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Old 08-12-2025, 09:05 AM   #12409
Fuzz
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Originally Posted by Erick Estrada View Post
Okay that's fine and all but in today's political climate where most people see everything binary, what exactly about Trudeau's decade in power could you use to convince Conservative voters that they should jump ship? What exactly did he accomplish outside of legalizing pot, and generally spending a lot of his tenure battling scandals, and pandering to the NDP to stay in power? Little to no investment in military and diplomatic services. Screwing up immigration letting in too many people, too fast creating a housing crisis. Creating emissions targets that were unattainable while leaving office with the worst economic growth in recent Canadian history. I mean he kind fanned the flames with is identity politics as Canada had long been one of the more reasonable countries on the planet and Justin and his Liberals deserve a lot of blame for the current division in this country.

I have a problem with PP and can't get behind the anti-abortion, anti-LGBTQ, and some of the other religious undertones but a lot of people care about their own personal situations and what they think will be best for them so as bad as you can paint the Conservatives from your personal perspective, the Liberals look equally poor from a different perspective.
I am in no way suggesting Trudeau didn't make mistakes, but some of those things you list are true only if you look at them through a Conservative lens. And many are Canadian challenges that (oh, here we go!) Harper didn't do any better on. I think we look for a leader to blame, but the reality is some stuff is really hard for Canada(and other countries as well) to solve. It's hard to do the right thing for the country when the previous PM worked to remove taxes, and the entire right has made that the only option, such that anyone on the left who may say "wait, we do need more money to do these things" is instantly written off by potential voters because of the endless deceitful messaging form places like the Frasier Institute.

As to "fanned the flames with is identity politics" I think that's nonsense, and the same pitfall the US made with regard to DEI and "woke". Ensuring all citizens have their rights protected isn't fanning flames. Defending the vulnerable is a good thing. Most of what gets trotted out as initiatives from the left are just reactions to the right attempting to remove the rights of others.

As to your initial question, "what exactly about Trudeau's decade in power could you use to convince Conservative voters that they should jump ship?" that isn't really a question to bother answering. Nothing? Trudeau has zero roll in government. He's gone. The only thing you can do is look at the current leader and direction of the party and relate it to the stuff Trudeau did, if you want to try to understand where they are going.

No, the far more important question for democracy is "how does voting for this current iteration of Conservative parties in Canada help move them back to sanity, and way from Trumpism?" If you are going to do the political groundwork to change the party from inside, well go ahead. That would be great. But most people don't, so all they have is their vote. And if you vote in support of them, you are admitting you are OK with that direction, which, well, look south. You actually have to reject a party for them to change, which Liberal voters know well, and Conservatives used to. Yes, it means another party will be in power, but that at least ensures we will continue to have a country worth caring for.

And if you do support the current direction, well WTF am I supposed to conclude? You already know my feelings on that, and it's why I am not shy on calling it out. Because it's indisputably wrong. And if your own personal situation has you thinking you are required to vote for your own financial interests, which is nonsense, because you have to be wealthy to benefit, and if you are wealthy, you don't have to "look out for" in a way that does not distill down to selfishness at it's core. It's that, or you have been misled on facts.

Last edited by Fuzz; 08-12-2025 at 09:08 AM.
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