, 10.07.2021 11:17 AM

My latest: shove your apology, Trudeau

Sorry, but Justin Trudeau likes apologies. He does.

He makes them all the time. Everyone has noticed. The BBC even published a story about The Apologist-In-Chief, asking: “Does Justin Trudeau apologise too much?”

Their answer: Yes, probably. (And, yes, they spelled “apologize” in the Brit way, naturally, with an “s” and not a “z.” Apologies.)

Here’s a partial list of Justin’s apologies. It’s partial, because we literally do not have enough room to publish all of the details about the Liberal leader’s apologies. We’re a tabloid, not an encyclopedia. (Sorry.)

— When Trudeau and his family were caught with their snout deep in the WE Charity trough, Trudeau apologized. “I made a mistake in not recusing myself immediately from the discussions given our family’s history and I’m sincerely sorry about not having done that.”

— When Trudeau and his family were caught with their well-appointed beaks in another trough — the Aga Khan’s lobbyist trough — he was again super contrite for not getting permission from the ethics czar first. “I’m sorry I didn’t, and in the future I will be clearing all my family vacations with the commissioner.”

— When Trudeau and his family were caught lying on the first National Day of Truth and Reconciliation — lying about where they were, lying about what they were doing, and lying about where they were doing it (an $18-million oceanfront mansion owned by the wife of one of the alleged tax avoiders identified on the Paradise Papers this week, according to the Journal de Montreal) — he again issued another post facto Act of Contrition: “Travelling on September 30th was a mistake, and I regret it.” He didn’t utter the word “apologize,” notably, but he claimed to have done so in a call with an Indigenous leader: “I apologized for not being there with her and her community for (Truth and Reconciliation) day.”

Do you see the oily, serpentine thread that weaves through all of Trudeau’s dewey-eyed, butter-wouldn’t-melt apologies? Yes: They all involve his family. You know: his multimillionaire family, who rarely seem to resist the temptation to plunder the treasury, or someone else’s bank account. About which Prime Minister Penitential then apologizes — always after getting caught. Never before.

But like we say: Justin Trudeau loves apologies. They turn him on. There was his apology for the Komagata Maru incident, wherein a ship full of mostly Sikhs were turned away from Canada about 100 years ago. Then there was the one he made for elbowing NDP MP Ruth-Ellen Brosseau in her chest during a nasty debate in the House of Commons in 2016.

Then there was the one he made for residential school survivors in Newfoundland and Labrador in November 2017. Four days later, he made another one to LGBT people for what he called “state-sponsored, systematic oppression.”

He apologized to the Tsilhqot’in First Nation for the killings of their chiefs in 1864. In that same year, 2018, he apologized because his Liberal predecessor, Mackenzie King, turned away 900 Jews on the MS St. Louis in 1939, most of whom would go on to be murdered in Nazi death camps.

And so on, and so on. Apologies followed to the Inuit, to the Poundmaker Cree Nation, and on and on. And now, because he made the first Truth and Reconciliation Day a farce, a bad memory.

Here’s the best response to your fetish for apologies that are never, ever, ever accompanied by changes in your behaviour, Justin Trudeau. It comes from Assembly of First Nations National Chief RoseAnne Archibald.

“Hollow apologies will no longer be accepted,” Archibald said. “As national chief, on behalf of all First Nations, I expect concrete action and changed behaviours.”

There you go, Justin Trudeau: Take your apologies and shove them.

Sorry.

— Warren Kinsella was a federal Ministerial Representative to dozens of First Nations across Canada from 2003 to 2015

41 Comments

  1. JH says:

    Seems we may be getting another apology as well.
    https://www.journaldemontreal.com/2021/10/07/des-vacances-paradisiaques-et-un-paradis-fiscal
    So typical of entitled Liberal elitists!

    • Peter Williams says:

      After staying at the Aga Khan’s island didn’t Trudeau give $50 million to the Aga Khan’s charity?

      What’s this vacation stay going to cost the Canadian taxpayer?

  2. RKJ says:

    Justin has found a seam to work among a gullible group of liberal voting Canadians and, he has an ineffective opposition so Justin is a happy boy. I expect he’ll keep up his game as long as he can milk the system.

  3. RKJ says:

    Imagine if Justin was running against Jean Chretien – Jean would have kicked his butt all over Canada. I still wonder why Chretien appeared with him during this election…..

    • Derek Pearce says:

      Probably because, while knowing that Justin too shall pass, he’s interested in the long-term health of the party and winning elections is integral to that health.

  4. Sean says:

    …Justin’s staff is diligently working on writing apologies for the next 25 really stupid / offensive things he will doe between now and the end of the year. These weekly national disgraces will never end until the Liberal Caucus and Cabinet start behaving responsibly and remove him.

    On that note….It is mildly amusing how people seem to believe that a law exists which prohibits a parliamentary caucus from removing the leader without following a specific prescribed process – as the Tories are doing now… when in fact… MPs can do that when ever the hell they want. Without any notice or process at all.

  5. Robert White says:

    Not to be a smart ass or anything, but it seems to me that I recall jurisprudence adopting the formal apology as a form of contritiion without admiting liability approximately twenty years ago.

    The Liberal Government has been over utilizing the apology as a talking point since around that time when jurisprudence adopted the practice en masse.

    $368k per year for a hired apologist promulgating hollow empty promises of ‘building back better’ for the corporate DAVOS set of financiers seems to only really require a Drama degree and a nice head of hair.

    I blame jurisprudence proper for the empty hollow apology era of politics. Trudeau is too stupid to think up anything original too.

    RW

  6. You know, one of my greatest acts of charity is moving to help the entirely clueless of which this Prime Minister is both a founding member and proud chief patron.

    With that in mind, I’ve pre-written the text for his out-of-this-world-upcoming-apology-to-Canadians. The text, while incredibly succinct, is unequivocal and to the point. It consists of two words: “I quit.”

    Nothing would make the vast majority of Canadians happier.

  7. Ted Hamill says:

    I would rather have JT and a Liberal government and a hundred more apologies than a Conservative government. O’Toole can try hard but you can’t put lipstick on a pig. There is nothing in Conservative political ideology that is designed to help the average Canadian.

    • Phil in London says:

      Spoken like a true koolaid swilling liberal

      • JH says:

        There will always be the shallow Himbos & Bimbos of the Trudeau cult who will support them no matter what. Daddy may have been a letcherous wife beater (& possibly Mao’s Manchurian Candidate), mom the town pump for the Hollywood Glitterati and Sasha an apologist for the Iran mullahs, but the flighty, the fickle and their elitist trailer trash crowd will always back them.

        • JH,

          This type of invective writing does our cause no good. I would advise restraint going forward. Concentrate the mind on the big picture: kicking his ass to the curb, after a short-lived but reasonably timed period of political restraint. That’s all that matters, or should matter, as the weeks progress. Erin has so much more work to do to win the country. Nothing that any of us does should in any way detract from that objective.

          • Campbell says:

            While you and I typically disagree politically, I want to say I really appreciate you calling this other poster out for going well over the line with his comment. I hope Warren doesn’t delete it, in order to give evidence of what is not appropriate political discourse or attacks, and that there is real value in people like you, Ronald, having the sense to call it out for what it is: counterproductive to the strategic aims of Trudeau’s opponents. Kudos to you.

          • JH says:

            Sorry I don’t agree. Time we started calling a spade a spade, This is a family of lowlifes, living big on money they inherited and the Canadian Tax Payer. Not all Liberals are like this, JC and Aline are examples of the opposite! This gang, their gofers and the POS in the LPC backroom who recruited the Trudeaus illustrate all that’s wrong with our politics and the shallowness of many voters. BTW if WK decides to censor me, I’ll accept the consequences. Was worth it to say my piece.

          • Ronald O'Dowd says:

            JH,

            You know me well enough to know that my objective here certainly is not to start a pissing contest with you so I will limit myself to this: it would be extremely helpful if you and the other long attended posters here would provide strategic points of reference for the leader. That’s what his office desperately needs given the failing advice that O’Toole got politically on Assault-Style Weapons and vaccination of candidates and caucus members. Some will choose to provide badly needed advice privately, others publicly, but either way, we need as much input now as possible to increase our chances of forming government in less than 2 years, and probably much less, if the PPs break in the way I expect them to do politically. I would hope you would be among those who choose to respond to this clarion call as it’s more than critical at this juncture, IMHO.

          • Ronald O'Dowd says:

            Meanwhile, I just read J.J. McCullough’s piece in The Washington Post. I mean, is this guy on the same right-of-centre planet as most of the CPC members? Never once does he describe Scheer as a social conservative. Hint: with respect to them, that’s why Scheer lost. HELLO.

            And Canada ain’t Texas that positively delights in taking away women’s reproductive rights…where’s McCullough on that when we need him?

            O’Toole lost big picture for one reason: Trudeau went negative the right way, while Erin’s team went negative meek like a lamb. Simple as that, period. Just ask any spectacular war roomer who happens to partially live here.

          • Ronald O'Dowd says:

            P.S. I also look forward to Warren’s reaction to The Star’s piece on Liberal strategy. Read it if you can get past the usual fawning in favour of…

          • Pedant says:

            When the Liberals stop lying about Conservatives and NDP politicians, we’ll stop telling the truth about their grotesque heroes. You know, like PET riding his bike through Montreal’s Jewish neighbourhood during WW2 wearing a German army officer costume (it was a Prussian-era design, but still)?

          • JH says:

            RO’D, here’s a start because this is still burning my arse!
            . ‘If you don’t stand for something, you stand for nothing!’
            Joining Trudeau and Singh in the desertion of Quebec’s English & Allophone communities doesn’t speak well of O’Toole or CPC.
            I’m tired of shilly shallying for votes in Quebec. O’Toole should have told Legault to piss off. Likewise the failure to say exactly what policies are on CBC funding, Guns, Vaxxing and a whole shopping list of other issues, where CPC leaders bend to every breeze from the Left. That’s too Liberal Trudashian for me. PMSH might not have been loved but he was respected. Catering to the lowest common denominator is not in my playbook. I’m close to being done, unless things change.
            PS; Start with Erin’s brain trust!

          • Ronald O'Dowd says:

            JH,

            Absolutely, I agree with your first point: as you know, we have a federal at least fund that is expressly designed to help fund minority court challenges. I may or may not have this right or wrong but to the best of my recollection, most of the parties are not prepared to help fund those legal challenges in Quebec. Apparently not so for French-speaking minorities in English Canada. The usual, hypocritical, double standard. That’s why they’re called politicians…

          • Ronald O'Dowd says:

            JH,

            Now to your second point: I’m with you to the extent that we both agree that it’s called the CONSERVATIVE Party and that necessarily requires that it manifest and display some core Conservative values. But the trick is, as Harper knew, just how many and how much. Go overboard and the CPC gets 2015 all over again. Get the mix right as Harper did in 2006 and you win. You also have to have the stomach to be able to quite deliberately avoid party resolutions that are controversial among the electorate once in power. Harper judiciously was able to pick and choose and that kept him mostly in power. So getting the mix right is no piece of cake. Harper didn’t have it close to 100% right and as you’ve rightly pointed out, both Scheer and O’Toole got the balance less right than Harper did, strangely enough. In the 2021 electoral calculus, the party can’t be The Alliance nor can it be The Progressive Conservatives, if we’re going to repeatedly win nationally as Harper did. Even Harper couldn’t get that precious delicate balance right in 2015 so I sometimes wonder which human can?

          • Ronald O'Dowd says:

            Finally, to be frank, here’s what I thought Harper would do in this election but he apparently stayed right out of it, even internally: I would cast Harper as a social conservative/libertarian but not an overly rabid variety. So I assumed he would make a difference in this election by going with the maxim, the “enemy” of my enemy is my friend. I had no idea how Harper really felt about the succeeding leaders but I thought he would go strategic and move heaven and earth to politically kill both Bernier and the PPC. In fact, I was shocked when he apparently never took them on because had Harper spoken out, even with the O’Toole huge flubs, we would have won in the final week of the campaign, albeit more than likely with a minority, something no one knows more about than Harper. Either he said fuck this or was quite deliberately sidelined and that was a monumental tactical mistake if O’Toole’s brain trust quite deliberately went that way. Harper and I are hardly buds but his input was more than crucial to turn the tide in our favour in the closing weeks of this campaign. If Erin’s people made that mistake, they had better never repeat it again. Real leaders don’t do that to other real leaders, whether they happen to like ’em or not. One person’s opinion.

    • And that sums up in a nutshell exactly why Canada is circling the drain.

    • Pedant says:

      How has Trudeau’s massive housing bubble helped the average Canadian, particularly those under 40?

      Are you an “I’ve got mine!” Boomer coasting on your birth-year lottery win?

    • Jeff says:

      Ted,
      And what exactly has sparky done to help the average Canadian… zip, squat, nothing!!
      Except raise the cost of everything with a tax that goes to service the massive debt that he has accumulated!!

  8. Peter says:

    Warren, you mention that after the Aga Khan trip, Trudeau committed to clearing all future family vacations with the “ethics” commissioner. Did he clear the Sept 30 Tofino trip?

    • Gilbert says:

      I doubt it.

    • Peter,

      His word means [fill in the blanks]…nothing that comes out of his mouth can ever be taken at face value. So, Canadians get to suffer on until the CPC and BQ finally put this government out of its misery. May it happen sometime after the first year mark, or sooner, if anything of the order of Sponsorship should come to light. You know, à la Panama and Paradise Papers. Is there gold in them thar hills? We’ll find out soon enough, I wager.

  9. Peter Williams says:

    Friday October 8. Where’s Justin?

    The liar-in-chief’s schedule shows him in private meetings, but where is he really?

  10. Douglas W says:

    Why should he care?

    He’s matched up against EOT + Jagmeet Singh.

    Neither worry him.

    • The Doctor says:

      You’re right, we seem to be locked into this stalemate politics for the foreseeable future. And it suits the Liberal Party just fine.

      • Doc,

        That’s because they’re idiots. Never fail to put your faith and true confidence in the NationalNinnyTM. He’s the absolute master of a gravity induced downward trajectory and his party can count on him to ultimately produce both unimpressive and highly predictable results…

    • Peter Williams says:

      Yeah, Mr Singh really worries Trudeau.

      Mr. Singh says he is prepared to withhold support from a Trudeau government.

      https://www.theglobeandmail.com/amp/politics/article-ndp-prepared-to-withhold-votes-in-parliament-leader-jagmeet-singh-says/?

      Yeah, right. That has as much validity as a Justin Trudeau promise.

      In the last minority government, Trudeau played Mr Singh like a fiddle. Singh might as well be a Liberal backbencher.

      • Ronald O'Dowd says:

        Peter,

        The only way an arrangement can pay handsome dividends for Singh is if they insist on cabinet posts in exchange for confidence. But that’s highly risky and could very well be a disastrous double-edged sword. Just ask Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg.

        • Peter Williams says:

          Or Mr Singh can vote against the government:
          a) in committees
          b) in Parliament

          Mr Singh won’t do b), and rarely does a. Justin knows that Singh’s words are empty threats.

          • Ronald O'Dowd says:

            Peter,

            Absolutely, can’t argue with that but isn’t that a reason for Singh to up his game considerably and make the Liberals pay dearly — for once — for NDP support in the Commons? If the Liberals aren’t prepaid to pay that price then let’s all take them down together. Of course, if past is prologue, it may not necessarily work out that great for us given what happened to Michael, Jack and Gilles the last time this type of a scenario played out. So, the right timing will have to be beyond super-critical.

          • Ronald O'Dowd says:

            Wait a minute, I’m getting old…was it Michael or was it Stéphane? Maybe it was Stéphane., the more I think about it.

          • Campbell says:

            Jagmeet Singh: he can dish out “nice words” like no other leader can, specializing in both accusing others of this, and practicing the art

        • The Doctor says:

          Nick Clegg, whose job it is now to lie his face off on behalf of Facebook. If there is a Hell, there’s gotta be a circle there reserved just for that person.

          • Ronald O'Dowd says:

            Doc,

            Perhaps, but it would have to be, at best, a sub-section. LAWYERS, especially those in litigation and politicians universally take up, by far, the greatest space in such a special and unique environment. And they deserve it much more than any of the other reasonably unseemly professions and occupations. They make the press and pre-owned car sales people look like saints. Just saying.

          • Ronald O'Dowd says:

            That’s why personally I have kept my lawyering to an absolute minimum and strictly only when it became necessary, given the exhaustion of all other possible options. That has kept me reasonably sane since 1995.

            I have such a case in development now. We’ll see soon enough if our client is smart or stupid. Either way, I’m there for the next chapter. (Yipee.)


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