Poilievre is Trump's man in Ottawa
Living the myths of our times and projecting them into the future is no longer affordable.
Like Trump before him, Poilievre is pandering to the working class just long enough to secure their votes. Once elected, he will betray them and align himself with Trump.
If we Canadians are concerned about Chinese and/or Russian interference in our elections and foreign affairs we are falling for the greatest myths of all times. Tragically, the favorite sport of North American and European politicians is to blame these countries for every problem we have— in fact they are playing the blame game of pre-pubescent school children. It is political juvenalia on steroids where they have a scapegoat for every occasion. They make the fatuous claim that anything that happens half-way around the world is a threat to “national security”. The claim is made that they are constantly threatening war against us when the historic record shows the very opposite. The declining American empire has been the most interventionist and bloodiest empire ever, picking up where the British empire left off. As Churchill noted at the end of WW ll it was America’s “turn” and Britain would assume the role of the willing accomplice.
“In the preservation of independence there is no alternative to vigilance. Independence is in divisible. You cannot have it intact here and in tatters there. It is as absolute as pregnancy. If a nation is not independent it is dependent and other appellations fit equally well— satellite, fellow traveller or even lackey, as Churchill once called Mussolini {in reference to his relationship with Hitler}.” —James M. Minifie, Canadian Journalist, from his 1960 book Peacemaker or Powder monkey
Sixty five years later Canada is a highly integrated “satellite” of the failing US empire. Under threat from a belligerent US administration which might well result in the final capitulation of our sovereignty our country in crisis. James M. Minifie like so many others saw then what was happening now. Canada’s Liberal and Conservative elites led the country down the primrose path to where we are today, any semblance of our “tattered” independence is now facing final foreclosure— and the turn of the screw may have gone too far.
In times such as these false prophets, fake populists and demagogues emerge to prey on the spoils of collapse. Truth becomes myth and projections into the future are dismal and corrupted.
As leader of the opposition Poilievre has had an easy time of it scoring points on a mediocre government and an unpopular prime minister. His leadership abilities have never been tested. He is a career politician with no work experience outside politics. He knows the game well, but is a very narrow partisan of the far right deeply indoctrinated in the neoliberal ideology that has ruined the West. His party is reactionary and closely affiliated with the US Republican party.
He has no experience on the international stage which is critically important and no experience in economic matters which is equally important. In his own right he is as much a political dilettante as his recently ousted nemesis.
Poilievre has been pulling at the heartstrings of working class Canadians promising to liberate them as if they are living in the 19th Century slums of London. He is no Dickens just another fake populist.
He refuses, as do all the other political parties, to identify that the neoliberalism of the last forty years is the agent of poverty as it is the the ideology that vacuums up the wealth of nations for the corporations and oligarchs.
Poilievre’s fake populism has a grimy amateurish transparency, no more than cheap melodrama. He has no place to hide.
Like Harper before him he wants to throw everybody in jail and throw away the key. In fact in Canada’s crime rates are stable. Traditionally Canada’s penal system is aimed at punishment as well as rehabilitation. We do not want to go the American way where they have one the highest incarceration rates in the world, the prison system is privatized for profit, and plea bargaining stuffs jail cells.
This is especially so at a time when basic human rights are collapsing and being weaponized against dissidents and innocent citizens. Canada’s incarceration rate is a mere 90— are we really so determined to join the top ten?
We have lived the myths of our times for too long and we cannot afford to project them further into the future.
Poilievre and Trump, and others like them, are the apprentices of predatory fake populism with no place to hide. They are the spoilers compounding the crisis.
Poilievre is the most despicable of politicians as he claims to be a champion of the working class while he stuffs his pockets with corporate cash and takes his advice from corporate lobbyists.
It is also deplorable that nobody, especially other politicians and the vacuous mainstream media, have called him on it.
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"Poilievre is the most despicable of politicians as he claims to be a champion of the working class while he stuffs his pockets with corporate cash and takes his advice from corporate lobbyists.
It is also deplorable that nobody, especially other politicians and the vacuous mainstream media, have called him on it."
The ever peccable Poilievre is a grifter that's taken a leaf right out of Trump's playbook. It works in Canada (and much of the West) because there is no party that truly: (1) dismantles and exposes the current order - i.e. neo-liberal economics + neo-imperial foreign policy - for what it is; (2) espouses an alternative vision centred around reducing socio-economic inequality at home along with conducting foreign policy in ways that don't involve meddling in affairs which are of little concern to Canada and; (3) does the hard yards to build grassroots support for such a vision (most importantly by fundraising predominantly at a grassroots level).
The result is what we have today, varying degrees of neo-liberal imperialists across all four national parties (yes, the NDP and the Greens too) led by elitists cosplaying as champions of the working class, the environment and so on while remaining beholden to the special interests that fund them. Any differences amongst them are cosmetic at best. For example, some want more investment in renewable/sustainable energy while others want less (or none in the case of peccable Pierre). But amongst those acknowledging the need to reach net-zero, nobody talks about how much of a hindrance the US military machine alone is (of which Canada is a part of being a member of NATO, NORAD and the likes) to reaching this target. According to a 2019 study, the US military has a larger carbon footprint than over 140 entire countries (i.e. if it were a country in and of itself, it would be the 47th largest emitter of greenhouse gases, see: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/06/190620100005.htm). Yet, not even the so called 'Green Party' is talking about a fundamental rethinking of foreign policy, to move away from the collective West's insane neo-imperialist policy of global hegemony.
For the time being, assuming a Poilievre crackdown on dissent would be Trump-esque, perhaps 'Crony Capitalist' Carney is marginally better. But until and unless the Greens and/or the NDP radically transform themselves by fully disengaging with neo-liberal economics and neo-imperial foreign policy, we'll find ourselves in the same spot in 4-5 years time.
And as far as foreign interference is concerned, CIJA, B'nai Brith, JNF anyone? For the record, all parties are deeply committed to unconditionally supporting the genocidal apartheid state as well.
In so many Canadian ridings, people are choosing a 'unity' candidate -- the one best positioned to beat the Conservatives. I'm voting Liberal for the first time in my life for this reason. And not for Carney, but for our local candidate who is running for similar reasons to those that have me voting for her.
This is riding specific, though. If I was voting in the riding to my south, I'd vote NDP since that riding has always been a tight race between the Conservatives and NDP.
"As leader of the opposition Poilievre has had an easy time of it scoring points on a mediocre government and an unpopular prime minister. His leadership abilities have never been tested. He is a career politician with no work experience outside politics. He knows the game well, but is a very narrow partisan of the far right deeply indoctrinated in the neoliberal ideology that has ruined the West. His party is reactionary and closely affiliated with the US Republican party.
He has no experience on the international stage which is critically important and no experience in economic matters which is equally important. In his own right he is as much a political dilettante as his recently ousted nemesis."