Remember the good old days – you know, when conservatives unambiguously opposed Russian aggression and tyranny?

And, for that matter, remember when progressives deeply cared about the fate of the oppressed people of the world?

Ronald Reagan, who conservatives used to venerate, once said that Russia was “the focus of evil in the modern world” – and that Russia “runs against the tide of human history by denying human freedom and human dignity.”

Remember those days? And then, remember the time that Reagan stood at the Berlin wall, and demanded that Russia’s leader tear it down – and how, not long afterwards, it actually was torn down? Remember that?

Even progressive champion Pierre Trudeau, who was too cozy with the former Soviet Union for too much of his life, in 1980 ordered Canada’s boycott of the Moscow Olympics – to protest precisely the tyranny and expansionism about which Reagan had warned the world.

Announcing the boycott, Pierre Trudeau said it was “the clearest and most effective way available” to condemn the Russian invasion of Afghanistan.

Anyway. That was then, this is now. Nowadays, Russian warmongering and human rights abuse are met with a shrug by too many on the Right – and, still, some on the Left.

Just this week, video of unelected Alberta Premier Danielle Smith was discovered online, in which Smith falsely claims Ukraine possesses nuclear weapons – and that it should be “neutral,” even after Russia invades it and rapes and murders its citizens.

Smith also seemingly suggests, in a now-deleted post, that Ukrane and NATO are to blame for the war. Said she: “I think the only answer for Ukraine is neutrality.”

Smith’s extraordinary statements – which are deeply cowardly and wholly immoral – were immediately condemned by pretty much everybody, including the Alberta branch of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress. Said Orysia Boychuk to Global News: “[Smith’s] comments were misinformed. Russia invaded Ukraine, not because of NATO and what Ukraine did or didn’t do…Russia invaded Ukraine because it seeks the destruction of the Ukrainian state and the annihilation of the Ukrainian people.”

But Smith is not alone in her craven Neville Chamberlain-like servility. Around the same time Smith’s video was discovered, the People’s Party of Canada issued a fundraising appeal – and demanded the end to any support for Ukraine.

Wrote the PPC leader, Maxime Bernier: “We must stop sending money and weapons to [Ukrainian president Volodomyr] Zelenskyy.” Bernier went on to describe support for Ukraine as “crazy,” quote unquote, and “virtue signalling.”

When this writer tweeted that the PPC position was disgraceful, I was bombarded for days with suspiciously-similar bot attacks on Twitter, calling Zelenskyy a Nazi (he is Jewish) and calling the war a money-laundering front (tell that to the 15,000 Ukrainians who have been killed, tortured or wounded by Russia).

This appalling indifference to Russian tyranny and expansionism would have never been tolerated by Ronald Reagan or any U.S. president – until 2016, that is. In 2016, however, Donald Trump came to power – and his victory only came after “multiple efforts from Russian-affiliated individuals to assist the Trump campaign,” the Mueller Report found.

Thereafter, the talking heads on Fox News and other Republicans took up Trump’s pro-Russia refrain. As the New York Times reported in front-page story on Sunday, Republican candidates “are embracing anti-interventionist military and foreign policies that…have been associated more with the Democratic Left.”

And, yes, there are still some on the Left who sound like Smith, Bernier and Trump. The leader of the Quebec Green Party has called Putin’s demands “reasonable” and – like Bernier – demanded the end to Western support for Ukraine. Similarly, progressive Toronto-area municipal candidate Alejandra Bravo has said she is “terrified” Canada is “training neo-Nazis in Ukraine” (we aren’t) – and that everyone should “stand against the war” (sorry, not until Putin is defeated).

So, yes, some on the Left continue to be unmoved by Russia’s war against the Ukrainian people, and the destruction and death that has attended it. But, increasingly, it is some Trumpist-style conservatives who are the ones who are most visibly unsympathetic to the documented carnage and murder.

Graham Greene once wrote that we must sometimes choose sides. Said the great British author: “Sooner or later, one has to take sides. If one is to remain human.”

Ukraine is the side of democracy and decency. Those who choose the other side risk losing much – their humanity, for starters.

Were he still with us, Ronald Reagan would agree.

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Three hockey truths.

One, our kids are never going to play in the NHL.

Two, it’s just a game.

Three, our kids are never ever going to play in the NHL.

I’ve got four kids, three boys and a girl. All of them played hockey. I spent a lot of time in cold hockey rinks over the years. Those three points above were my motto.

I was one of those hockey Dads who wouldn’t say much. If the kids scored a goal, I’d clap. If the team needed a sponsor, I’d be it.  If someone needed a ride, on either team, I’d give it.

Every once in a while, I’d be standing beside a Dad, or a Mom, who was not setting a good example. You know: the parents who would scream at the kids, or the officials, or the coaches. The ones who thought their little angel was going to play in the NHL. The jerks.

So, I’d sidle up beside the loud parents – I stand 6’5” in my Doc Martens, and I usually was wearing a biker jacket and a punk rock T-shirt with an offensive band name on it – and I’d quietly remind them of the three points above. They’d look a bit uneasy. Then I’d move on.

The people who ran Hockey Canada – now blessedly gone – remind me of those parents. Hanging out in rinks, bossing people around, clueless about the harm they were causing: that was the leadership at Hockey Canada.

The loud parents and the ex-execs at Hockey Canada share one other character flaw, too: they were apparently always willing to excuse, and cover up, any and all sorts of misconduct. Because, they thought, they were sending the kids to the big show.

Except they weren’t. Instead, they were teaching the kids – young males, almost entirely – that any type of wrongdoing, even criminal, was fine. As long as they were devoted to the game.

As noted, however: it’s just a dumb game. Hell, it’s not even Canada’s game anymore.  No Canadian team has won the Stanley Cup since 1993. So much for the national pride exemption.

It’s a game, Mom and Dad. It’s a game, Hockey Canada white-washers. It’s a game mainly for kids. Chasing a lump of vulcanized rubber across frozen ponds with some wooden sticks.

The bad parents, and the bad Hockey Canada execs, lost sight of that. They believe and believed they are/were on some higher mission. That they were in pursuit of some higher divine purpose, all truth and decency be damned.

But, but. When the boy-men start to get charged criminally with sexual assault and assault and gang rape, will the bad parents and the bad Hockey Canada people wake up from their infantile fantasy on skates? Probably not.

If you are willing to overlook rape, and gang rape, you’ll probably forgive anything. But at that point, you’re not just a hockey Mom or Dad or more. You’re not just an executive who has selflessly devoted yourself to the national game.

You’re beneath contempt, and you don’t belong near any hockey rink, hurting some kids who are just trying to have fun – chasing a but of vulcanized rubber and a dream of new friends and laughter.

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