COUNTERWEIGHTS EDITORS. GANATSEKWYAGON, ON. THURSDAY, MARCH 6, 2025. [UPDATED MARCH 9, 11 PM ET — scroll to bottom]. Justin Trudeau’s press conference in Ottawa this morning warmed our Canadian hearts.

The CTV News written report is somewhat misleadingly headlined “Trudeau vows to not be ‘caretaker’ PM, gets emotional at one of his last events.” The mainstream mass media (MMM?) have been part of the virtually systematic domestic denigration of Pierre Trudeau’s eldest son, that has (probably) at last started to seem to more than a few like a big mistake.

We counterweights editors are with Angie Rivers at the Waterloo Regional Police in Ontario, who posted this about PM Justin Trudeau yesterday : “Love him or hate him, you have to admit he hits it out of the park in a crisis.” To us that would be a more apt headline for the CTV news report this morning than the as-usual-belittling “PM, gets emotional at one of his last events.”

To us as well, what PM Trudeau did this morning on TV was (quite casually) summarize what it is about Canada that has deep roots in an indigenous and migrant past, and a long and prosperous future ahead of it, in a new world order only very gradually starting to take shape!

We disagree with Justin Trudeau passionately about the role of the British monarchy in this future — and in the Canadian present, but beyond that somewhat symbolic (albeit very important) issue we feel strongly that he has been a good prime minister of Canada, 2015–2025.

Until recently we also unhappily anticipated that this level of good leadership would be missing over the next four years, as a Canadian Trumpish (if not quite Trumpian?) regime clone came to office in Ottawa in 2025. But that was before a transformation long awaited in some Canadian circles arrived on the scene at last.

A chart recently released by the Leger polling organization nicely summarizes the raw numbers behind this transformation. In their Canadian federal polling work, Leger notes, the Conservatives have fallen in popularity from 47% of poll respondents on January 12, 2025 to 38% on February 22, 2025. Between the same two dates — a mere six weeks apart — the New Democrats also fell from 17% to 14%.

Meanwhile, the Liberals (the old “natural governing party of Canada”) suddenly rose from 21% to 35%. Or as explained by Philippe J. Fournier@338Canada :”Sondages fédéraux de la maison Léger : l’avance du PCC passe de 26 à 3 points en six semaines” — the Conservative lead (over the Liberals) has gone from 26 to 3 points in a mere six weeks!

Meanwhile again, just this morning Polling Canada posted these additional polling averages from Philippe Fournier’s federal update this past Sunday : “Federal@338Canada Model — Outcome Odds : LPC Minority 35%, CPC Minority 34%, CPC Majority 28%, LPC Majority 2%” (LPC = Liberal Party of Canada, CPC = Conservative Party of Canada).

As M. Fournier headlined the latest update of his polling averages : “The Liberal Surge Continues … Multiple polls confirm dramatic shift in momentum, as Liberals close in on Conservatives.” (There is a new Leger poll with a middle field date of March 1, 2025 that puts CPC at 43% and LPC at only 30%. But an EKOS poll with a middle field date of March 3, 2025 actually has the LPC in first place at 41%, with the CPC at only 36%!)

What explains this dramatic shift — after virtually consistent Conservative leadership in the polling averages since July 2022?

One prospect is the resignation of Justin Trudeau on January 6, 2025. Another is the political (and economic) chaos next door, during the first several weeks of Donald Trump II’s new and almost certainly overactive and overreaching US federal administration.

A third prospect is the political rise of former Bank of Canada (and then Bank of England) Governor Mark Carney. He grew up in Edmonton, Alberta, in a neighbourhood known as Laurier Heights, after the seventh (and Liberal) prime minister of Canada, Wilfrid Laurier. And for us yet again he has almost suddenly become a surprisingly dynamic potential new Liberal leader and Prime Minister of Canada, to succeed the retiring Justin Trudeau.

Whether Mr. Carney will finally become the new Liberal leader will be decided over this coming weekend (announced Sunday, March 9 to be exact). We don’t want to say much before then.

Except that lately we have been more impressed by Mark Carney as an actual political candidate than we thought we would be. (Though some among us feel feminist attachments to Chrystia Freeland as well!)

And there are polls which suggest Carney really is the man Canada’s natural governing party has been looking for in the middle of the 2020s.

We may or may not have more to say immediately after the Liberal leadership vote this coming weekend …

Stay tuned!

UPDATE MARCH 9, 11 PM ET : So the Liberal Party of Canada convention in Ottawa — linked to almost 152,000 online participants, coast to coast to coast — has now given Mark Carney almost 86% of its vote on the first ballot. And he is the new Liberal leader. (His three other opponents picked up the remaining 14%, with Chrystia Freeland in second place with a mere 8%.) This was widely seen as a genuine landslide victory, putting Mr. Carney in a very strong position inside the party.

In the current Canadian House of Commons the Liberals have the largest number of seats (though not a majority, without eg help from New Democrats, once given by a written deal more recently revoked, by NDP leader Jagmeet Singh). This means that the new Liberal leader becomes prime minister — and will remain in office until his minority governing party is, as widely expected, defeated on a confidence measure in the House, precipitating a fresh election.

In the immediate future, over the next few days current PM Justin Trudeau will offer his resignation to the Governor General, and advise her to ask Mr. Carney to form a new government. Carney will do so quickly under the circumstances, and possibly include much of Mr. Trudeau’s final cabinet. On some scenarios the new PM Carney will then soon enough call a fresh election (even without waiting to be defeated in the House by opposition parties?), to clear the decks for defending against the next rounds of the Trumpian tariff war, launched by the MAGA Monopoly game under way in Washington. (No one can be certain about details here at the moment, but …)

Meanwhile Mark Carney gave what struck our small counterweights editors enclave as a powerful acceptance speech, after his victory was announced early this evening. Several of us watching on TV in the boardroom here in the east-end Beaches were especially struck by his urgings about how we in Canada will have to be doing some things faster than usual, in the challenging but exciting new era that lies immediately ahead. It left us with the thought that the former central banker Mark Carney just may have serious and sensible ideas about how to push Canada into what he calls “the strongest economy in the G7” (that also puts people first), to make the remarkable country we have now even better. And we’re certainly hoping that this is true!