Sunday, June 30, 2019

The Tale of Two Prime Ministers

One prime minister had the mammoth task of bringing a country together.

The other is determined to tear it apart.


To wit:

Mere days before this Canada Day – a holiday made possible by Macdonald’s Confederation determination – the Trudeau Liberals announced they would be re-casting Macdonald’s narrative as part of an ongoing renovation of Bellevue House in Kingston. 

(Macdonald and his family only lived at Bellevue for about a year, but it’s now a national historic site and focal point for tourists.)

Trudeau’s MP for the area, Mark Gerretsen, proudly re-announced money to fix up the place. 

Buried deep in a background document, though, we find that the government will also “renew” and “update” the “visitor experience” at Bellevue.

That’s Trudeau-speak for casting 21st Century judgment on 19th Century leaders’ actions. ...

As PM, Trudeau has sacrificed his predecessor’s image and memory in the name of ‘reconciliation.’

He removed Macdonald from the $10 bills that are common currency for Canadians who still carry paper money.

He was conspicuously quiet when Macdonald statues across the country were vandalized or taken down.

He was silent when the Canadian Historical Association removed his Macdonald’s name from a prestigious book prize they’d handed out annually for decades.

And when Ontario teachers pushed for Macdonald’s name to be removed from schools across the province? Again, crickets from the Prime Minister’s Office (which, incidentally, is in a building that used to be named after Macdonald’s public works minister, but that too has been changed.)
Poor Sir John A… Yesterday’s father of a nation. Today’s whipping boy.

Sir John A. Macdonald was a man in whom Anglo-Protestant pet hatreds found purchase.

He was also a man that brought Upper and Lower Canada, as well as New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, together and then expanded Canada's reach from coast to coast.

Justin can't even explain what his family does to reduce its use of single-use plastics.


One might expect someone as dim and petty as Justin to turn his back on someone like Macdonald. He must relish that there are people as slow-witted as he who do not appreciate that without Macdonald, there would be no Canada in which to enjoy "free stuff" and to revile a nineteenth century country-builder.


Whom the gods wish to destroy and so on.


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