I don't know why you find this piece so humorous, obviously the Conservatives are testing the waters for an election campaign around the theme - Quebec, a nation of slackers, traitors, cowards and malcontents - which would target both the Liberals and NDP.
They apparently have no qualms in dredging up past grievances and crises, fomenting further antagonism and setting English Canada against Quebec if it serves some greater purpose in their scheme of things.
Next they'll do an expose on Trudeau senior, what he wrote in his memoirs about antiwar activism during the second world war, how he was booted from the Officer's Training Corps in 1942 for his support to the anti-conscription campaign of Jean Drapeau and try to tag your current leader with his father's " sins".
Keep in mind it's not just the NDP which is allegedly "divided", but Canada itself which was divided over a 50 year period by a series of wars, the Boer war, WW1, WWII, during which there were mass antiwar riots, armed intervention by Canadian troops against the Quebec populace, the war measures act, mobs attacking English and French language media and institutions in retaliatory actions and so forth..
It's easy to throw dirt in attack ads, much more difficult to investigate, try to make sense and explain a complex history. And you are caught right in the middle of it - a major player in these events was former Liberal leader Henri Bourassa, sometimes ally, sometimes adversary of Laurier.
Now back during the war years, Bourassa, the editor of Le Devoir, was as beloved in English Canada as Al Qaeda is today, the Orange Unionists would campaign on the theme " A vote for Laurier is a vote for Bourassa is a vote for the Kaiser", so you can get a sense of Conservative campaigns future...
As far as Boulerice's future goes, nothing he wrote or said on the subject of the first world war goes against the grain of what contemporaries were saying and writing during the actual events, and keep in mind they had mass support at the time, so I doubt dredging up the issue will have much effect on his present day constituents.
It's a different story in English Canada where the Conservatives have a ready supply of drooling bigots on various media discussion threads ready to pick up the cue and engage in any form of Quebec-baiting required. Or any other baiting for that matter. Most of the time they don't even have to wait for Harper's cue, they'll do it willingly day in day out without remuneration, just for the hell of it.
I don't know why you find this piece so humorous, obviously the Conservatives are testing the waters for an election campaign around the theme - Quebec, a nation of slackers, traitors, cowards and malcontents - which would target both the Liberals and NDP.
ReplyDeleteThey apparently have no qualms in dredging up past grievances and crises, fomenting further antagonism and setting English Canada against Quebec if it serves some greater purpose in their scheme of things.
Next they'll do an expose on Trudeau senior, what he wrote in his memoirs about antiwar activism during the second world war, how he was booted from the Officer's Training Corps in 1942 for his support to the anti-conscription campaign of Jean Drapeau and try to tag your current leader with his father's " sins".
Keep in mind it's not just the NDP which is allegedly "divided", but Canada itself which was divided over a 50 year period by a series of wars, the Boer war, WW1, WWII, during which there were mass antiwar riots, armed intervention by Canadian troops against the Quebec populace, the war measures act, mobs attacking English and French language media and institutions in retaliatory actions and so forth..
It's easy to throw dirt in attack ads, much more difficult to investigate, try to make sense and explain a complex history. And you are caught right in the middle of it - a major player in these events was former Liberal leader Henri Bourassa, sometimes ally, sometimes adversary of Laurier.
Now back during the war years, Bourassa, the editor of Le Devoir, was as beloved in English Canada as Al Qaeda is today, the Orange Unionists would campaign on the theme " A vote for Laurier is a vote for Bourassa is a vote for the Kaiser", so you can get a sense of Conservative campaigns future...
As far as Boulerice's future goes, nothing he wrote or said on the subject of the first world war goes against the grain of what contemporaries were saying and writing during the actual events, and keep in mind they had mass support at the time, so I doubt dredging up the issue will have much effect on his present day constituents.
It's a different story in English Canada where the Conservatives have a ready supply of drooling bigots on various media discussion threads ready to pick up the cue and engage in any form of Quebec-baiting required. Or any other baiting for that matter. Most of the time they don't even have to wait for Harper's cue, they'll do it willingly day in day out without remuneration, just for the hell of it.