We Need More Politicians Like Him

September 22, 2009

President Barack Obama is a bleeding-heart conservative when compared to politicians like former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau.

The late Trudeau was an inaugural inductee into the new Queer Hall of Fame.

The former prime minister was a key figure in decriminalizing homosexuality and his famous partial quote — “there’s no place for the state in the bedrooms of the nation” — helped convince Parliament to pass the law in 1969.

Trudeau’s son, Justin, said he is incredibly honoured that the work his father did is being acknowledged.

“I know that the decriminalization of homosexuality 40 years ago was something that my father was very proud of,” Trudeau said.

“He’d be touched,” he said, of his father who passed away almost nine years ago.

Once again, Canada wins.

By the way, Trudeau was an outspoken Christian (Roman Catholic). He also got divorced during his tenure as Prime Minister.

(Thanks to Shawn for the link!)

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What Are Your Thoughts?leave a comment

Valdyr

Shouldn’t the equivalent opposite term for bleeding-heart liberal be “freezing-heart conservative”, or something? Robot-hearted?
Erp

Cold-hearted I think is the term used.
Veritas

Many Canadians consider Trudeau to be one of the greatest Prime Ministers – I would disagree on many points, but he was one of the best in social progressiveness we ever had. He really believed in the equality of everyone in the country, as long as you believed the same.

This is an honour well deserved. The state has no business in the bedroom of the nation.
Randall

Trudeau was the last Canadian Statesman. Since him, all we’ve had were politicians.
Claudette

LOL @ Canada winning again. Whatevs, I’m proud to be an American and in the USA, uninsured and all …
Trixie

Welllll, Canada may be a has-been here. The American blogs missed Stephen Harper’s “God’s Verdict” statement:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/…/gods-verdict…/article1269229/
In fact, most Canadian news sources didn’t delve too deeply into it either.
silver

He will be dearly missed. He wasn’t the best Prime Minister we’ve ever had, but no one is perfect, but at least we can say that he was a Canadian looking out for Canadians, unlike the crap we have now.

All we have ow are people looking out for themselves, their money and power and their vision on a better Canada, in that order.

I’m ashamed of all the mud-slinging that our two major parties are doing. Makes me wish the Rhinoceros Party of Canada. Not THAT was a group I’d vote for; they never once lied to0 us!

Silver

For the curious, here’s a wiki link to the Rhino party; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhinoceros_Party_of_Canada
Paul

Oh, fuddle-duddle!
Vicky

I’m not a huge Trudeau fan–though I wasn’t even alive when he was leading, so what would I know–but you have to salute him for that moment. And, though I do feel he substituted charisma for sound policy a lot of the time, I would vote for him over Harper any day!
Ian

He implemented universal healthcare too (and not a “public option” like Obama’s talking about, but real healthcare for everyone). He also pissed off a good Western chunk of the country by trying to establish a Nationalized Energy Program. He worked a lot with the democratic socialist party, the NDP, since he rarely held a majority of the parliament (henc his major left-wing reforms).
Indigo

Trudeau was and remains a very polarising figure, (ask anybody from the Prairies) but even his detractors generally give him a grudging respect. He shook up the Canadian establishment, paved the way for the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and as mentioned above led the charge to strike down a number of unjust laws.
And he pirouetted behind the Queen’s back. Dude had style.
Chal

Kind of strange to think that homosexuality was illegal just 40 years ago.
joe agnost

You’ve gotta give him props for his stance on equality. Good on him (and us) for sure!

As a Canadian though I will never forgive him for the bilingualism debacle that he started and we’re all paying for now.

Billions of dollars wasted trying to bilingualize the country (which is admirable if you ignore the impossibility of such an endevour) – and to this day we’re still wasting tens (hundreds?) of millions of dollars a year on it!!

It adversely affects many things (my children’s education for one – as french immersion programs are hurting those students that wish to be educated in english) and the stats keep showing that less and less of the country speaks/understands french!!

(And don’t get me started on the public service and our gov’t being dominated by french canadians because of the ‘speak french’ requirement for the most basic job – where language isn’t even an issue!)
Kaylya

I looked up the particular context of the “God’s Verdict” quote and it’s not that bad. I mean, obviously it reflects a belief in God, but that’s not exactly news.

“To be honest with you, I am a lot more concerned by God’s verdict regarding my life than the one of historians”

All that being said, Harper’s a Fundie who belongs to a conservative church. The difference between the US and Canada is that you play down your religion, whatever it is, in Canada. (For more on Harper’s church:
Why Stephen Harper keeps his evangelical faith very private

The attack ads for Michael Ignatieff center around the fact that he spent years and years in the US as a prof at Harvard (and thus is an elitist who doesn’t care about Canada and such), not the fact that he’s at the very least not religious if not privately atheistic.
Erp

Kind of strange to think that homosexuality was illegal just 40 years ago.

In Canada. It (or at least engaging in same-sex acts) was illegal in some states of the US until 6 years ago (Lawrence v. Texas struck down the laws against it in the remaining 14 states).

It is still illegal in many countries.
Steven

I think “fuddle-duddle” pretty much sums up my Dad’s feelings about living through the Trudeau era. At 40, I’m a little young to remember much of it as I had other interests than politics at that time. While I admire the social progress made during Trudeau’s tenure I deplore the lingering costs of bilingualism (Je ne parle pas Francais)and the confusion of our constitution that replaced the BNA act. It would be refreshing to see another Canadian leader with some personality, style, and a few ideas to spend my tax dollars wisely.