Opinion by Murray Mandryk •
As long as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau remains in office conservative politicians like Alberta Premier Danielle Smith will have a convenient place to redirect their voters' anger.
© Provided by Leader Post
It was a poorly executed handshake performed rather brilliantly.
The supposed awkward encounter last week between Alberta Premier Danielle Smith and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was about as good a barometer of our current political climate as you will find.
It surely summed up today’s most basic political reality: As long as Justin Trudeau remains prime minister, there will be little other than politics because he is what unites the very forces that oppose him.
As was the case at last week’s Canada Health Transfer funding meeting, where two-thirds of the premiers were of conservative bent, Trudeau again proved to be a handy foil — one that conservative politicians need.
After all, there will always be bad days in which Danielle Smith has to explain why she thought she could offer amnesty to anti-vaxxers, or Saskatchewan Health Minister Paul Merriman has to sputter his way through why he chose not to ask Ottawa for COVID-19 help sooner in 2021.
But what usually comes along the next day is a reason to remind voters why they dislike Trudeau and his federal Liberal government.
He is now what binds together conservatives in all their forms. He is why so many now rally around Premier Scott Moe and the Saskatchewan Party.
And he will handily remain so — as long as Carla Beck’s Saskatchewan NDP cling to a social-policy urban-based strategy and remain no threat to seizing power. A common enemy is still needed, and Trudeau perfectly fits the bill.
This is why Smith’s limp handshake with Trudeau last week was consequential.
Naturally, this infuriates those wondering why the media would fixate on such a thing amid heady matters like whether or not the provinces agree to the 10-year, $196-billion increase in Canada Health Transfers offered by the federal government. Well, here’s a few things to consider:
In the 15 years since the Sask. Party came to power, Canada health transfers alone have more than doubled to $45.2 billion from $21.7 billion through Conservative and Liberal administrations.
That’s been 15 years in which a Sask. Party government responsible for local health-care administration has had ample reason to do something other than complain about the previous NDP administration closing 52 rural hospitals.
In fact, some of those years have been the most prosperous in Saskatchewan history, suggesting there’s been plenty of time and money to address the problems. Yet didn’t we see angry protests this summer over closing rural emergency care ?
Does anyone believe that this has all been caused by federal underfunding of provincial health care rather than provincial budget spending choices? What have been those recent choices of late?
In Saskatchewan, a government with a $1.1-billion surplus in 2022-23 just handed every adult a $500 cheque.
Yet Premier Scott Moe was eagerly singing baritone in the premiers’ health-care chorus where the preferred selection is the feds are underfunding health care because they are only offering a paltry $200-billion increase.
Maybe it’s not totally about ganging up on one unpopular Liberal prime minister. It’s been going on for awhile.
Whether it’s been a Conservative or Liberal in the prime minister’s office, premiers have balked at health-care spending accountability, direct program funding or the provinces funding health care themselves through “tax points.”
Premiers have instead demanded cash, acting like spoiled teenagers always going back to dad when they’ve blown the inheritance.
But today the operative word is “acting,” as seen in Danielle Smith’s ineloquent embrace with the one-time high school drama teacher.
Clumsy, hostile and disdainful, it just seemed an all-too-deliberate message to the folks back home that Justin and Just Transition shan’t be touched. Sincere derision? Who can say, in the play-acting world of politics, which is all about sloganeering about how politicians have “got our backs.”
However, it was telling.
We fixate on such images because most communication is visual. The Smith-Trudeau picture said a thousand words — a clarion call to the base as to who is the source of all problems.
Make no mistake about who in this picture is framed as the common enemy.
Mandryk is the political columnist for the Regina Leader-Post and the Saskatoon StarPhoenix.
Related
Braid: A handshake about Smith's image on a day of health care confusion
It was a poorly executed handshake performed rather brilliantly.
The supposed awkward encounter last week between Alberta Premier Danielle Smith and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was about as good a barometer of our current political climate as you will find.
It surely summed up today’s most basic political reality: As long as Justin Trudeau remains prime minister, there will be little other than politics because he is what unites the very forces that oppose him.
As was the case at last week’s Canada Health Transfer funding meeting, where two-thirds of the premiers were of conservative bent, Trudeau again proved to be a handy foil — one that conservative politicians need.
After all, there will always be bad days in which Danielle Smith has to explain why she thought she could offer amnesty to anti-vaxxers, or Saskatchewan Health Minister Paul Merriman has to sputter his way through why he chose not to ask Ottawa for COVID-19 help sooner in 2021.
But what usually comes along the next day is a reason to remind voters why they dislike Trudeau and his federal Liberal government.
He is now what binds together conservatives in all their forms. He is why so many now rally around Premier Scott Moe and the Saskatchewan Party.
And he will handily remain so — as long as Carla Beck’s Saskatchewan NDP cling to a social-policy urban-based strategy and remain no threat to seizing power. A common enemy is still needed, and Trudeau perfectly fits the bill.
This is why Smith’s limp handshake with Trudeau last week was consequential.
Naturally, this infuriates those wondering why the media would fixate on such a thing amid heady matters like whether or not the provinces agree to the 10-year, $196-billion increase in Canada Health Transfers offered by the federal government. Well, here’s a few things to consider:
In the 15 years since the Sask. Party came to power, Canada health transfers alone have more than doubled to $45.2 billion from $21.7 billion through Conservative and Liberal administrations.
That’s been 15 years in which a Sask. Party government responsible for local health-care administration has had ample reason to do something other than complain about the previous NDP administration closing 52 rural hospitals.
In fact, some of those years have been the most prosperous in Saskatchewan history, suggesting there’s been plenty of time and money to address the problems. Yet didn’t we see angry protests this summer over closing rural emergency care ?
Does anyone believe that this has all been caused by federal underfunding of provincial health care rather than provincial budget spending choices? What have been those recent choices of late?
In Saskatchewan, a government with a $1.1-billion surplus in 2022-23 just handed every adult a $500 cheque.
Yet Premier Scott Moe was eagerly singing baritone in the premiers’ health-care chorus where the preferred selection is the feds are underfunding health care because they are only offering a paltry $200-billion increase.
Maybe it’s not totally about ganging up on one unpopular Liberal prime minister. It’s been going on for awhile.
Whether it’s been a Conservative or Liberal in the prime minister’s office, premiers have balked at health-care spending accountability, direct program funding or the provinces funding health care themselves through “tax points.”
Premiers have instead demanded cash, acting like spoiled teenagers always going back to dad when they’ve blown the inheritance.
But today the operative word is “acting,” as seen in Danielle Smith’s ineloquent embrace with the one-time high school drama teacher.
Clumsy, hostile and disdainful, it just seemed an all-too-deliberate message to the folks back home that Justin and Just Transition shan’t be touched. Sincere derision? Who can say, in the play-acting world of politics, which is all about sloganeering about how politicians have “got our backs.”
However, it was telling.
We fixate on such images because most communication is visual. The Smith-Trudeau picture said a thousand words — a clarion call to the base as to who is the source of all problems.
Make no mistake about who in this picture is framed as the common enemy.
Mandryk is the political columnist for the Regina Leader-Post and the Saskatoon StarPhoenix.
Related
Braid: A handshake about Smith's image on a day of health care confusion
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