I'm not a great fan of Trudeau, but I woud still like to question the very standards of judging the performance of a government as presented below:
Pierre Elliot Trudeau
- destroyed the Canadian military
Who was the enemy?Were we ever invaded under Trudeau? Well, there was the FLQ crisis, but as far as I could tell, the Canadian military and police were more than sufficiently equipped to deal with it. We don't spend billions of dollars on the military just to beat our chests on Canada day. Fireworks once a year on 1 July can achieve the same results for much cheaper. Though I have many points to criticise about Trudeau, this is not one of them.
- greatly decreased our influence in the world (see above)
Yeah, Iknow the feeling. Here's what Churchill had to say about it:
"It is alarming and also nauseating to see Mr. Gandhi, a seditious middle temple lawyer, now posing as a fakir of a type well known in the east, striding half-naked up the steps of the viceregal palace, while he is still organizing and conducting a defiant campaign of civil disobedience, to parley on equal terms with the representative of the king-emperor."
- Winston Churchill, 1930
God forbid that we should not be able to dictate policy to other nations.
- started us down the road to massive debt
- gave us martial law, after two kidnappings
Yes, indeed he over-reacted there.
- began the uniquely Canadian habit of rule by OIC....bypassing Parliament, whom he refered to as "those nobodies"
No he didn't begin it. Here's what I found on Wiki:
After the British Empire entered World War I on the Allied side, an Order-in-Council was made in Canada for the registration, and in certain cases for the internment of, aliens of "enemy nationality". Between 1914 and 1920, 8,579 "enemy aliens" were detained in internment camps.
- began the centralization of all power in the PM's office, making the nation an elected five year dictatorship (see above)
Any references? I do know he was excessively centralistic for my taste as far as centralizing power at the federal level is concerned. But in his own ofice? I'd need a reference before I could comment on that.
- repatriated the Constitution as a sop to his own ego...bypassing Quebec (and thus setting in motion subsequent unrest, culminating in the creation of the BQ, the near loss of the country in 1995) and including (at the behest of the Premiers) the "notwithstanding" clause, completely undermining the Charter (as shown by Quebec's use of same)
Now this is a very valid point, and he was big-time wrong on that point.
- took lying in elections to new lows (see the Wage and Price control thing, 1974)
Debatable. He took it low, but he was neither the first nor the last.
- won the distrust of our allies
Our allies, or some of out allies? I'd need a reference for that.
- And that is just to start....I haven't even gotten into the idiocy of the failed policy of nation-wide bilingualism and Nanny-state control
Now as for Official Bilingualism, he was clearly looking at a short-term stop-gap solution to the political problem he was facing in Quebec. Again, nothing unique to him, and the blame for thi falls on every parliament since that has not repealed it and, most importantly, on the Canadian electorate that has supported it, likewise satisfying itself with Official Bilingualism as a short-term stop-gap partial solution to a deeper problem, the root of the problem being ignored. Official Bilingualism is possibly the darkest point of his leadership.
