If the Canadian Sleepwalkers Association wants hints about how to hold a convention, they need look no further than last month鈥檚 federal Conservative conference.
The latter was billed, loosely, as a policy convention, but that is an untruth, because the Tories offered scant few policies. Actually, they spent a fair bit of time rejecting policies.
They voted against recognizing that global warming is a reality. Then they opposed medical assistance in dying. They rubbished carbon taxes.
The second-place leadership candidate, Nova Scotia鈥檚 Peter MacKay, didn鈥檛 even bother to attend. Scintillating it was not.
But the take-away message is that Erin O鈥橳oole doesn鈥檛 know politics. Why else would he stand at the conference podium and demand that the party 鈥渞ecognize that climate change is real.鈥�
What was going through his mind? You might as well invite the Taliban to embrace waterboarding.
O鈥橳oole knows perfectly well that skepticism about global warming is an item of faith among many on the right. They see it as a fictionalized gimcrack invented to justify more government intervention in their lives.
No doubt he wants to broaden his party鈥檚 base by appealing across the political aisle.
But here鈥檚 the problem with that. Just 10 per cent of Canadians say the Conservatives are their second choice. Far more see the Liberals, NDP or Greens as their next best option.
As things stand then, there isn鈥檛 much room for the Tories to expand their tent by embracing left-leaning policies. Voters attracted by those notions already have a range of alternatives to choose from.
So what should O鈥橳oole be doing? Forget selling notions more than half your party won鈥檛 buy.
Instead, reframe a conservative agenda in ways that awaken latent support. For all his other failings, Donald Trump did exactly that.
He broadened his party鈥檚 appeal by bringing to the surface concerns that many voters held, but saw no point in raising, because their politicians weren鈥檛 listening.
We鈥檙e talking about working-class job loss and poverty. The flight of corporations abroad to lower-income economies. Mountainous red tape. Dysfunctional government.
All of these issues would resound here. 鈥楴uff said about the first three. And the fourth? Well, when our federal government finally gets around to presenting a budget, two whole years will have passed. That鈥檚 an unconscionable abuse of Parliament.
But Trump didn鈥檛 just identify concerns that had gone unheard.
He convinced disgruntled voters that he really meant business, that he wasn鈥檛 just another ward-heeling politician who would change his tune once he got elected.
It helped that he was the first non-politician running for the top office since General Eisenhower.
O鈥橳oole can鈥檛 quite claim that distinction. Yet before he stumbled into politics, he was a twice-decorated captain who served 12 years in the Canadian Air Force.
I鈥檓 not suggesting he mimic John Kerry, who strode on stage at the 2004 U.S. Democratic party convention, threw a salute and barked out: 鈥淚鈥檓 John Kerry and I鈥檓 reporting for duty鈥� (he鈥檇 fought in Vietnam).
Yet O鈥橳oole has already served his country with distinction. Instead of trying to force left-leaning policies on a right-leaning party, he should be talking about honour and devotion, duty and courage, qualities all too absent in politics today.
