Canada is unrecognizable from what it once was prior to 2015. Photo Credit: Justin Trudeau/X
On the eve of the Liberal Party convention that is to select a new leader – and Canada’s next prime minister, it is an appropriate time to reflect on the 2015-25 chapter in the country’s political history – a chapter that might well be entitled, “Canada’s Lost Decade.”
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberal government will be judged harshly, recognized as Canada’s worst and most contemptable for having so feverishly attempted to fashion the country as a post-national state. Trudeau will undoubtedly be remembered as a transformational prime minister (even greater than his father in this regard). Indeed, he has transformed the nation. After nearly a decade of being governed by these Liberals, Canada is unrecognizable from what it once was prior to 2015.
Recent editorial headlines have begun to define this Liberal government’s legacy. In a lead editorial in the Globe and Mail entitled, “Justin Trudeau will leave behind a weaker nation,” the point is made, “The result is a country far less safe than a decade ago, and whose voice is increasingly marginal…. it is already all too clear that Mr. Trudeau’s chief legacy is a weakened Canada.” The Fraser Institute has expectantly observed, “Justin Trudeau’s legacy—record-high spending and massive debt” while Michael Higgins in the National Post opined, “Trudeau’s legacy is one of chaos and disaster.” In a Manhattan Institute for Policy Research editorial, Canadian public policy analyst Michael Bonner states, “On almost every measure, he leaves the country poorer, less productive, angrier, and more divided than he found it.”
Much has been written on the economic reports that document Canada now experiencing steep declines in living standards, unpromising economic forecasts, and an ever-widening gap in productivity that has Canadians living as poor cousins to their American neighbours. Further to this point, the most disturbing result of the 10 years of Liberal government is that “the Canadian promise,” which had been held out for generations through the country’s history, has been broken and, certainly for the majority of millennials and younger generations to follow, there is little to no hope of attaining the prosperity and position of their parents.
Canada’s Lost Decade is a reflection of the Trudeau Liberals’ post-national vision. In pursuit of their vision, the Liberals have permitted the primary responsibilities of a federal government – maintenance of national unity, the rule of law, able defence of land and people, and the nation’s alliances – all to be forsaken. They have left Canadians with a compromised, vulnerable state and this can be seen on multiple fronts.
Consider that Canada’s sovereignty has been undermined by a government that is colluding with foreign influences – on everything from the potential joint gain-of-function virus research at the Winnipeg and Wuhan labs to foreign interference in the country’s elections. Canadians have been kept in the dark on the intimacy of the Liberal Party-Chinese Communist Party relationship. Canada’s government-sponsored main stream media refuses to shed any light on it – so, much credit must be given to independent, investigative journalists such as Sam Cooper and Terry Glavin that this insidious web of activity has been made public at all.
The Liberals mismanagement of the country’s purse-strings has amassed a momentous national debt load, while entrenching a bigger and more expensive socialist state. This decade-long mismanagement has placed Canadians in a strait jacket. Government spending is at a record high driven by Ottawa’s ballooning bureaucracy and the increasing number and size of government contracts. The unbridled spending is unsustainable and it has required the Liberals to raise the country’s debt ceiling and print money. And the costly results over this past decade are predictable: working Canadians today pay a greater portion of their income to taxes and there is a greater income disparity in the country than there was in 2015. Canadians are paying increased taxes without seeing anything to show for it. The Liberals’ marquee carbon tax is a perfect example of this: even with annual carbon tax hikes the government has continuously missed their carbon emission targets (in fact emissions have increased since 2015).
With an immigration policy designed to rapidly change the composition of the country, the Trudeau Liberals have succeeded in fracturing Canada’s longstanding social contract. For most of their regime, Canada has had open borders and has taken in an unprecedented number of migrants. This has effectively shattered the country’s social cohesion and created serious crises in housing, public safety, health care and the provision of social services. Most alarming is the Liberals’ failure to respond to the diaspora violence on our streets – to the absurd point that in one instance they ignored Hamas supporters burning the Canadian flag while yelling “Death to Canada.”
The Trudeau Liberals have religiously practiced “progressive” politics that aimed to introduce Marxist critical race theory and the notion of relative truth, while erasing Canada’s history and undermining the country’s institutions. Trudeau himself declared Canada “has no cultural identity”, that the country was shamefully built by “racists”, “guilty of genocide”. The Liberals brand of progressivism also degrades public spaces with policies that are soft on crime, tolerate illegal protests, and provide easier access to hard drugs. The genesis of these policies once novel to Canada can be traced to the machinations of global organizations.
Consider as well the cadre of environmental ideologues at the core of the Liberal administration who have been pursuing globalist agendas at the expense of Canadians’ national interests. The Liberals’ specific state-interventionalist approach sets out to fulfill a set of environmental priorities and has essentially sabotaged the development of the country’s rich store of natural resources. The Lost Decade is one of lost opportunities that could have grown the Canadian economy – building the country’s energy infrastructure and expanding the country’s export markets. A serious repercussion of this deliberate throttling of resource development is the growing sentiment of alienation in western Canada. The spectre of separation is now being openly argued, from the recent Edmonton Journal column by David Staples “Is Canada worth saving? A surprisingly difficult question to answer just now,” to the news this week of Alberta lawyer Jeffrey Rath leading a delegation to Washington DC to request Americans begin statehood negotiations to annex Alberta.
Beyond their failings on the economy, immigration and national security, the Trudeau Liberals will be remembered for the manner in which they governed, from the vindictiveness of the prime minister to the extraordinary acts setting troublesome precedents for future governments. The government was tightly managed out of the prime minister’s office in an authoritative-borderline-totalitarian fashion, as has been repeatedly confirmed by Liberals who have found themselves on the receiving end of powerplays by Gerald Butts, Katie Telford and the host of unaccountable political operatives in the PMO. Through the decade there have been numerous political sideshows involving Jody Wilson Raybould, Marc Garneau, Andrew Leslie, Bill Morneau, and most recently Chrystia Freeland and Ruby Dhalla.
From those early days in 2015 to his latest globe-trotting farewell tour, Trudeau set the tone of what would be the Liberals’ disposition in office: unapologetic and arrogant, with a certitude that ironically is both self-righteous and amoral. There are three snapshots that capture this noxious character. First, there’s Trudeau’s teary-eyed confession of acting out multiple indecencies in blackface with a virtue signally message to the nation that we can all learn from his indiscretions. Second, there was the vindictive obstinance of Trudeau and his cabinet responding to Canadians’ peaceful Freedom Convey protests; the divisiveness of a prime minister stating “Do we tolerate these people?!”, the mean spiritedness of freezing bank accounts, the continued weaponization of Canada’s legal system to unjustly punish protestors, and the “unreasonable and unconstitutional” use of the Emergencies Act. Third, the continuous deceitful attempts to hide from Canadians the Liberals’ potentially treasonous acts of collusion with their friends in Beijing and the active network of diaspora continuing to this day to support Liberals’ electoral efforts.
As “Canada’s Lost Decade” chapter draws to a close this weekend, may Canadians also be witnessing the turning of a new page sometime this year that will rebuke the Liberals’ post-national vision and set about to mend our torn and vulnerable nation.
Chris George is an advocate, government relations advisor, and writer/copy editor. As president of a public relations firm established in 1994, Chris provides discreet counsel, tactical advice and management skills to CEOs/Presidents, Boards of Directors and senior executive teams in executing public and government relations campaigns and managing issues. Prior to this PR/GR career, Chris spent seven years on Parliament Hill on staffs of Cabinet Ministers and MPs. He has served in senior campaign positions for electoral and advocacy campaigns at every level of government. Today, Chris resides in Almonte, Ontario where he and his wife manage www.cgacommunications.com. Contact Chris at chrisg.george@gmail.com.
