Wonderful story about Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau on CBC

I have just watched a telling of the story of Prime Minister Trudeau, in the series about the greatest Canadians, on CBC....Oh how I wish we had him around today......He was so brilliant, brave, wise, and visionary.....I remember him saying in the 70's, words to the effect that if the prosperous western countries did not do something to help the plight of the suffering third world countries, it would come back to haunt us......He was so right....We miss you Pierre!.....:loveya:
P.S...When he died in 2000 Pres. Carter came to his funeral and sat beside Fidel Castro!....(There's one in old Bushie's eye, eh?....hahaha)

That man drove this country in the hole for decades.... And don't get me started on Mirabel airport.... What a scumbag...

Or change your religion.

when he imposed wage and price controls.

Remember that political compass. Trudeau was a "libertarian" when it came to individual rights and freedoms (and even, and more modern-ly and progressively, when it came to collective rights). But he was right wing when it came to social justice.

His "just society" really didn't offer much to workers and economically disadvantaged groups once the prosperous early days of his period of influence came to an end.

Michael Ignatieff continues in the Trudeau vein today. He's brilliant and wise when it comes to individual and collective rights -- and he supported Bush's invasion of Iraq.

It's just that Liberal/liberal blind spot, you see. They can't won't see economic exploitation and imperialism when it's hitting them, and more importantly the exploited and invaded/colonized, in the face.

Trudeau was an important and essential element of Canada's modern evolution. He simply was not a saint, though ... let alone a working-class hero.

And then, of course, there was that little War Measures Act thing ... which Tommy Douglas voted against.

http://www.cbc.ca/greatest/top_ten/nominee/douglas-tommy.html

He took his final and most controversial stand during the October Crisis of 1970, when he voted against the implementation of the War Measures Act in Quebec. The move was devastating to his popularity at the time, but he would be heralded years later for sticking by his principles of civil liberty.

I know who's getting my vote. ;)

For assisting the separatists. We also have Bourassa to thank for that.
Much the same as the US Patriot act.

Wage and price controls were great for capitalists. If one got a promotion then it didn't apply. Or any other reason. Unless one worked for the government or a union classified job. Ironic in a way that Stanfield lost the election at the time. Perhaps the best prime minister we never had, according to some.

agreed with what he did with the War Measures Act....I remember this!!!

That a lot of people agreed with the action taken.
However, we were told that the reason the decision was taken was that Bourassa felt that he did not have control and that there was an imminent danger. Subsequent events have proved that this was wrong. There was a joke that if you put Bourassa in a room and gave him two glasses of water and told him that one of the glasses contained a deadly poison, that when you came back to the room later he would be found dead. Both glasses still full of water and he died of dehydration.

As for the War Measures Act it resulted in many people being rounded up, thrown into prison and resenting the federal government action that had resulted from the premier being afraid to take action. As the Prime Minister, he probably had to make the decision. It was accepted and praised in most of Canada. However, that does not make it correct.

Since very few people were watching what was going on in Quebec in the late fifties and sixties, outside of headlines of molotov cocktails, there was little understanding of the actual goings ons. It was there that the RCMP were using dirty tricks, like burning barns to gain acceptance into different groups. So how many headlines were instigated by the RCMP. There were reports, unconfirmed in the media, of US agents relaying info from different groups and police agencies to the separatists groups to gain acceptance.

So how does one evaluate that a decision was wrong. I know that I would probably have had to make the same decision had I been in his shoes.

Looking back from the year 2004 it appears to me that the decision was wrong, but maybe in another 100 years it will be seen to have been correct.


Edited for grammar.

I'm not getting into a shouting match with anyone....good night....:loveya:

I wasn't aware that I ("anyone") was shouting. I don't actually disagree that Trudeau was a "great man". The fact is, nonetheless, he was a flawed politician.

His response to events in Quebec in 1971 was hardly different from the Bush response to events in New York in 2001 (although, granted, Trudeau didn't go invading an unrelated country).

He used extreme measures affecting the rights and freedoms of *everyone* to combat criminal actions by a particular group; you're maybe aware of the similarity between some features of the War Measures Act and some features of the Patriot Act?

He denied the exercise of basic rights, like the right to counsel and other rights of detained persons, to people arrested under the WMA. Does "Guantanamo" come to mind? Again, a less extreme response, but qualitatively similar. One of my friends was detained in Montreal under the WMA, for no reason that we ever understood. He was frightened and confused. He was able to make contact with us in Ontario, and we (young and inexpert that we were) were able to arrange representation for him. While I lost contact with him after that, I've always hoped that our response did something to give him a small sense of our solidarity somewhere behind the overwhelming sense of betrayal and outrage he would certainly have felt at what had happened to him and others in Quebec.

Trudeau used a military response against an entire people, and in fact the entire country (we were pretty nervous about our own political activities in Ontario on the Vietnam moratorium weekend that fell within the early days of the WMA), in response to the criminal acts of a handful of individuals. ("Criminal" in a technical sense; I make no comment about the political justifiability of what they did, which certainly fell within the definition of "terrorism".)

More importantly, though, despite his fine words about justice for the third world, his domestic economic policies were not social justice policies.

Tommy Douglas did combine the two (and of course, while he was admirable in his own right, he was part of a movement of many other committed and admirable people). He was committed to civil liberties, to personal rights and freedoms. He was also committed to social justice -- to the right not merely not to be interfered with by the state, but to participate in society.

Participation requires a decent standard of living and access to education and health care, at a minimum, along with collective rights like union rights and language rights. And in order for people to have a decent standard of living and adequate access to good-quality services, there must be economic and fiscal policies that do not favour corporate and élite interests over the interests of working people and the poor. And Trudeau simply was not part of the solution when it came to those policies.

Canada is characterized both by our commitment to personal rights and freedoms and minority rights and by our commitment to social participation. Trudeau was without argument a leader in solidifying the first. He was completely undistinguished, and in fact a negative influence, in respect of the second.

And I just have to say that stating an opinion and then responding to someone else's statement of opinion by characterizing it as an attempt to start a shouting match just isn't really progressive or democratic ... or even liberal.

"He used extreme measures affecting the rights and freedoms of *everyone* "

By Jan 1971 Quebec Ombudsman, Louis Marceau had received 95 complaints resulting from the War Measures Act. The complaints fell into three categories: damage done to property during police raids, conditions of detention and injuries suffered.

By July 6, 1971, Marceau reported that he had received 238 complaints and that he found that 103 were justified and could give rise to compensation.

"His response to events in Quebec in 1971 was hardly different from the Bush response to events in New York in 2001'
Where do I begin ????

Please do yourself and to those who may be listening (to your gross distortions and your "creative remembering") a favour and review the facts.

http://tetley.law.mcgill.ca/politics/octoberbook.htm

Please do yourself and to those who may be listening (to your gross distortions and your "creative remembering") a favour and review the facts.
http://tetley.law.mcgill.ca/politics/octoberbook.htm

Did you have some particular facts in mind? Some hint to offer as to what your problem might be here?

At this point, just allow me to assure you that if I choose to review some facts, I'm sure I'll be able to find some -- and it won't be in a draft of a book about the matter written by an expert in maritime law ... who, oddly enough, might just have an axe to grind when it comes to Quebec politics in general, and the WMA in particular:

http://www.mcgill.ca/news/2003/fall/epilogue/

William Tetley, QC, practised law from 1952 to 1970, when, after two years as a member of the Quebec National Assembly, he was appointed to the cabinet of Liberal Premier Robert Bourassa. Since 1976, he has taught at McGill's Faculty of Law. Reach him at ...

Friend of yours, or just a random google?

Do I take it that the facts you present regarding claims for "damage done to property during police raids, conditions of detention and injuries suffered" are somehow intended to rebut the assertion that the measures implemented by Trudeau affected the RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS of everyone? Are my rights and freedoms not affected unless I'm arrested or my barn burned down, maybe?

USAmericans talk these days about the chill that has descended on civil society as a result of the Patriot Act; people are literally afraid to engage in overt, public dissent. If you don't think that a chill descended on my campus in Ontario when the WMA was declared ... well, you weren't there. Would I be correct?

I'm not sure what you might know about my "creative remembering" other than what I told you. Perhaps you're suggesting that I lied about my friend who was arrested and detained under the War Measures Act without any grounds whatsoever.

Where do you begin? Oh, I dunno. How about by presenting facts and arguments to rebut something I said, rather than just characterizing me as dishonest?

Anybody here ever actually READ the War Measures Act?

I hadn't read it in a few years. Here are the first two sections (we will all remember that the "Governor in Council" is, in practical terms, the federal Cabinet):

http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~sprague/wma.htm

War Measures Act, 1914

An Act to confer certain powers upon the Governor in Council in the event of War, Invasion, or Insurrection

Statutes of Canada (1914) Chapter 2.

SHORT TITLE.

1. This Act may be cited as the War Measures Act.

EVIDENCE OF WAR.

2. The issue of a proclamation by His Majesty, or under the authority of the Governor in Council shall be conclusive evidence that war, invasion, or insurrection, real or apprehended, exists and has existed for any period of yime therein stated, and of its continuance, until by the issue of a further proclamation it is declared that the war, invasion or insurrection no longer exists.

POWERS OF THE GOVERNOR IN COUNCIL.

3. The Governor in Council may do and authorize such acts and things, and make from time to time such orders and regulations, as he may by reason of the existence of real or apprehended war, invasion or insurrection deem necessary or advisable for the security, defence, peace, order and welfare of Canada; and for greater certainty, but not so as to restrict the generality of the foregoing terms, it is hereby declared that the powers of the Governor in Council shall extend to all matters coming within the classes of subjects hereinafter enumerated, that is to say:-

(a) Censorship and the control and suppression of publications, writings, maps, plans, photographs, communications and means of communication;

(b) Arrest,, detention,, exclusion and deportation;

(c) Control of the harbours, ports and territorial waters of Canada and the movements of vessels;

(d) Transportation by land, air, or Water and the control of the transport of persons and things;

(e) Trading, exportation, importation, production and manufacture;

(f) Appropriation, control, forfeiture and disposition of property and of the use thereof.

Given the obvious conflicts with the present constitutional Charter of Rights and Freedoms (hmm, Trudeau's baby), the Act has now been repealed.

Of course, we now have anti-terrorism legislation ...

http://www.parl.gc.ca/37/2/parlbus/chambus/house/debates/022_2002-11-05/han022_1145-e.htm

Most people out there think, “What the heck. This is never going to affect me. I am a law-abiding Canadian citizen. I don't have to worry about this”. That just is not the reality. In the course of even the last five or six years in Canada, whether it was the APEC summit in B.C. or the Quebec summit, there have been numerous cases where civil liberties were infringed upon, where actions taken by our own government and in some cases our own Prime Minister were really extremely questionable. ...

Yeah, that's an NDP MP speaking. A source I just like better than a Quebec Liberal Party hack.

thinking he was so cute! I met him on a visit to the parliament buildings and was so taken with how genuine he seemed. Don't really know a lot about his politics, I'm not living in Canada anymore and confess didn't have Canadian Citizenship very long and certainly ineligible to vote in the Trudeau years .. I'm rambling .. anyway, I liked him. some will say


fuddle duddle ..

I say R.I.P. Pierre.

No one out here, that I'm aware of, recalls him so fondly.

I will say, however, that I always appreciated that (as far as I can remember) he kissed no international political ass.

Sorry I miised the film.

The Greatest Canadian contest....People across Canada have been voting by phone or internet on this for several weeks....Trudeau was 2nd in the voting, behind Tommy Douglas the last time they told the tally....You can see the choice if you tune in.....:)

He was a great PM,and I am from the West.

He made mistakes (who doesn't?), but he was overall a great leader for Canada....I agree with what he did about the War Measures Act in Quebec....Nobody was tortured or held in jail once they were cleared ...It was necessary to nip the FLQ in the bud....In the "Greatest Canadian" contest tonight, he came in third....Terry Fox was second and Tommy Douglas, another great person, got the most votes and came in first....