HARDING: The English debate was tilted against Poilievre from the start

Last night’s English debate was not some even-handed affair, designed simply to inform Canadians and leave them to their own conclusions. In subtle ways, viewers were set up to favour Mark Carney over Pierre Poilievre in ways most probably didn't realize.

TV electoral debates are about impressions as much as facts. The very first U.S. presidential election debate in 1960 demonstrated that powerfully. Young, tanned Democrat candidate John. F. Kennedy wore a blue suit that stood out well against the grey wall behind him. His opponent, Republican Richard Nixon, wore a grey suit, looked tired as he was recovering from the flu, and shifted uncomfortably behind a podium, owing to a knee injury. 

Post-debate polling showed radio listeners thought Nixon won, but TV viewers thought Kennedy won. Nixon won on policy, and lost on charisma. Of course, Kennedy became the president. 

The 2025 Canadian election debate, like all others, was destined to be a venue where impression meant as much as argumentation–if not more.

The event was hosted at the CBC building in Montreal under the auspices of a debate commission created by the Trudeau Liberal government. That’s hostile territory for someone like Poilievre who intends to defund CBC English (and other mainstream media) and dethrone the Liberals. And Montreal is historically the most Liberal-friendly city in Canada.

Usually, a prime minister is on the defensive at a debate after years of decisions his opponents can openly criticize. Canada’s decade of decline should have left the Liberals with innumerable vulnerabilities and no hope, but instead, the fresh face of Mark Carney pretentiously wipes the slate clean. He can brag about getting rid of the consumer carbon tax, despite advising Trudeau on economic matters and extolling the carbon levy in his book Value(s).

These unusual dynamics left the debate doomed to imitate Bill Maher’s 1990’s show Politically Incorrect. Here, a token right-winger was always in the lion’s den against three ideological opponents: Maher and two guests. The best the righty can do is hold his own, while everyone else argues with him in common agreement that he is wrong. Psychology leaves the viewer sympathetic to left-leaning group opinion completely apart from the fact it’s hard for one person to out-argue three people.

Poilievre is that outlier on the political right, Carney the progressive capitalist, and Blanchet and Singh the leftists. Where the leaders stood on the podiums reflected this same division. Carney stood ideologically and physically in the middle, just where a politician trying to win wants to be. It’s not just median-voter theorem that puts the centrist Carney at an advantage. Ask someone what’s better, moderation or extremism, and they’ll choose moderation every time.

A 1980’s Head and Shoulders commercial said quite truly, “You never get a second chance to make a first impression.” The slogan was so true and psychologically compelling, Proctor and Gamble paid millions to sell shampoo with it.

In this respect, Carney was set up for success and Poilievre for the political equivalent of dandruff.

The debate’s opening theme was “tariffs and threats to Canada.” Carney had the best opportunity imaginable to set the tone and win over viewers from the start. Despite years of espousing the post-national Canadian state, the Liberals have ridden a wave of alleged patriotism from the bottom to the top of the polls for two months now.

Carney even got the first question from moderator Steve Paikin, and was asked what the starting point should be to relate to a combative United States. Carney said it “has to be one of strength.”

That sounds great and viewers can nod their heads, but what idiot would say, “We have to start with weakness”?

Next, Paikin asked, “Mr. Poilievre, would you do anything differently?”

What could Poilievre say? Carney had stolen his line and implemented something so politically obvious, no one could argue with it.

Poilievre replied, “What would I do different? Well, I’ll start by what I would do the same," affirming the approach of retaliatory tariffs. He later added, “Well, we need to be in a position of strength. The Liberal government has weakened our economy..."

Like Carney, Poilievre said he'd fire up the domestic economy “so that we stand up to President Trump with a position of strength.”

Poilievre explained the Liberal failures and offered a contrasting vision of how to improve the economy. The problem was, he sounded like an echo because it was almost impossible not to.

The other leaders had no such problem because they got independent questions. Jagmeet Singh was asked whether Canada can reliably partner with the U.S. when defending the Arctic. Singh said no, and insisted Canada had to be “resilient, independent, and less reliant on the United States.”

News flash, any boats we have in the Arctic are so weakly armed they could barely shoot someone in a rowboat, and they can’t break the ice either. And anyone with the slightest political wisdom has to doubt the NDP would jack up military spending at all, let alone enough to defend the Arctic without U.S. help.

No matter, Singh tapped into anti-American sentiment with a nice-sounding answer and some viewers probably found him credible.

Next, Bloc Quebecois leader Yves-Francois Blanchet got the easiest alley-oop question ever: “Mr. Blanchet, what supports would you want to see for industries affected by tariffs–many of course are in Quebec?” Blanchet was all but begged to say: oh yes, Ottawa should open the vaults for us, just as Montreal-based Justin Trudeau did for years before there was any tariff threat at all.

Instead, Blanchet said he usually tried to not speak English in Montreal and offered some virtue-signaling answer about Quebec and Canada being different. What is frustrating is that this irrelevant response might have played well to his voter base.

Poilievre was asked the first question in the second segment, but with a set up that could only inspire suspicion.

“Many provinces, including some provinces with Conservative governments, have ambitious housing targets, none of which have been met. Why do you think your housing plan will be any different?” said Paikin.

Perhaps some sharp and thoughtful viewers picked up on the way their impressions were being programmed, but I suspect most didn't realize it at all.

Unfortunately, for Poilievre, It’s hard for him to find favour with voters when they are subtly being manipulated against him. The uphill battle Conservatives typically face in Canadian politics is completely evident in this election.