Ungovernable - who's on trial here, the truckers or the government？
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
132.86093
Summary
In the wake of the truckers' protest on Parliament Hill, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his government are trying to paint a picture of Ottawa as ungovernable. But what if a government pushes people too far? Is that what ungovernability looks like?
Transcript
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While the truckers were on Parliament Hill, Ottawa was ungovernable. That's what Canada's Public
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Safety Minister Marco Mendicino has been telling the convoy inquiry. The thing is,
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if people are ungovernable, whose fault is it? Theirs or the people governing them?
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What if a government pushes people too far? Now obviously the Liberals and their NDP
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allies are going to try and tell the story their way. That's why before that we had the prime
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ministerial defamation about racist misogynist truckers and their unacceptable opinions and
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Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson's slur about nasty people. So yes, Ottawa had a parking problem and for a
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while it had a noise problem. But to see what ungovernable looks like, flick through YouTube
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footage of the riots that swept across the US. That's what ungovernable looks like. In Ottawa,
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during the convoy protest, by contrast, there were wives and children. There were barbecues,
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bouncy castles, hot tubs and a lot of litter bins in case the truckers were accused of making the
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place untidy. In fact, the place was well kept. Homeless people got into the habit of receiving
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free food from the barbecues and significantly none of the scurrilous accusations leveled against the
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convoy proved to be true. That is, it wasn't their people dancing on the tomb of the unknown soldier
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or trying to set fire to an apartment block. As for the noise, the air horns stopped after the
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organizers received a cease and desist order. Really, obeying judicial orders, how ungovernable is that?
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These are sad days when a federal government stokes up loathing against some Canadians in order to better
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justify itself to other Canadians. This is not what governments are for. Prime Minister Stephen Harper had
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one overarching objective during his time in office to give Canadians good government, balanced budgets,
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lower taxes and a chance for everybody to live their own Canadian dream. He liked it if you voted for
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him, of course, but your opinions were your own. As we know, that's not how Prime Minister Trudeau sees it.
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To him, it matters very much that Canadians have these acceptable opinions. Yes, of course.
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As for good government, somebody who thinks budgets balance themselves and doesn't think much about
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fiscal policy clearly doesn't know what it is. And it's because of blind spots like these that he and his
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NDP allies came to push some independent-minded people who drove trucks just a bit too far. Amazingly,
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NDP leader Jagmeet Singh has just promised to support Trudeau's government, even if the inquiry finds they
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made the wrong decision. It's one thing to disagree. It's another to despise. And while the inquiry into the
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government's use of the War Measures Act has yet to report, sorry, make that the Emergencies Act,
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it's starting to look like the only thing that was ever in danger was the Prime Minister's self-esteem.
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And the only thing that was ungovernable was his personal loathing to people who didn't think like him.
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