himself to clearly and unambiguously condemn Donald Trump.

Canadians want him to do that. I’m now convinced he will never do that. Is that bad? Well, it could be fatal.

I had never seen Pierre Poilievre give a speech in person before. He seemed a bit shorter than I expected – although this writer is 6’4″ in my Doc Martens.

He was impeccably suited, there was not a hair out of place, and he seemed a bit younger than he does on TV. Certainly less severe.

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At one point he made a joke about snow in mid-April, and I was the loudest laugh in the room. It was funny.

I thought to myself: he should do that more often. He should smile more. He should laugh more.

But in politics, as in life: once you reach 40 or so, how you are is how you are. No big changes are possible.

The Pierre Poilievre you see is the Pierre Poilievre you are always going to get.

Anyway. In the hall the Conservatives rented out for their leader’s speech, there was some buzz about the rally he planned to hold in Kingston later that same day.

Having now seen the pictures of that event, I understand why. Conservative supporters were stacked in there like cordwood. It was very, very impressive.

Which again begs the question so many are asking in this election campaign: how can Pierre Poilievre be attracting so much support at his rallies, while attracting increasingly less support in the polls?

My hunch: the Conservatives have a somewhat smaller core, but they are fanatically devoted to their choice. The Liberals, meanwhile, have a notionally-bigger group on their side, but nowhere near as much commitment.

Sadly for the Tories, campaign rallies are not always a reliable predictors of outcomes. Polls are.

It’s worth mentioning that the Conservative media team were friendly, prompt and courteous. They were a pleasure to deal with. Which makes their decision to remove the media from their campaign plane and buses all the more mystifying.

In the fullness of time, the Conservatives will likely learn that fateful decision affected the coverage they got in election 2025 – and how much coverage they got.

That doesn’t mean the media coverage automatically became all negative. They just got less of it. And, for a Tory leader running in his first national election campaign, that was probably a mistake.

To conclude about a fateful, historic day: this being an election and all, politicos of course spent last night crunching the numbers and sculpting the strategy.

The dilemma for the Liberals is that the tariffs are not as damaging as they could have been. In comparative terms, you might say we were even spared.

The dilemma for the Conservatives is that they can’t just go back to 2024, and start running their “affordability” playbook. Because there will be real pain for many Canadians.

So, expect Carney to suggest that the tariffs are apocalyptic, when they aren’t. Expect Poilievre to minimize them when they’re not minimal.

And the people? The people will then do what they always do, which is vote for the guy who most closely reflects what they are feeling.

Not the actual reality.