Up yours, Trump! Up yours, Trudeau!

I really enjoyed hearing about the two biggest assholes on both sides of the Canada-U.S. border, President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, getting torn apart by people who used to be their allies.

Up here in the Great White North, we may be seeing the demise of our arrogant, selfie-loving, virtue-signalling fraud of a prime minister thanks to his former justice minister, Jody Wilson-Raybould, someone who represents two of the groups he has always claimed to want to help: women and aboriginal people.

Down south, President Trump's former lawyer, Michael Cohen, summed up the wannabe dictator perfectly, saying, "He is a racist. He is a conman. He is a cheat."

One would assume that Trump and Trudeau are completely different because they're on opposite ends of the political spectrum. But they're more similar than you might think. They're both frauds, they're both liars and they're both hypocrites. And I would like nothing better than to see both of these two idiots go down in flames.

Ideology is a prison

The political world is so polarized nowadays. There seems to be no middle ground. Now of course, ideologies have existed for centuries. The difference now is that more and more people are parking themselves firmly on the right or the left of the political spectrum. Political centrism is on the retreat. Too bad, because I think that when you adhere strictly to any particular ideology, it's like you're putting yourself in prison. A prison that prevents you from considering any ideas from the other side of the political spectrum that might actually make sense and may be part of a solution to whatever problem you're trying to address.

For example, the topic of immigration is now a very hot-button issue here in Canada now. Unfortunately, the discourse about it is now dominated by those who think we should throw our doors wide open to anyone seeking refuge from some form of hardship or persecution and those that want to slam the doors shut and not let anyone into this country simply because they're from the "wrong" part of the world or don't embrace a rigid, Westernized mindset. What happened to the days when we could be tolerant and welcome people from all over the world, but still keep are borders secure from potential threats?

I can of course cite many other cases where ideology has ruined the discourse on most issues at hand. For instance, people on the left tend to automatically equate private enterprise with greed and inequality, but consider anything controlled by government to be in the public's interest and always the best way forward. In contrast, folks on the rigid right automatically equate anything that is controlled by government as inefficient, bloated and wasteful, while assuming that the private sector always does the job better and more efficiently.

I like to think outside the box that ideology can put people in. So for instance, I am strongly in favour of school choice and some sort of private sector involvement in Canada's health care system. At the same time, however, I don't want American-style two-tier health care, nor do I want to gut public education. I don't want to shut the door on people trying to get into this country, but I don't want people pouring across the border without going through customs and security screenings. And while I don't think public transit runs very well in Toronto and would like the TTC's monopoly to end, I certainly do not support privatizing the TTC and leaving mass transit entirely in the hands of profit-seeking private interests.

Someone once told me that politics is about compromise. But nowadays, people all over the world seem a lot less willing to budge on any given issue. There is less and less room for constructive dialogue. I think this needs to change, otherwise we're in for much more savage times.

Why I can't pursue my passion for politics

Since I was fourteen years old, my number one passion has been politics. Too bad, I sometimes think, because if I had some other interest, I probably wouldn't be as angry and frustrated as I've been for most of my life. I've been frustrated by the fact that although I'm obsessed with politics and would like nothing better than to be someone who affects change, I've been stifled by a Canadian political system that is rigged to prevent people like me from ever having a voice for change in this country.

It's not like I haven't tried. For example, I used to be part of a political party, but I found out that when you're the member of the party, you're just expected to follow the party leader like a well-trained dog follows its master. Just tow the party line. Oh yeah, and give them your money. Not a month went by without someone from the party calling me asking for a donation. Here in Canada, the party leader is everything. He or she rules the party like an absolute monarch. And if you stray away from the party's script, you will inevitably be kicked out. Now, I won't have anything to do with any political party in this country. Quite frankly, I spit on all of them. 

I still do vote. Well, sort of. In provincial elections, I show up at the polling station and decline my ballot, because I can't bring myself to support any of the incompetents we call leaders in Ontario. I would probably do the same federally too, but one doesn't have the option of declining their ballot in federal elections. So I just vote for the folks who I think will support Israel the most, since none of the main parties offer the kind of substantive changes I'm looking for, which include proportional representation, an end to excessive party discipline, an elected or abolished senate, and a freer economy. 

I was once told that if I didn't like this country's pitiful excuse for leaders, I should run for office myself. But of course, to do that, I'd have to join one of the parties I hate. Then, if I was elected, I'd have to vote in lockstep with my party and not say anything that contradicts the party line, or be kicked out of caucus. Well, there's always municipal politics. Oh, wait. Unseating an incumbent councillor is virtually impossible, and I don't think I'd have a chance in hell running for mayor, because you need to be a household name to do that and have a realistic chance of winning. 

So for those of you who accuse me of just complaining and doing nothing to affect change, I ask you, in light of everything I just said, what the hell am I supposed to do!?