Another photo op for Carney, another win for Trump
Prime Minister Mark Carney recently appeared on the inaugural episode of Bloomberg Television’s The Mishal Husain Show. A variety of topics were discussed during this interview, including (unsurprisingly) U.S. President Donald Trump.
One exchange in particular received extensive media attention. Husain, a longtime British journalist, asked Carney if he had learned anything from Trump. “I’ve learned lots of things from President Trump,” he said. When Carney was pressed to provide an example, here’s what he said: “You always learn things from people. I don’t fully subscribe to this, but I see the effectiveness, the value of ‘flooding the zone,’ of doing multiple things at the same time. I think that he has a very effective way, in his own almost unique manner, of framing issues and of dominating the agenda.”
Well, then. Carney seems to mistakenly believe that he’s learned from Trump how to flood the zone. In reality, the zone continues to flood Carney at every turn.
The most recent example of this involved these two world leaders who recently met at the White House. Similar to their first meeting, there was a friendly handshake, plenty of smiles and a few laughs as they got down to the serious business of hammering out a trade deal.
You know what was also similar? Trump got the upper hand over Carney again.
It wasn’t difficult to gauge where this conversation was going to end up. Carney, instead of bringing a shiny red apple to the Oval Office, decided to wear a brand-spanking-new red tie. “Red is for you,” he actually told Trump with a big smile on his face. Well done, little Marky. Maybe if you’re lucky, the teacher will also let you clap the erasers from the chalkboard when class is over!
All kidding aside, things didn’t get much better for Carney.
Trump dominated the bilateral meeting. That’s no surprise: the leader of a country that hosts this event has the home-field advantage. What Carney needed to do was learn from the mistakes he made at the first bilateral and use his limited amount of time to define and defend Canada’s political and economic interests.
Carney failed in this task. He’s still too green when it comes to political leadership and taking charge of a room full of reporters. He may be more intelligent, capable and resourceful than Justin Trudeau, but that’s an exceedingly low bar to surpass. He may not be able to achieve anything more than his predecessor’s level of mediocrity.
Trump beat Carney to the punch in several spots. After introducing the PM, he said this is someone “who I have made very popular. He’s an extremely popular prime minister, and I’m very honoured to do it … right from the beginning, I’ve liked him.” Trump certainly liked having a weak, deferential and inexperienced Liberal leader in Canada to deal with, as I’ve previously pointed out. When Carney discussed trade and tariffs, he said, “and, the most important thing …” to which the president interjected, “the merger of Canada and the United States!” The room started laughing, including Carney, who was forced to retreat and say, “That wasn’t where this was going!”
Trump also said Carney “is a good man. He does a great job. He’s a tough negotiator.” This led a reporter to ask the president what was holding things up with a trade deal. “If he’s a great man and you want to do a deal with Canada, why aren’t you?” Trump responded with his best line, “Because I want to be a great man, too.” Everyone laughed, with Carney seemingly laughing the hardest.
Was a new trade deal arranged? Of course not.
Carney emphasized that Canada is the second-largest trading partner for the U.S. due to cross-border trade and being the “largest foreign investor.” He knows there are areas where the two countries compete rather than, in his mind, face conflict. “It’s in those areas that we have to come to an agreement that works, but there are more areas where we are stronger together, and that’s what we’re focused on. And we’re going to get the right deal. Right deal for America, and right deal, obviously from my perspective, for Canada.” That’s all fine and good, but Carney didn’t suggest anything specifically. It was just a word salad with no beginning and end.
Trump used a different tactic and got better results. When asked about the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement renegotiation process and whether there will be minimal tariffs, he replied, “Well, we’re going to have tariffs between Canada and … you know, they have them with us. I will say with our farmers, as you know, they went up to as much as 400 per cent, 250, 300—and even one at 401, we found one having to do with a very small product, but it was high.” Trump correctly noted that “we’ve always had tariffs between the two of us. Actually, Canada was charging us very high tariffs on our agricultural things, a lot of our agricultural products. And that’s one of the things we talk about for bringing that down.”
That’s why Trump is so masterful when it comes to press conferences, going tête-à-tête with reporters and bringing out retorts left, right and centre. It’s a real skill he possesses.
What about Carney? He can’t tame the flood and remains zoned out.
Michael Taube is a political commentator, Troy Media syndicated columnist and former speechwriter for Prime Minister Stephen Harper. He holds a master’s degree in comparative politics from the London School of Economics, lending academic rigour to his political insights.
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