View From the Hill by Keith Beardsley – Max Max Leaves the Conservative Party 082318

Ottawa Ontario – Well, as his nickname implies Mad Max has done it again and this time he has left the Conservative Party.

There is one thing that we can always count on in politics and it doesn’t matter if it is municipal, provincial or federal politics, and that is people’s egos.

There is always someone who is convinced that they are the next best thing in politics, if only the rest of the team would see it that way. Being full of your own importance isn’t that uncommon and it has ruined many a political career.

In the dog days of summer, when news is scarce, Bernier can attract attention. It will be a different game once the House returns and Bernier is just one more seat at the back of the room representing fewer voters than Elizabeth May.

Bernier is best remembered for his lost briefing book, but, I remember a poorly prepared minister scrambling to read his Question Period briefing book, just as the QP prep with the Prime Minister was to get under way and then stumbling over his answers when practice questions were directed his way. Not knowing your files is not the the stuff that Prime Ministers are made of and that was for one department not the whole government. I didn’t see prime ministerial material in him then and I don’t now.

Max can bask in the camera lights for now, but he will also have to deliver on a host of policy issues, raise funds, try to attract sitting MPs, find some good advisors, or change the ones he has now, and come up with enough followers to run candidates in at least Quebec, if not Canada.

I would wish Max good luck, but I will save that for Andrew Scheer and the Tory team when they take on Trudeau in 2019. Go Scheer Go!




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