Pierre Elliott Trudeau: a man who was ahead of his time

[Royal Eagle]

Trudeau was a Canadian icon and perhaps the most controversial political figure of our history. He was an intelligent man who stuck to his principles and constantly defended justice and freedom, will say his admirers, while his detractors will accuse him of arrogance, of favouring a strongly centralized form of government and economic incompetence.

But you can't certainly deny that he was ahead of his time, particularly based on his views about Canadian identity and multiculturalism. His tolerant views towards integration of immigrants, his unyielding rejection of a ethnic, race-based concept of nation, and his promotion of civil rights ideals. He wanted a country where individual rights and justice superseded social, political and cultural entities. His famous words :''The state has no business in the bedrooms of the nation¸'' regarding the private lives of homosexuals demonstrate that, as he was opposed to the social conservatism and discrimination of gays at that time.


And any liberal and defender of civil rights who respects himself would forever praise him for establishing the Charter of Rights and freedoms in Canada's 1982 constitution. Sticking to his principles, he helped Canada to be a land where any law-abiding citizen will have his constitutional and civil rights respected first and firemost.

[burn_baby_burn]

[CaptainCrunch]

Trust me, I have zero respect for the man, I think he was pretty much useless as a prime minister, and he did more to divide this country then any prime minister in history.

I didn't mourn him to much when he passed.

[Vedder]

Originally Posted by burn_baby_burn

I came in here just to do that and you beat me to it. This should be interesting.

[Iowa_Flames_Fan]

Originally Posted by Royal Eagle

He was a intelligent man who sticked to his principles and constantly defended justice and freedom, will say his admirers, while his detractors will accuse him of arrogance, of favouring a strongly centralized form of government and economic incompetence.

Both are right.

[rubecube]

nm

[burn_this_city]

I liked that his wife slept with a Rolling Stone.

[Royal Eagle]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Trust me, I have zero respect for the man, I think he was pretty much useless as a prime minister, and he did more to divide this country then any prime minister in history.

I didn't mourn him to much when he passed.

I'm personally indifferent about Trudeau's tenure/legacy as PM. His strong favouritism of federal authority in relation to the provinces has always turned me off, as a supporter of decentralization and autonomy for provinces.

However, Trudeau's life before he became PM in 1968 is quite interesting and underrated by historians. In the 1950s and 1960s he was a highly respected intellectual figure and stood up for civil and individual rights. That's the Trudeau I admire and respect as an idealist myself.

[burn_baby_burn]

Originally Posted by Royal Eagle

I'm personally indifferent about Trudeau's tenure/legacy as PM.

However, Trudeau's life before he became PM in 1968 is quite interesting and underrated by historians. In the 1950s and 1960s he was a highly respected intellectual figure and stood up for civil and individual rights. That's the Trudeau I admire and respect as a idealist myself.

Didn't he skip out on serving his country in WWII to smoke dope some where in Asia?

[Dion]

Reasons to hate Trudeau...... Communist sympathiser

[Resolute 14]

A man can't stand up for both freedom and absolute centralized control at the same time.

Simply put, no man in Canadian history has had as divisive an effect on national unity as Trudeau. Certainly the most newsworthy PM we've ever had, but also the worst.

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by Royal Eagle

Trudeau was a Canadian icon and perhaps the most controversial political figure of our history. He was a intelligent man who sticked to his principles and constantly defended justice and freedom, will say his admirers, while his detractors will accuse him of arrogance, of favouring a strongly centralized form of government and economic incompetence.

But you can't certainly deny that he was ahead of its time, particularly based on his views about Canadian identity and multiculturalism. His tolerant views towards integration of immigrants, his unyielding rejection of a ethnic, race-based concept of nation, and his promotion of civil rights ideals. He wanted a country where individual rights and justice superseded social, political and cultural entities. His famous words :''The state has no business in the bedrooms of the nation¸'' regarding the private lives of homosexuals demonstrate that, as he was opposed to the social conservatism and discrimination of gays at that time.


And any liberal and defender of civil rights who respects himself would forever praise him for establishing the Charter of Rights and freedoms in Canada's 1982 constitution. Sticking to his principles, he helped Canada to be a land where any law-abiding citizen will have his constitutional and civil rights respected first and firemost.

Originally Posted by Royal Eagle

I'm personally indifferent about Trudeau's tenure/legacy as PM.

However, Trudeau's life before he became PM in 1968 is quite interesting and underrated by historians. In the 1950s and 1960s he was a highly respected intellectual figure and stood up for civil and individual rights. That's the Trudeau I admire and respect as a idealist myself.

In the English language the word "a" needs to be converted to "an" when it preceeds another word that begins with a vowel. Also, it's stuck not "sticked."

[Tyler]

Hard to forget him flipping western Canadians the bird while rolling out of town.

Pretty much sums up the guy's views of the west during his tenure.

[MarchHare]

he did more to divide this country then any prime minister in history.

Of course it's not popular to say ANYTHING positive about Trudeau here in Alberta, but no single person made a more significant contribution to defeating the separatists in the 1980 referendum than he did. So while you can claim that he divided the country -- and from an Albertan's perspective, he certainly did that -- he also unified it. There might not even be a Canada as we know it now if not for him.

This speech, given just a few days before the referendum, will long be remembered as one of the high points in Canadian political discourse:

http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/p...h4-4083-e.html

But nevermind that -- let's bitch about the NEP some more.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Royal Eagle

I'm personally indifferent about Trudeau's tenure/legacy as PM.

However, Trudeau's life before he became PM in 1968 is quite interesting and underrated by historians. In the 1950s and 1960s he was a highly respected intellectual figure and stood up for civil and individual rights. That's the Trudeau I admire and respect as a idealist myself.

Sorry he was a hypocrite, his actions during WWII were cowardly and extreme. The fact that he liked to cruise around on his motorcycle with a German suplus helmet on was disgusting.

His later life support of Mao, Castro and the gulag system in the Soviet union that was used to develop siberia was equally disgusting.

The man was morally bankrupt, vindictive and while he was a good leader for Eastern Canada, he personally alienated the West.

I'm sorry he wasn't a great prime minister, his early life was a study of cowardice, and his later admiration of brutal murdering dicators was just wrong.

[alltherage]

It's hard to take a political thread seriously when there are that many spelling/grammatical errors in the op.

Having said that, Trudeau was a sensationalist who will always be remembered for his straight shooting style. Right, wrong or indifferent, it was refreshing to have a politician who wasn't constantly watering everything down to the point where it didn't mean anything anymore.

[Dion]

Trudeau and the NEP

Many stories remain of the heartbreak caused by the Trudeau government's plan: lost jobs, bankrupt businesses, foreclosed homes. Flipping pancakes at today's Stampede breakfast, Mr. Dion may even hear some. His plan may be different, its intentions less mischievous. But it isn't hard to stir Albertans' still-raw memories.

"The National Energy Program was really sinister," says Frank Atkins, a University of Calgary economist. "It just retroactively taxed the piss out of the oil industry, and in very sinister kinds of ways ... they were going to screw the oil companies and take their money and pour it into Ontario where the votes are."

Promoted as an effort to counter the shock of rising world oil prices ($1.80 a barrel in 1970, oil hit $30 by 1980), Mr. Trudeau argued the NEP would make Canada self-sufficient in energy by forcing Albertan producers to sell domestically at a deep discount to world prices and allowing the government-run Petro-Canada an advantage in buying energy assets. Self-sufficiency would protect Canada from the ravages of the inter-national market. Eastern Canadians would be able to buy oil at below-market rates. And Ottawa would have a window into an industry dominated by foreign giants.

Marc Lalonde, Mr. Trudeau's energy minister and the brains behind the NEP, later acknowledged the motive was what Albertans had suspected all along: to transfer wealth from Alberta to Central Canada.

"The major factor behind the NEP wasn't Canadianization or getting more from the industry or even self-sufficiency. The determinant factor was the fiscal imbalance between the provinces and the federal government," he says in David Kilgour's 1988 book, Uneasy Patriots. "Our proposal was to increase Ottawa's share appreciably, so that the share of the producing provinces would decline significantly and the industry's share would decline somewhat."

By that measure, it worked: By the time the Progressive Conservatives cancelled the NEP in 1986, Ottawa had si-phoned more than$100-billion in today's dollars from Alberta. Billions more in investment bolted a province that until then had revelled in an historic boom, causing immensely more damage: construction and energy projects were cancelled virtually overnight.

Alberta's unemployment rate shot from 4% to more than 10%; bankruptcies soared 150%. The housing meltdown was far worse than the current U. S. subprime crisis, with values collapsing 40% in Edmonton and Calgary. It would take office landlords a decade to work off the glut. Alberta's government went from record prosperity into deep debt.

"There was an enormous amount of pain everywhere," says Ted Byfield, founder and then publisher of the defunct Alberta Report, a magazine that loudly gave voice to the province's fury. "Alberta was very much a small-business province. Behind the big oil companies, there were thousands of little people.... All this was just brought to a crashing halt."

Former premier Ralph Klein, who was mayor of Calgary at the time, says: "Thousands of people lost their jobs, their homes, their businesses, their dignity. Some took their own lives."

The scheme never fulfilled its promises: Mr. Trudeau assumed oil prices would climb indefinitely; instead they plunged to $19 by 1988. By then, Alberta's industry was too weakened to adjust. Ottawa held onto its stake in Petro-Can until 2004, when prime minister Paul Martin sold off the last 19% for $3-billion.

The trauma set off a generation of political bitterness. Albertans felt Mr. Trudeau seemed untouched by their plight. He mocked Mr. Lougheed, saying the Alberta premier had been outsmarted by multinational oil firms. Keith Davey, the Liberals' campaign strategist, put it bluntly during the Liberals' 1980 federal election: "Screw the West, we'll take the rest."

The NEP became code for Western alienation; a famous Alberta bumper sticker urged: "Let the Eastern s freeze in the dark."

http://www.david-kilgour.com/2008/Jul_05_2008_02.htm

[FlamesAddiction]

I've lived in 4 provinces from Ontario to BC, and the only one where Trudeau was hated was Alberta. Honestly, overall he was a pretty popular politician and his legacy for the most part seems to be positive.

The only really bad thing he did was temporarily nationalize Alberta's oil in response to the energy crisis, but the image that many Albertans had of Ontarians living the high-life because of it while Alberta suffered is pretty unfounded. It was a harsh over reaction, but was thought to be necessary in order to keep the country operating. It was a response to international conditions that he had no control over.

[troutman]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

I liked that his wife slept with a Rolling Stone.

And he slept with Liona Boyd.

[4X4]

Originally Posted by MarchHare

But nevermind that -- let's bitch about the NEP some more.

You're the first one to bring it up.