On the Prairies mention of the name Trudeau evokes a range of emotional responses from low guttural growls to outright howls of anger.
The name Trudeau became mud on the Prairies when Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau angered Westerners.
They didn’t like his ballet style pirouettes, or banner sliding. They didn’t like it when he asked why he should sell their wheat, although 40 years later half of them clamoured for the right to sell their own wheat.
They didn’t like it when his national energy policy ripped the heart out of the oil industry. They didn’t like it when he brought back the Constitution to Canada from Britain and changed the focus to individual rights from rights of majority of the community.
When his son Justin came on the political scene the same disdain was expressed by Westerners — sort of the sins of the father must be part of the son’s behaviour.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was behind the eight ball out west from the start. Westerners were leery of him. They didn’t care for his coronation as leader of the Liberals. Even many Liberals were initially leery of him.
Those voters who thought Justin Trudeau was a fresh face representing a new generation and a new way of operating politics have been disappointed.
He has shown poor judgment time after time: violating ethical rules by accepting a free family vacation from the Aga Khan; making a fool of himself by parading in East Indian costumes while visiting India; not recusing himself from selection of a charity when his family members had been hired to work for that charity.
And he showed politics operating as usual in confrontations with Judy Wilson-Raybould over administration of justice in the SNC Lavalin matter.
When the pandemic arrived and the country was locked down to prevent spread of COVID-19 his daily briefings re-assured Canadians and changed their attitudes. Here was a leader demonstrating the qualities expected to keep his people following the health principles to control the disease and prevent hospital facilities from overflowing with patients.
That public support has dissipated since vaccines to ward off the virus have been discovered.
In spite of millions of dollars of Canadian pre-orders for vaccines before they were ready to market, Canada is not getting timely delivery.
Naturally, the blame has been falling on Trudeau’s shoulders. The media, especially the right wing National Post/Leader Post, have used this as a feeding frenzy to blame Trudeau.
Ask yourself: is it reasonable to blame Trudeau because Pfizer didn’t build enough facilities to make vaccine and match production with the demand? Pfizer knew from the pre-orders what demand existed.
It is just as reasonable as blaming Trudeau because storms are delaying delivery of vaccines on time.
Ron Walter can be reached at ronjoy@sasktel.net
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the position of this publication.
