Don’t underestimate Trudeau’s toughness. It could make him stay

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“I don’t think Canadians want to see us plunge back into an election,” Justin Trudeau said at his cabinet’s retreat in Hamilton last weekend.

We should believe him on that. There’s not much sense in another election, which would make it three in the course of four years. It’s not like there is some matter of monumental importance confronting the nation.

Or, check that. For multitudes of Canadians, there is one. It’s getting rid of Justin Trudeau. An urgent priority.

But from what I’m hearing from the Prime Minister’s cohort, he’s not all that troubled by the torrents of abuse and derision. He’s been around long enough to know it comes with the territory. He was around when his father came under great loathing; when Brian Mulroney was so abhorred he tumbled into the teens in public support; when Jean Chrétien was being pushed out of office by his own party; and when Stephen Harper was held in sufficient scorn to be pummelled by Justin Trudeau himself in the 2015 election.

The animosity toward this Prime Minister is more visible, extreme and vulgar, but this has a lot to do with the social media era we’re in. Had the other prime ministers faced an environment wherein millions could spew their venom at them under cover of anonymity, it wouldn’t have been much different.

In coping with it, not to be underestimated is what Justin Trudeau took from his father. He’s different from him in so many ways but one thing that rubbed off was toughness – inner fortitude. Pierre Trudeau encased himself in iron. The son has some of it, enough to shield him from the malice.

His pride level runs high. The more the haters come at Justin Trudeau, the more he will be determined to hold on to power.

Much of the anger – speaking of what comes with the territory – is directed at him from Alberta and Saskatchewan. Nothing new here. Liberal leaders have been detested in those lands for more than half a century and it isn’t about to change.

Much of the rancour – ditto, comes with the territory – is from, quite naturally, core Conservatives. The Prime Minister can handle that. He need only suggest they might wish to look in their own backyards. The conservative brand under Donald Trump and his followers, and under multiple recent leaders in Britain, has become an object of tragicomic ridicule. In Canada, the embarrassment sees the Conservatives having thrown two leaders overboard in the past three years and their new chief scoring personal approval numbers lower than Mr. Trudeau’s.

Another source of animosity toward Mr. Trudeau is his style of government – the ethical transgressions, abuses of power, and incompetence over ordinary functions, such as issuing passports.

Much of this, sadly, comes with the territory as well. Is the degree of folly much different from prime ministers past? From the utter chaos and cabinet rebellion under John Diefenbaker; from the scandals that beset the Lester Pearson government, sidelining so many of his Quebec ministers; from the corrupt ways of Mr. Mulroney’s Tories, which saw cabinet resignations reach into the double digits; from the sponsorship scandal and caucus rebellion under Mr. Chrétien; from the long list of abuses of power under Mr. Harper?

Of course, Mr. Trudeau had vowed – as most all of them do on coming to power – to change things, to run a clean show. In some cases, such as Mr. Mulroney’s, the malfeasance didn’t personally involve the leader. In Mr. Trudeau’s case, the SNC-Lavalin affair, which led to the resignations of two big-rank cabinet ministers and his principal secretary, directly involved his office.

But in dealing with the trolls, whataboutism is a handy tool for the Prime Minister. Looking ahead, I’m told he wants to keep his survival pact with the NDP in place for at least another year, and then decide on whether to go for a fourth consecutive election win.

Differentiating this Liberal government from previous long-running ones, however, is his sustained low level of support. It’s been in the low-30s for years and there is no indication it is about to change. A recession is on the way.

There’s that and there’s the fatigue factor that grips any government in power for an extended period. It’s setting in for these Liberals now and it will be worse a year from now.

Mr. Trudeau should be aware that no prime minister has been able to extend his direct run of governance beyond the 10- or 11-year mark since Mackenzie King.

This, too, is something that comes with the territory.