It’s easy and popular for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to demonize a vaccine protest when it comes from a mob of horn-blaring barbarians at the parliamentary gate.
But when the pushback against his incendiary ‘fringe’ label for this raging rebellion of the unvaccinated erupts inside his tightly muzzled caucus, it’s time to put down the matches and let cooler minds prevail in the Prime Minister’s Office.
MP Joel Lightbound, a calm, credible, thoughtful third-term Liberal from Quebec, gave Trudeau a massive political migraine Tuesday when he declared he was speaking for many timid Liberals who believe it’s time to heal a vaccine mandates rift which has divided families, traumatized school children and stranded travellers.
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Lightbound looked beyond the swastikas and Confederate flags of the occupation to see truckers fronting for real people who are struggling to cope with vaccine demands and excessive restrictions.
So he bravely (and crazily) spoke out against Trudeau’s politics of vaccination division and stigmatization Tuesday at considerable risk to his future in caucus and certain death to any cabinet aspirations.
But Trudeau was hearing none of it as he faced his first Question Period this week.
When Lightbound’s devastating observations were thrown at him, Trudeau delivered the same alphabet soup of scripted lines he’s been reciting for two years with no hint he would reconsider any softening of any positions.
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Now, just to be clear, there’s no point in governments talking to Freedom Convoy leadership with their bizarre plan to overthrow this democracy and replace it with unelected leaders rejecting all COVID-control mandates.
This is meant as a statement of fact, not an insult to convoy leaders and their seditious mandate manifesto, but they’re out of their collective minds and have forfeited any right to adult negotiation.
But for the basic trucker angered at a cross-border vaccination requirement rooted in optics over epidemiology, while facing a potential Trudeau government plan to demand vaccination for truckers crossing provincial boundaries, it’s time Trudeau suggested a compromise to help end the standoff.
At very little risk of unleashing a wave of truck-imported coronavirus, Trudeau could scuttle plans to ban unvaccinated truckers from driving between provinces and promise to secure U.S. approval to end the international border vaccination requirement by month’s end.
That would allow the majority of truckers fronting the national capital blockade to retreat with mission-accomplished dignity, leaving only the piggybacking anarchists behind for well-deserved ridicule and possible arrest.
In a world where many countries and most provinces are moving quickly to ease restrictions, something even Canada’s chief public health officer is advocating in the near term, Prime Minister Trudeau needs to stop marginalizing the unvaccinated and recognize the collateral damage so many restrictions are having on Canadians.
The case counts are dropping, the hospital-overcrowding crisis has eased and yet Canada, one of the most vaccinated countries in the world, remains one of the most restrictive for the unvaccinated AND triple-vaccinated.
Alas, change under duress won’t appeal to Justin Trudeau. The optics of him standing up to the angry mob are just too irresistible, particularly when the Conservatives so helpfully align themselves with truckers as guardians of the fallacy.
This is Trudeau trying to channel his father, the prime minister who defiantly faced down a mob of stone-throwing Quebec separatists during a St-Jean Baptistexjmtzyw Day parade. There’s one notable difference, of course. Justin Trudeau vanished into a COVID-19 lockdown and stayed silent for more than a week as the truckers rolled in.
Others look to this as Justin Trudeau’s just-watch-me moment. Again, there’s a rather stark contrast with his father, who deployed the military and dropped the war measures act on Quebec terrorists while Trudeau the Son vows to do . . . well . . . nothing.
But as the world looks on incredulously at this uncharacteristic display of Canadian resurrection, which is starting to spread with alarming speed, perhaps there is something from his father which could help ease the current turmoil.
It’s clearly time for a little more Just Society tolerance and a lot less Justin Society antagonism.
That’s the bottom line…..
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Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks with media as he arrives for Question Period, Tuesday, Feb. 8, 2022 in Ottawa. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld
