Campaign notebook: size matters

Well, sort of

The Poilievre Conservatives have been boasting about the size of their campaign rallies. So, naturally, the Carney Liberals did likewise. Both campaigns started claiming they had huge numbers of folks coming out to hear The Leader.

They were both lying.

Pro tip, partisans: when you make a claim about something – the size of your tax cut, the size of your party membership, the size of your rallies - we in the media will fact-check your claims. That’s our job. We are paid to be skeptical.

It's laborious, unexciting work. But CBC did it about Tory and Grit claims about respective rally attendance, here. And, lo and behold, they discovered that the political parties were, um, lying about size.

As in the bedroom, as in life: when you claim something is really big, someone is eventually going to get out the measuring tape.

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The rally size fetish remind you of anyone? It’s a bigger problem for Poilievre, for obvious reasons.

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The leaders are now going to start getting ready for next week's debates. You'll see less of them at their “rallies” and quite a bit more of their advertising. Political consultants “heavy up” their ad buy during down days, and debate prep days.

This week, you will be reminded that Pierre Poilievre is a way better debater than Mark Carney. He will dominate, in English and French (the Bloc leader will be a big factor in the latter, too).

But it is very unlikely to change the trajectory of this election campaign. As with newspapers, as with newscasts, people generally don't devote a lot of time to watching entire political debates anymore. What they watch is clips.

That's what killed Joe Biden’s candidacy last year. Not the entire debate, per se, which went for 90 excruciating minutes on June 27, 2024. The clips of Biden in the debate, in his worst moments.

That's how Justin Trudeau dominated in 2015. Overall, he was not a better debater than either Steven Harper or Thomas Mulcair. But, with his unerring sense of how online media works, Trudeau would come to life at key moments that he knew would be clipped.

How will Mark Carney do with the battle of the clips? Good question. We will all find out this week.

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Druggy pedophile and MAGA guy Matt Gaetz has already decided, however. He likes Poilievre's chances.

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Pierre Poilievre had a wonderful, well-written Passover message. It was really good.

Whoever did the lighting for it should be fired, however.

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I think the race is tightening up a bit because:

• Carney's controversies are getting coverage across media

• Poilievre's base aren't going anywhere

But mainly:

• Trump hasn't been doing his 51st state and related bullshit

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It's not campaign-related, but you simply must watch Douglas Murray destroy the antisemitic enabler Joe Rogan and his openly antisemitic sidekick. You must. Here is a sampling.

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Yesterday, after getting back to my cabin, I was sitting outside in a parka and tuque and mitts, drinking an alcohol-free Guinness, and it was snowing a little bit, but I refused to permit winter to last any longer.

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Chag Pesach Sameach, friends!