Montreal City Weblog

Kate 12:12 on 2025-01-06 Permalink Reply  

• Uatu 15:40 on 2025-01-06 Permalink

  Funniest thing about this is a YouTube video nicknaming Poilievre “fascist Milhouse” lol

• Blork 17:24 on 2025-01-06 Permalink

  OMG I’m so using that (even though I generally disagree with name-calling in politics). That said, I have been known to refer to him as “PeePee the Trump Puppet.”

• Ian 18:17 on 2025-01-06 Permalink

  L’il PP is a schmuck plain and simple, but “fascist Milhouse” made me G-LOL.
  Any bets on the nex leader of the Liberals? I’m thinking probs Joly or Carney but this late in the game it will be a sacrificial role. It’s really too bad Trudeau insisted on clinging to power instead of strategically transitioning back in the summer so the Liberals would at least have a chance. It’s pretty funny seeing the Trudeau fanbois blaming Singh for all this when basically it’s only Singh that allowed Trudeau to prevent a non-confidence vote for this long. When PP kills the NDP gains the Lberals and NDP will be able to use that politically… but at this point the best we can hope for is a conservtive minority IMO.

  I’m still annoyed Mulcair let Trudeau scuttle him as he would have been way more electable than Singh but to be fair he’s also way too centrist for an NDP leader. Centre left is Liberal turf, even if they govern more right. Not as right as the Conservatives, but PP is even right of trad Cons. I dread to learn what horrors L’il PP has in mind for when he actually has to do something and not just snipe at real power.

• Kate 18:24 on 2025-01-06 Permalink

  I’m afraid we’re headed right for Convoy Canada now.

• CE 19:23 on 2025-01-06 Permalink

  Calling PP a fascist feels a bit like when I hear right wingers refer to Biden or Trudeau using terms like “radical socialists”.

• Chris 20:37 on 2025-01-06 Permalink

  CE: yup, exactly. Things are very polarized these days. And it’s a vicious circle I think. It makes a lot of normies and centrists think the Left is crazy with these exaggerated “fascist” claims, and that the Right is crazy with these exaggerated “communist” claims. Then they stay home and don’t vote. 🙁

• Kevin 23:39 on 2025-01-06 Permalink

  What do you call someone who has spent several years saying that his political opponents are “unleashing crime and chaos in your neighbourhood” when crime is at the level it was in 2006?

  Although I do roll my eyes every time the guy who has had his federal pension “protected” since he was 31 years old claim that all his political opponents are only in it to “protect” their own pensions…

• CE 23:50 on 2025-01-06 Permalink

  You could call him an ideologue, a populist, or what I usually call him, a fucking idiot. I just think “fascist” goes too far and isn’t particularly accurate.

• Chris 23:53 on 2025-01-06 Permalink

  >What do you call someone who has spent several years saying that his political opponents are “unleashing crime and chaos in your neighbourhood” when crime is at the level it was in 2006?

  A blowhard, a liar, an exaggerator. What do you call him?

• nau 00:44 on 2025-01-07 Permalink

  Chris (19:37 comment): that doesn’t really square with my memory of past politics. Centrists have always been happy to see themselves as the “sensible” people in contrast to the “crazy ideologues” further out in either direction. (It’s not like centrists don’t exaggerate to themselves how extreme Canadian right and left views are.) And back in the day, the left was commonly painted as “pinko-commies” by “normies.” It was only with the fall of the Soviet Union and the left turning away from even lip service to socialism that only the right continued to reflexively tar them as communists. Things were polarized back in the day but the whole spectrum was further left (economically speaking) so exaggerated lefty rhetoric was against capitalists not fascists. In the days of the Progressive Conservatives, there wasn’t much talk of the right as fascists. That became more widespread with Reform and the decline of Red Tories. It’s true that it wasn’t centrists referring to the new right as fascists, but politically informed centrists understood that it was further to the right. There were certainly people who had switched between voting Liberal and PC who wouldn’t countenance voting Reform even after it renamed itself back to Conservative. It didn’t stop them from voting however, and I doubt that it’s just the “fascist” and “communist” insults that keep people from voting. On the one hand, people don’t vote because they think their interests are never served, and on the other because they’re turned off by negative ad campaigns which are run by all parties in all parts of the political spectrum (and at least in some cases are run with the intent to depress the vote.)

• Tim S. 09:34 on 2025-01-07 Permalink

  I don’t know if Pollievre is actually a Fascist, but he certainly hasn’t done anything or set any boundaries to reassure people that he isn’t one. He’s left the question of “how far would he go” very deliberately open.

• Ian 19:22 on 2025-01-07 Permalink

  Is L’il PP a fascist? Probably not. Would he cozy up to fascists and deliver fascist-friendly policies if he thought it would help him secure power? Probably yes. I’m not convinced he has any real political convictions, he’s just a career politician looking to climb the ladder.

  To draw a parallel, Rebel Media doesn’t have to be Der Sturmer to be bad for Canada… but then again even CTV covered the Jordan Peterson “interview” with L’il PP as if it was real news.

• Chris 00:32 on 2025-01-08 Permalink

  nau, I broadly agree with your recollection. But my 19:37 comment was about the present, not about the past.

• Tux 10:07 on 2025-01-08 Permalink

  What’s a fascist, Wikipedia says: “characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy, subordination of individual interests for the perceived good of the nation or race, and strong regimentation of society and the economy”

  Is PP dictatorial, well, he dictates to his party what they can and cannot say. He’s never collaborated with others in gov’t.

  Centralized autocracy: In that he’d prefer if a small handful of corporations ran everything, yes?

  Militarism: He wants to “change the culture of the Canadian armed forces from Woke to Warrior” so, that’s a thing.

  Forcible suppression of opposition: Just wait! Protests in Canada will get more violent under the conservatives, mark my words. Agents provocateurs to make protests look like ‘riots’ or just the police newly hopped up on self-importance with a conservative gov’t in place.

  Belief in a natural social hierarchy: Well, he pretty clearly hates queer people and women.

  Subordination of individual interests: Yes, to corporate interests.

  Strong regimentation of society and the economy: His policy ideas are all about cutting funding to gov’t programs and cutting taxes for the rich. His economic plans seem likely to exacerbate income inequality, furthering the divide between the rich and the poor in Canada. Get ready to feel lucky just to have a gigging app job with no benefits.

  So is PP a fascist? If he isn’t he sure walks and talks like one.

• Ian 11:20 on 2025-01-08 Permalink

  It’s only fascism if it comes from the fascist region of Southern Europe, otherwise it’s jsut sparkling alt-right populism /s

• Tim S. 12:57 on 2025-01-08 Permalink

  I once had a German history prof who asked us to define Fascism, and after we’d all spent quite some time discussing it quite firmly gave us Ian’s answer, slightly rephrased. With all due respect to his expertise, I still think a broader definition is possible – basically, “might is right” as an end.