Coldstream Corner: The First Professor With Whom I've Agreed

Justin Trudeau by Garry Harrison

One Man’s View of JT

Interesting to say the least!

- Garry Harrison (Professor of British and Irish Literary Studies who lives in Canada)

Say what you will about Pierre Trudeau – and you may say many negative things about a man who deliberately chose to spend the Second World War sitting on the sidelines, who shilled for Red China while it murdered tens of millions of people, who was a life-long apologist for Soviet Communism, who began a relationship with a teenager when he was already an old man, who nearly spent Canada into bankruptcy, who tried to steal the wealth of the West and ruined a generation of Albertans, whose quest for personal glory nearly broke the Canadian federation, and who recklessly fathered a daughter when he was a septuagenarian and therefore left a little girl of nine without a father when he died – but it is beyond dispute that he was at least a somewhat very intelligent man.

It is true that he was also a cold, reckless, and destructive man, but there was definitely something there.

Of Justin it may be said that he has managed to inherit all of the flaws of his father – his recklessness, his arrogance, his willingness to apologize to and appease enemies of our civilization, and his almost-unique ability to be wrong about every issue of significance. Whether or not he inherited the other qualities of his parents – that is to say whether his personal life is as dissolute and debauched as that of his father – is not currently a matter of public record, but I imagine that it will be soon enough. However, it can be said with certainty that J Trudeau did not inherit his father’s sole virtue: everything that is already in the public record suggests that Justin Trudeau is a profoundly stupid man whose only qualification to be Prime Minister is that he has a famous name. That he should, at this particular juncture in history, be elected Prime Minister of Canada ought to shame all Canadians.

What, pray tell, has this man ever accomplished in his entire life? His biography is available for all to read. Young Master Trudeau, so far as I can tell, has never held anything resembling a real job for any length of time. His biography describes him as having been a teacher, but he was still a substitute teacher at least as late as 1999 (he worked at my High School) and he appears to have begun a never-completed graduate degree in 2002. Before that – when he was already in his mid-twenties – he was a ski bum in Whistler. In other words, this Prime Minister appears to have – at the absolute most – had about three years of full-time work experience before seeking to lead the nation. This man never led anything in his entire life. Quite literally he doesn't have the requisite experience on his resume to be hired as the Manager of a Starbucks. Indeed, to be very clear, the last sentence wasn't intended to be at all insulting to anyone who either manages or works for Starbucks – I'm a frequent customer and it is, by all accounts – a very challenging job. But, surely, we can all agree that Prime Minister is a job that requires at least the same level of previous management experience as Starbucks management?

Consider all that you have achieved in your own life. Most of you, I presume, are from background rather like myself. That is to say that you are from middle class families and had to earn your way through life. You had to work to pay your way through school. You had to worry about paying the rent, about saving money for a down payment, about how much of a mortgage that you could afford. Most of you have probably worked bad jobs or taken work beneath your education and dignity because we simply needed the money. Some of you probably missed out on having fun – on ski trips to pick one relevant example – either because you could not afford them or because you simply had to work. That, you and I probably both believe, is simply a natural part of life. All of that is quite foreign to Justin Trudeau.

Now, I am both a conservative and a capitalist. I do not begrudge or resent great wealth and privilege in and of itself. One of the primary aims of my own life is to eventually earn (and manage to keep, in the face of a rapacious (greedy) state) enough so that the next generation of Yoshida's doesn't have to make compromises when it comes to fundamental life decisions for financial reasons. I think that people have a right to earn as much as they can and to pass that along to their children. But, as the children of privilege get to enjoy certain advantages in life, so do I believe that those to whom much is given have a profound moral responsibility to contribute to the world in some fashion exchange for all that they have been given in life.

And what, we ought to inquire, has J Trudeau done with his life and privileges? His accomplishments such as they are – eternal years as a student, two partially-completed Masters’ degrees, and perhaps a few years of work experience – are scant when compared with those of the average middle-class Canadian of modest means and background. I could literally walk down the street outside of my home and pick out a hundred random people with more work experience, education, and life experience than J. Trudeau has. When you consider that this man is the child of a multi-millionaire and carries arguably the most famous name in Canada, his below-average record is particularly shameful. This man had every single advantage that it is possible for a young Canadian to have and that is all that he could do with his life?

In general, I view the idle rich to be more objects of pity than ones deserving of hatred. That calculation, however, changes rather rapidly when they aspire, as J. Trudeau does, to translate that unearned privilege into power over the rest of us. If “Justin Trudeau” were instead “Justin Thompson” it’s pretty safe to assume that he'd be collecting EI and writing a screenplay on a battered laptop at some local coffee shop. The only reason why we are threatened with this man in 24 Sussex is that he carries a famous surname.

It is the greatest of ironies that so much of the support for this particular man came from the sort of people who spend the rest of their time re-blogging articles on “white privilege.”

Now, as Canada prepares to join the fight against ISIS and the other Islamic barbarians who threaten our people and way of life, we see that J Trudeau intends to use his unearned privileges to carry on his father’s tradition of serving an apologist for and appeaser of all of the enemies of our civilization. In this he is, most regrettably, simply carrying on in the long tradition of a sad Quebec political establishment whose behaviour in the face of our enemies has long been disgraceful and immoral. Just as the Quebec political establishment took seditious and at times almost traitorous positions in the face of the German threat in both World Wars (shameful episodes that are somehow generally hushed-up in the retelling of our history), today J. Trudeau is, as his father once was, on the other side in the great crusade for civilization.

Justin Trudeau in 24 Sussex – will likely be fatal for the Canadian Federation.

How long do you think, in this day and age, will the Western Provinces remain willing to accept the dictates of a Quebec-controlled government hostile to the very basis of its entire economy?

This child doesn't have the political skills or the experience to navigate such a potentially-perilous situation, for not only is he unfit to lead the nation, but he is also an unworthy successor to his predecessors as Leader of the Liberal Party who, for all of their many faults, were at least men of accomplishment and substance.

If you believe in individual merit – if you believe that we should have a country where accomplishments matter more than your name – then we should have rejected this haughty and arrogant child who would presume to rule over us all.

"Promising to legalize marijuana got T2 the votes from all the young people," Kia would've said.