The Trudeau Liberals are still a government, yes.

But make no mistake: they are dying. And they are dying without dignity.

Yes, they have all the trappings of government. The expense accounts. The limousines and chauffeurs. The legions of officials producing mountains of unread memoranda for them. All that.

But, when observed from less than a distance, the Trudeau regime has only a thin, brittle exoskeleton of power: they’re a hologram of a government. They’re as lifeless as cold ashes.

The Trudeau Liberals have 158 seats, the opposition parties have 179, a Parliamentary minority. In the real world, that is kind of the equivalent of being strapped to a death row gurney, waiting for the governor to call. (Or not.)

The Trudeau government’s may not look entirely dead, from the outside. But they are inarguably dead inside, and only a Lazarus-like miracle can revive them, now.

Proof of all that was seen, in the past week. In the Middle East, a war is raging between civilization and barbarity. That’s what it is, in its essence.

Israel and Hamas, respectively. Civilization’s victory seems likely, but is by no means a certain or permanent thing. October 7 made that clear: if the conditions are right, if the evil side are sufficiently organized, any one of us – men, women, children, babies – can die in the most horrific of ways. All captured on a smirking terrorist’s GoPro camera.

When war is being waged by civilization on one side, and utter savagery on the other, it shouldn’t be difficult to pick sides. It shouldn’t be hard. Choosing sides, as Graham Greene once wrote, is how we remain human.

The civilized world has chosen Israel. South Africa, a Russian satellite that has pimped itself out to Hamas, brought a case before the International Court of Justice, alleging that Israel is committing “genocide” against Hamas’ vassal state, Gaza.

International law, of course, is written by angels, sought by despots, and mostly ignored by the sane. But, in South Africa’s case, it was important to take sides. So, the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Austria, Ireland, the European Union and others either vigorously opposed, or refused to support, South Africa’s Hamas-approved litigation.

But what of Canada? What of the Trudeau government?

On Friday afternoon, in a statement that washed up onshore like a dead whale, Trudeau said this: “Our wholehearted support of the ICJ and its processes does not mean that we support the premise of the case brought forward by South Africa.”

People poked and prodded the dead whale. It wasn’t a ringing endorsement of Israel – it wasn’t particularly clear – but it read, to most, like Canada did not support South Africa’s lawsuit against the victims of October 7. A fuller statement would be forthcoming, Trudeau hurriedly added, on that same day, Friday.

This writer, and other supporters of Israel, offered up some reluctant applause. We thought Trudeau would support South Africa’s stunt. He didn’t, it seemed. Good.

Since he made his statement on a Friday afternoon, just as the Jewish sabbath was about to begin, few Jewish spokespeople could be found to speak. So, Trudeau and his witless Global Affairs Minister snagged some applause over the weekend.

And then, this week, the truth spilled out. On CBC, no less.

A fine reporter there, Evan Dyer, wrote a story headlined thus: “After days of confusion, Trudeau government says it will abide by ICJ on genocide case against Israel.”

His sub-headline: “Prime minister, foreign affairs minister issued a statement that left many observers baffled.”

It was a “clarification,” Dyer wrote, issued by functionaries at Global Affairs on Monday. He wrote: “Sources said the government also didn’t want to signal that it was rejecting the genocide claim outright.”

Ah, now we see. Support, if necessary, for public relations purposes. But not necessarily actual support, where it counts.

The language games promptly blew up in the Trudeau regime’s faces. They achieved what would be otherwise impossible: they united both the Israeli and Palestinian sides. Both sides condemned them for their dishonesty. Their deceit and duplicity.

But it’s more than simple dishonesty, isn’t it? It’s what happens when a government is just dead inside.

Like the government of Justin Trudeau is.

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Governments-funded hate rallies?

Anti-Israel and anti-Semitic protestors are getting paid to protest.  That was the revelation that Postmedia shared last week.  In Canada and the United States, groups and individuals are receiving thousands – sometimes tens of thousands – to stage angry, and occasionally violent, protests against the Jewish state.

But some of that money, this newspaper has now discovered, is actually coming from levels of government.

Some will say they aren’t surprised.  The shocking tale of Laith Marouf, for example, is why.

Marouf and his “Community Media Advocacy Centre” received more than $125,000 from the federal government to ostensibly fund projects to help combat anti-racism. But, after Marouf was found posting wildly anti-Semitic content online – one tweet saw Marouf describing Jews as “loud-mouthed bags of human feces, aka the Jewish White Supremacists” – the Justin Trudeau government reluctantly agreed to try and get the money back.

But Marouf is now in Beirut, broadcasting more vile anti-Semitism – with the full support of the Iranian regime, we have learned.  And few expect the Trudeau government will be successful in getting back the $125,000.

Watchdog Honest Reporting Canada, meanwhile, has found that the feds have supplied another anti-Israel organization – the Pride Centre of Edmonton – with $138,000 in funds.  The Centre recently signed onto a notorious anti-Semitic open letter that denied that Israeli women and girls were raped, and subjected to horrific sexual violence, by Hamas on October 7. That letter referred to this country as “so-called Canada” and called on MPs to resign for their “complicity” in “genocide.”

Meanwhile, Postmedia has now confirmed that the Plenty Collective – a Victoria, B.C. group that has supplied anti-Israel protestors with as much as $20,000 a month to participate in hate rallies – has actually received monies from government.

The collective, which has organized multiple anti-Israel protests for months, received $28,000 from the Victoria Foundation, a registered charity.  The foundation, in turn, receives hundreds of thousands in funding from the Trudeau government’s “Investment Readiness Program.”

Just last year, for example, the foundation got more than half a million from the feds.  It in turn passed along thousands to the Plenty Collective for “gender equity.”  But it has now announced it has initiated a “review process” to see how that money was used.

But the anti-Israel Plenty Collective benefitted from its relationship with the Victoria-based Belfry Theatre, too.  The theatre group is a not-for-profit, putting on half-a-dozen plays a year.  But – for reasons that are unclear – the Belfry Theatre also passed along monies received from the government-supported Victoria Foundation to the Plenty Collective.

On its web site, the theatre claims that “through the Victoria Foundation Community Grants Program the Belfry similarly assisted the Plenty Collective to implement queer community building, with an intersectional lens, through nourishment, art, and connection.” But after Postmedia reported the collective was funding anti-Israel protests, the theatre hurriedly announced this:

“We have been assured by the Plenty Collective that the Victoria Foundation grant is being used for community arts-based projects. Together with the Victoria Foundation and the Plenty Collective, we are reviewing the grant activities undertaken by the Plenty Collective.”

The theatre group has not responded to this reporter’s questions about its relationship with the anti-Israel Plenty Collective – and whether federal government, non-profit or charity funds were used to fund anti-Israel protests.

Tellingly, however, the theatre has cancelled a showing of a play called The Runner, after the Plenty Collective objected to it.  The play sympathetically depicts an Orthodox Jew who works for ZAKA, an organization that collects the remains of Jews killed by terrorists. (Full disclosure: this writer has raised funds for ZAKA in the past through the sale of my paintings.)

It is a disturbing tale: anti-Israel protestors being paid to protest. And, now, multiple examples of government funding, directly or indirectly, the organizations that put on those protests.

Says Ian Ward, a councillor for Colwood on Vancouver Island, who has led the charge against anti-Semitic activity there: “As long as municipal, provincial and federal politicians refuse to condemn antisemitism, and stall on a needed call for investigations into funding, we will continue to see our cities held hostage and our democracy under threat.”

Ward is right. It’s time for an inquiry.  It’s time to follow the money.

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OTTAWA – Liberal forecast here in the Nation’s Capital: rain, hail and locusts. With a possibility of sunshine, chirping birds, and limitless blue skies.

That, at least, was the Grit forecast at the 90th birthday party of the Rt. Hon. Jean Chretien in Ottawa Thursday night. Lovely and clear, but incoming clouds spelling total disaster. Uncertain, you might say.

This writer was there solely to toast Chretien, so the phone was off. Not notes were taken. But many, many conversations were had, with veteran Liberals from Vancouver Island to Prince Edward Island. It was revealing. But it wasn’t unanimous.

In attendance was the sitting Liberal Prime Minister, who was quite genteel, and kept his focus on the birthday boy. Also there: many of his cabinet ministers, particularly the ones with leadership ambitions. (You could tell they were ambitious, because they were offering to take selfies of people.)

And, of course, there were scores of Chretien-era former ministers, MPs, Senators and staffers. Tons of them.  All there to celebrate Chretien, and recall some of his many achievements – among them, winning three back-to-back Parliamentary majorities. A feat that has only been achieved by Sir Wilfred Laurier, more than a Century ago.

The attendees were from all over, but quite a few had stuck around the Nation’s Capital after Chretien resigned in 2003. Some did lobby work, some gave advice here and there, and some abandoned political life and got a job in the public service.

But all seemed to have kept their eyes fastened on Ottawa, and the political comings and goings during the ten-year reign of Liberal Party leader Justin Trudeau.

What they had to say is significant, because the 350 people in attendance know how to win. They won more majorities than anyone since, and most anyone before. They know their stuff.

There were three camps. The pessimistic, the optimistic, and the undecided. Here’s the political weather forecast from each camp.

The pessimistic: This group -chiefly represented by those whose livelihood no longer depends on Liberal beneficence – foresee unmitigated disaster for the Liberal brand. This group speculated that a decade in the political wilderness was not just possible, it was inevitable.

The main reason, for the pessimists, wasn’t entirely Justin Trudeau’s fault. The country is in a foul mood, they intoned, and he isn’t the kind of guy you keep around when everyone is miserable.

Besides: Justin had overstayed his welcome, said the pessimists. Nearly a decade in power is plenty – as good as it gets. Time to change the channel.

If there was one criticism the pessimists had, however, it was this: Trudeau-era Liberals weren’t real Liberals. They had moved the party too far to the Left, and had become indistinguishable from the socialists. The woke stuff, in particular, had left the pessimists out in the cold.

The optimists: this group believes – and some cases, are convinced – that they can win again, with Justin. No, they did not attend the party wearing straight jackets.

On the morning of the big party, Abacus released a stunner of a poll, showing the Trudeau Grits a whopping 17 points back of Pierre Poilievre’s Tories. Seventeen points!

Pressed for the reasons for their sunny ways outlook, then, the optimists took out their crystal balls. As it were.

The Spring will see interest rate drops, they insisted – something with which most economists agree. The economic fundamentals – debt-to-GDP and the like – are better than any other G7 country. Also true.

Trudeau may not be a Chretien-style PM, they acknowledged. But he is a Chretien-style campaigner, they noted, and he too has won three back-to-back elections. (Although only one of them resulted in a majority.) Also true.

And, the optimists concluded, Poilievre is rage farmer. He doesn’t have any hope stuff on offer – it’s all anger and fear, 24/7. He thinks the country is broken, and the only people who believe that are the ones who wouldn’t vote Liberal if you put an unregistered long gun to their head.

You can’t sustain anger forever, the optimists said. Sooner or later, voters get exhausted by it. And that’s when Poilievre will run out of gas, say the optimists.

I repeat: they were not wearing straight jackets.

The undecided: This group tended to be mostly found in the private sector. They’d done their political bit, and they had moved on to pastures untainted by governmental overreach and bureaucratic machinations. They looked blessedly serene.

And, mostly, they didn’t know what was going to happen. They agreed that it was foolish to underestimate Trudeau, as three successive Conservative leaders had done (one of those leaders, by the by, sang a birthday ditty to Chretien in a video greeting, and he – Stephen Harper – brought the house down).

By the same token, said the undecided, it was foolish to dismiss a 17-point gap, too. With mere months to go before an election happens, they opined, double-digit deficits should not be sniffed at. They’ve been going on for months, and they’re real.

So, there you have it. The winningest faction within the winningest political party in Western democracy – and they’re all split on what the future holds, too. They, like everyone else, are peering at the skies and wondering. Do we go golfing, or do we head to the root cellar and batten any relevant hatches?

Chretien, meanwhile, saying nothin’. He wasn’t revealing which camp he belonged to. He told jokes, he brought us to tears, he was terrific.

If he ran again, he’d win another majority.

On that forecast, all present would agree.

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