Is Trudeau's Poll Lead Such A Good Thing?

The latest polls show the Trudeau-led Liberals leading the Harper Conservatives 36% to 29%, with the NDP at 23%. Coincidentally, this petition from Forest EthicsEthics suggests it is not necessarily an occasion for celebration:



WHOSE SIDE IS JUSTIN ON, ANYWAY?

Liberal leader Justin Trudeau has been in office just a couple of short months and already he's making friends with folks on the wrong side of the tar sands issue. High-fiving Alberta Premier Alison Redford for spending billions to lobby for the tar sands industry and then slamming Prime Minister Harper for not doing enough to promote the Keystone XL pipeline... really? Really?!

Does Justin Trudeau stand behind Canada’s First Nations and Canadians from coast to coast who are saying no to pipelines and tankers, or does he stand behind Big Oil?

Send your message to Justin Trudeau using our handy email tool. Use the sample message or write your own. It's time we let Justin know we're watching his support for tar sands very closely.

Liberal leader Justin Trudeau’s only been on the job for a couple months – and already he’s getting off on the wrong foot by sounding like he’s showing support for the tar sands industry by promoting the Keystone KXL pipeline.

As Canadians, we must let him know that he is wading into waters that we don't support by high-fiving Alberta Premier Alison Redford for spending billions lobbying for the oil industry. In the same breath he slammed Prime Minister Harper for not doing enough to promote the Keystone XL pipeline. As if billions in oil subsidies and massive cuts to countless environmental regulations weren’t enough?!

A Word From The West

We are still in Alberta, having just returned to Edmonton from a trip to Banff and Lake Louise conducted by our son. I suspect that even if we weren't here, I would have some sympathy for the West's reaction to the latest utterance from Justin Trudeau.

Although I generally don't like to use cliches, some would say that this is what happens when you send a boy to do a man's job. The alternative interpretation, of course, would be to say this is what happens when a party of no discernible principles elects as their leader the person whom polls suggest will lead them back to the promised land of politics.

Sadly, the good of the country does not appear to enter into the Liberal Party's calculations.

On FIPA, Justin Trudeau, and Chauncey Gardner

Last night while checking my Twitter feed, I noticed several people expressing their deep disappointment over the fact that Justin Trudeau led his Liberal Party to vote with the Harper regime against an NDP motion to inform China that it will not ratify the Canada-China Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement (FIPA). While much has been written about the pact, the chief objections seem to revolve around the following:

- it will severely circumscribe our ability to regulate our environment, since any such measures that lead to loss of corporate profit would result in compensation demands from the aggrieved businesses;

- lawsuits will take place in secret tribunals outside of Canada;

- the negotiations have been conducted in secret, completely devoid of transparency;

- as opposed to NAFTA, which can be cancelled with six months' notice, FIPA will have a lifespan of 31 years

- China will be able to circumscribe local preferences on suppliers and employment.

To be fair to Trudeau, the Liberals are on record as saying they oppose some of the provisions of the deal, but were not prepared to side with the NDP motion to definitively declare the deal dead, banking instead on the possibility of changing some of the treaty's terms.

Nonetheless, the reaction of disappointment toward Trudeau's vote got me thinking about his dearth of policy pronouncements and the fact that in the run-up to the leadership convention, so many were projecting their own hopes and interpretation onto the blank canvas that he touts as a strength, since he claims to want to talk to Canadians about their concerns and priorities. Indeed, all we know about where he stands comes from his announcements about concerns for the middle class, youth unemployment, and similar platitudes.

Which got me thinking about a book I read several years ago, later made into an outstanding film featuring the peerless Peter Sellers in his last performance. Entitled Being There, it told the tale of a simple man, Chauncey Gardener, a gardener who is forced out into the world upon the death of his employer. In some ways a savant, he knows nothing except the world of gardening, but is mistaken for a well-educated, affluent upper class man, and ultimately his 'counsel' is sought by the high and mighty of society, who infer deep meaning, never intended by the speaker, from his literal and simplistic observations.

Clearly, Justin Trudeau is no savant. But then, the movie was not so much about Chauncey than it was a sendup of the credulity and shallowness of the people around him, searching for meaning and wisdom where there was none.

Perhaps these two clips best demonstrate my point:

Conservative Attack Ad - UPDATED

I suspect many will agree that this ad says more about the Conservative Party behind it than it does about its subject:

UPDATE: This Star editorial provides some useful context for and analysis of this attack ad.

So Typically Classless

But then, why would anyone expect anything different from the Harper regime?

H/t Sol Chrom

Just Another Pretty Face

Those of a certain age will remember the much beloved 1970's sitcom, The Mary Tyler Moore Show. Set in a television newsroom in Minneapolis, the series chronicled life both inside and outside the studio of its many and varied employees, who ranged from the gruff but ultimately lovable Lou Grant, played by Ed Asner, to the vapid but ultimately harmless news anchor, Ted Baxter, played by the late Ted Knight. The handsome broadcaster was essentially a sendup of all those 'pretty faces' one sees on TV who in reality are as sharp as the proverbial bag of hammers.

Reading Thomas Walkom's piece in today's Star about Justin Trudeau and his now unimpeded march to the Liberal leadership, I couldn't help but think of good old Ted. Walkom makes the following tart observations about Justin:

That Trudeau has such charisma is a given. In public, he is confident and engaging — earnest but with a sense of humor.

He presents himself as genuinely likeable, a trait that should serve him well against Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

But the fault for which Garneau once chided him is real. Trudeau’s public utterances don’t have much content. To listen to him at, say, a university campus event is to emerge disappointed.

He sounds and looks fine but doesn’t say much.

And it is, of course, this latter observation that should be of concern to those who see Trudeau fils as the one who will lead them out of the political wilderness. A man long on platitudes (he, along with the other contenders, as Walkom notes, is in favour of youth employment, transparency, openness and democracy,) but shockingly short on specifics, Trudeau and his supporters may come to realize that the so-called 'wow-factor' associated with his 'leadership' will wear thin very quickly, given that today's citizens, when they bother to vote at all, are a far more cynical lot than those who existed in the sixties and pledged their fealty to his father.

Yes, on the Mary Tyler Moore Show, everyone loved Ted Baxter but few, I suspect, would have wanted him to sit in news director Lou Grant's chair.

From Platitude Central - Part 2

“This country has entered some very choppy waters. If elected leader, I will provide a firm hand at the helm to bring the economy safely back to shore.”

“Canada has a greatness that has barely been tapped. I am confident that I have the vision and the plan to mine that greatness.”

"Recognizing the forgotten middle class and the vital role it plays in a healthy economy is probably one of the greatest strengths that I bring to this leadership race.”

What do you think? Am I ready for prime-time politics? Need a bit more work, perhaps? Well, in all candour, I simply made up the above-three cliched platitudes about two minutes ago as I sat down to the computer. Presumably, those who are vying for leadership of the Liberal Party, either on the federal level or the provincial level here in Ontario, have given some thought to their positions and pronouncements before declaring their candidacy, yet their utterances have thus far not risen above the banal triteness of my three spur-of-the-moment declarations above.

In this second of what I hope will be a series of posts on the platitudes that plague our politics, I would like to take a closer look at what the leading Liberal candidate, Justin Trudeau, has been saying:

In his most recent public appearance, young Justin offered the following as he addressed the party faithful in Ottawa last evening (I have taken the liberty of highlighting the egregiously cliched parts:

While offering no specific policy plans to members of the Carleton-Mississippi Mills Liberals, Trudeau talked about it being easy to divide people into various socio-economic classes and regions; that it is much harder to unite a people. He frequently balanced oft-used conservative terms like “hardworking families” with protecting social programs coveted by progressives, sometimes reaching poetic heights of first-person oration.

“It was always the case that if you worked hard, you could make a better life for yourself in Canada. You could progress and have a chance if you left your persecutions and class divisions back home. That shaped us,” he said. “If you worked hard you could succeed. But when winter happens - as it often happens in this country - when winter happens: this country is too big to not lean on each other.” (Okay, the metaphor about winter is kind of nice, but its cliched sentiment breaks no new ground.)

He then went on to talk about young people no longer expected to have a better life than their parents and the ever-increasing wealth gap.

As an appetizer, maybe these words serve a purpose. However, if they are in fact the main course, I must confess to a deep and abiding hunger for something more substantial.

POSTSCRIPT: As an exercise in platitude-parsing and political rhetoric analysis, be sure to check out the text of young Justin speech in which he announces his candidacy for the leadership of the Liberal Party.

From Platitude Central

Kim Campbell once famously said that  "an election is no time to discuss serious issues." Given the paucity of substance emerging thus far from declared candidates in both the Ontario and federal Liberal leadership races, I suspect that same 'wisdom' applies to leadership aspirants.

In the time leading up to selection of the next round of political saviours, it is my intention to track those platitudes regularly in order to chronicle the sad state of political discourse in this country; regrettably, it is a discourse debased not only by the ever-ready opportunistic attacks by opposition parties, but also by our own refusal as citizens to face up to unpleasant realities.

To begin this series, may I recommend perusal of Thomas Walkom's column in today's Toronto Star? In it, Walkom explores the utterances of young Justin Trudeau, the likely soon-to-be anointed next messiah to lead the federal Liberals out of the political wilderness (please forgive the cliche - it just seems so apt here).

The gist of Walkom's criticism is the platitudinous nature of Trudeau's utterances thus far, and of course it is a criticism that too readily applies to all current leadership aspirants on both levels of government:

Youth unemployment? Trudeau spoke firmly against it and said something must be done. It’s only when the reporter checked his notes later that he realized the candidate had never quite said what.

Medicare? The existing system, said Trudeau, is not sustainable. A serious conversation is needed. Otherwise medicare will die from benign neglect.

The most specific he got was in talking of the need for [m]ore emphasis on prevention. More home care. But all without more federal money.

And so the dance of triteness goes on, I suspect with more than a small cadre of media members and the electorate willing to have 'sweet nothings' whispered in their ears.