Everything you say can be used against you

Image of Justin Trudeau courtesy of Flickr.
Image of Justin Trudeau courtesy of Flickr.

Liberal MP and candidate for Liberal leadership Justin Trudeau has recently been criticized in the news regarding quotes he said around two years ago which are now labelling him as “anti-Albertan.”

Here’s what happened:

In 2010, Trudeau attended the Télé-Québec television program Les francs-tireurs (The Straight Shooters) for an interview and said Canada wasn’t doing well “because it’s Albertans who control our community and socio-democratic agenda.”

The comments from the interview, especially the above mentioned, set off a reaction from Conservative MPs on Parliament Hill resulting in, what some would call, an exaggerated amount of attention.

Trudeau wasn’t running for the position of Liberal leader at the time he said it, making it easier for him to get away with it. Now, all of a sudden, it’s resurfaced, and it’s making headlines.

So, is what he said two years ago really relevant in the news now? The truth is, it is… now that he’s in the spotlight and vying to be the Prime Minister of Canada.

Being in the public eye has its ups and downs, especially when it comes to politics. Politicians’ words represent who they are as a leader and what they want to achieve with their power. Every single word a politician utters is jotted down and recorded, making the ‘thinking before you speak’ rule absolutely key at all times.

Unfortunately, with good press comes bad press. In this case, Trudeau is experiencing some bad press. It appears Conservatives have been putting a lot of effort into looking back and beyond in the Justin Trudeau files to expose some negative dirt on him to the public.

Since Trudeau announced that he was running in September, the man has mostly received positive feedback from the public. He’s been called a front-runner time and time again. He’s Pierre Elliot Trudeau’s son, he’s young and lest we forget, handsome; an idealistic political figure.

With a reputation like that, he’s a favorite to many, except, of course, the opposition, who now see him as a threat.

As the age old saying goes, the only way to bring an enemy down is to make them look bad, in this case by digging deep into their past and finding something juicy to terrorize them with.

We’ve seen all kinds of dirt brought up about politicians in the news before, some of the more common ones being affairs, bribes, inappropriate behavior… and the list goes on.

Since the issue made headlines last week, Trudeau has appeared in front of the media in Vancouver apologizing, for the second time, for the unintentional offence.

“I’m sorry I said what I did. I was wrong to relate the area of the country that [Prime Minister Stephen] Harper is from with the people who live there and the policies that he has that don’t represent the values of most Canadians,” said Trudeau. “It was wrong to use a shorthand to say Alberta, when I was really talking about Mr. Harper’s government, and I’m sorry I did that.”

Trudeau greeted the reporters happily with a smile on his face, and no visible shame whatsoever, indicating a sense that the matter to him isn’t as serious as the news media is making it. Although the situation may not have worried Trudeau, he officially has been warned.

Trudeau, I hope you’ve learned your lesson and won’t be making the same mistake in the future. I rest my case.

1 comment

  1. AGREED. Justin Trudeau is the Mitt Romney of Canada – he’s interested in power, not what’s best for Canada and/or Quebec. Granted, he has an amazing ability to assuage the concerns of whomever he is talking to, (thus saying whatever is required for support) but he is alas, a political puppet. Of who, though?! We seriously need to ask this question.

    Justin needs to be called out on all of these “discrepancies” and held accountable for his comments/remarks THROUGHOUT and even before his leadership bid.

    I would welcome a chance to debate this “light-weight”.

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