This is only my opinion, and not the representation of Saintel Daily, LLC.

In Canada, we are in the midst of deciding who is going to run against Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (PMJT) in the next election.  Now, when I say “we”, I really mean a handful of people who belong to the Conservative Party.  There are a total of 14 candidates throwing their hats into the ring.  I don’t intend on dissecting the merits of all of the candidates, but I would like to determine one thing.  Is Kevin O’Leary the Canadian version of Donald Trump?  It kind of seems that way.  So my next question is whether or not this is a good or bad thing for Canada?

I think he’s most famous for appearing on the shows “Dragon’s Den” and “Shark Tank”.  For those of you who don’t know, Dragon’s Den is the Canadian version of Shark Tank, but has been around longer.  O’Leary is also a businessman and owns/co-owns several financial businesses.  But what does he know about politics?  Apparently in this day in age, it doesn’t matter.  Or at least that tends to be the topic of discussion by my friends south of the border.  The same could be said about PMJT though.  His background is technically teaching.  But the difference is that PMJT’s father was a former Prime Minster also.  And, if you want to get technical, PMJT was likely “groomed” for his post.

That’s not to say that O’Leary couldn’t do the job as Prime Minster, but I wonder if he’s taking a run at it because… Because…. he thinks the same way as Donald Trump?  I don’t know what either’s motivation is for running.  But it kind of seems like a game to both of them.  If I can run a company, surely I can run a country.  And maybe that theory is correct.  Maybe there is someone out there who can run a business successfully and segue into politics.  But I’m not convinced that is the case.  In either country as it stands.

Kevin O’Leary’s run for leadership of the Conservative party seems to be because Donald Trump did it.  And did it successfully, so why not O’Leary?  O’Leary is very similar to Trump in many ways.  Both are successful businessmen, TV personalities and both are brash and egotistical.  In Season one of Shark Tank, O’Leary was sarcastically referred to as “Mr. Wonderful” by Barbara Corcoran and it turned into a thing.  He now refers to himself as “Mr. Wonderful”, but in a positive context.  It takes a big ego to turn that around.  Do Canadians really want Mr. Wonderful as their Prime Minister?

Maybe there is support by the Conservative Party for his nomination.  After all, it does appear that he is “winning”.  Honestly, this is kind of scary.  If he’s successful in the nomination, and then successful in the race to be Prime Minister, what’s going to happen next?  What kinds of sweeping changes might we see in the next few years?  Right now, the Liberal Party has a majority government, which means we won’t see an election until 2019.  I realize that is two years away, but two years worth of time to change the mind’s of Canadians.

We may be a more socialist country than America, but there are still a lot of people who feel that the Liberal government aren’t doing enough to help them out.  Or that the Liberals are wasting money on social initiatives that could be better spent elsewhere.  But could someone like Kevin O’Leary make the country better?  Or would we start to see what’s happening in the states moving farther north?  I wrote a previous post on what it would be like if Donald Trump were Prime Minister.  In that piece I scoffed at the idea that Canadians would even elect him.  But now I might have to eat my words.  If Kevin O’Leary wins the nomination, I will examine what that means for Canada.  Stay tuned.

By Staff Writer

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