It should be no surprise that during an official visit such as that of U.S. President Biden to Canada now underway, that both leaders sing from the same song sheet. (Something would be wrong if they didn't.).Thus, we heard much aspirational rhetoric from both the president and from Prime Minister Trudeau about coordinated action to deal with the fentanyl problem, standing up for democracy in Ukraine and ad nauseam, about how climate change and economic policy and national security were all so intimately bound up, that they were really all the same thing. People were produced as props — that’s standard these days — and so were asked to stand up in the gallery a beaming steel worker whose status as the beneficiary of promised Liberal largesse earned him a standing ovation, and a delightful Ukrainian woman who has been in Canada 10 years but still has relatives at risk in the old country..Then the big moment, the acknowledgment of Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor. In some ways they were obvious props for a prime ministerial call out. Yet given the content of the CSIS leaks of the past few weeks, they showed in my view remarkable generosity of spirit in allowing themselves to be used that way. Any of us could put ourselves in their place and wonder with them, when after more than two years living rough in a crowded Chinese jail cell with no daylight, access to consular advice or even certainty that you wouldn’t be summarily executed, whether their prime minister had any idea what that had been like, as he wittered on that he had got them home, “the right way, by the rule of law…”.Mr. Trudeau might have said more, if he had said less about that and praised instead their fortitude in a very difficult situation. (Later Mr. Trudeau sidestepped a question about whether he actually believed Han Dong, accused of recommending to a Chinese diplomat that their sufferings be extended lest the Conservatives benefit. There’s a pattern here…).There was more food for cynics: Did we really need a presidential visit to get serious about fentanyl? And while we may support Ukraine for all sorts of good reasons — in Canada’s case if only because the million-plus Ukrainian vote is worth having — it is wildly imaginative to suppose democracy in Ukraine resembles anything experienced in this country, or described further south by de Tocqueville. Indeed, it is a country in which electoral winners prosecute and imprison the losers and their supporters. (Yes, they do that in Ukraine, too.).And of course, when it comes to climate change, Canada under Mr. Trudeau has become a country that cares deeply about it, right up to the point where selling clean Alberta natural gas offshore to help an ally, or to facilitate a friendly country switching out of coal, might help the province in Confederation that he least likes. (Then, not so much.).So, it was quite a show: Only the weight of ‘clean steel’ promised from Dofasco by the prime minister compares to the burden of clean irony contained in this parade of platitudes. But, it’s what these occasions are all about. And, to give credit to some hardworking people in the PMO Tour department whose work is seldom acknowledged, it was well choregraphed. The message you were supposed to get, got reported..However, while everybody’s talking about the deal to close the crossing at Roxham Road, and possible joint operations to bring order to Haiti, it would be unhelpful for Canadians to miss the prime minister’s other message. It was coded, but it was clear. "Everything is interwoven." Calling the times in which we live a ‘consequential moment… serious times,’ the prime minister warmed to his rhetorical climax, declared, “Our way of living is facing multiple threats at the same time. That's why security policy is climate policy is economic policy. Because climate change, inflation, war, energy shortages, but also foreign interference, misinformation, disinformation and constant attacks on our values and institutions all compound.... Authoritarian threats both at home and abroad. We have to continue to do what is right. This is not the time to compromise on our values.”.Decoded, that means your Liberal government believes that to deal with what it has considers interwoven threats in these consequential times, it too must be everywhere, and in everything. The government that once surreptitiously tracked your cellphone, that took unto itself the powers of the Emergencies Act and now wants to control the use Canadians make of the Internet, is deeply concerned with people whose different ideas may be... what? Misinformation? Disinformation? Unacceptable?.There was much talk of liberty (American) and freedom. (Canadian.) Sounds like the same thing..But, too much irony, too much code..These are consequential times indeed, and that Biden and Trudeau are singing from the same song sheet is not necessarily a sweet sound for people who love those things on either side of the border.
It should be no surprise that during an official visit such as that of U.S. President Biden to Canada now underway, that both leaders sing from the same song sheet. (Something would be wrong if they didn't.).Thus, we heard much aspirational rhetoric from both the president and from Prime Minister Trudeau about coordinated action to deal with the fentanyl problem, standing up for democracy in Ukraine and ad nauseam, about how climate change and economic policy and national security were all so intimately bound up, that they were really all the same thing. People were produced as props — that’s standard these days — and so were asked to stand up in the gallery a beaming steel worker whose status as the beneficiary of promised Liberal largesse earned him a standing ovation, and a delightful Ukrainian woman who has been in Canada 10 years but still has relatives at risk in the old country..Then the big moment, the acknowledgment of Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor. In some ways they were obvious props for a prime ministerial call out. Yet given the content of the CSIS leaks of the past few weeks, they showed in my view remarkable generosity of spirit in allowing themselves to be used that way. Any of us could put ourselves in their place and wonder with them, when after more than two years living rough in a crowded Chinese jail cell with no daylight, access to consular advice or even certainty that you wouldn’t be summarily executed, whether their prime minister had any idea what that had been like, as he wittered on that he had got them home, “the right way, by the rule of law…”.Mr. Trudeau might have said more, if he had said less about that and praised instead their fortitude in a very difficult situation. (Later Mr. Trudeau sidestepped a question about whether he actually believed Han Dong, accused of recommending to a Chinese diplomat that their sufferings be extended lest the Conservatives benefit. There’s a pattern here…).There was more food for cynics: Did we really need a presidential visit to get serious about fentanyl? And while we may support Ukraine for all sorts of good reasons — in Canada’s case if only because the million-plus Ukrainian vote is worth having — it is wildly imaginative to suppose democracy in Ukraine resembles anything experienced in this country, or described further south by de Tocqueville. Indeed, it is a country in which electoral winners prosecute and imprison the losers and their supporters. (Yes, they do that in Ukraine, too.).And of course, when it comes to climate change, Canada under Mr. Trudeau has become a country that cares deeply about it, right up to the point where selling clean Alberta natural gas offshore to help an ally, or to facilitate a friendly country switching out of coal, might help the province in Confederation that he least likes. (Then, not so much.).So, it was quite a show: Only the weight of ‘clean steel’ promised from Dofasco by the prime minister compares to the burden of clean irony contained in this parade of platitudes. But, it’s what these occasions are all about. And, to give credit to some hardworking people in the PMO Tour department whose work is seldom acknowledged, it was well choregraphed. The message you were supposed to get, got reported..However, while everybody’s talking about the deal to close the crossing at Roxham Road, and possible joint operations to bring order to Haiti, it would be unhelpful for Canadians to miss the prime minister’s other message. It was coded, but it was clear. "Everything is interwoven." Calling the times in which we live a ‘consequential moment… serious times,’ the prime minister warmed to his rhetorical climax, declared, “Our way of living is facing multiple threats at the same time. That's why security policy is climate policy is economic policy. Because climate change, inflation, war, energy shortages, but also foreign interference, misinformation, disinformation and constant attacks on our values and institutions all compound.... Authoritarian threats both at home and abroad. We have to continue to do what is right. This is not the time to compromise on our values.”.Decoded, that means your Liberal government believes that to deal with what it has considers interwoven threats in these consequential times, it too must be everywhere, and in everything. The government that once surreptitiously tracked your cellphone, that took unto itself the powers of the Emergencies Act and now wants to control the use Canadians make of the Internet, is deeply concerned with people whose different ideas may be... what? Misinformation? Disinformation? Unacceptable?.There was much talk of liberty (American) and freedom. (Canadian.) Sounds like the same thing..But, too much irony, too much code..These are consequential times indeed, and that Biden and Trudeau are singing from the same song sheet is not necessarily a sweet sound for people who love those things on either side of the border.