Enter the dragon: O’Leary’s Canada is a nation in lockstep
Three per cent growth is Tory’s only goal; Anyone opposed can get out of his way
It’s likely the 13 other candidates in the federal Conservative leadership race and the party’s 80,000-some members prefer to wait until after the May vote to declare a winner.
But not Kevin O’Leary. He’s already moved on. During a 45-minute interview, he barely mentioned the leadership contest and he never once mentioned the names of any of the other candidates.
He overflows with confidence. Why shouldn’t he? He’s a reality TV celebrity whose net worth is estimated at somewhere around $400 million (a figure he refuses to confirm, citing his mother’s admonition that bragging about how much money one has is bad for one’s karma).
Forget the 13 candidates — O’Leary has others in his sights, including several provincial premiers who he wants defeated before he starts running the country.
He credits his social media attacks on Alberta’s Rachel Notley and Ontario’s Kathleen Wynne for their waning popularity and expects nothing less from the campaign launched this week against Nova Scotia’s Stephen Neil. By 2019, when O’Leary figures he’ll be running the show, they’ll be gone.
He needs them gone because as prime minister, O’Leary wants everyone to fall in line behind his single policy platform: achieving three per cent annual economic growth.
It’s an audacious goal since Canada has only achieved that kind of growth five times in the past 15 years. (The United States has managed it only twice in that time.)
But wanting it and getting it are two different things, particularly since O’Leary would want to cut taxes, reduce regulations and synchronize spending policies across all levels of government.
O’Leary’s logic is as simple as the promise: Who doesn’t want economic growth and a return to the good old days?
Having agreed on that common goal, the next step is closing the door and cutting a deal. Nobody needs to see that “sausage making,” as he called it. But O’Leary is convinced it’s possible because every political leader wants and needs something.
Take the carbon tax. O’Leary hates it almost as much as Ontario’s cap-and-trade system. He’d get rid of them both because it makes Canadian companies uncompetitive. And if he can’t get the provinces to agree? “I’ll just reduce that from their transfer payments,” he said.
Would a prime minister really penalize provinces for not following in line with spending, taxing and program guidelines set by the federal government?
“Try me,” O’Leary said. “I’m the best friend you (provincial leaders) have ever had — the best friend. Or not.”
Boston is where O’Leary spends a lot of time. But Canada is home, he said. It’s where he pays his taxes.
Both his adult children are Canadian and the reason he wants to be prime minister. Both voted Liberal in the last election.
“I said to my 20-year-old son, ‘Trevor, now, we’re going into these booths and you’re going to vote Conservative, right? Because we’re a Conservative family.… So, you’re going to vote Conservative and you’re going to look for Stephen Harper’s name on this thing (the ballot).”
Aside from the fact Harper’s name wouldn’t have been on the ballot in that riding, Trevor refused — even after O’Leary reminded him he lived rent-free at their Toronto home.
The kids have subsequently come around, O’Leary said, after he pointed out the magnitude of the deficits the Liberals plan to run. And that’s how he plans to win over and win back Conservatives.
Despite the bravado, O’Leary isn’t a shoo-in to win the preferential balloting for the Conservative leadership. The winner needs broad support and the widest acceptability in all 338 ridings, which requires a lot of organization that a political newcomer might not be able to muster.
But with O’Leary’s outsider status in the party, his business background, his brand from reality TV, his social media presence, policies and take-no-prisoners attitude, comparisons to Donald Trump come easily.
O’Leary skates past a question about whether that’s a liability in Canada, especially as Trump’s popularity falls because of his immigration ban. The Irish-Lebanese Canadian acknowledges some similarities, but stresses his support for both immigration and an inclusive society.
The Donald has been a mentor — but his surname is Cherry. Yes, Don Cherry, who was once a client of Special Event Television, owned by O’Leary and two partners.
O’Leary took no sartorial lessons from Cherry. He sticks to businessman blue and black. His only flashy accessory is a big watch with a red alligator strap.
“(Cherry) spoke through the camera to the people,” O’Leary said. “I was mesmerized by him. You couldn’t stop looking at him.”
And that’s exactly the effect O’Leary figures he can have on Canadians.