Don Martin: Passport furor foreshadows a dirty-tricks campaign where perceptions will be reality

It’s been out there for 24 hours now so the great passport-eradicating-Canadian-history controversy is set to expire in the Canadian news cycle.

To frame a few new illustrations on pages tucked inside a passport as proof of a Liberal plot to purge the Canadian historical record seems like a severe stretch.

Crayon-quality artwork? You betcha. The end product of extensive public consultation? Doubtful. The predictable fallout that a pair of usually-bright cabinet ministers failed to spot in advance? Inexplicable.

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre had one only question period showdown with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau this week. And he used most of it to accusing the Liberals of expunging the memory of 3,500 Canadian soldiers who died at Vimy Ridge while giving a finger-flip to the memory of Terry Fox.

Clearly, given how few Canadians ever noticed the existing passport images until yesterday, it’s best to move on to focus on dozens of far more serious federal concerns.

A NUMBER OF POLITICAL SUBPLOTS

But this farce did reveal a number of political subplots, including the Trudeau government’s most dubious skill – their ability to turn positives into negatives.

Announcing a better-protected passport with easier online renewals only to see it become opposition cannon fodder as a Mao-level cultural cleansing is no small accomplishment. Even more discerning was watching above-average ministers Sean Fraser and Karina Gould fumbling about trying to unveil the new design while accusing reporters of “creating a story.”

But turning good news into bad news is becoming a habit for the Liberals.

For example, it took a week of foot-dragging and telling Beijing they expected retaliation before expelling a Chinese diplomat over threats to an MP’s family. The government was immediately slapped with the anticipated retaliation.

Falling poll numbers suggest the public is severely unimpressed with the go-slow Liberals, this following a very bad week when the Michael Chong controversy became a classic textbook best-avoided example of a prime minister beaten down by shifting storylines.

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There are other interesting sidebars emerging from the passport “scandal.”

For starters, it’s the shotgun start to silly season in the House of Commons.

This happens every May as warm days grow longer and sitting hours are extended until late into the night to ram through the government’s legislative priorities over sleep-deprived opposition MPs.

Sickened at the thought of being stuck with 338 fellow MPs for the final push to summer recess means the rhetoric ratchets up as camaraderie collapses and political warfare flares with little or no provocation.

In the days ahead, this rite of parliamentary spring will morph into the inevitable prediction of a cabinet shuffle and the date-guessing game for when Parliament will be prorogued to set up a Speech from the Throne in October, which will invariably be seen as the starting gun for election campaign.

ELECTORAL PREVIEW OF TRUDEAU'S CAMPAIGN LINES

The passport kerfuffle also provided an electoral preview of Trudeau’s campaign lines as he furiously accused Poilievre of being a fight-picking, misogynistic, anti-abortionist who crawls around in “the dark corners of the Internet” to produce his social media feeds.

Now, let us pause to note that anyone watching the Donald Trump town hall on Wednesday night would immediately view Poilievre as junior tadpole who has barely learned to swim in the slimy pond of politics. You never truly appreciate our Canadian politicians more than after watching this former president engage in a rude, delusional, full-throated, flat-out-lying tirade for an eye-wincing hour of can’t-look-away television.

But I digress.

Trudeau’s mostly-bogus shots at Poilievre’s character sound even more desperate when he pivots to attacking the record of a Conservative government that hasn’t been in power for three elections and is now under its third leader since he became prime minister.

Sadly, the passport furor foreshadows a soul-destroying, hair-on-fire, dirty-tricks, character-assassinating campaign where perceptions will be the reality and the truth highly negotiable.

So, sigh, let the silly season begin.

And, by the way, that major cabinet shuffle will come in late June and Trudeau will prorogue Parliament in mid-September to set up a spring 2024 election. You read it here first.

That’s the bottom line…