Full Comment - Jean Chrétien looks better now compared to the alternative

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00:00:55.200 the little guy from shawinigan le petit gar jean cretchen turned 90 recently and a who's who

00:01:01.900 of canadian politics turned out for an event in ottawa to honor canada's 20th prime minister

00:01:06.940 even stephen harper who once squared off against cretchen sent a video message that had the place

00:01:12.200 in uproarious laughter as harper sang to cretchen in french hello and welcome to the full comment

00:01:17.520 podcast my name is brian lily your host and this week we're going to look at the cretchen legacy

00:01:22.700 in the time around his birthday there were no ends of accolades some media interviews and a lot of

00:01:27.800 reminiscing cretchen is having a bit of a moment but not everyone is impressed chris ellie penned a

00:01:33.820 column in national post titled more pearls of nonsense from jean cretchen with the subhead

00:01:38.900 why is anyone still listening to this proudly a moral mediocrity in it he takes cretchen to task 1.00

00:01:45.420 on several fronts including his handling of indigenous issues as minister and as pm like all prime

00:01:51.920 ministers cretchen's reigns had its good points and it's bad he was famous for colorful turns of

00:01:57.020 phrase for me pepper i put it on my plate next i don't know your proof is a proof what kind of

00:02:04.480 a proof it's a proof a proof is a proof and when you have a good proof is because it's proven he

00:02:09.620 famously balanced the budget and he put canada on a sound fiscal footing he was also pm during what

00:02:15.540 became known as the sponsorship scandal he was pm of the country when it was nearly torn apart by a

00:02:20.860 referendum in quebec but he was also pm when the side of national unity won so where does cretchen's

00:02:27.380 legacy stand 20 years after he left office that's really only something that can be properly assessed

00:02:32.720 years after he's gone and perhaps now's the time so to take a look at the cretchen legacy i'm joined

00:02:37.680 by chris sellie of the national post also steven le drew a lawyer political commentator and a man who

00:02:43.140 spent many years inside the liberal party and served as party president while cretchen was leader

00:02:47.840 gentlemen thanks for the time good to be here thanks for having me chris let me start with you

00:02:53.820 um your column took cretchen to task at a time when the liberal party was singing his accolades

00:02:59.720 a big part of the focus but not the only part of your column was looking at his record on indigenous

00:03:05.620 issues and i found it interesting that after singing his praises for for days the liberals were

00:03:12.980 suddenly running away from cretchen when it came out that uh while he was prime minister he tried

00:03:18.940 to weaken the language in the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples

00:03:23.840 and they're calling that a a stain on canada's uh history the liberals seem to uh love and hate the

00:03:31.740 guy all at the same time well yeah that was an interesting moment because that's far from the most

00:03:37.580 damning thing uh in hindsight about his record on on indigenous affairs i mean frankly i would prefer

00:03:44.680 to have a prime minister who tried to influence wording in an agreement like that that canada 0.92

00:03:50.040 could actually support rather than what the current government has done which is essentially say

00:03:54.080 oh no we agree with everything in this u.n declaration on indigenous affairs we're going to make it

00:03:58.580 canadian law but really nothing's going to change um you know indigenous people in canada don't have 1.00

00:04:04.300 self-determination just because we've said we agree with uh the um with the u.n declaration to me

00:04:11.420 what's more remarkable is that his legacy uh his his sort of reputation has survived intact as we've

00:04:18.300 really been kind of well canceling people who had anything whatsoever to do with the residential school

00:04:25.440 system over the years well canceling conservatives who have had anything to do with the residential school

00:04:30.580 system because you know there's still a mountain named after pierre trudeau there's still uh schools

00:04:35.520 named after him a statue in toronto a statue in montreal an airport in montreal and he he opened the last

00:04:43.460 residential school in canada yeah that's true although i mean one of the most notable people to be canceled

00:04:49.100 was egerson ryerson who was a public education pioneer in ontario who had very little to do or upper

00:04:56.380 canada as it then was who had very little to do really with the residential school system and he

00:05:00.500 wasn't identified as a conservative uh or a liberal as far as i know i don't actually know what his

00:05:05.400 political affiliations were so it was broader than that um and if anything but all i mean is if

00:05:10.300 anything was going to make people say oh you know geez maybe we shouldn't be quite so um laudatory

00:05:16.880 about jean kratria over his record of indigenous affairs it would be you know the fact that he introduced

00:05:21.440 the 1969 white paper which was essentially going to write special status for for um indigenous people

00:05:28.240 out of existence you know an assimilationist document that eventually got withdrawn but you

00:05:33.600 know just a few years ago or two years ago uh he gave this horrendous interview in in quebec where he

00:05:39.800 basically it sounded like he didn't even really understand what the residential schools were he sort

00:05:43.780 of compared them to his own experience at boarding school um where he had not you know his parents had

00:05:49.280 not been forced to send him there uh and it was this was an academically elite seminary school

00:05:54.200 obviously so there was so much on his record to make people pause and and and so it was i found it

00:06:02.780 remarkable that it was that story about uh the negotiators on the u.n declaration that finally got

00:06:07.480 people liberals you know as you say a stain i mean that's a pretty harsh word i i uh i'm not a fan of

00:06:15.940 canceling people um in general and and definitely not over um historical uh positions but steven uh

00:06:24.580 what would you uh say in response to to chris on this front well i mean this is going to sound heresy

00:06:30.920 to most of your listeners but quite frankly residential schools were not a big issue until just in the last

00:06:38.860 few years in the past few years it was um pierre elliot trudeau as uh as chris said opened up the the

00:06:45.520 last school he as um minister of justice and then carried on as prime minister uh brought them totally

00:06:53.980 under the the auspices of the federal government they were still considered to be uh better than the

00:07:01.760 alternative in some cases and there's no question i mean you can't question the fact that there are some

00:07:07.160 horrific experiences particularly around the turn of the last century uh no question about that but

00:07:13.220 i mean when you have someone as enlightened as pierre elliot trudeau saying well listen it's better

00:07:18.580 than the alternative in some cases and that went on for years and years and years that's why i say

00:07:22.400 um it will sound like heresy to some people but put yourself in the context of the time and then put

00:07:29.020 yourself as chrachin did let's not forget chrachin when he was in the indian affairs as it was called then

00:07:34.940 um made extensive visits uh throughout the communities he made a whole new community

00:07:42.800 and for davis inlet when he went there and saw what terrible conditions he spent tens of millions

00:07:50.520 of dollars we're going to build a brand new community with everything uh for you people in

00:07:55.940 davis inlet um and move you over there so you have a better life chrachin actually adopted and i'll use

00:08:03.420 this because i'm in a part of ontario where there's a reserve nearby and the people on the reserve

00:08:09.100 call themselves indians so chrachin adopted an indian boy i brought him into his family and treated him

00:08:16.180 like a son so yes there were some inadequacies but i don't think there were uh nobody should be

00:08:24.620 canceling chrachin for what he did on the indian file it's interesting you say that uh what you're

00:08:30.660 saying is heresy now i remember covering the residential school apology that stephen harper

00:08:35.320 gave and speaking to people who had gone to the residential schools and hearing from those who had

00:08:43.200 gone through horrific ordeals but also people who said i actually had a good education that's not the

00:08:48.340 story for everyone but mine was good you can't tell those stories now that you can't tell those stories

00:08:54.540 at this point better than the alternative i've spoken to people like that too brian that would

00:08:58.880 be great if attendance had been voluntary uh i don't think you can really excuse taking people's

00:09:04.400 kids away uh even in the benefit of hindsight but it was the uh the most enlightened minds of the day

00:09:09.200 said it was the right thing to do and as often as the case the most enlightened minds of the day

00:09:12.920 didn't know what they were talking about chrachin's biggest legacy though that most people remember him

00:09:18.120 for they talk about his fiscal record and that's one where he continues to get accolades even though

00:09:26.680 you know there's qualms about that like balancing the budget on the backs of the provinces but it is

00:09:32.900 something that people still talk about and they say well at least chrachin balanced the books well

00:09:38.180 chrachin was a liberal and when you say when you say brian that people now there's some people who are

00:09:45.440 supporting and some people are not that's because of the great division uh right now in the liberal

00:09:51.000 party chrachin was a not a classical liberal but he was a traditional liberal and uh he knew that you

00:09:58.580 have to balance the books and he knew that you had to have programs in certain circumstances but he was

00:10:05.440 not a radical uh or nor nor was he a socialist and the people who um are not supporting him now are the

00:10:13.720 justin liberals as i pull them i say and they are quote either progressives or socialists and they

00:10:20.900 don't like what chrachin did because they have a very new uh viewpoint of the world which i would say

00:10:28.920 over at least over half the party does not support chris yeah i i think uh i mean i noticed over the

00:10:36.000 past couple weeks i saw a couple people in interviews asking about his his top achievements and he says

00:10:41.160 balancing the books both times i saw uh number one and absolutely um you know that's pretty much an

00:10:46.460 unimpeachable um part of his legacy although you know obviously as you say the provinces would

00:10:51.780 would uh would uh have some have some quibbles with that but it's it's you know it's fascinating how

00:10:58.860 out of fashion that has now become um and i don't even really get the impression that uh you know

00:11:06.620 the conservatives now pierre probably have talks talks about balancing the budget but it's not sort

00:11:10.300 of it's not like a balance the budget at all costs kind of message that you would sometimes get uh or

00:11:16.480 not at all costs but you know until quite recently like even the ndp would have their platforms uh

00:11:22.660 promising balanced budgets and at some point we're gonna have to get back to that

00:11:26.700 mulcare ran on a balanced budget in 2015 and jack layton did in 2011 and at some point we're gonna

00:11:34.360 have to get back to that and at that point gretchen will probably you know people will look to what he 0.98

00:11:38.060 did um yeah i can't quibble with with that part of his legacy as far as i'm concerned

00:11:42.480 uh steven you were around at that point um you know maybe you've heard this story maybe you've

00:11:50.340 heard others but i'm told that um when ministers would go and they'd have this great idea and you

00:11:58.480 know because gretchen would allow ministers to go out and come up with policy ideas and then pitch them 1.00

00:12:02.120 to him and so they'd they'd be like oh boss i got something i got something really good i just need

00:12:07.080 an increase of x number of dollars or x percent in the department's budget and he would i'm told he

00:12:13.220 would sit there and listen and say uh-huh uh-huh uh-huh and then the minister would leave and he

00:12:17.640 would call martin and treasury board and say cut them by double what they asked for and that stopped

00:12:23.540 ministers from asking for money have you heard that story or others like it well i have heard that

00:12:28.580 story i have a story um well actually it was when he was a minister of justice but kretchen is a

00:12:36.840 was and is a consummate political animal and so the story you just recounted brian is about finances

00:12:44.660 but he would always look at something from in those days finances because he was trying to balance the

00:12:49.880 budget but in in other circumstances he would look at the politics of it is this going to be a problem

00:12:57.200 down the line is this new program going to be worth it is this uh question that you want addressed

00:13:03.340 really you know going to be uh stirring up trouble for me and for my government uh he would rather let

00:13:12.440 things lie than be a uh a real disturber of the the status quo well that's unlike the conservative i might

00:13:22.420 say well well he was he was a traditional liberal that way in other words he would say if it's not

00:13:29.680 broken we aren't going to go in there and stir this but let me compare that to the current guy

00:13:34.480 because we've got a story out of the montreal gazette where they're going after wood-fired

00:13:39.940 pizzerias and bagel shops over pollution and climate change and you're like really you're going to take on

00:13:48.820 this this this is what's going to save the world is taking on that's something to me the kretchen would

00:13:55.340 look at and say you know that might make the people angry you know you're absolutely right but that's

00:14:02.800 how kretchen that's how kretchen judged matters and whether it was worth it or not and uh that's why

00:14:11.020 uh many people in the party now say gosh wish we had that guy back because he wouldn't be going

00:14:17.000 off on these cockamamie schemes which are i think probably well they're they're ill-advised at best

00:14:23.640 and the probably part of the problem with them is that it's to um deflect criticism of the failures

00:14:32.300 of this government so let's have something new that somebody might like that's what that's what

00:14:36.880 trudeau's so you're talking about someone who's very pragmatic now chris your subhead and i don't

00:14:41.840 know if you wrote it but it's in your column as well you you describe kretchen as amoral you didn't

00:14:47.660 have any guiding principles um tell me why you're saying that what what is it that makes you jump out

00:14:54.820 and say this guy's completely amoral not immoral but amoral well i think stephen kind of hit on it

00:15:01.760 there is is that he had an uh an acute sense of what the public wanted and what the public didn't

00:15:09.720 want uh and that's a good thing but i think it led him uh it it it his pragmatism i think

00:15:18.100 is to a fault and it's still to a fault i mean when you look for example at his relations with with

00:15:23.660 the chinese um you look for example where you know when uh we were trying to get the two michaels out

00:15:28.260 and he was just out there flapping his gums saying oh let's let's just you know free

00:15:31.820 meng wing chao you know never mind the rule of law we'll just we'll just do a prisoner exchange like 0.99

00:15:36.560 we're in the middle east or something um his record on on china overall is chris well it's chris what

00:15:45.440 what would have been the matter with that if there had been just an as you say an exchange of prisoners

00:15:50.240 forget about the rule of law because we have an agreement with the united states because we have it

00:15:54.180 because we have an agreement with the united states on expedition we could have gotten around that

00:16:00.600 agreement easily talked to a number of lawyers and they there's ways to get around that but the

00:16:06.080 government was just so doe-headed they didn't have any operatives they didn't have anybody who knew

00:16:12.160 what the heck they were doing and chretchen you know i mean you can point it out chris as it was a

00:16:17.000 fault but he was very practical and i dare say so we had some judge in vancouver who spent months of

00:16:24.120 not years trying to figure out whether she should go back or not or be released and we had two

00:16:29.300 canadians in prison in china for many more years then would have been the case if we had just made

00:16:36.080 an exchange whatever two years earlier let me push back on you a bit there steven um you know to chris's

00:16:42.820 point there is an extradition agreement with the united states wouldn't this have been just giving

00:16:47.320 into hostage diplomacy um all the time when you're dealing with hostages even though you don't say it

00:16:54.760 you don't admit it um we know that there is a certain giving in to hostage diplomacy and you you

00:17:02.620 you couch it in different words but clearly the united states they didn't want to go ahead with this

00:17:08.460 either if we had had some smart operatives going to washington saying look here's an easy way out of

00:17:15.980 this thing they could have sold it it would have been done legally and chris chris i i agree with

00:17:23.640 you on on china being a a bad spot for chretchen but also unfortunately an awful lot of retired 0.99

00:17:29.840 canadian politicians in the last quarter century they all seem to get they all seem to get rich off

00:17:35.920 of china and and and their their their judgment on the issue i think goes out the window but but at

00:17:42.420 home i mean don't you want some pragmatic transactional politics you know it look the

00:17:49.480 the knock against the liberals is if you don't like their principles hang on five minutes they've got more

00:17:53.980 uh and that really they're only about power but there is something to be said for just getting things

00:18:00.520 done as opposed to arguing the way that at times the ndp and the conservatives can be

00:18:06.720 too doctrinaire i i mean i i agree look i mean pragmatism is is uh a canadian trait and i think

00:18:15.180 that's one of the reasons why canadians like chretchen but as i say i think you can take it

00:18:20.200 and it looks good now as you say because there's just so much we just so much weirdness coming out

00:18:26.920 of ottawa just just you know bagels and pizzerias just i mean that's not like a cabinet decision that's

00:18:33.660 some kind of regulatory body doing that but i mean at the same time like what why are we

00:18:37.100 plastic straws you know we don't we don't send any plastic into the ocean why are we

00:18:43.360 why okay why are we doing these things and yeah absolutely i mean i bless you for that bless you for

00:18:50.520 that even though the government would would be probably crawling down my neck right now if they

00:18:55.000 heard me bless you for that because there does need to be a degree of pragmatism in this government

00:18:59.720 some common sense of good judgment that most canadians now i dare say are saying is absent

00:19:05.100 well so wayne easter a long-time liberal mp cabinet minister under with i think he even held a post

00:19:13.980 under trudeau if i'm not mistaken if not he was at least you know uh committee chair and such but a

00:19:19.720 long-time upstanding liberal he turned around a little while ago and he said i'm a member of the

00:19:26.040 liberal party not the justin trudeau moment so before we take a break let's take a couple of

00:19:30.600 moments and talk about the difference between the liberal party as it once existed and and justin

00:19:36.040 trudeau's cult of personality or as somebody recently put it to me they called it the keelberger party

00:19:42.980 this is this is we for politics it's about getting up on stage making you know grand statements and doing

00:19:52.640 nothing except getting rich while feeling good about yourself yeah i mean i i have this expression i i

00:19:59.160 don't know if i coined it or if i saw it somewhere and i've used it but but with the liberals with these

00:20:03.760 guys it's like the announcement is the policy they announce something and that's that and it's like well

00:20:09.760 is it going to work oh i don't know like we'll deal with that you know months down the line we're just

00:20:14.740 trying to win this 24-hour media cycle here so we've got this announcement and and you know then

00:20:20.420 we'll chuck it to the minister and we'll see if it works or not i mean you know losing control of

00:20:25.220 immigration um for god's sake like it's quite amazing that justin trudeau set to lose um set

00:20:35.520 to lose power and part of his legacy at this point would be fracturing not not totally but somewhat a

00:20:42.940 really excellent consensus that we've had about immigration um you know we can quibble over numbers

00:20:47.680 but the fact is we want we generally all want a lot of immigrants we can't build houses for them 1.00

00:20:54.000 they're bringing in you know they brought in so many uh foreign students they didn't know what they

00:20:59.300 were doing i mean what this this to me is something that i would not expect a crutchian government to do

00:21:07.160 and um you know chris chris part of that steven and you say you would not expect a crutchian government

00:21:15.360 and i think you're absolutely right on that because crutchian had a number of very solid ministers in his

00:21:22.740 cabinet he was not afraid um of having someone else who might be as smart as he is or might be as

00:21:29.400 practical unlike our current prime minister who seems doesn't want anybody in his cabinet who has

00:21:35.280 uh announce the brains which would be more than what he has so i mean when you have these um you

00:21:42.320 know these policies coming out of this uh this government uh you don't have ministers who are

00:21:47.260 are going to be pursuing it you're right you have an announcement by the prime minister usually not by

00:21:54.140 other ministers by the prime minister they say oh how how good are we uh we're investing in the middle

00:22:00.240 class we are building the middle class we are building houses he's going across the country now 0.65

00:22:04.880 with announcements of how many houses he has built total bs well and and he'll make these

00:22:11.620 announcements you know oh we're we're building uh 140 units here in guelph ontario 140 units

00:22:18.040 have you looked at the numbers here this has nothing to hold a press conference about i mean it's good

00:22:24.980 but holy cow like we need like housing starts in this country are going down we're building fewer

00:22:32.900 homes now year over year as the housing crisis gets worse and worse yeah to your point about

00:22:39.900 competent ministers steven uh was interesting to see john manley come out about canada's position on

00:22:45.340 the world stage and uh i know you disagree with john on um on china uh chris so do i don't worry

00:22:52.220 but you know he stood up and he said we used to be listened to and and we were manley was going

00:22:58.540 back and forth across the border in the days after 9 11 keeping the border open when the americans

00:23:03.640 wanted everything shut he was dealing with the afghan issue for stephen harper on a uh a bipartisan

00:23:11.440 committee looking at where we should go in the war people used to seek out candidate's opinion and i

00:23:16.600 don't think anybody does now unless they happen to be scrolling by on twitter yeah i'm not so sure

00:23:22.080 i mean that was an interesting article uh i read the article i read about about john manley's uh

00:23:27.860 comments was interesting because it didn't mention a single example of canada actually seeking us out

00:23:32.920 and you mentioned a couple there but i've always i've always thought that that's somewhat exaggerated

00:23:38.360 um the idea of canada as this sort of leading honest broker in the world and and one of the things

00:23:43.800 when when when kretchen just when when kretchen a few years ago actually i think it was on the

00:23:49.440 occasion of his 80th birthday um he was talking about how how you know when he went abroad when

00:23:54.900 he was a when he was prime minister everyone was oh you know canada we need you to do this and do

00:23:59.400 that i mean the most the most famous foreign policy um well the most famous foreign trip i i would

00:24:07.220 think of kretchen's career was we went to israel in 2000 and just made a complete jackass out of 0.51

00:24:12.140 himself for like five days in a row and like he left and the palestinians were angry the syrians were angry 0.94

00:24:17.300 the lebanese were angry the israelis were angry he was just a a bumpkin on the world stage and it was 0.77

00:24:25.340 truly embarrassing and and so to to me to hear him he to hear him talk about how great things were when

00:24:32.620 he was in charge look the man has an ego and he's entitled to it but uh it it it really gets up my

00:24:39.060 nose well chris you're absolutely right about that visit it was an embarrassment and you can't um

00:24:45.140 you can't have uh perfection and that was you're right it was that was just a a dog's breakfast that

00:24:50.600 visit from from beginning to end but he had very few of those and canada notwithstanding a failure or

00:24:58.900 two by the prime minister you still had weight it still had gravitas and certainly had more now

00:25:05.120 largely because of the numbers of circumstances one because our prime minister is a flake he is a

00:25:11.480 lightweight the other world leaders um you know just say oh geez they treat him like canada's

00:25:18.060 version of berlusconi when he was prime minister of italy you know here comes here comes the joker

00:25:22.740 and so we have a joker as prime minister and no flake is the right word okay flake and uh i'll uh

00:25:30.540 accede to you on that chris but the other thing is then that we have nothing in canada to back it up

00:25:36.840 i mean we don't we are not in the five eyes anymore when united states britain um you know

00:25:43.500 australia get together to deal with defense issues they don't even call canada anymore it's not because

00:25:49.840 necessarily the prime minister we don't have any ships that float we have very few planes that fly

00:25:55.920 we don't have soldiers or sailors there's nothing that we can bring to the table we're going to take

00:26:01.940 a quick break here guys it's a fascinating conversation and we haven't even gotten to sponsorship

00:26:06.400 should win a gate the quebec referendum national unity we got to talk about all of those when we

00:26:11.960 come back

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00:28:10.240 responsibly we've talked about jean cretchen's legacy when it comes to fiscal sanity the indigenous

00:28:15.880 issue uh how the party's changed but what about some of the scandals that hit him and the way the

00:28:22.020 country was managed show in a gate is not one that most people would remember involved a golf course

00:28:28.620 and a grant to a business in his riding but most people remember sponsorship even if they don't know

00:28:33.880 all the ins and outs and even though the gomri inquiry found that didn't find blame for cretchen

00:28:41.120 it's still a stain on his legacy um steven you were there at the time how much was this

00:28:47.720 hurting the liberal party when you were still involved by the way for people that don't know

00:28:53.260 steven is not involved in the current rendition of the liberal party if you can't tell but

00:28:57.900 back then back in the early 2000s how much was this hurting this institution that you and so many

00:29:05.540 others had worked hard to uh to build up over the years well i was uh i was president of the liberal

00:29:11.620 probably at the time and uh i was uh i presided over an executive committee of about 50 people

00:29:17.580 from coast to coast to coast who met four times a year and i can tell you it was um a serious problem

00:29:24.220 and at the time but this let's remember cretchen's advice to his ministers if they had a problem

00:29:31.580 don't react right away don't go out there and flap your arms he said when a bird comes along

00:29:40.100 and has a has a dump on your your shoulder for instance or on your on your coat if you wipe it

00:29:48.240 away right away it's going to be a greasy mess if you just let it sit for a while and dry and then

00:29:55.440 you'll just what you'll flake it off it'll just uh go away and uh that was a bizarre metaphor okay

00:30:04.800 that will that's that is what he said that is what he said many times i remember one time

00:30:12.340 jane stewart uh remember her she was a very confident minister and she had a political problem one time 0.98

00:30:19.080 she's outside the second the prime minister's offices on the second floor of the uh of the center

00:30:26.000 block and she's talking to the press and she's not going that well he just walks in and takes over

00:30:33.200 and says wait wait wait wait wait what are we doing discussing this now we have things to talk

00:30:38.180 about that are important and we're just going to let this issue dry for a while of course with the

00:30:43.000 compliant ottawa press oh sure mr prime minister jane the prime minister walked away they all looked at

00:30:51.480 each other and of course just like cretchen saying with the bird dropping drop drying on your coat

00:30:57.600 in a few days you just flick it away and you go on your merry way so yes there were scandals

00:31:04.540 but you know most people i dare say now chris and brian most people don't remember those at all they

00:31:11.040 remember cretchen balancing the budget and they also remember which is a political party problem

00:31:17.260 of cretchen um leaving office now that was that was a that was a tough situation but um he left with

00:31:25.380 his uh head high and he left the party uh having won three majorities to uh a guy who oh what what was

00:31:33.200 he gonna have he or what was he what did susan delacorte call oh right juggernaut jugger yeah that

00:31:39.380 didn't work out um christy do you think well it didn't but part of that christy i think sponsorship

00:31:45.260 still resonates today i mean we're 20 years on and you know it's going to be 20 years worth of new

00:31:52.500 voters who have no clue what we're talking about no i think that's probably right you'd have to be

00:31:59.840 this isn't watergate or something like that you have to be a certain age for it to um for it to

00:32:06.100 resonate i think it was it was the perfect liberal scandal i've always thought in that it it it conflated

00:32:12.420 it conflated the national interest with the party's interest right and it was it was so easy for people

00:32:19.440 obviously to get sucked into it right we're trying to save the country ah but you know

00:32:23.680 you know give a little kick back to the liberal party and they'll save the country too um you know

00:32:29.860 it was gross it was absolutely uh greasy nasty scandal but no i i don't think it i don't think

00:32:39.400 it still resonates i mean i you know and why like honestly it shouldn't resonate i mean there's no

00:32:44.080 reason to not vote liberal because of the sponsorship scandal um you know no one no one still left

00:32:50.980 let me come in here you mentioned watergate and watergate still resonates even if most people who

00:32:58.180 are not of our advanced years uh don't know the specifics of watergate they know that it was it was

00:33:05.600 nixon it was republican and it wasn't good that's what they really know about it sponsorship i dare say

00:33:11.520 when you're you're exchange with brian a few minutes ago most people don't have any idea what

00:33:16.980 it was the other thing i'm going to say which will be controversial is that it was for the it was

00:33:23.320 intended to be for the the greater good and you have to understand quebec politics and i think you use

00:33:33.040 the word greasy and uh quebec politics can be very very very greasy look at snc lavalent and our current

00:33:40.520 prime minister in that situation uh a few years ago and it was run by uh quebecers in the pmo and then 1.00

00:33:48.560 the other offices in quebec it's a different if it's it's a very different set of politics i think

00:33:54.460 when you use the word adjective greasy you uh you may very well be um very too kind chris too kind

00:34:01.400 because it's very different well i think greasy is a good word but let's talk about how he handled

00:34:07.480 quebec uh there were times when he you know in in my view would acquiesce uh there were times when he

00:34:15.240 would just tell the separatists to go pound sand there was an anglo living in montreal in the early 0.60

00:34:20.880 2000s i was always thankful that on the language front he took a strong stand unlike the current

00:34:26.180 prime minister who seems to think anglos don't matter as long as they vote liberal um you know the

00:34:32.140 the remember the the party quebec wall was always screaming about the english the bilingual english

00:34:40.100 and french traffic warning signs on the bridges well the bridges are federal they wanted it in

00:34:45.900 french only just like all the highway signs and cretchen would tell them well there are bridges go to

00:34:50.440 hell uh i appreciated that but you know do you when you look at the the referendum do you look at it

00:34:58.020 and say cretchen kept the country together he won the referendum or do you say he almost lost the

00:35:05.220 country that was too close for comfort i would say the latter i would say the latter more than the

00:35:12.660 former um i mean he didn't almost lose the country i mean it's kind of a it's there's this myth that if

00:35:17.860 it had been 50 plus one on that ridiculous like 150 word question that suddenly quebec would

00:35:23.140 have a right to secede that's just not that's not a thing you know it would have it probably would

00:35:28.540 have led to negotiations but they would have been negotiations between all the members of the

00:35:32.260 federation not just between quebec and ottawa but yeah i i think he was too complacent uh going into

00:35:38.540 that campaign and i would think that my impression is that most historians don't see him as the

00:35:44.100 as the real winner of that it was more jean charret and and uh

00:35:49.140 uh people less less sort of antagonistic to the nationalist cause who uh who pulled that out of

00:35:59.080 the fire uh but you know it was tough like you know that was a real moment for the for the separatist

00:36:04.840 cause so up against the incredibly charismatic lucien bouchard um who uh you know is cretchen could

00:36:14.480 hold a room because he was uh the ah shucks little guy bouchard just had a different charisma that drew

00:36:21.040 people to him but steven is there um uh a parallel between how cretchen was pm and people say he almost

00:36:30.880 lost the country other people had to go in and and fight the the battle and the 1980 referendum where

00:36:37.420 pierre trudeau was prime minister and things weren't going well and he had to send in jean

00:36:43.220 cretchen as his justice minister to fight the battle well that's why i was just thinking about

00:36:48.320 that 1980 uh battle i was in ottawa then not very involved at all with uh with quebec but i remember

00:36:53.780 uh trudeau's speech at the uh paul sauvet arena in uh in montreal which uh was viewed as a um as a

00:37:02.680 turning point um in in the public mind about uh staying in canada uh cretchen was heavily involved

00:37:11.980 that was what gosh i mean virtually everybody in the federal government was uh was sticking their

00:37:16.580 oar in the water for that one i think that uh there was a bit of complacency with uh with uh the last

00:37:23.420 one i um i i know that um people didn't think it was a real threat until almost too late and then

00:37:35.720 they mobilized remember uh chris and brian the busloads of people going from toronto to that big

00:37:44.000 uh rally in montreal say we love you don't go i i i could not get on the buses there were that many

00:37:51.060 people lined up they turned hundreds of us away if not thousands uh but i was here in toronto waiting

00:37:57.880 to get on one of those buses that was going to take you overnight and it wasn't going to be

00:38:01.660 comfortable but that many people showed up right yeah no i was living in montreal all the time that

00:38:06.780 was an absolutely incredible scene and it's kind of hard to imagine something like that happening now

00:38:11.320 when you think about it um like just just that level of attachment um

00:38:18.540 i think people would say fine go yeah well some people yeah right now but i mean cretchen

00:38:25.940 once he got motivated and yes you can be um chris people can be critical they say well you know he

00:38:34.720 almost lost it yep the numbers show that but um and you can be critical for saying well i didn't pay

00:38:41.460 enough attention to it at the start but once people started to realize you know holy doodle this is a

00:38:48.420 serious matter he threw his guts into it he threw his uh his back his mouth his guts and all the

00:38:54.900 lieutenants and um and quebec politics are not an easy situation to deal with quebec politicians 0.98

00:39:01.380 uh even those in the liberal party are not always easy to deal with but uh he did and so listen the

00:39:07.980 bottom line is um he got through it you know some people if you want to argue about churchill world

00:39:13.840 war ii people say he almost lost the war too yeah he almost lost the war sometimes but he won it so

00:39:18.700 there you go so you've been very complimentary of mr cretchen today uh steven and and let's be

00:39:25.960 honest with everyone you're one of the people that forced him out you were president of the party and

00:39:31.220 went public and said the guy's gotta go tell us the story of how that happened but why did you say

00:39:37.580 he had to go well first of all um the constant all i did i wasn't against cretchen i'll tell you what

00:39:45.660 was going on oh you've been described as a horrible martinite by uh by some of his people i'm sure

00:39:50.860 oh oh oh as one very wise judge who uh knew politics well told me a few years later

00:39:58.920 he said steven um the the cretchenites think that you were for martin the martinites think you're for

00:40:05.140 cretchen they all don't like you you did a great job so i followed the law and the law of the

00:40:12.460 constitution of the liberal party has been changed when martin was in there because he didn't want to

00:40:17.320 happen to him what happened to cretchen is that in the constitution i had to call a convention and a

00:40:24.520 vote within a year of every election and in the first after the first two elections they were called

00:40:32.500 cretchen easily got through but after the last election his people let him down he um he was not

00:40:40.120 well served by particularly by people in some people in toronto and many people in montreal

00:40:45.020 and uh i had to go to 24 sussex we had a chat his chief of uh staff his principal secretary knew what

00:40:53.280 i was doing others knew what i was doing and i said you know prime minister you have to go or

00:40:57.880 i will call the convention but you're going to lose the convention and rather than lose the convention

00:41:03.820 and the vote you have to go and he couldn't he was godsmacked he couldn't believe it my people tell

00:41:09.220 you i said will you go back and ask your people the tough questions which i gave them and uh two

00:41:13.780 months later he phoned me and said yes i i hear your point and i'm going to resign he was let down by his

00:41:19.400 people um but i was going to follow the law of the party and both the cretchen forces and the martin

00:41:26.560 forces uh allowed me to extend that period of time before i had to call a vote at a convention

00:41:34.480 and um you know it was it was messy but uh ultimately everybody knew it was you know i'm a

00:41:42.040 lawyer i tried the law is very clear on this thing i followed the law and everybody got pissed off with

00:41:47.040 me but that's the way it goes sometimes excuse my french now i'll ask you to both comment on this

00:41:53.760 um you first even then chris uh when he stepped down he was 70 years old uh this is a guy who was

00:42:01.500 called yesterday's man before he was even prime minister and then staged a water skiing photo op

00:42:07.760 so that uh he could show that he he wasn't yesterday's man but he leaves at 70 and was

00:42:13.600 considered past his best before date we've got two octogenarians running to be president of the united

00:42:20.960 states right now and you know cretchen looks about as spry as they do um you know have we changed

00:42:29.460 our view on how old politicians uh you know can be or are still effective i mean donald trump and

00:42:36.560 and joe biden um they're going to be wandering around the retirement home soon and americans

00:42:42.200 that that's their only choice between those two you know and i think that uh no one's going to say

00:42:47.440 that uh biden is an example of a knock of jerryan who is uh in in peak form uh remember years ago in

00:42:54.600 1980 uh people thought ronald reagan uh was too old to become uh president i don't know what he

00:43:00.960 was he was probably in his early 70s or late 60s cretchen at 70 was in good shape he used to like to

00:43:08.500 hear the stories of gladstone the british prime minister who was prime minister um for another

00:43:14.200 10 years after cretchen he said well i could do this and i dare say brian and chris i dare say

00:43:21.260 he could do it he was uh doing a pretty good job cretchen was let down by his staunch supporters i

00:43:29.080 was in the middle i was neutral but i think that uh you bring up the point of 70 um you know right now

00:43:36.640 uh 70 is the old 60 i think that uh he could have continued on and done a good job i think that uh

00:43:43.900 and look at about 90 i was wasn't it just a few years ago brian he was uh skiing down not water skiing

00:43:50.160 he was snow snow skiing he's going down the hills apparently he's playing pickleball which is all

00:43:56.660 the rage these days ah gosh you won't you won't catch me or chris playing pickleball i don't know

00:44:03.000 chris do you play pickleball and how do you feel about octogenarians running for office well i've never

00:44:08.260 played pickleball but i would happily try it if uh if i was invited uh for a round it's an interesting

00:44:14.700 question i i think as i as i recall and and this is just an impression i felt like trudeau or sorry

00:44:21.740 cretchen uh as he got older was getting less and less coherent in both languages um not that i think

00:44:29.360 that he that his brain wasn't functioning but just i felt like hearing him talk was more and more of a

00:44:37.480 of a challenge to try to figure out what he's saying and you look at some of the quotes no no no

00:44:42.780 and you look at some of the quotes that that uh just over the past couple of days um that have

00:44:52.900 been printed and uh what was it there's there's just some great lines uh right it was asked um

00:45:01.040 uh vastly capitalists on on ctv asked asked him whether he thought justin trudeau should run

00:45:07.220 you know should stay on and he says uh you have to make the right decision a decision is a decision

00:45:12.020 when you're in the your car you have to make a decision either a truck is coming down turn left

00:45:17.520 you have to turn right a truck is coming so every decision is important

00:45:21.160 this is i don't know what that means you couldn't write this stuff no but uh but put it on an

00:45:31.120 inspirational poster yeah i got needlepoint or something like it's just you know he had some

00:45:39.880 kind of special he had some kind of thing that just not very many politicians have um that he can just

00:45:49.860 he can charm he could charm a room but like if you asked me to describe what his charm was

00:45:57.300 i mean i never found him charming uh but uh i mean i i guess i did i sort of understood i'll say this

00:46:06.760 is as someone who's who scrummed him who covered him uh both as a local reporter in montreal and then

00:46:13.240 on the hill um sometimes he sometimes he would get tough questions steven and sometimes you'd be

00:46:19.680 going at him hammer and tall and he would just come out with the the weirdest thing to say and he

00:46:24.940 would charm you by the end chris is right like he'd come up with these sayings about brushing bird

00:46:30.920 shit off your shoulder and people would laugh and okay smile and move on okay yeah i put it on my plate 0.71

00:46:42.540 let me uh one observation that not that many people know about is that if kretchen were going 0.99

00:46:49.860 to speak to a room of a thousand people and in advance of that he was in you know a waiting room

00:46:56.320 of three or four people he would get and he'd get sort of bored and he would go out and deliver a flat

00:47:04.360 speech if you brought him into that room of a thousand people and people were cheering and he was walking

00:47:11.480 down the aisle and people were sticking their hands out you know and women trying to kiss him and he

00:47:17.380 would get fired up and and we did this we learned we learned he would be fired up and he would go out

00:47:23.360 and he would give a stem winder of a speech it was unbelievable he did have as as chris put it some

00:47:29.940 some charm and as you put it you know he would he would just uh brian he could be extraordinarily

00:47:37.900 persuasive and even if you disagreed with him i feel people say god you know what i don't agree

00:47:44.100 with anything he said but i sure liked listening to him people would do that so yeah he does have a

00:47:50.620 chemistry

00:47:51.740 yeah kind of like a ralph klein or a doug ford today or and it's just it's right on the edge of arrogance

00:48:00.480 it's it's a you know there's a few people like that ralph klein was like that doug ford is like

00:48:04.920 that today um it's a rare commodity and uh i bet that political consultants wish they could bottle

00:48:11.500 it uh gents thank you very much for uh your time today i'm not sure we figured out what cretchen's

00:48:16.960 legacy was but we'll leave it there and uh and allow the uh the audience to weigh in and let them

00:48:23.020 decide on on how it is so thank you again very much my pleasure bye chris full comment is a post

00:48:32.140 media podcast my name is brian lily your host this episode was produced by andre prue with theme music

00:48:37.200 by bryce hall kevin libban is the executive producer remember you can subscribe to full comment on apple

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00:48:49.160 your friends about us thanks for listening until next time i'm brian lily

00:48:52.660 you

00:48:53.660 you

Full Comment - February 05, 2024

Jean Chrétien looks better now compared to the alternative

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