Trudeau The Politics Of My Way Essay

Trudeau: The Politics Of My Way Essay, Research Paper

Trudeau: The Politics of My Way

Unlike the United States, with its generalissimo politics-Washington,

Jackson, Grant, Eisehower- the martial arts have been conspicuously absent from

Canadian politics. But there in one exception: in 1968 Pierre Elliot Trudeau

became the first Canadian leader to bring the gunslinger-Lone Ranger ethos to

Canadian politics.

Trudeau introduced to Canada the refined art of single combat; it was the

politics of “Doing It My Way”-the politics of going my way or being left behind.

Single-combat confrontation implied much mor than the loner or renegade in power,

and far far less than the shaman black tricks of Mackenzie King. Trudeau was

always far more the solo Philosopher King engaged in intellectual trial by

combat than the Magus Merlin conjuring up solutions by puffs of smoke, sleight

of hand or divine intervention. Ouijaboard politics was the occult domain of

Mackenzie King, a man virtually devoid of policy, a political palm reader

forever checking the whims and moods of his powerful baronial-Ralston Howe, St.

Laurent-and sometimes Byronian colleagues to see how best he could placate them,

or calm them, or Heap his beatitudes upon them.

Trudeau, from day one , was always more samurai than shaman. Even in his

pre-leadership days, Trudeau’s love of trial by combat was predominant.

Mackenzie King would have never touched the unholy trinity of divorce, abortion

and homosexuality: each one of these issues is a sleeping dog best left to lie;

each could only infuriate conservative Canada from coast to coast. Since King

dared not touch them seriatim he certainly would not have touched them together-

in an omnibus bill.

This, Trudeau did joyously. The myths-makers have it at this was

Trudeau’s first deliberated joust, the kingship being the final prize. But

Trudeau had no leadership aspirations at the time; all that he had, still has,

was the love of combat for the sake of combat and religious scruples be damned.

Trudeau the Catholic zealot tackle divorce, abortion and homosexuality active

Prime Minister in this country’s history, liberated the homosexual practitioners

of black acts totally abhorrent to him; ironically, in the process, Trudeau gave

irrational Canada a pretext for branding him a homosexual too.

P.E.T. has always hated the consensus building of Mackenzie King; even the

populist following of a Diefenbaker was an anathema to Trudeau. The single-

combat warrior “doing it my way” is always alone; he leads the people but is not

of them; like the prophet he wanders either in dessert or lush green pastures

and often, like the prophet, he watches his people march into the Promised Land

without him. For Trudeau, being alone is to be free; victory is a consequence

of solitude; companionship an act of weakness, cronyism even wise.

It is ironic that Trudeau, a devout Jansenist Roman Catholic, emotionally

and philosophically opposed to both divorce and abortion, should grant Canadians

greatly expanded divorce rights and their first right to legale abortion.

Trudeau took the unholy trinity then disturbing the bedrooms of the nation

because all three were trial combat, all three required one strong man to push

them through. In this minefield Canada’s political loner had walked alone and

apparently loved it.

Canada’s other solo flyer, John Diefenbaker, may or may not have been a

renegade in power, but the input his holitics received from Senate cronies and

Kitchen cabinets was enormous. The letters and advice that daily poured in to

the chief were a populist input that Diefenbaker slavishly adhered to. Trudeau

was no Diefenbaker; he was neither a populist nor a renegade. Trudeau was

simply a man who brilliantly massaged and manipulated others so that his single

will appeared to be the will of many, so that his will be always done.

The theme of my-way politics sheds much light on the vrai Trudeau, the

Trudeau that is, rather than the Trudeau people think there is. Trudeau has

never been the privacy-demanding recluse, the reluctant leader that herdsmen of

Canadian journalism insist he is.

In secular life Trudeau is no trinitarian; he has chosen his oneness

because, from the earliest politics, oneness worked for him so spectacular.

Trudeau’s personal handling of the constriction crisis was a “my way” all the

way. Trudeau, the self-proclaimed socialist prophet of his people, waxed ever

so eloquently against the sins of conscription, and yet Trudeau seemingly could

not see in War measures that potential greater evil of a Canadian fascism that

surly meant permanent conscription and enslavement of all. Equally puzzling is

the referral of Trudeau’s nationalist compatriots and colleagues in the years

since to give him any credit for fighting in 1942 a good nationalist fight on

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