Category Archives: Justin Trudeau

Dec 18 2015
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Justin Trudeau, Syrian refugees, uncategorized

Adorable

Amy Walter. Adorable.

Amy Walter. Adorable.

One encounters over the course of one’s life a limited number of people of whom it might be said that they are adorable. Not beautiful, although beautiful they may be. Not sexy, although that too is possible. People you are drawn to without being sexually attracted to. People at whom you cannot not look. People who do not fail to make you smile, who are the human equivalent of puppies. You know — adorable people.

Here are some of the people I find adorable, in no particular order:

  • Ellen Degeneres
  • Ellen Page
  • Amy Walter of the Cook Political Report
  • Michelle Williams
  • Seth Myers
  • Trevor Noah
  • And yes, Canada’s new Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau.
Matthew, from Downtown Abbey

Matthew from Downtown Abbey. Too adorable to die.

Jian Ghomeshi was adorable until he wasn’t and Dan Stevens, the actor who played Matthew on Downtown Abbey, is so adorable that, after they pulled the plug on his character, I didn’t have the heart to watch another season. “I can’t believe they killed Matthew!” I lamented on Facebook, garnering this chilly response from my brother Peter: “Thanks for the spoiler.  I’m still in Season 2.”   My sister Pamela shared my distress: “What is the point of Downtown Abbey if there’s no Matthew?” she wondered.

Exactly.

During the recent Canadian federal election, my friend Andrea worked with a woman assigned the task of driving Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau between speaking engagements. It was warm outside and, having sweated through his shirt at the first engagement, he was obliged to change into a fresh one in the back seat of her car.

“It was the greatest moment of my life!” she remembers.

"Handsome Canadian Prime Minister greets adorable Syrian refugees."

“Handsome Canadian Prime Minister greets adorable Syrian refugees.” Damn straight!

Recently Justin Trudeau was on hand to personally greet the first plane full of Syrian refugees coming to Canada. Slate’s headlined its Facebook post on the event this way:  “Handsome Canadian Prime Minister greets adorable Syrian refugees.”  A great photo op? Of course. Grandstanding? Grand gesture is more like it. And why not? In this sad, sorry world of ours, with so many of our neighbours to the South and not a few grumpy old Canadians  roiling in xenophobia and entitlement, there’s no such thing as too much adorable.

Trudeau welcomes Syrian refugees

Syrian refugees take selfies with the Prime Minister. Adorable.

 

 

Nov 06 2015
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Canadian election 2015, CBC radio, Conservatives, Ezra Levant, Justin Trudeau, Liberals, Pierre Trudeau

Justin Trudeau! Hallelujah!

As a (clearly American) wag put it,

Justin Trudeau

Thank you, Canada, for restoring my faith in, well, Canada.

Of late, that faith had wavered, as a Conservatism that errs dangerously close to that of Right Wing Republicans in the United States gained purchase in my adopted country. This was evidenced by the ascendancy of columnists like Mean Boy Ezra Levant and a government that, for nine long soul-destroying years, promulgated a hardly concealed racism, while exhibiting a blatant disregard for our planet, indigenous people and that quintessential of all Canadian traits, niceness.

And then October 19 happened and Canadians all over this country rose up, said, “Hell, no!” and swept the Conservatives out of office;  in a landslide victory, Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau became our 23rd Prime Minister.

I feel reborn.

citizencard2Back in the mid-70’s, when I first came to Canada as a graduate student at the University of Toronto (and when Justin’s fab Dad, Pierre  “Just Watch Me “Trudeau, was PM), I lived in a dive in the Annex with no access to a television. I listened instead to a then fully funded CBC radio. Over the next several years, this national treasure — another target of Harper’s Conservatives —  provided me a crash course on Canada – its culture, its vast geography, its history, its politics — subjects about which the overwhelming number of Americans know absolutely nothing. When I finally became a Canadian citizen in 1991, that decision was not born of necessity or convenience. I may have been born an American; I chose to become a Canadian.

Canada is a great country. More importantly, it’s a good country. And it’s back.

citizencard1_0001So pack up your Ayn Rand, your Ezra Levant, your lack of fellow feeling, your race-baiting and your fear-mongering and head on south to one of those Red States, you know, one of those Hell holes where ideas go to die. You’re bound to feel more comfortable there with your cranky cohort  than in the True North Strong and Free.

Because we’re not in Kansas anymore.

We’re in Canada.

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