Justin Trudeau boots all senators from Liberal caucus

www.thestar.com...#

OTTAWA — Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau stunned Parliament Hill Wednesday by expelling 32 senators to sit as Independents, part of a proposed plan to overhaul Senate appointments to ensure it is a non-partisan body.

He has also written to the Speaker of the Senate, Noel Kinsella, to stress that his intention means, no matter how those now-Independent senators wish to identify themselves, they cannot call themselves Liberals in the upper chamber, the Star has learned.

Personally, I think this is a very naive idea as stated. Unfortunately it carries right along in the new tradition of democracies of the West, where democratic processes are side stepped as much as it is possible for the imperial leadership to do.

Justin Trudeau is not innovating when he hands down a decree like this, insulting long standing Liberal Party members and even telling them they can no longer identify in the Senate as Liberals.

He is following along in the manner of his father, lying about his attitude to wage and price controls in order to defeat a candidate with a more realistic election platform, and in the footsteps of his mother on her wild night with the Rolling Stones. He is following Jack Layton in attempting to broker a merging of the NDP and the Liberals without consulting the people who voted for him and with Paul Martin in signing the North American Peace and Prosperity Partnership agreement with almost no Parliamentary discussion of such a preliminary to a North American economic union.

Justin Trudeau is giving us circuses, not bread.

Justin Trudeau knows that politics is partizan. It is never not partizan. What he proposes to give to Canadians is stealth partizanship.

Thank you Mr. Trudeau, but no thank you. There is already too much stealth in canadian politics.

I'm wondering if what is really going on is that Justin Trudeau, neophyte politician, is beginning to take the country on a wild ride, in a very immature way, as he reinvents the political wheel.

There is no such thing as non-partisan politics, which is practically a contradiction in terms.

reply to post by ipsedixit


I have been up here a few years now. I tried to start following the politics up here, but alas, it seems that politics up here is about on par with US politics. Lieing, backstabbing, moneyhungry, psychotic, partisan politics. It's sad, I thought that up here was going to be so much better than the US. I guess the old cliche about the grass being greener on the other side is an apt analogy.

It is really hard to imagine how such a "reform" could function.

Are we to believe that a political party in power is going to modify legislation on the advice of "non-partisan" senators? The idea is an absurdity that gives the impression of being designed for "youth".

As a meaningful idea it can only be interpreted as a prelude to the abolition of the Senate.

Call me old fashioned but I would rather have legislation second guessed and back seat driven by elder statesmen of the party in power, not a group of non-partisans, assuming such a group could be found.

How would these people be certified "non-partisan"? Nobody has access to their lifetime voting record. If the public were to elect these people it would be ridiculous to assume that they would be elected on the basis of "non-partisanship". How is the public going to make that determination?

Is Mr. Trudeau really saying that all future votes in the Senate will be free votes and the Party Whips will no longer be employed there? That I could buy, but excluding senators from the Liberal caucus is a hair brained idea in my opinion.

To me this opens the gate to all kinds of subterfuge.

More stealth politics.

One thing you can count on if senators have no party affiliation, is that the senate will be more disorganized and more fractured and more easily fractured and hence less of a threat to a government in power.

This idea sucks.

A Trudeau is a Trudeau, is a Trudeau.
His father was a egomaniacal navel gazing SOB.
Justin is a nothing but a delusional pretty boy trying to ride on Daddy's coattails.
The lefty's might love his hair, but that's all that he has up there.

reply to post by ipsedixit


This is just my opinion based on years of following the horrific state of Canadian politics.

I believe that Trudeau did this for selfish reasons in order to make him appear as some type of god-send to Canadians. A proper comparison in my opinion would be what is happening in the Vatican. People think that the new pope is out to make a change since he cares, but I believe he is just following orders from his advisers. The previous popes had advisers so why wouldn't this one?

Back on topic...I think that Trudeau is being advised on what to do and how to act.

I bet my left leg that the caucus will be filled with equally corrupt senators and nothing will change other than the faces who are pissing on us and calling it rain.

reply to post by TKDRL


I hate to admit it, but you couldn't be any more correct.

Canadian politics is a circus and is a miniature version of the American model.

No matter who you put in office, they are a different head from the same snake, same puppet masters control these puppets. No matter who you put in office the same agenda will continue with a twist to portray the illusion that things are different. I can't stand Harper, and I must admit that on a personal level I can relate to Trudeau, but at the end of the day they are ruthless politicians who will do and say anything in order to achieve their goals.

I am glad that people are waking up to the false stereotypes of Canada, and its foreign and domestic polices driven by our corrupt politicians who sell out to the highest bidder.

Welcome to Canada

If anybody in Canadian politics really wants to reform the Senate, I have a reform for you.

Let senators keep their party affiliation and let them attend caucus meetings. They will be fully informed about political issues that way, all the issues, not just the ones in the newspaper.

All senate votes are free votes. No more Senate Whips.

Last and most important of all, no more celebrity sucker appointments to the senate of people who may be outstanding in other fields or related to eminent deceased broadcasters but who never won an election in their life, never drafted a piece of legislation and know zip about politics.

The senate should be the reserve of experienced former holders of elected office or trusted political operatives of legitimate political parties in Canada.

Appointing ex-broadcasting personalities and other non-political personalities to the Senate was the first subtle move enroute to making the senate an irrelevancy.

Let's get the Senate back to what it was designed to be, a pain in the ass to the government.

reply to post by Corruption Exposed

I think this is the policy of a "poser" and a very cynical one at that. It is a grandstanding move that really does a great injury to the Liberal Party.

This is junior's way of saying "I am going to rid myself of the meddling interference of the elders of the Party."

Malcolm McDowell as Caligula should be his press spokesperson.

This idea is a disaster for Parliamentary government as this country has known it for generations.

Inevitably, unofficial "caucuses" will form among the "non-partisans" in the Senate, like crystals in a solution, and "voila!!", Justin Trudeau will have reinvented the wheel of Canadian politics . . . and another generation of Canadians will have had the wool pulled over their eyes by yet another political fraud.

Doing this is so much easier than tackling the real issues in Canadian politics, which are our relationship with the United States and CORRUPTION.

reply to post by ipsedixit


Dream on about no more senate whips! It's in the very nature of political animals to whip one another "for the party" or NGO too for that matter whether the official Whip position is abolished or not.

I absolutely do believe that Justin's move was orchestrated and done to impress us, as to show that he can be decisive and strong and that his decision was above all a sign of his leadership: Electioneering. I wonder how many people will buy into that.

We don't need to reform the Senate, we need to reform who gets elected to Parliament.

The Senate in theory is a roadblock to bad legislation. Nowadays the people we elect to Parliament don't want bad legislation roadblocked. They want it fast tracked. I think that is more likely to be the result of Trudeau's "reform".

This idea is an abrupt and precipitate stunt. It is more dangerous than riding around Montreal on your motorcycle in a Nazi helmet during WW2 or doing a pirouette behind the back of the Queen. Those kinds of things are merely juvenile. This dumping of 32 senators from the Liberal caucus is taking much too lightly the institutions of government in this country.

I find it difficult to believe that even a Trudeau can get away with this.

I don't think Liberal senators are going to make a fuss (Party discipline) but I would be surprised if no trouble was brewing for Justin Trudeau in the Liberal Party.

reply to post by ipsedixit


I agree, these are definitely the actions of a poser. But are we surprised? (rhetorical question lol)

Remember Harper's Senate scandal a while back? All these people are snakes and the interest of Canadians' well being is the least of their concerns as we are reminded on a weekly basis with all the crap that is going on. It is obvious that the voice of the average Canadian means nothing to these people.

I am not choosing sides. I can't stand either of them. I quit voting a long time ago.

I will conclude my post with some wise words from George Carlin...RIP

A lot of Canadian politics is a prelude to amalgamation with the United States in some form.

I think it is inevitable and I think all of Canada's important political parties are working in ways that grease the skids to amalgamation or go along with it half-heartedly. Nobody is sounding an alarm against it.

Fortunately the vast majority of people in both countries are decent and law abiding and widely outnumber each country's rascals.

ipsedixit
reply to post by Corruption Exposed

 

I think this is the policy of a "poser" and a very cynical one at that. It is a grandstanding move that really does a great injury to the Liberal Party.

This is junior's way of saying "I am going to rid myself of the meddling interference of the elders of the Party."

Malcolm McDowell as Caligula should be his press spokesperson.

This idea is a disaster for Parliamentary government as this country has known it for generations.

Inevitably, unofficial "caucuses" will form among the "non-partisans" in the Senate, like crystals in a solution, and "voila!!", Justin Trudeau will have reinvented the wheel of Canadian politics . . . and another generation of Canadians will have had the wool pulled over their eyes by yet another political fraud.

Doing this is so much easier than tackling the real issues in Canadian politics, which are our relationship with the United States and CORRUPTION.

You think this is all his design? The old members of the party are there to facilitate his rise to the throne, not to impede him.

I agree with you about corruption. It has been treason most foul. It is the goal of Agenda 21 to systematically eliminate the sovereignty of all governments to bring in the NWO. That goal is still very much on tap otherwise the Senate would not have allowed to pass the bits of stuff that reduced our country to a shadow of its former self. It's been too many years in the making. Everything we are seeing on TV is meant to get us to think that we still live in a democracy, but it is all but dead.

Well the senators in Canada doesn't have much purpose, they are put there by the PM so what you see is just a bunch of guys with a high pay that pass whatever the PM sends to them. Its a big waste of cash.

TKDRL
reply to post by ipsedixit

 

I have been up here a few years now. I tried to start following the politics up here, but alas, it seems that politics up here is about on par with US politics. Lieing, backstabbing, moneyhungry, psychotic, partisan politics. It's sad, I thought that up here was going to be so much better than the US. I guess the old cliche about the grass being greener on the other side is an apt analogy.

I try to tell Americans this all the time when I see them saying they want to move to Canada. Things are just as corrupt up here, and if anything we have less freedom than our neighbors to the south. About the only thing we've got going on the U.S is free healthcare (but you pay out the ass in taxes for that).

reply to post by DeadSeraph


Yeah taxes lol. Property taxes where I am are nothing at least. I also like how inheritance and lottery winnings are not taxable. Not that I will be getting either of those.

NavyNut
Well the senators in Canada doesn't have much purpose, they are put there by the PM so what you see is just a bunch of guys with a high pay that pass whatever the PM sends to them. Its a big waste of cash.

This is quite widely believed, but it doesn't take into account human psychology or the fact that senators may serve long after a Prime Minister has departed the political scene.

The Senate isn't there to overthrow the government, but it is a check on poorly drafted pieces of legislation or actions by the government which might be better reconsidered. That is why the Senate should be stacked, but with very experienced political people who take their jobs seriously, not with ex-celebrities learning as they go.

In our era, inconveniences caused by Senate oversight are seen as a source of trouble, which is why the Senate is being stacked with "personalities" in what are largely public relations moves by the Prime Minister. Senate appointments are made for political utility or to demonstrate that the PM is hip and in tune, "one of the people".

I grant that these sorts of things will always be a part of political "plum" appointments, but the idea that political expertise is not that important is a departure from tradition that is very suspect. The institution of Parliament itself is being undermined by these sorts of appointments.

One day the PM, maybe Justin Trudeau himself, the new voice of reason in a younger generation will say, "The Senate is not effective anyway. It's full of tubby celebrities who exceed their expense account allotments anyway. Let's get rid of it."

That initiative will be portrayed as "common sense" and a "breath of fresh air" and "getting rid of corruption" and "about time it was done", etc., but in reality it will be the culmination of a decades long attempt to get an impediment to the centralization and concentration of power out of the way.

The Senate in Canada is not like the Senate in the United States. In Canada it is meant to look over the shoulder of government in the political persona of the previous generation, making sure that some young whippersnappers don't drive us all into the ditch.

Are we being driven into the ditch?

We have certainly become a country that I don't recognize anymore. My Canada would not have destroyed Libya and yet not one major political party in this country opposed our participation in that fraudulent "no fly zone" exercise.

We have gone from efforts to make the Senate young and hip and easily bamboozled to efforts to get rid of it entirely in the name of what? Reining in expense accounts? That is BS for rubes. They want to get rid of the Senate because they want to get rid of the continuity of Canada's personality as a country. Canada is being made over into a vehicle for corporate agendas, not a vehicle for a people's aspiration for their own distinctive way of life.

Canadians are being given a personality transplant and I for one, don't like it.

Cynic
A Trudeau is a Trudeau, is a Trudeau.
His father was a egomaniacal navel gazing SOB.
Justin is a nothing but a delusional pretty boy trying to ride on Daddy's coattails.
The lefty's might love his hair, but that's all that he has up there.

LOL I was going to post the exact same thing but you said it much better, we always say the apple doesn't fall far from the tree and well nowa-days the youth seem to vote on looks and twitter clout than on actual democratic clout ( eg Calgary's Mayor Nenshi) . Im actually afraid of the youth voting for this guy, that's if you can even get them out to vote.

I understand what your saying but its always been this way even if senators stay in place after the PM that put them there is gone the new PM will just appoint another bunch of puppet to take the majority basically making them useless. Its always been this way and a waste of tax dollars. I think we senators should be voted in by the population if they at all serve a purpose.

reply to post by NavyNut


Saying this in the assumption you can bring people out to vote, the number of people participating in elections are staggeringly low and upsetting.