There are a lot of politicians with controversial legacies, Gough Whitlam, Maggie Thatcher etc. but for every ardent hater they have their defenders. With the exception of a few short term disasters, e.g John Gorton there are few politicians who are universally derided here. But P.E.T seems to have no defenders on this board, so if he was so hated how did he last so long, how did he keep winning elections and why doesn't he have defenders like Thatcher and Whitlam?
P. E. Trudeau
- Thread starter Arachnid
- Start date
Probably because the right wingers hate him so much they just see no point in it.
archaeogeek
Banned
Trudeau, during his lifetime, was actually pretty progressive. In Quebec, he had the wound of the war measures act, but even that only slightly reduced his popularity among the French Canadians (as I'm wont to point out, there were no Snipers in Edmonton during the NEP). As the NDP was still relatively unknown in Quebec (it was seen as a western regional party at the time by Quebecois), a social democratic liberal leader was a good deal for a Quebec that 20 years of quasi-fascism had shifted massively to the left.
The myth of french canadians united against Trudeau is actually pretty recent, there were a few frictions (hell, one of the most nationalist laws in Quebec at the time was passed by a liberal premier and a liberal house), but there was also a lot of respect, grudging or not, in the west outside of Alberta and in Quebec (and that grudging respect extended even to the nationalists - this was ironically one of the things hampering Chretien in Quebec, as it didn't extend to him).
It's easy to make a national myth against someone who is too stiff to object at the revisionism.
In fact, in Quebec, there were quite a few caricatures of party leaders trying to channel Trudeau to break in Quebec (like one of Stockwell day wearing Trudeau's signature cape, hat and gloves and trying to say fuddle duddle). Let's just say the hate is obviously overplayed when your socialist, separatist teachers talk in such admiration about a man who was one of their fiercest political opponent at the time.
The myth of french canadians united against Trudeau is actually pretty recent, there were a few frictions (hell, one of the most nationalist laws in Quebec at the time was passed by a liberal premier and a liberal house), but there was also a lot of respect, grudging or not, in the west outside of Alberta and in Quebec (and that grudging respect extended even to the nationalists - this was ironically one of the things hampering Chretien in Quebec, as it didn't extend to him).
It's easy to make a national myth against someone who is too stiff to object at the revisionism.
In fact, in Quebec, there were quite a few caricatures of party leaders trying to channel Trudeau to break in Quebec (like one of Stockwell day wearing Trudeau's signature cape, hat and gloves and trying to say fuddle duddle). Let's just say the hate is obviously overplayed when your socialist, separatist teachers talk in such admiration about a man who was one of their fiercest political opponent at the time.
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Speaking as someone who lived most of his life in Manitoba, I am a fan of Trudeau. He made a number of mistakes, that's for sure, but on the whole, he was the right person for the job at the time.
This I can substantiate. I have Internet-friendships with two French-Canadians, and when questioned about Trudeau both like him.
Gorton is liked by a lot of people. Okay, he mightn't be considered a terribly effective political leader, but a lot of people respect him for being a true ideological (if not partisan) independent, and a knock around bloke.
Ask any older or well-read Labor supporter who their favourite conservative pol from Oz history is and it's usually Gorton who tops the list, particularly as he opposed the Dismissal. Basically even cranky old lefties who can't bring themselves to forgive Fraser have a soft spot for Jolly John.
William McMahon, now he has very few defenders. It's just a couple of Rightwing Liberal loyalists like his former campaign adviser John Howard and the strangely contrarian opinion of Phillip Adams that have any good words for little Billy.
What, what, what?!
You've been misreading Dvaldron's caustic assessment of the man on that thread at Chat, haven't you? (Ah, I see it's RB and TheMann. Curses!)
PET had the original cult of personality in Canadian politics. Google the online articles of Larry Zolf of the CBC to find how Trudeau absolutely haunts the moden Canuck imagination.
He won an election by saying voting for "them" was voting for wage and price controls. He defended "his" wage and price controls as being much nicer.
He won an election by claiming that voting for "them", you'd be paying $2.50 a gallon for gas. He changed it to liters.
Charisma without conscience.
He won an election by claiming that voting for "them", you'd be paying $2.50 a gallon for gas. He changed it to liters.
Charisma without conscience.
Well as you might have guessed I'm a Rightwing Liberal in my 20's and as you've pointed out Gorton isn't very popular with us and most of the lefties I know dislike him for being a Liberal. I was actually tossing up whether to use McMahon as an example instead of Gorton.
(a.) Gorton was given life membership in your party before he died, and (b.) he always hated Malcolm Fraser with a white hot passion (hence his preferencing Labor when he ran as an Indy in '75--he even campaigned with Whitlam!) but if you and your friends are on the actual conservative Right I guess neither (a.) nor (b.) makes up for anything much when it comes to assessing the man's legacy.
What, uni socialist Left? They probably think Adam Bandt is suspiciously bourgeois.
Labor Unity (Labor Right) are pretty sane about most issues though tbh I haven't asked their opinion of him.
Socialist Alternative are obviously nuts.
That's because it's 1. pointless to fight over him with the near-obsessed Canadian Righties on this board 2. smacks of personality cult either way.
I think he'a a good deal better than a lot of other PMs we had, or have.
The fact of the matter is that apart from the Charter and Constitution, he did not leave a permanent legislative legacy. Had he left in 1972 or 1979 he'd be a personally interesting man (and still is) but political mediocrity. He was a natural leader and undoubtedly brilliant and charismatic. But his economic (yes, I fully blame Mulroney for continuing the spending binge) and foreign policies caused great damage. I believe he did a superb job on the FLQ crisis and fighting separatism, and that he was the only man who could have took on Rene Levesque. For that he deserves full credit.
Re "right wing obsession": It is not we Tories but the Liberals who endlessly discuss Trudeau. You never hear Harper talking about Macdonald, the father of the nation, endlessly, or even much lesser Tories such as Borden or Diefenbaker. Trudeau was an aberration in the Liberal Party, which repudiated his economic and foreign policies immediately upon his departure. His own son is firmly in the party's centre and has said that if he ever enters 24 Sussex "it will not be a return to the past" (paraphrasing). One could say that the long decline of the Liberal Party, as dramatically evidenced 3 days ago, began with his policies which alienated the West and Francophone Quebec. He is this nation's Margaret Thatcher, as Magniac has said. There will always be irrational worshippers for whom he could do no wrong (and see Justin as Pierre, when they are very different in both personality and policy) and irrational haters for whom he could do no right. No Canadian on this forum, to my knowledge, fits either category.
Winning elections: 1968 was a personality cult thing, the Tories had just gone through a 5-year civil war with a leader who never fully established his authority in nearly a decade and a smooth economy. 1972 was a squeaker. 1980 was quite simple: Trudeau was a leader, the only man who could take on Levesque. Joe Clark wasn't a leader. 1974 I don't know enough to comment on.
Re "right wing obsession": It is not we Tories but the Liberals who endlessly discuss Trudeau. You never hear Harper talking about Macdonald, the father of the nation, endlessly, or even much lesser Tories such as Borden or Diefenbaker. Trudeau was an aberration in the Liberal Party, which repudiated his economic and foreign policies immediately upon his departure. His own son is firmly in the party's centre and has said that if he ever enters 24 Sussex "it will not be a return to the past" (paraphrasing). One could say that the long decline of the Liberal Party, as dramatically evidenced 3 days ago, began with his policies which alienated the West and Francophone Quebec. He is this nation's Margaret Thatcher, as Magniac has said. There will always be irrational worshippers for whom he could do no wrong (and see Justin as Pierre, when they are very different in both personality and policy) and irrational haters for whom he could do no right. No Canadian on this forum, to my knowledge, fits either category.
Winning elections: 1968 was a personality cult thing, the Tories had just gone through a 5-year civil war with a leader who never fully established his authority in nearly a decade and a smooth economy. 1972 was a squeaker. 1980 was quite simple: Trudeau was a leader, the only man who could take on Levesque. Joe Clark wasn't a leader. 1974 I don't know enough to comment on.
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I'm only referring to board members, which was the original question. Only his opponents even talk about him, and one is from Preston Manning country, one is a Thatcherite, and the last one is a disgruntled Red Tory/Right Liberal. So yes, the forum Canada-right is postively obsessed with PET compared to forum Canada-left.
The West, again; fair enough.
I would put it to Chretienite shift to the right, which permitted corporate stranglehold on rhetoric to shift the "centre" rightward and grab the rug from under the Liberals' feet. They're still flapping around trying to find a centre that's not there.
The Western Protest parties that now have risen to prominence predate Trudeau, and it took thirty years, but one of the great National Establishment parties, the PC, was utterly destroyed, the other, the Liberals, is ailing. The Establishment has changed, the centre has vanished, and regionalist parties predominate.
If Trudeau managed all that by himself, that's just damn impressive; but I think it was already an ongoing trend.
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DAMIEN
Banned
There is only one regional party in Canada and that is The BQ and they were almost wiped out the last election.
The Conservatives are not a regional party but a center right party that eliminated the conservatives who had betrayed conservative principles and went left.
The NDP has taken over where the Liberal Party was because the younge population tends to lean very left.
The Conservatives are not a regional party but a center right party that eliminated the conservatives who had betrayed conservative principles and went left.
The NDP has taken over where the Liberal Party was because the younge population tends to lean very left.
archaeogeek
Banned
The reform party was a regional party. Their attempts at running anywhere outside of the prairies were Manning's delusions of grandeur that anyone but Alberta and SK gives a damn about the plight of big oil.
Also, Rogue, until Mulroney, the Liberals won Quebec without fail even after 1970.
Trudeau was a man of his times and he was a flawed man in many ways. But he tried his best given what he was forced to deal with. Even if I vote NDP, I consider him one of the better prime ministers Canada has ever had.
He gave not just French-Canadians but English-Canadians a better sense of what being Canadian was truthfully all about, instead of still feeling a lingering sense of links to Britain or just simply being anti-American.
It was, IMHO, many years later than other distinct societies as they evolved into independent entities, but it came thanks to him and what he gave us (the Constitution and especially the Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms). And while those documents do have their flaws -- enough by which that has kept Québec from signing on to the Constitution even now, nearly thirty years after repatriation in 1982 -- they are a sight lot better in my eyes than what Canada had possessed before that time.
And it was a man from Montréal who had done it.
Rest in peace, Mr Prime Minister. As your son so eloquently put it:
The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
He has kept his promises and earned his sleep.
He gave not just French-Canadians but English-Canadians a better sense of what being Canadian was truthfully all about, instead of still feeling a lingering sense of links to Britain or just simply being anti-American.
It was, IMHO, many years later than other distinct societies as they evolved into independent entities, but it came thanks to him and what he gave us (the Constitution and especially the Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms). And while those documents do have their flaws -- enough by which that has kept Québec from signing on to the Constitution even now, nearly thirty years after repatriation in 1982 -- they are a sight lot better in my eyes than what Canada had possessed before that time.
And it was a man from Montréal who had done it.
Rest in peace, Mr Prime Minister. As your son so eloquently put it:
The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
He has kept his promises and earned his sleep.