I don’t have anything against Justin Trudeau personally.
Image via Wikipedia
In fact, from what I hear, he’s a pretty stand-up guy. Were I still living in the US, I’d say, “he seems like he’d be fun to have a beer with,” which seems to be the highest compliment you can pay to an American running for office.
But Justin Trudeau doesn’t seem to like me very much.
I should preface this by saying that throughout my childhood (spent within a pretty short drive of Downtown Toronto), we were Liberal voters. Dad always backed the Liberal candidate no matter who they were, and Mom dutifully followed along. And when we moved to Oshawa, I think we were the only family in town that didn’t vote for Ed Broadbent.
And as I now get set to vote in the first Federal election in Canada since moving back home last year, it would appear Justin has written me off already because I had the gall to do something as treasonous as call one of his assertions into question. Suddenly I’ve been labelled a Kool-Aid drinker and a troll by young Justin (and yes, he’s a few years younger).
Here’s how it all went down. This morning (3/29), Justin made the following post on Twitter:
If you had clicked the link, you’d be taken to the following screen shot of a web page on CraigsList, purporting to look for writers to post “right-wing comments” on political websites, while making up facts and simply stirring the pot:
Click the image to open it full-screen
Maybe I spent too many years with political talk radio in the US (or too long as a fan of Ron Silver‘s character on “The West Wing”), but when I read the “ad” above, I smelled a rat.
You see, one of the things I’ve learned is that most “errors” made by political parties are very carefully orchestrated and choreographed errors. (This is not, by the way, synonymous with errors made by candidates, which occasionally involve things like strippers and drunk driving convictions.)
However, anytime I see something completely stupid done in the name of a political party, my “New Coke” radar kicks in and I start wondering how authentic it really is.
My friend Justin Trudeau (apparently not my friend at all, as you’ll see in a moment) looked at the ad and apparently believed it to be true. Believed that a company that is politically savvy enough to be hired by someone’s campaign would be stupid enough to take out such a brutal ad on CraigsList, complete with spelling errors and all (cuz evrywun noze them rite wingers kant spel).
I found it alarming that someone with Justin’s political clout could be duped by something that was to me, a bigger fake than the lake at the G8. So I took him to task on it and pointed out the folly of the “ad” in question:
Now, one of the oldest tactics in the political book is to take advantage of a bigger bullhorn anytime you can get it, and use it to direct attention away from inconvenient questions by making making fun of the questioner. So it wasn’t a surprise that Justin treated his 59,000 Twitter followers to a gem from that playbook, knowing they would drown out my 700 followers and thus ignore my point. Thus, my friend Justin (as I remind you, apparently not my friend at all) said this:
Now I’m no political expert (although I played one on both CNN and on FOX News once), but I don’t think that’s how one wins friends and influences people. Remember, I’m a free agent on the political scene here at home; I don’t yet have a party to call my own, and I recognize fully that every political party does stuff they pretend they would never do. But come on, Justin, all I did was – gasp! – question the authenticity of a “document” on the internet, found on a website that has even less credibility than Wikipedia.
…a document which, by the way, has been removed from the CraigsList website (which is what they do with spam and offensive ads):
Keep in mind that you could go on the CraigsList website right now and write an ad like the one in question. People do it all the time, when they’re not sending emails from a good-natured South African bank president who just wants to store a few billion dollars in your checking account for a while.
Someone then sent Justin a link to a video, which he gleefully reposted:
The video he links to is entitled “CTV Confirms Government(s) employing Internet Trolls, Shills & PR Agents to ‘correct misinformation’”. Interesting because the video has little to do with that at all. Interesting as well, that the video doesn’t address Justin’s assertion in any way, shape, manner or form!
And then?
Come on, Justin! A Kool-Aid drinker? A troll? Don’t be hatin’!
Reminds me of the time I was reading Barack Obama’s autobiography, and came to the part where Obama admits that as a young man, he was a cocaine abuser (yes he does – look it up). I remember bringing that to someone’s attention and being labelled a racist for daring to impugn Obama’s character. After all, only a racist would have the temerity to do something the American press deliberately avoided doing – reading something in Obama’s own autobiography.
This is starting to feel oddly similar, this less-than-friendly interaction with Justin Tr — wait a minute… Trudeau… Trudeau… where do I know that name from?
Ah yes… the “winning hearts and minds” thing runs in the family, I see…
The Famous "Trudeau Salute" Lives On (on Twitter).
From everything I hear about Justin Trudeau, he’s a good guy. I just don’t know what I did to piss him off. I still think it’d be fun to get together over a couple of Kool-Aids sometime.
Update: Had to put a bow on this; moments ago, I received the following from Justin:
Told you he was a good guy. Hey Justin – hope you didn’t take the illustration of the “salute” as a shot. As a matter of fact, it was one of the things my Dad loved about your Dad. I have a hunch that when they both got to wherever they ended up, mine might have offered to buy yours a Newcastle Brown for it.
Now my head hurts and I need coffee.
Deal. I’ll take a Newcastle over a Kool-Aid anyday.
Neil
I’m a member of your fan club. Great stuff.
You’re crowing as if you’ve won the argument with Mr. Trudeau. But you haven’t proven that the Craig’s list ad was a hoax. You’ve merely argued well a less damning explanation. As to the actual truth of the matter the jury is still out. But let us keep in mind what Warren Buffet said: there is a class war between the rich and the poor and the rich are winning.
Kenneth -
Congratulations for evidently having read at least some of what I wrote. I’m not sure where the “crowing” is (maybe you have access to parts of the blog that I don’t…), but you have – I think unwittingly – served to illustrate the point of the entire post.
If I were to produce a picture showing Jack Layton in a compromising position with a goat, there would be a flurry of activity delivered at blinding speed to try and determine the source of the photo, the credibility of the source, and the veracity of the photo.
Here, we have an ad (which takes much less creative ability than Photoshopping Jack Layton with a goat), published by an anonymous source, rife with spelling errors and usage issues, submitted to a website universally regarded as even less credible than PerezHilton.com, and there are those to whom a simple fact-check seems unnecessary.
Interesting, isn’t it, how the level of proof required is somewhat pliable when it comes to political discourse (depending on the objectivity of the participants).
If I have anything to “crow” about, it’s that Justin Trudeau seemed to at least mitigate his hard-line stance that all Conservatives who use social media are insincere “trolls”. At least, in my mind. I wonder if you’re willing to do the same.
All this talk of crows and goats should serve as a reminder, politics can be a zoo sometimes. Thanks for the comment.
Quick edit to add: Since CraigsList has removed the ad, I wonder if anyone has any proof that the ad ever existed at all? Maybe when the Layton/goat people were done, they Photoshopped a bogus Craigslist ad and screenshot.
for whatever this is worth, it was a whole lot more interesting than much of the political tweeting going on;).
now off to read part deux.
and now i want a newcastle too.
Thank you Neil for considering my comment.
As I said in my first comment, the jury’s still out.
Your statement “I found it alarming that someone with Justin’s political clout could be duped by something that was to me, a bigger fake than the lake at the G8.” You take it for granted that Justin has, in fact, been duped. Has he ? Or has he, in fact, nailed it ? “Bigger fake” is your inference; not as yet verified. Your tone, IMHO, is decidedly ‘case closed.’
Later in your blog, true, you shift ground and nuance somewhat: “But come on, Justin, all I did was – gasp! – question the authenticity of a “document” on the internet, found on a website that has even less credibility than Wikipedia.” Earlier, you weren’t merely “questioning the authenticity,” you were, quite boldly, demonstrating belief in your “bigger fake” inference.
Consequently, I am, as yet, unwilling to withdraw “crowing.”
Regarding your generous reply: “If I have anything to “crow” about, it’s that Justin Trudeau seemed to at least mitigate his hard-line stance that all Conservatives who use social media are insincere “trolls”. At least, in my mind. I wonder if you’re willing to do the same.”
It never crossed my own mind to think “all Conservatives who use social media are insincere “trolls.” Let’s just see if JT, himself, did indeed say or even imply that.
Of his 4 tweets on the matter, the only direct reference to Conservatives appears first, March 28 : ‘’And I thought the Con trolls hated me on principle, but turns out it’s just a well-paid job (listing source as journalist Susan Delacourt).” If “troll” refers to all who use social media, then you and I are trolls. Perhaps I’m mistaken, but I assumed that a troll was a particular kind of user of scocial media. If this is the case, your conversion of “Con trolls” into “all Conservatives,” is a misrepresentation of Mr. Trudeau’s statement.