Liberal Losers

The latest poll indicated that a majority of Canadians would vote Liberal if Justin Trudeau were to become the head of the Liberal Party of Canada.  Are we so besotted with a pretty face?  Someone who adores being a thespian, being the centre of attention, just having a ball through it all.  His credentials as far as experience goes in the field of life experience and work?  A stint at teaching drama at a private high school in British Columbia.

He is, of course, a Member of Parliament, having handily won an unlikely enough seat in Quebec.  And although he delivers speeches in sympathy with the plight of the middle class losing their advantages in this tough new economy what does he really know of financial duress in his personal life?  Although he speaks of the importance of pan-Canadian alliances, his devotion to Quebec is searingly obvious in his pronouncements.

His lapses in judgement, from unrefined language in the House of Commons to speculating about voting in sympathy with Quebec leaving confederation for a stint at a heady sovereignty-financial balancing act in rescuing their culture and language from the predations of les Anglais in defiance of the Conservative agenda which he abhors does him no credit, and should give voters a heads-up on his level of maturity.

Even while courting voters in Western Canada, vouching for himself as a true-blue Canadian loving the north and the south, the west and the east of this great country that his father before him lauded, he reveals himself now and again as a Quebecer first.  His sympathy for Quebec's aspirations do not reflect an equal sympathy for that of Alberta's. 

He did surprise many critics by expressing support for permitting China to own a part of the oil patch, and his support of exploiting those natural resources did temporarily set him apart from the Liberal pack.  He appears amenable to the advice of those seeking to install him as their next leader.  Their cleverness in schooling him reflects on their agenda, but what does it reveal about him?

And then, revelation of a two-year-old video of Justin Trudeau extolling the virtues of bilingualism and the vitality of Quebec culture along with his view that Quebec-based federal leaders were the most successful, particularly if they were Liberals, matched with criticism of Alberta has set him back to square one, where he seems most comfortable.

"Out of context!", screeched his campaign: "The Conservatives are using out-of-context statements made years ago (two years ago, as a Member of Parliament from Quebec) in a long interview...resorting to smear campaigns to stop their slide.  Justin knows that Calgary, Alberta and all of Western Canada are at the very heart of Canada's future...".  That's the new Justin, in any event, the one on display lately, since he threw his hat into the Liberal leadership ring.

The Calgary Centre by-election is top of mind for the Liberal Party, just as it is for the Conservatives.  But the Conservatives are the majority-ruling government and the Liberal Party is stumbling in the desert of self-annihilation.  Helped along a little further a day earlier by another fairly high-profile Liberal, David McGuinty, who shot himself in the arse, inviting his Alberta colleagues to "go back home" because their province-centric views on energy irritated him.

Meanwhile, delicious irony prevails, as the premiers of Alberta and Quebec have discussed between themselves the attractiveness of a potential pipeline shipping oilsands crude from Alberta to Quebec refineries.  The boys who would be men trip all over their values and their tongues run helter-skelter away with them, while Alison Redford and Pauline Marois announced the formation of a working group to investigate the potential of an east-west pipeline.

Loverly.