Leadership Quote by Paul Martin

There is a practiced confidence in Paul Martin's "we": a national voice that sounds less like poetry than a mission brief. The first clause stacks certainty on certainty - we know what we can do, we know how to do it - as if doubt itself is the real enemy. It's a classic governing move: define competence as already settled, then frame the political task as simply removing friction so the country can "get on with it". That phrasing quietly recasts democracy from argument into execution.

The subtext is managerial, and revealing. Martin isn't selling a single policy; he's selling a temperament. Coming out of an era when Canada was negotiating its identity against the gravitational pull of the United States and the aftershocks of 9/11-era security politics, "influence and pride" does double duty. Influence speaks to the Ottawa obsession with relevance: a middle power's anxiety that it will be sidelined unless it actively shapes global rules, alliances, and trade. Pride speaks to domestic cohesion: the reassurance that international engagement isn't elitist hobbyism but a source of shared dignity.

The rhetorical trick is that "How?" arrives as a promise of method and then resolves into a value statement. Ensuring Canada's place "in the world" sounds concrete, but it's deliberately open-ended, letting listeners project their preferred version of Canada - peacekeeper, broker, humanitarian, dependable ally, economic player. Martin offers a national self-image sturdy enough to organize policy while vague enough to avoid a fight about the details.