The centre-left’s divine right:
Peter C. Newman on how the Liberals’ current leadership is just the latest to believe it is owed power
The Liberal party’s operational code has always been in simplicity itself: to govern Canada by striking the most marketable balance between elitism and egalitarianism. They labelled it the New Liberalism, and pretended that anybody called Trudeau could win.
Not bloody likely, it turns out.
In his jolting run for Grit Heaven, the Trudeau named Justin has been campaigning and getting into hot water by promising as little as possible but as much as necessary. Young Justin’s evolving platform treats voters as commodities to be harvested—like having the concession for blow-up balloons at a county fair.
His tendency to swing between political immaturity and ideological laissez-faire hasn’t caught on, because it’s based solely on his current situation of waiting impatiently to take his turn in power—without earning it. That only worked in a two-party system, never with three. In 2011, the Grits were pushed, for the first time ever, into political purgatory, where the also-runners shudder and hide, pretending that a recount might be in the cards. The youthful Trudeau has had to fall back on his inherited tendency to see himself as a natural heir of the haughty attitudes that once characterized the divine right of kings, especially Mackenzie Kings.
His campaign has been a backward march. Liberals still harbour the petulant assumption that they alone know what’s good for Canadians, and that it’s just plain dumb to vote for any other party—except as occasional comic relief. It’s comic relief, all right, but at the expense of what used to be called the Government Party.
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The centre-left's divine right: The arrogance of Justin Trudeau's Liberals
Peter C. Newman on how the Liberals’ current leadership is just the latest to believe it is owed power
The Liberal party’s operational code has always been in simplicity itself: to govern Canada by striking the most marketable balance between elitism and egalitarianism. They labelled it the New Liberalism, and pretended that anybody called Trudeau could win.
Not bloody likely, it turns out.
In his jolting run for Grit Heaven, the Trudeau named Justin has been campaigning and getting into hot water by promising as little as possible but as much as necessary. Young Justin’s evolving platform treats voters as commodities to be harvested—like having the concession for blow-up balloons at a county fair.
His tendency to swing between political immaturity and ideological laissez-faire hasn’t caught on, because it’s based solely on his current situation of waiting impatiently to take his turn in power—without earning it. That only worked in a two-party system, never with three. In 2011, the Grits were pushed, for the first time ever, into political purgatory, where the also-runners shudder and hide, pretending that a recount might be in the cards. The youthful Trudeau has had to fall back on his inherited tendency to see himself as a natural heir of the haughty attitudes that once characterized the divine right of kings, especially Mackenzie Kings.
His campaign has been a backward march. Liberals still harbour the petulant assumption that they alone know what’s good for Canadians, and that it’s just plain dumb to vote for any other party—except as occasional comic relief. It’s comic relief, all right, but at the expense of what used to be called the Government Party.
more
The centre-left's divine right: The arrogance of Justin Trudeau's Liberals
