Poli SAVVY: Petty high school gossip or world leaders making fun of Trump?

Well, Christmas has come a bit early this year, thanks to Saturday Night Live!

Anything with Paul Rudd, really anything, feels like a gift from Santa. Over the weekend, the late-night comedy show produced a skit portraying the world leaders as cool kids teasing the black sheep of the gang, U.S. President Trump.

While Paul Rudd was impersonating a bad boy-version of French President Emmanuel Macron, Jimmy Fallon took the role of an over-apologetic Justin Trudeau and James Corden was U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

The skit was a recollection of a conversation from the NATO summit that took place a week ago at Buckingham Palace, in London. Trudeau was caught on hot mic by a CBC producer venting to the other leaders about Trump’s lengthy 40-minute press conference from earlier that day.

As much as the skit was delicious to watch, some people were quick to point out that such comments could hurt the Canada-U.S. relationship. “At a time when Canada needs strong relationships more than ever, Justin Trudeau’s poor judgment, lack of professionalism and love of drama continues to weaken Canada’s position on the world stage. We saw this just yesterday at the NATO Summit,” said Opposition Leader Andrew Scheer on Parliament Hill.

You might wonder what all the fuss is if the entire world is already laughing at the guy…

Even the U.S. president’s leading political rival, Joe Biden, used the footage of Trudeau’s comments for one of his Democratic Party’s presidential nomination ads on Twitter. The post read “The world is laughing at President Trump.”

Does this give a free card for bullying? No. Will it affect Canada’s relationship with America? Well, I would hope that this precious relationship is strong enough to survive high school gossip, Andrew.

 

Graphic by Victoria Blair

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