Au revoir, Justin
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Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced his resignation Monday after nearly a decade in power, bowing to rising discontent over his leadership and growing turmoil within his government signaled by the abrupt departure of his finance minister.
Trudeau, the latest incumbent to be driven out by rising voter dissatisfaction worldwide, said it had become clear to him that he cannot “be the leader during the next elections due to internal battles.” He planned to stay on as prime minister until a new leader of the Liberal Party is chosen.
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While I was frustrated with some of the Liberal Party’s decisions over the past couple of years, I will miss elements of Trudeau’s leadership. I am so glad he was at the helm during COVID, for example. I voted for the Liberals in his first and second campaigns with enthusiasm. In his third campaign I actually would have voted NDP, but because of the way our election process works, I voted Liberal because I thought the local Liberal candidate was a fantastic choice.
Unfortunately, those in the wings to take over the LPC aren’t terribly charismatic, IMO. And as much as I love Jasmeet Singh (and NDP positions in general) there is little to suggest they would be able to make a run for even a Minority government in the upcoming election. My hope is that the Liberals and NDP will form a coalition government. My fear (and, sadly, prediction) is that the Conservatives will win, and likely with a majority government. And I am soooo not okay with that happening.
While Trudeau clearly led a privileged life as the son of a former Prime Minister, he was also a school teacher for several years. He’s also only a few years older than me. So it is the first time ever in politics that I have felt like the person at the helm was even close to being someone “like me”. It was definitely time for him to step down, and even if he hadn’t I wasn’t enthusiastically going to be voting Liberal in the next election, but I’m still a little sad about the end of his leadership.
And just because I can…. Here’s me and the kid with Trudeau in 2019…
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Very cool, @dolmansaxlil ! Where did this take place?
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Very cool, @dolmansaxlil ! Where did this take place?
@wtg He made a campaign stop at a little
breakfast restaurant in my small town of 6,000. An elementary school friend was running for MP here and they were hoping to wrestle the riding away from the Conservatives (it has been Conservative for as long as I can remember). So Trudeau did a little swing through the area in support. Sadly she didn’t win the riding and she has walked away from politics (she is an elementary school teacher). -
Just realizing that the way I wrote this could be misleading. Yes my old friend ran for MP but the event was open to the public. We just walked in the morning of and got breakfast while we waited for him to arrive. I wasn’t on some fancy guest list or anything.
