Matt Taibbi on "Justin Trudeau's Ceauşescu Moment"

When one of my favourite political writers -- the one who called Donald Trump the "insane clown president" -- likens Justin Trudeau to Nicolae Ceauşescu, the late Communist dictator of Romania, I take notice. And that's what Matt Taibbi did in his Substack blog TK News yesterday. Under the headline "Justin Trudeau's Ceauşescu Moment" is the subhead "Denouncing truckers for 'unacceptable views,' Canada's Prime Minister skipped town rather than face evidence of his own unpopularity. Is neoliberalism finally cracking?"

For those who have forgotten, Nicolae Ceauşescu was President of Romania from 1974 to 1989. His second decade was characterized by an increasingly erratic personality cult, nationalism and a deterioration in foreign relations with the Western powers as well as the Soviet Union. In December of 1989, in the face of something like the Canadian truckers' freedom rally in the city of Timișoara, the Communists gathered a rent-a-mob in Bucharest to show their presumed support for the régime. Then this happened.

   

For three minutes (2:45 to 5:45) the crowd shouts insults and deprecations at the President. (I don't understaned Romanian, so am not sure if the F-word was used or not.) Mr Ceauşescu offers the people a generous bribe -- a 10% increase in the minimum wage -- to be quiet and cease their opposition. And he urges them to rise up to defend Romania against the intervention of "foreign agents". 

"Better to die in battle, in full glory than to once again be slaves upon your ancient ground, and we must fight to live free and independent!" Someone in the crowd responds, "He's right. Let's rush the stage!"

   

Even if you don't understand Romanian, you can hear that at about the 8-minute mark of this video (the second part of his speech) people are starting to shout back at the Communist dictator. Just before the clip ends, you can see him waving his hands in gestures that clearly say "no, no, no! I don't want to hear that!" After this speech he ran away, but was caught and was executed four days later, still wearing the same clothes. 

I would be surprised if Blackie McBlackface knew anything about the Communist tyrant's fall from power, but he has smart people pulling his strings, who certainly advised him that it was better to go to ground -- an "undisclosed location" in the Laurentians? -- rather than risk a similar confrontation with Canadians who were already waving "Fuck Trudeau!" flags on Parliament Hill.

That's Matt Taibbi's point. For neoliberalism or  "liberal democracy", the bloom is off the rose. The real people (as distinguished from the liberal elites who rule Ottawa, Washington, Paris and London) are fed up. But, just like Ceaușescu, the rulers don't want to admit or even hear that. Mr Taibbi writes:

There may be no real-world comparison between a blood-soaked monster like Ceaușescu and a bumbling ball-scratcher like Joe Biden [I love that phrase!], or an honorarium-gobbling technocrat like Hillary Clinton [that one too!], or a Handsome Dan investment banker like Emmanuel Macron, or an effete pseudo-intellectual like Justin Trudeau. 

Still, the ongoing inability of these leaders to see the math of populist uprisings absolutely recalls that infamous scene in Bucharest. From Brexit to the election of Donald Trump to, now, the descent of thousands of Canadian truckers upon the capital city of Ottawa to confront Trudeau, a consistent theme has been the refusal to admit — not even to us, but to themselves — the numerical truth of what they’re dealing with. 

Trudeau is becoming the ultimate example. Truckers last month began protesting a January 22nd rule that required the production of vaccine passports before crossing the U.S.-Canadian border. Canadian truckers are reportedly 90% vaccinated, above the country’s 78% total, a key detail that’s been brazenly ignored by media in both countries determined to depict these more as “anti-vax” than “anti-mandate” protests (which seem to be about many things at once, but that’s another story). 

When an angry convoy descended upon the capital, Trudeau dismissed them in a soliloquy that can only be described as inspired political arson: The small fringe minority of people who are on their way to Ottawa, who are holding unacceptable views that they are expressing, do not represent the views of Canadians…who know that following the science and stepping up to protect each other is the best way to ensure our rights, our freedoms, our values as a country. 

 A near-exact repeat of the “basket of deplorables” episode, Trudeau’s imperious description of “unacceptable” views instantly became a rallying cry, with people across the country lining the streets to cheer truckers while self-identifying as the “small fringe minority.” Everyone from high school kids to farmers and teachers and random marchers carrying jerrycans of fuel joined in as Trudeau’s own words were used to massively accelerate his troubles.

I'm tempted to copy and paste the rest of Mr Taibbi's article but imagine I'd hear from his lawyers. Suffice to say that he has hit the liberal nail right on its pointy head. The people are speaking. Will the liberal elites listen? They'd better, lest they wind up like Mr Ceaușescu.

Further reading: "The Week Canada Liberated the United States", by Joel Pollak, Senior Editor of Breitbart News, 11/2/22.