Politics & Power Quote by Rick Mercer

Mercer skewers Canadian electoral anxiety with the easy cadence of someone doing stand-up about a family habit everyone pretends not to have. The joke lands because it’s not really about ideology; it’s about fear and triage. “At the last minute” frames the Liberal move as a ritual: when power feels wobbly, they reach for the same old pressure point. The line “God love you” is the dagger wrapped in a hug - a faux-benevolent pat on the head that signals: your values are adorable, now be practical.

His real target is strategic voting as a cultural reflex, and the Liberals’ role as the country’s gravitational center. By acknowledging the NDP-curious voter, Mercer mimics the party’s tone: indulgent, faintly condescending, confident it can recapture progressives by invoking the ultimate Canadian bogeyman, the “wasted vote.” That phrase is the subtextual threat. It translates to: you can have your conscience, or you can have influence - pick one. It’s a subtle way of turning democracy into consumer advice.

Context matters here: Canada’s first-past-the-post system makes this kind of emotional blackmail plausible. Mercer isn’t just mocking a campaign tactic; he’s critiquing a structure that rewards vote-splitting panic and lets centrist parties market themselves as the only “responsible” option. The humor works because it’s uncomfortably recognizable: the Liberal pitch isn’t persuasion so much as last-minute custody of your hopes.