The Star came out of the closet on Sunday, Feb. 13, dropping any pretense of being an objective reporter of the news. Its front page, featuring two solid red arrows pointing dramatically to the right, posed the question, against a black background that took up three quarters of the page: Is This The Rise Of The Far Right Here In Canada? It was clearly referring to the Trucker Convoy and the massive, more or less spontaneous support it was receiving from the Canadian population. The dramatic impact the page was obviously designed to make seemed to me more typical of a ranting piece of propaganda than an honest attempt at journalistic integrity.
Two lengthy articles inveighed against what seemed to their writers the rise of “Trump-style populism.” Each engaged in generalization after generalization, dragging out the same vicious slurs typically used by the Left in lieu of actual, rational discourse. And so, for example, Susan Delacourt’s article cites the observation of “veteran U.S. journalist Alex Wagner” who pointed out the disturbing parallels between those thousands of Canadians supporting the trucker convoy and those who generally show up in support of Donald Trump.
The revealing parallel is not the anger of the crowds, Wagner observed, but the joy…..”There’s like a sort of rowdy carnival-like atmosphere, which is something you see at every Trump rally.”
As you must have realized by now, in the feeble minds of the religious Left, any similarity between a political movement or any aspect of its agenda and anything Donald Trump has ever either said or done, by definition proves the villainy of that movement. If Trump likes chocolate chip cookies and you do too, you must be a monster.! Hence Delacourt’s suggestion that the “joy” of those hundreds of thousands who lined Canada’s highways in support of the convoy, is actually a matter of some concern.
She pursues this line of “logic” by invoking the observations of University of Alberta political scientist Jared Wesley, an expert, apparently, on the sinister characteristics of the contemporary, world-wide, populist revolution. Delacourt states: What’s struck Wesley, among others, throughout the convoy protest are the ways in which the demonstrators have appropriated symbols of patriotism and Canadian identity, right up to this country’s reputation for being “nice.”
So those who were waving Canadian flags and singing our national anthem, those who were clapping and cheering along Canada’s highways, often with their children next to them, were merely pretending to be patriotic, pretending to be nice. Such is the profound analysis of a U. of Alberta “intellectual;” such is one of the major themes of Delacourt’s superficial article.
Of course there were overtly hostile signs displayed in Ottawa such as those saying “Fuck Trudeau.” Wesley, ever ready with an explanation in line with his bias, ascribes them to the ugly “tribalism” inherent in all populist movements. Ms. Delacourt agrees. When “ordinary” people of “conservative” views appear to be sweet, peace-loving advocates for their personal freedoms, they’re really just pretending. And when they get angry because they feel their views have been given no honest consideration whatsoever by our “intellectual” elites, they betray their true nature as the sub-humans the Left has arrogantly concluded them to be.
Yes, the anger amongst millions of “conservative” Canadians with their Prime Minister has nothing to do with his stated admiration for the former dictator of Cuba, nothing to do with his admitted respect for the despots of Communist China, nothing to do with the fact that he got elected primarily because of the identity of his equally totalitarian father, nothing to do with the fact that he has basically granted himself dictatorial powers to deal with a traffic problem in downtown Ottawa…….No, those of us who loathe this arrogant ideologue are simply victims of a “tribalist” mentality rooted in hate and clearly inferior to that of the brilliant “intellectuals” cited in Delacourt’s brilliant article, an article which ludicrously asks us to believe that an apparent dictator is not really a dictator, while people who behave like civilized, peace-loving human beings are actually monsters in disguise.