It’s that time of year to bring back one of The Hub’s favourite traditions: giving our readers a head’s up on what they can expect in the year to come. As for how well our contributor’s crystal balls work, well, check out last year’s predictions and judge for yourself. Looking ahead, here are some can’t-miss predictions for 2025.
Pierre Poilievre’s coming battles and Taylor Swift’s inevitable fall from grace
By L. Graeme Smith, The Hub’s deputy editor
1. MAGA Americans will fall into (and out of) love with Pierre Poilievre.
Conservatives in the Anglo-American world have been taking notice of the scrappy, apple-munching, journo-jousting prime minister-in-waiting up in the Western world’s northern reaches. That attention—and admiration—will only intensify when Poilievre finally upgrades his seat from the opposition bench to the G7 roundtable and takes his place as Canada’s next prime minister.
Poilievre has two things going for him in this regard: he’s a run-of-the-mill classical liberal, yes, but a run-of-the-mill classical liberal who doesn’t kowtow to progressive sensitivities and doesn’t cower under the media and elite pressure that accompanies such a violent transgression (so, maybe not so run-of-the-mill). At least that is the image he’s so far cultivated, contrived or not, and it has won him fans amongst embattled centre-Right voters from Calgary to Canberra to Cambridge who are pining for a champion willing to take on the global managerial elite in no uncertain terms.
But for conservative Americans, Poilievre’s jabs will be a lot harder to cheer when the target shifts from perpetual punching bag Justin Trudeau to Donald Trump, the titan of tariffs himself. And jab he must. Standing up for Canada—or first (how far we’ve fallen!) making the case for Canada—and pushing back against Trump, Trump’s trolls (both the jokes and the bots and the might-as-well-be-bots who parrot them), and border war pronouncements (turned painfully real policies?) will be Poilievre’s principal job once he takes the reins.
Expect his popularity to plummet amongst the mighty MAGA minions once they realize Poilievre has no incentive to become another Republican Party lapdog. Much to their chagrin, and the chagrin of the Canadian Left, Poilievre will be a steadfast advocate for Canada’s interests. This will maintain his popularity in Canada and tank his reputation amongst Trump’s faithful who only superficially claim to care about free markets and other conservative principles. It will also cause some consternation amongst certain MAGA-sympathetic Canadians who will be forced to choose between cheering on Trump or cheering on their fellow conservative countryman.
2. The Canada-U.S. bond will actually grow stronger.
That being said, once in power, the posture of Canada’s Conservative government will not be entirely oppositional to our southern neighbour—just the opposite. Expect Trump’s threats and trolls to receive strong and measured pushback, but expect also that the Conservatives will realize that the best way to stand up for Canada’s interests in both the short and the long term will be to more closely integrate with America at the expense of the wider world. Not cede our sovereignty, but safeguard it within a tighter two-country continental market framework and “Fortress North America” defence strategy. Contra Trudeau the Younger, ultimately, Poilievre and co. will position Canada as a pro-Washington, anti-Beijing player on the world stage.
3. Canada’s mainstream media will find their bite again once Poilievre is in power.
There are several forces swirling that are certain to convalesce into the excrement storm of the century—and no, I’m not talking about the next Liberal Party leadership race or the political prospects of the NDP under Jagmeet Singh’s stewardship. It is the coming media response to the notion of “Prime Minister Poilievre” moving from theory to reality.
The first is that Poilievre, as mentioned above, has no interest in flattering the Laurentian Elite sensibilities of our mainstream media and will actively set himself in opposition to them, and they to him. His eschewal of them in favour of the burgeoning alternative and independent media ecosystem will only exacerbate this dynamic. Add in the coming defunding of the CBC and the potentially coming dismantling of the government-funded subsidy regime for the rest of the press (excluding The Hub!), and journalists’ already unshakeable self-righteousness will now be bolstered by existential self-interest.
Things will get very messy and very, very annoying.
4. The Trump-Musk breakup is coming.
I first wrote this prediction even before Elon Musk and the newly Republican-aligned Silicon Valley tech class went to war with the core MAGA movement over the H-1B visa issue. This represents only the first burbling challenge for that relationship. Aside from some other obvious political and policy faultlines sure to emerge, Musk, alongside being the world’s most successful entrepreneur, is a glutton for attention. As is, to put it mildly, Trump. Trump will not tolerate anyone in his inner circle outshining him. Expect Musk to eventually find himself kicked to the curb.
5. The Taylor Swift backlash is inevitable.
Similarly in the vein of what goes up must come down, Swift is too acclaimed and too popular for the coming fall not to be both fierce and, ahem, swift.
6. Pandemic politics return as Bird Flu becomes front-page news.
A bonus prediction I desperately hope does not come to pass: we all get well-reacquainted with the craziness of pandemic politics as H5N1 presents a growing global threat.
Mike Bolt, Keeper of the Stanley Cup, takes it off the ice in Vancouver, B.C., Dec 7, 2012. Darryl Dyck. The Canadian Press.
The Minnesota Wild will win the Stanley Cup (and other sports certainties)
By Howard Anglin, former deputy chief of staff to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, now a doctoral student at Oxford University
Reviewing my old New Years predictions, I’m struck that they have been rather bleak. Which is odd, as I am a relentlessly—probably annoyingly—cheery person.
Typical past predictions:
“The tattered civilizational order we inherited will endure a little longer, but no new year will ever again be as good as the preceding year. Not in our lifetimes.” (2023).
“The tawdry, disposable culture force-fed to us through anxious screens will look like a Norman Rockwell childhood compared to what is coming.” (2024)
“Savour each passing year before it too slips out of reach and into a past that we describe wistfully to our uncomprehending children. If we have any.” (2024 again).
So, this year I am going in a completely different direction:
- The Wild will win the Stanley Cup
- The Bills will win the Super Bowl
- The Celtics will repeat as NBA Champions
- The Phillies will win the World Series
- The Roughriders will win the Grey Cup
- Oregon will win the College Football Playoffs
- Auburn will win March Madness
- The USA will win the 4 Nations Face-Off
- Liverpool will win the Premier League
- Ireland will win the Six Nations
- Australia will retain the Ashes
