The Herle Burly was created by Air Quotes Media with support from our presenting sponsor TELUS, as well as CN Rail.

Greetings, you curiouser and curiouser Herle Burly-ites! David's old friend Frank Graves, founder and president of EKOS Research and known online as the unmistakable "Voice of Franky" on Twitter, is never shy about speaking his mind. But unlike most loud voices online, Frank brings the data to back it up.

He was the first pollster to flag a Liberal resurgence back in early 2025, when everyone else had written the party off. We all know how that turned out. Now EKOS has fresh numbers showing the Liberals at 45%, the Conservatives down 14 points since the election to 27%, and the NDP climbing to 17%.

David and Frank dig underneath those topline numbers, and it's a wide-ranging one conversation. Frank explains why what's left of the Conservative coalition is increasingly defined by disinformation and alienation rather than ordinary political disagreement, and how he actually measures that. He walks through the sharp generational divide in the numbers, with under-35 Canadians deeply pessimistic about their futures and drifting toward the NDP's brand of progressive populism, while support for the Liberals climbs steadily with age.

Together they take a detour into Quebec, where Frank's data suggests the Trump threat has actually strengthened attachment to Canada rather than fuelled separatism, a dynamic he contrasts with the more worrying numbers coming out of the Alberta referendum debate.

And in the back half, Frank goes deep on something he's increasingly alarmed about: how AI-generated "slopaganda" and fraudulent respondents are quietly corrupting online polling panels themselves, and why he thinks the industry badly needs regulation before trust in the numbers fully evaporate.

A fascinating, wide-ranging hour with one of the sharpest minds in Canadian polling. Stay with us for the hour.

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