That startling sound you heard yesterday was probably just a co-worker spitting their coffee over their smartphone after Alberta Premier Danielle Smith clutched her pearls and advised progressive politicians to take it easy on their MAGA Canada counterparts lest someone get hurt.
“I certainly hope that some of the progressive politicians here are careful of their language because they’ve been talking about conservative politicians in the same way and they need to dial it down,” Smith told reporters at the premiers’ meeting in Halifax, referring, of course, to the now notorious events at that Donald Trump rally in Pennsylvania Saturday.
“When it starts getting personal and names get called and labels get called, I think it can have a way of heightening and animating the level of polarization,” Smith piously told a reporter in a CBC news clip. “We’ve all gotta be mindful of that.”
God knows, we could use a little more civility in Canadian politics nowadays, but the irony of Premier Smith’s military-grade gaslighting is palpable.
Consider some of the things she, her government, her party, and its supporters have had to say about political opponents like, just to pick a couple of examples, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and federal Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault.
Of the latter, alert readers will recall Smith herself told far-right American commentator Tucker Carlson on a public stage in Calgary last January that “I wish you’d put Steven Guilbeault in your crosshairs.”
Now, as must be ritually recited at times like this, I’m sure Smith didn’t mean the man described as the leading voice of white grievance politics in the United States should literally put Guilbeault in the crosshairs of a rifle scope – merely that the far-right bloviator should say more defamatory things about Canada’s environment minister.
Still, what other kind of crosshairs are there? And what kind of ideas would you expect the sort of folks who take Carlson seriously take from that suggestion?
True, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. But sometimes a metaphor is inappropriate, including the one about crosshairs.
I guess we’re all going to have to learn that in-the-crosshairs is now an inappropriate thing to say in political discourse of any colour. But this means the people with the bumper stickers that say “The West Wasn’t Won With a Registered Gun” and “Fuck Trudeau,” as well as the Alberta politicians they favour, are going to have to learn to dial it down a bit themselves!
Alert readers will recall that there was a shooting and firebombing at Edmonton City Hall literally the day before Smith and Carlson sat down on stage for that congenial public chat.
Moreover, police have said they believe the violence, which took place while school kids were touring the building, was politically motivated. Thankfully, there were no injuries.
Still, given what happened the day before, the high-profile Calgary kaffeeklatsch featuring the premier and her American pal would have been an excellent place to spread the word that it was high time to cool the political rhetoric on all sides before someone was hurt.
As I wrote at the time, “One would have thought this would be a great opportunity to speak about the need for peace in our society, how our differences ought not to divide us, and how attacks on symbols of democracy are attacks on us all.”
So what did Smith actually have to say about that political violence, the day before, right in Alberta’s capital city?
Nothing. Nada. Not a word!
There was nothing from anyone else in her government either.
There wasn’t even a statement on the government’s official website, where there is always room for a spurious attack on Trudeau or Guilbeault, like the premier’s unhinged statement at the COP28 Conference in Dubai last December in which she accused the environment minister of “treachery against our province” and “actively sabotaging the interests of Albertans.”
However, Smith did make one public comment the night after the shooting in Edmonton. She cheerfully tweeted a photo of herself in the company of Carlson, National Post founder Conrad Black, and misogyny apologist Jordan Peterson.
In retrospect, this was a telling omission. It informs us just how much Smith really cares about the potentially violent impact of harsh political rhetoric – at least when it’s directed at politicians she doesn’t agree with in a city that doesn’t vote for her party.
As a result, we can be pretty confident right-wing political discourse in Alberta will return to normal within days, if not hours.
As for progressives, I suppose, if the Trump/Smith effort to stop them from even mildly criticizing Republican-style policies on either side of the international boundary works, it will soon be safe to go back to reviling them as ineffectual snowflakes and crybabies.
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