Categories for Musings

Seeing as how everybody else is writing about Justin Trudeau, and seeing as how I’m a Liberal, I figured I’d do likewise in a column or something on the weekend. Herewith, then, Ten Reasons Why Justin Trudeau Is A Good Choice, in short form. Gratis. You’re welcome.

1. He’s the only candidate with the ability to get younger voters onside.

2. He isn’t an old fart. Old farts are out, and will be super out in 2015.

3. The name works still, in lots of places with lots of votes.

4. He’s got charisma, big time. Ottawa being Hollywood for ugly people, that counts.

5. He’s like his Dad: he only goes when he’s gonna win (cf. boxing match).

6. He’s effortlessly bilingual and thoroughly multicultural (eg. ask a cab driver, anywhere, what they think of him).

7. He makes the Liberals exciting again.

8. He has made pro-merger/coalition/cooperation noises in the past. He’s therefore smart.

9. He will bring back a lot of experienced folks who’ve been on the Liberal sidelines for years.

10. The hair.

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So, how’s that clever strategy – you know, transforming the BC Liberals into a branch plant operation of Harper’s government – working out for y’all, anyway?

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Charles and I react with shock as a shirtless Justin Trudeau and an unidentified crazed man in a Speedo appear on the set.

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It’s the right decision, and was apparently only made in past 48 hours or so. Good for him.

It now creates pressure on Justin Trudeau it will be impossible for the Montreal Liberal MP to ignore. If he doesn’t run, the party’s over, in more ways than one.

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More than 150 Nearly 200 comments on the column, below, about the possibility of a Justin Trudeau candidacy. (And nearly 200 over at the Sun site.) There are many, many Liberal commentators passionately debating the idea, most of them in favour.

More interesting, however, is the number of Conservatives frantically attacking Trudeau and trying to convince Grits not to select him as leader. They almost sound panicked.

Like I say: interesting.

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Son: Daddy?

Me: Yes, buddy?

Son: What is a fax?

Me: [Long, shocked pause.] Seriously?

Son: Yes, what is it?

Me: Wow. Well, um, it’s an old thing, I guess. Sending papers through phone lines. Like an email, but with paper. We did it in the old days.

Son: Okay, thanks.

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…and replete with (happy) meanings, too.  Against Me!, Joan Jett and Laura Jane Grace cover the Replacements’ ‘Androgynous’ in NYC.  Been listening to this song for nearly 30 years, but never before has it worked as well as this. (From LL.)

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What a huge, huge loss to the Beach and this City. Such a kind and decent man, and what a writer he was. God bless him and his family.

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Still think it was okay to make jokes about their son’s fate?

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He said it, not me.

Coyne attempts to style his column today as a cautionary tale about social media, and about how, you know, he was the one who taught the lesson.

That’s a lot of hooey, however. Coyne didn’t teach anyone any lesson. He and others who should know better – Wells (“mail a severed foot”), McLeod (retweeting Jun Lin jokes), Wicary (defending Coyne’s tactic), et al. – mocked a young man who died a horrible death, and they were indifferent to the suffering of his family. They looked like complete jerks as a result. They didn’t teach a lesson to anyone, in my opinion.  But they’ll never admit that, of course.

Thus, again, the tweet below. Anyone feel, anywhere, that Coyne et al. did anything other than make themselves look bad, on the very day that Vancouver schools received dismembered limbs in the mail?

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