TORONTO

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau negotiating with U.S. President-elect Donald Trump is like having “Bambi” up against an “18-wheeler.”

Kevin O’Leary is warning Canada is going to get “squashed.”

So with Canada’s economy about to become American roadkill, it was good to hear the ‘Shark’ testing the waters to go in for a political kill.

Turns out, the Shark Tank and Dragons’ Den star is no longer just kicking the tires about a possible run for the federal Conservative leadership, but is now building a team before the Feb. 24 deadline — when he has to decide if he’s going to jump in for real.

“Yes,” he told me about looking for good people to work with. “I’m interviewing strategists, campaign managers and fund raisers, as well as lawyers familiar with Conservative and Elections Canada rules.”

With billions of our dollars wasted, massive debt left for out kids, and a clear lack of judgment on the world and domestic stages from Trudeau, hopefully O’Leary does follow through and run.

And with Trump talking about bringing back American business, it’s obvious Canada needs to not only have a strong leader, but also someone who believes in business, free enterprise and entrepreneurship. Most of the current Conservative leadership hopeful roster doesn’t have O’Leary’s qualifications on that front.

Trudeau/his principal secretary Gerald Butts can’t boast that either.

Mr. Wonderful is not only a multimillionaire, but like a Trump is a celebrity with a big personality who everybody knows as a brash populist who expresses exactly what is on his mind.

That he’s sometimes politically incorrect, and a political outsider, can only help him.

“Re Trump, the largest issue Canada faces is that he will be lowering taxes and lifting regulations, while Trudeau, Butts and (Finance Minister Bill) Morneau are taking the country in the exact opposite direction, making Canada the most uncompetitive jurisdiction in North America,” O’Leary told me. “Who is going to invest in Canada under Butts’ ill-conceived punitive anti-job carbon tax plan and Morneau’s soon-to-be-uncompetitive business tax structure?”

In recent days, O’Leary’s been in a Twitter battle with Butts.

Tweets Butts: “O’Leary calls himself an ‘eco-preneur,’ but invest(s) in coal companies & other large polluters.”

"O'Leary calls himself an "eco-preneur," but invest[s] in coal companies & other large polluters." @TIMEhttps://t.co/wC9EH9ZfQj — Gerald Butts (@gmbutts) November 26, 2016

Tweets O’Leary: “Incompetent @RachelNotley spends 1.36B closing coal plants early instead of upgrading @gmbutts wiped out #Ontario doing this #WeakLeadership.”

But what Canadians and Americans are cognizant of is other regions in the world have our jobs and don’t have any interest in the strict pollution-reducing guidelines our industries must adhere to.

“Butts and I are getting into a debate about how carbon pricing should be implemented in Canada,” explains O’Leary. “His strategy destroyed the energy market in Ontario, even Wynne admits that now. However, Butts has not learned from his mistakes and now he wants to implement the same disastrous agenda across Canada.”

This is why O’Leary’s looking more and more like a potential candidate to try to make Trudeau a one-termer.

“They have no plan on how to compete. Weak leadership keeps Canada uncompetitive, and that is what we have now,” said O’Leary. “I have a better plan.”

A plan, he says, to be able to compete with a tough business world and an even tougher American president.

“I’m trying to shine the light of transparency on this government and ask it to provide the Canadian taxpayer with more performance and efficiency metrics,” O’Leary said. “I have not found one Canadian that does not want me to do that.”

Says O’Leary: “Trump changed the game on this government overnight. Now they are standing on the highway like a deer about to be run over by an 18-wheeler doing 120 km/h.”

Rather than be flattened, a shark wants to take a bite out of the American truck’s tires.

jwarmington@postmedia.com