Traitor.

The Cambridge dictionary folks define it thusly: “A person who is not loyal or stops being loyal to their own country.”

Anyone who commits high treason is considered a traitor – and it’s a serious charge. It’s still there in section 46 of our Criminal Code, in fact: anyone who kills or tries to kill the King, anyone who “levies war against Canada,” anyone who assists an enemy at war with Canada? That’s treason.

The penalty for high treason is life in prison. Up until 1998, high treason could be punishable by death. Louis Riel, the leader of the Metis people, was wrongly executed for treason in 1885. Thomas Scott, a white opponent of Riel, was executed by firing squad in 1870. So was a Canadian citizen, Kanao Inouye, who was born in Kamloops, B.C., and hanged for treason in 1947, in Hong Kong while in British custody. His last words were: “Banzai!”

No one has gone fully “banzai” on their opponent in Election 2025, yet, but you can tell they’re getting close. The winged monkeys who support Pierre Poilievre and Mark Carney have been firing “treason” broadsides at each other for weeks. You know: Carney is a traitor because he worked abroad and allegedly sent Canadian jobs to the United States – while Poilievre is a traitor because he won’t get his security clearance and India (alleged the Globe on Tuesday) meddled to help him win his party’s leadership.

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Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats.

SWOT, it’s called, in corporate strategy sessions. What are our internal strengths and weaknesses? What are the external opportunities and threats?

In the federal general election campaign that gets underway today, you can be certain that the three main Canadian political parties have already done a SWOT, or something approximating it. It’s the kind of analysis that determines ad buy, debate strategy, messages, you name it. It’s important.

Here, then, is the SWOT for the 2025 election campaign. Clip and save.

STRENGTHS: The Mark Carney Liberals are winning. Their main internal strength, to the surprise of many, is Mark Carney. He may have the pedigree of a bland, boring banker, but the newly-selected Liberal leader has turned all that into a strength: at a time when the despised-by-Canadians Donald Trump is causing instability and uncertainty everywhere, Carney projects calm and predictability. Female voters, in particular, like him.

Carney has also been willing to take political risks. Going for a skate with the Edmonton Oilers could have been a disaster, if Carney had slipped and fallen on his keister – à la Tory leader Robert Stanfield and the infamous football fumble. Carney didn’t, and he won an approving quote from team captain Conor “Jesus” McDavid.

Pierre Poilievre, meanwhile, has strengths of his own. He’s got more candidates, more money, and more organizational muscle. He’s a highly disciplined politician, and has been getting himself ready for this moment for his entire life. With the exception of the Mango Mussolini and climate change, his priorities match those of most Canadians.

Jagmeet Singh? He, um, is good at TikTok.

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This is unexpected. Wish my folks were still here to see it.

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What are they really like?

When you are a political staffer – like this writer was, back in the Palaeolithic Era – you get that question a lot. People find out that you work for a notable politician, and they want to know the real deal: what is he/she like when the microphones and cameras are tucked away?

Mark Carney first.

On Monday, the newly-minted Liberal leader was asked totally legitimate questions about his “blind trust” by the CBC’s Rosemary Barton and the Globe’s Stephanie Levitz. Barton and Levitz essentially wanted to know why Carney didn’t disclose his financial holdings when he could have.

Levitz went first, querying Carney about the whereabouts of his millions. Carney’s response: “What possible conflict would you have, Stephanie?…Point final.”

Get that? “Point final.” That’s kind of the English equivalent of saying, in French, “This discussion is over, child.”

Barton wasn’t deterred by that. She said it “was very difficult to believe” Carney could have no possible conflicts of interest. At that point, Carney’s patrician mask fully slipped. “Look inside yourself, Rosemary,” he actually said. You are “trying to invent new rules,” he snapped at her. You are acting with “ill will,” he barked at the CBC veteran broadcaster.

Well, no. She was just doing her job. But in those few seconds, Carney revealed himself to be arrogant, pompous, evasive and condescending. He looked terrible; all that was missing was him gnawing at an apple.

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