Can anyone tell me what, exactly, has “changed” since Mark Carney took over the leadership of the Liberal Party of Canada? Has Trump stopped threatening Canadians with annexation while imposing industrial strength poisoning of our economy through the imposition of 25 per cent tariffs on the auto sector? Has Doug Ford acted upon any of his “threats” to hurt American industry, or has he only bought another air fare to Washington to try and talk some sense into Trump before being laughed out the door by the sycophants formally known as The Apprentice’s “cabinet”?
Of course, nothing’s changed – no, wait; are Carney’s recently announced policy changes that sound suspiciously like those of the Conservatives considered by voters to be a “change”?
Yes, there has been “change”, but it’s not taking the shape of a healthy form that offers Canadians serious alternatives to address the economic hardship that the narcissist is attempting to impose upon us. Simply put, our media is doing the same thing that American media did when they were supposedly “covering” their 2020 presidential election: reacting to Trump’s every word as though it actually mattered, and in the process ignoring everything else about “the greatest nation on Earth” that was already unravelling before their eyes.
Interestingly enough, it has been NDP MP Charlie Angus best explaining to Americans why anything that Trump might have to say about this country is refuted by our history of being a friend and providing aid – even of a military variety.
American media sources are now regularly using Canada’s struggles with Trump’s pronouncements threatening our sovereignty to recognize what the Trump – Musk “joint presidency” is doing to their nation. Some Democratic politicians are even starting to utilize our normally “socialistic” propensities as reason for preserving even the minimalistic programs designed to protect American citizens as they grow older, as did recently elected Michigan Democrat Kristen McDonald Rivet, who while presenting her position on tax cuts to a town hall of mostly Republicans voters, found her audience more engrossed with the Trump – Musk attempts to disembowel social services, a program into which voters had paid premiums for most of their working lives.
Trump’s rationale for acting as he is doing towards Canada is also being challenged in the Senate. On Tuesday, New Mexico Senator Martin Heinrich forced Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard to admit that Canada’s role in bringing fentanyl into the United States was nonsense, effectively destroying Trump’s oft-quoted excuse used to impose steep tariffs on Canadian goods and services.
Still, our media sources are acting as though the events of this extremely short election period are going to place any future government replacing the previous minority model with a Trump-like Poilievre exhorting us to follow The Apprentice’s “lead” in attacking government “waste and mismanagement” deployed during the Trudeau-Singh “disastrous reign”, by creating a Canada where, IF people “work hard to get ahead”, they will be able to “own a home on a safe street” and reap the benefits of good government created under a Conservative majority in Parliament.
It’s insulting listening to Poilievre embracing this plagiarism of the so-called “American Dream”, when in the last eight years those who chose to seek their future in the United States based upon this deco art fantasy are relocating to Canada in ever-increasing volumes. When asked “why” they are making such a choice, they quoted a long list of social programs – EI, maternity leave, CPP and OAS. Thanks to an NDP presence that saw major progressive legislation emerge from a fractured minority Parliament, the list now includes DentaCare, PharmaCare, $10 a day daycare and our schools now being able to feed our children at least one healthy meal a day, so that they are better able to concentrate upon meeting the goals of the curriculum.
I cannot believe that Canadians in general will just “forget” the role the NDP fills and watch as they lose a majority of their seats because of their “support” for Trudeau. To what ends – so that a Liberal or Conservative government that will be offering insignificant tax “breaks”, dumping the carbon tax despite forecasts of greater weather uncertainty, or constructing pipelines that should have been built when the Elder Trudeau introduced the National Energy Program?
Whatever…
Come 2:00 p.m. this afternoon, you’ll find me at the Union Centre, being formally introduced to Virgina Kutzan, NDP candidate for the Prince Albert riding, a retired nurse and social justice advocate who is known to be able to easily relate to the issues expressed by Indigenous and rural voters alike and is looking forward to delivering policies to Ottawa that the two major parties refuse to consider as resolution to their many fractious issues, including climate change and reconciliation.
One can only hope and trust that she, too, holds the view that we should be wary of ever again re-electing a Conservative MP and sending him back to Ottawa to dismantle our Made in Canada safety nets, as Trump is doing in the U.S.A., and Poilievre has been advocating for in his war with Trudeau.
