Yesterday the party released a video of Trudeau bragging about the money that’s been pouring in since he became leader. The party was so eager to get it out that they didn’t give him time to get dressed, and he turns up in somebody’s front yard in his crumpled Saturday cargo pants and a green Joe Fresh T-shirt.
“So I wanted to tell you first,” he says, as if he’d whipped up the spot on his iPhone on a moment’s notice (voice from behind the camera: “Daddy, I have to GO!”) and was e-mailing it home to Mom. “Since I became leader of the Liberal Party of Canada, we’ve raised over a million dollars. ” Looking and sounding like he’s speaking to a seven-year-old who just scored his first goal in Timmy Tyke, he continues: “In this campaign, 14,000 people gave, of whom 6,000 was their first political donation ever.”
And Daddy is So Proud of You!
There is something decidedly weird about the whole set-up. First of all, there’s the outfit. OK, he’s young, he wants to come across as a typical Canadian guy, and typical Canadian guys of a younger age evidently wear dumpy-looking cargo pants on the weekend. That’s fine. But wait a minute, the job he wants is as Prime Minister, and Prime Ministers don’t usually stop to make chatty videos while on their way to put out the garbage in their grubbiest clothes. I bet Xi Jinping doesn’t do that. I know Putin doesn’t.
In the French version of the video, in fact, a truck drives noisily by just as the video is nearing the end, suggesting, 1. The Liberals only rented the camera for an hour and didn’t want to spend the extra dough to shoot a retake, and 2. Justin just missed the garbage truck and probably caught hell from Sophie when he got back inside.
There’s also the setting. It’s just at the bottom of the front steps of a typical-looking suburban Canadian home. So, is it Justin’s home, or did they drive to Brampton and shoo away some neighbours for 40 minutes while they did the shoot? The video is shot with two black bars on either side and Justin in the middle, looking suspiciously like it’s meant to mimic the Canadian flag. It’s also of suspiciously high quality for what is clearly meant to be a casual, almost amateurish film, meaning the party put great thought and effort into devising what looks like some undergrad’s campaign spot for a seat on the student council.
And there’s the script. When Trudeau announces that the party has managed to scratch together “a million dollars”, he looks so caught between sincerity and mirth that you can’t help thinking of Mike Myers playing Dr. Evil in Austin Powers, seizing control of the world’s airwaves and announcing to word leaders: “In a little while you will notice that the Kraplacistany warhead has gone missing. If you want it back, you will have to pay me … One Million Dollars!!!”, sending the world leaders into fits of laughter.
A million bucks? The Tories pulled in more than four times that amount in the first quarter alone. Trudeau must obviously be aware of this, yet wants his peeps — his cute little Canadian peeps — to know that he’s still proud as punch that they scraped together their pennies and sent them in to party HQ (Still, we must remember, children: no one accepts pennies any more. Ask Daddy for some dollars next time).
So what’s up? Either this is the most amateurish political video ever shot, or the most calculated. And I’m betting on the latter. The Liberals have to figure that Stephen Harper will hunker down in his man cave and dissect this baby until his head explodes.
Cargo pants? A crumpled T-shirt … what could it all mean? When the Conservatives wanted to introduce some warmth to Mr. Harper’s public persona, they dressed him in a sweater vest. So now he’s got to buy a green T-shirt and some wrinkled shorts? Stephen Harper in shorts, now that’s an image to conjure with.
In the English version, Justin keeps his right hand in his pocket and gestures with his left; in the French version it’s the reverse. In English he stands centre-stage; in French he strides in from stage left. The Conservatives, who never do anything by accident, will go nuts trying to figure it out. What’s the message? What’s he trying to say?
Yes, this is as subversive a political ad as you are ever likely to see, reducing the entire Conservative party to a country club of pale elderly men who wouldn’t be caught dead in shorts for fear of national ridicule. Diefenbaker in shorts; Bob Stanfield in shorts, Joe Clark in shorts. Just think of it.
No, wait. Better not.
Original Article
Source: fullcomment.nationalpost.com
Author: Kelly McParland
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