Thoughts on Trudeau of late.

I'm not particularly a fan of Trudeau. But, I find a lot of the criticisms he faces misplaced. And I suspect some part of that is also his fault. But, his ability to manage personal crises aside I want to focus on a few key elements of late which may deal a blow to his image; Keystone XL, Payette's resignation and the Pfizer delays.

It is hard to decide which of these is the most ridiculous. But, I think I would resign the Governor General to the least ridiculous, or perhaps most unfortunate depending on how you want to view it. But, I'll get to that later.

First, I will start with Keystone XL. This one is Alberta's fault. Period. While I know that the Federal Government has been involved and it has been in their interest to seem involved if only to try and lure Conservative voters, this was not exactly a shock and it wasn't even guaranteed to succeed if Trump had remained President. On top of which, the Federal government DID step in and save another pipeline; the Transmountain Pipeline. Both pipelines are of dubious value to the long term economics of Canada or even Alberta. But, the government did toss Albertans a very large bone on that one.

And, as stated, Keystone looked quite potentially doomed from the start. It was cancelled under Obama. And yes, that was rescinded under Trump. But, there is a reason that we're here 4 years later and this pipeline is STILL not far enough along that it couldn't be scrapped again. And that is because even with the support of Trump and Alberta and yes, even the Canadian government, it hit barrier after barrier.

But, ultimately, it died where and when it did not because of anyone in Canadian politics. It died because an American President decided to kill it. And, the rhetoric out of Alberta that we should impose trade sanctions is frankly the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. No. What the governments of Alberta and Canada SHOULD be doing is accepting that this happened and won't be rescinded again and instead use the damage done to Canada as leverage to get in on enacting an energy plan which can benefit both Alberta and the US which aligns with Biden's strategy.

Such a move would be a win-win. The oil and gas industries prime is behind it. Some regions may be able to squeeze out short term gains for a few more years. But, I wager that will boil more down to either clout or luck than any particular strategy. And Canada doesn't have the clout and we shouldn't gamble on luck. Alberta can, and should be, a green energy power house.

On Pfizer, I already talked about this in another post. There is not a damn thing the government can do. And there isn't a damn thing which another administration might have been able to do once we hit this point. Any MP criticizing the Prime Minister or his party for the outcome are simply attempting to turn the pandemic into a tool of partisan politics and they should be ejected from the house of commons via humorous circus cannons.

Basically, Pfizer is NOT a Canadian company. They tried to be fair in how they handled the delays. But, ultimately, the EU, where the company actually is headquartered put pressures on them. And clearly, they felt the pressure merited their shift in tactics. There is simply no way in hell we could exert the same pressure.

On Payette, I said this was the least ridiculous because apparently Trudeau skipped the use a 3rd party committee to vet the selection for Governor General and instead chose his own. However, this committee wasn't some long standing tradition either. Rather, it was implemented first by his predecessor. And, appointees to this role still undergo rigorous background checks.

I don't personally think that a 3rd party selection process really improves the odds of not making such a mistake. Though, I can admit that it doesn't look good. And, Trudeau should take some blame. By eschewing that option, he took a risk. It didn't pay off.

All that being said though... the Prime Minister doesn't technically choose or hire the Governor General. As per our constitution, that responsibility lies solely with the Monarchy. And while it would be beyond unconventional for Queen Elizabeth to reject an appointee to this position it is nonetheless her prerogative and part of that process does involve having this person meet the Queen so that she can make that determination. 

Put another way; Payette is a former astronaut and, prior to this, a well respected Canadian figure. She passed all of the background checks, including ones carried out by CSIS and she raised no red flags to the Queen who has long been considered a good judge of character.

Furthermore, the grounds for her resignation are not the sort of thing which are likely to have been uncovered by an independent selection committee. Canadian labour laws and hiring practices in general put a lot of the power regarding providing references in the hands of the candidate and present legal risks for references who give negative reviews.

In short... this isn't the sort of thing such a selection process would have been able to detect. So, it is a bit silly to blame anyone for the appointment. Had she somehow been grossly under-qualified for the job, or had she been a threat to national security it would be a whole other can of worms.

Now, as promised, as much as I hate the current Conservative party, I'm also no fan of Trudeau. From my perspective is that he had a reasonable first 2 years. He accomplished quite a few of his campaign promises and made some progress. And then he kind of stopped doing anything worth mentioning.

Really, he got lucky when the pandemic hit because he was fast to respond, and the way in which the government responded in the early months was actually not horrible.

That being said, the government spends too much effort on image and not enough on change. Specifically, I think climate change is a bigger threat than COVID-19 and the government campaigned on environmental topics. But, they seem to be largely maintaining the status quo with relatively minor investments forward on environmental topics. 

And yes, I know the Alberta thing is sensitive. But, there is a clear, easy solution here; dump a shit tonne of money into Alberta for the express purpose of growing the region as a green power house.

Making a serious, progressive move into the green energy sector and focusing those efforts where the outgoing economy is getting hit the hardest is a smart move on so many levels. 

I also know governing a country isn't as simple as all of that. But, just a government can buy a pipeline and make it succeed, I KNOW there are ways to execute on that vague strategy.