Trudeau Launches Campaign to Replace Impertinent Electorate

You may have missed this story because you were having a life, but a recent editorial in the Vancouver Sun has sent the Diversity@ crowd into shallow orbit over B.C.’s lower mainland. The editorial by an instructor at Mount Royal University in Calgary suggested— brace yourself— that diversity might instead be divisive and a strain on national unity.

Twenty years ago the concept of people melding into the social fabric was considered the model for progressive immigration. Now, according to critics, it’s a model for the white patriarchy and vegan deniers and fascism. Oprah-styled pandering is the new rule. "You get a culture and you get a culture and you get a culture.”

The Sun’s writing staff was apoplectic that their pages were soiled with such racial intolerance. The backtracking Sun editor said the piece did not meet their standards about tolerance, inclusion and smiley faces for all. This will never happen again. (He never mentioned journalism.)

There was a time when contrary views were the norm. But now that gathering news is subordinate to lecturing the proles, balancing opinion is a quaint reminder of days gone by. Like smoking in the newsroom. Instead of being an editor, this Sun functionary is a party apparatchik placed to enforce conformity to the party line handed down (along with slush-fund cheques) by PM Justin Trudeau.

The kerfuffel brought to mind a recent headline. "Andrew Scheer holds news conference as questions swirl over his social policy controversies" CBC Aug. 29

This is how controversies swirl around the social policies of a Conservative leader in Canada. Activists— who aren’t getting traction on a pet cause— loudly deride the positions of Andrew Scheer or Doug Ford or Jason Kenney on (looks at prompt card) his commitment to LGBT and women's rights. 

This gives sympathetic media at CBC or the Toronto Star cover to report that there are “serious questions about Scheer’s leadership”. A story emerges (see above) that suggests a new torment in the population over (checks prompt card) Scheer’s commitment to LGBT and women's rights.

There is little evidence in polling to suggest that any Canadians outside The Gatekeepers are in new torment over Scheer’s commitment to LGBT and women's rights. But discovering that would require the dormant media to leave its bubble. Which they’re not going to do if it hurts their fellow passengers on the Left.

So now a Conservative leader must address this fabricated torment in a press conference. The issues the public is really concerned about (economy, immigration, carbon taxes) are shoved aside so that Scheer or Ford can throw up all over his shoes on policy he was not elected to change.  

There was no better example of this feint than Alberta’s recent provincial election. It was truly an existential election. In a province where 100,000 people lost jobs in the tsunami of outside agitation over oil, citizens had basic concerns about their future. The S Word (Separation) was in the air.

Which was the cue for CBC Alberta to decide that Jason Kenney must be scrutinized over… gay/ straight alliances in the province’s high schools. The story of Kenney’s waffling led newscasts and was featured prominently online. Then repeated in other media. 

The people to whom this was a defining issue could fit comfortably in the ski lodge at Sunshine Village. But hey, it made Kenney look inept on the story, and in some ways it led to his wipeout in Redmonton, the provincial seat of government and a university hotbed. 

Anything for a friend, right? This one-two combination between the Left and its media goes back years. The most celebrated hustle was in the 2004 federal election when Conservative Stephen Harper seemed poised to topple the longtime Liberal administration of Jean Chretien/ John Turner. 

He had tapped into Liberal corruption and the economic malaise in the nation. Then, with less than two weeks to the vote, the press minions produced a story quoting a Conservative candidate about gays and the fires of hell. Was Harper the tool of extremists? Was the West going to unleash The Handmaid’s Tale on helpless Canadian women?

Harper was overwhelmed on a random issue. The polls flipped. Harper lost. 

So when Harper got his second chance at the PM job he imposed a fatwa on Conservatives speaking out of turn. Loose lips on social issues was a one-way ticket to oblivion. The veil of silence worked so well that media— prompted by their liberal pals’ nocturnal online emissions— created the Harper/ Hitler meme.

Harper rejected this noise for the better part of a decade. People could see he was just a policy wonk who loves hockey. In revenge, the Laurentian Party press adopted a part-time high school drama teacher of regal (read: Trudeau) lineage as the Happy Ways answer to Harper/ Hitler.

Against all odds (and in denial about his own sexual/ ethical problems) Trudeau was elected PM. Go figure. You can tell Trudeau is grateful for the support from his revival of Harper/ Hitler in Liberal campaign material for 2019. Get a solid, give a solid, amIrite?

So with the writ dropping, our Betters at the Vancouver Sun are conjuring new ways to promote The Green Church and Diversity® Anyone asking where the money is coming from to fund these policies will be tagged— in Hillary Clinton’s inimitable phrase— as deplorable and irredeemable. 

The whiff of entitlement was on display this week as the urban snobs coined #ScheerWasSoPoor in response to the Conservative leader suggesting humble beginnings. In between show times at the TIFF conclave they piled on to denigrate the poor and working classes of the country (who will be flat broke if the Greens prevail). 

Sample: “#ScheerWasSoPoorThat he got an Acura for his 16th Birthday, he wanted a Lexus.” Or: "#ScheerWasSoPoorThat his mother had to chase the garbage truck with a shopping list.”

Scheer responded gamely, but having him address any Liberal talking points is a win for his detractors. Just as the editor ordered. Have subsidies, will cower. Has a nice ring to it.

Bruce Dowbiggin @dowbboy is the publisher of http://www.notthepublicbroadcaster.com. He’s also a regular contributor to Sirius XM Canada Talks Ch. 167. A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada's top television sports broadcaster, he is also a best-selling author whose new book Cap In Hand: How Salary Caps Are Killing Pro Sports And Why The Free Market Could Save Them is now available on brucedowbigginbooks.ca.