Lori Dueck, Victoria, BC

I was highly stimulated within reading the first two pages of Doug Roche’s book as it sparked my thoughts and feelings I have been carrying all along. I instantly started writing notes of my opinions on the subject as follows:

Carney talks the talk until “in” but has he been walking the walk? In my opinion “NO”! He’s not helping the marginalized, poor or disabled but entertaining conversations with Danielle Smith regarding the pipe line, standing up to Trump, hmmm? yet putting so much money into military… it doesn’t sound like peace to me!

Help with cost of groceries or replacing the GST with a new name with slightly more money. Environmentally, not great either. Agreeing to military, pipelines and a holiday in Italy while Canada is on fire in every sense of the word!

Carney is a charming talker however he is a banker with that mindset, giving more money to those who already have enough, it will trickle down to the poor and vulnerable! He says. Hardly, has that strategy ever worked yet?

I have never been, since day one, on the Carney band wagon! I don’t dislike the guy. I don’t know him personally or know his motives. However, I don’t see him making the changes we need for the greater good. The poor and vulnerable need help now, not later, they can’t survive. People lose lives in these circumstances. We can’t play games with crazy people when it comes to war whatever kind it is.

Climate change is killing our planet and our lives. World wide fires, floods and other disasters constantly now. No, one person can’t save the world but when you are on centre stage you have a serious role to play as the world is watching. Each of us have a little role in how we live our lives, our values, motives and courage. I do not see this as happening in our political stage right now. Although I would NOT want the responsibility of being Prime Minister!

Doug’s ability to take a complex situation and word it simply that I can follow along through the year journey is appreciated. The fact that it is broken into several essays as they unfolded is refreshing.

As I read through the book Doug wrote, I am hearing more about the book I have not read by Mark Carney, Values, Building a Better World for All. It is only confirming to me that at this point I stand by my personal opinion and conviction about him. I am reading more of what Carney said he thought Canada needed, beautifully written but not what he is doing now that he could be the one to fulfill it!

(Side note: once he was elected he allowed Poilievre to be heard but the NDP got the worst of the outcome, given not a voice.)

As I was reading chapter 6, Carney should reject Trump’s Star Wars, Doug was questioning why Carney seemed to have caved in and joining in the Golden Dome plan. I also don’t know the truth behind his motives. However, upon watching documentaries on several people, I found that there are facts that there is more money in war.

Based in reading Chapter 7:

Can agreeing to appease someone like Trump ever result to fairness? Did anyone ever think doing something not right to try to negotiate for something fair would work? It sounds like the “enemy” in all angles at work. We don’t need to spend money that is going to be spent to harm others at the same time leaving budget at home soil cutback to now harm our most vulnerable by neglect. We have our own resources to grow our vegetables and such. I believe that the seeds that are being planted in bad soil is producing more of the same. Taking courage may be challenging and time consuming however you now are using good soil and producing life giving product.

AT WHAT COST?

I especially like chapter 12, Pope Leo’s old-fashioned diplomacy,

Pope Leo does not cave into a game of pleasing Donald Trump but he, in a Christ-loving way, counters the bad choices of harming people with building resources of help and love in those communities. That takes Christ-strength courage, faith and love to do that. Our Prime Minister definitely needs to apply that way of peace, not neglecting his own country appeasing another’s corruption!

A book written in a time capsule order that has me looking deep within myself to come to my own conclusions, in my opinion, is well written. Doug isn’t telling anyone what to think but facts, personal reflections and expertise in his life experience of many decades of working within the political field.

In chapter 14, I like the courage both NDP interim leader, Don Davies and Green Party leader, Elizabeth May had in speaking up in parliament against the war.

Doug does an amazing job throughout his whole book with facts and realizations about the weaknesses of Carney until the final words in the conclusion where he seems to weaken his stance by being a polite Canadian by letting Carney off the hook.

I am pleased that Doug included the Davos, Switzerland, January 20, 2026 speech, as I had never heard it before. Once again, I stand with my opinions that what Carney said was contradictory to his book, Values, Building a Better World for All to his climb to Prime Minister promises which have mostly have been broken. He is boasting about who and what Canada is, spending money in war, AI and such, however abandoning his own country’s most vulnerable. With Carney’s neglect of those in need he is actually causing the two tiered system, the rich and the poor to be more pronounced. I also think it is terrible to see the words “we” with Canada as I am not in agreement to any of this behaviour. I believe Canada as a peaceful, Christian, country it was, is lacking by changing its stance in the wayward world we have today.