Do Carney and Poilievre have different visions for the Canada-U.S. relationship?

The clearest attempt at a line of demarcation during Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre's speech on Canada-United States relations was an apparent rejoinder to Prime Minister Mark Carney's insistence that a "rupture" has occurred.

Quoting a John F. Kennedy hymn about the geography, history, economics and necessity that have brought Canada and the U.S. ever closer, Poilievre said the former president's "insight captures a reality deeper than any temporary dispute."

"Canada's prosperity and security are inseparable from a stable relationship with the United States," Poilievre said at the Economic Club of Canada last week. "And that is why we should not declare a permanent rupture with our biggest customer and closest neighbour in favor of a strategic partnership for a new world order with Beijing."

Had he been in the audience, the prime minister might have fairly protested that he never said Canada doesn't need a stable relationship with the United States, nor suggested that Canada should swap out its entire trade and security relationship with the United States "in favour of" a new relationship with China.

In that respect, Poilievre might be accused of swinging at a straw man. 

But Carney has said Canada's "old relationship" with the United States is "over." And it's possible Poilievre sees things differently — a difference that first seemed to emerge during last year's election campaign.

That line of demarcation for Carney was drawn last spring. 

Carney said the United States was not only an "ally" but "our most important security ally." But, he said, "part of what our relationship has been based … has been a degree of integration between our economies, our trade becoming closer and closer together."

And that, he repeated, is "over."

Poilievre did not directly dispute those comments last week. But at a couple points he seemed to want to draw a distinction between the current occupant of the White House and the broader Canada-U.S. relationship.

Canada and the United States, Poilievre said, "have built probably the greatest partnership any two countries have ever built in the history of the world." And that partnership "remains profoundly in the interests" of both countries. 

"It's important to distinguish between governments and people. Politicians come and go. People remain," Poilievre said. "The miner in Appalachia, the energy worker in Texas, the engineer in California — they do not wake up every day asking how they can stick it to the Canadians." 

That seems plausible. A recent survey by Abacus Data, for instance, found that 64 per cent of Americans had a positive view of Canada. And Poilievre's adjacent point was that Canada should still seek out and nurture allies within the United States.

But some of those miners, energy workers and engineers nonetheless voted for Donald Trump. And some of them probably still support him.