“Would you really be so bold as to steal the land for a Trudeau memorial?”
“Just watch me.”
It’s telling of the characters of the two men that the one was prepared to go to great measures to protect the nation’s democratically elected representatives against the targeted violence of radical terrorists, and the other is prepared to go to great measures to specifically appropriate land set aside for a memorial to his ideological opponents purely out of pettiness and spite.
And for as much as Trudeau is reviled for having enacted the War Powers Act, and whatever abuses might have come about under it, Trudeau himself got the act replaced, because he understood that it granted far too large and sweeping a set of powers which were not always needed in full.
Does Canada have a great many victims of Communism? Being American, I am pretty ignorant of Canadian history - was it just the aristocrats who were beheaded in the Dark Times that led to universal healthcare?
Not at all - many peasants have been subjected to the horrors of free healthcare, public education, employment insurance, and old age pensions.
They should also build a memorial to the victims of capitalism.
Although there are certainly reasons to criticize Trudeau’s use of the War Measures Act, it’s interesting to note that it marked an end to FLQ violence and threats. Indeed, I don’t recall that there were even any minor incidents afterwards.
This quote requires a lot more context.
At first glance opposition groups looks a lot like opposition parties, and using the October Crisis as an excuse to go after political rivals would be a major abuse.
But as far as I know the groups in question refers to the FLQ, an actual terrorist organization. If those are the groups in question I think that’s a critical piece of context that’s missing and radically changes the implications of the quote.
The War Measures Act during that month was used against much more than just suspected FLQ. Many radical leftists with no connection to FLQ were arrested as the police went down their lists of known subversives. While the FLQ faded away after that, invoking martial law was probably overkill.
No, they went after socialist groups, antiwar groups, and other leftwing groups who were in no way associated with the FLQ. My father’s own group, Forward – now the NDP Left Caucus – had its membership rolls burgled from its offices by the RCMP under WMA.
To be fair, a lot of that was huge sections of their support base drawing away from the FLQ out of disgust and condemnation of their kidnapping and murdering innocent people.
When the behavior of a hated cause / faction / instituon / culture that you’re fighting against is more sympathetic and well liked than your own actions are, you’ve shot yourself in the foot.
Radical violence falls into this pitfall all too easily - people might cheer when the Revolution harms a hated opposition figure, but they will be outraged if the Revolution harms a respected one. This is why revolutionary movements rely so heavily on propaganda and the distortion of reality - you have to male the people you kill into monsters, or people will condemn the violence.
Stephen Harper is an ass.
Canadians, why do you keep electing people like Harper and mayor Laughable Bumblefuck? Not only are they bad for the country/city, but they are such assholes that they bring down Canada’s reputation for niceness.
There isn’t enough stone.
Christ, What an asshole.
It’d be interesting to see the government put it out to tender. Which would win? The contractor’s desire to minimize the critical monument, or to maximize profits at cost plus plenty percent?
I’m gonna go with @Boundegar’s “not enough stone”.
For all the antagonism between Nixon and Trudeau… wow
They’re building one around Fort MacMurray right now.
I don’t know about Mayor Laughable Bumblefuck, but for Harper we at least have the excuse of a parliamentary system with first-past-the-post seat elections, and low voter turnout. In the last election, the Conservatives got 39% of the votes cast (only 24% of actual possible votes - the voter turnout was only 59%) and ended up with 53% of the seats, which let them govern as they do.
Easy answer: Many left wing parties, one right wing party. Vote splitting --> Conservative victories.
It’s meant to be a monument to international victims, the families of some of whom eventually immigrated to Canada. (If you look at the board of directors for the charity behind the monument, it consists primarily of people active in Eastern European or Asian community associations.)
It’s a little odd, and there’s certainly a political element to the current government championing it, but it wouldn’t be entirely without precedent — there’s a monument to Katyn down the street from me, for instance, and the country has several monuments to the Holodomor.
