How could a smug, arrogant Liberal who sees himself as the champion of real folks not get re-elected after only one term?
Ask outgoing Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre. A month ago he was dancing on the graves of jobs in Western Canada as word came down that the company that was going to build a pipeline to move oil from Alberta to the Atlantic coast had given up the ghost.
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Coderre had never been more full of himself.
The representative of real people was now also a friend to the planet Earth.
Never mind that he had dumped millions of gallons of raw sewage into the St. Lawrence River.
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Let’s not bring facts to a fairy tale that many “experts” had promoted.
It was said Denis Coderre was Montreal’s most popular mayor since Jean Drapeau, who ran virtually unopposed in the 60s, 70s, and 80s.
Coderre, until what seems like only five minutes ago, was thought of by public thinkers as the heir to the King of Montreal. He might as well have been called Drapeau II.
But something nasty occasionally happens to smug pundits who unwittingly act as defenders and apologists for smug politicians.
Elections happen. And on Sunday, the voters of Montreal peeled Coderre like an orange.
Valérie Plante nailed 51 per cent of the vote. Coderre got only 46 per cent.
When was the last time a mayor of Montreal was defeated at the polls after only one term?
We’d have to go back six decades to a year when the top-selling songs included The Twist and Save the Last Dance For Me.
Denis Coderre’s last dance was Sunday Nov. 5, 2017.
In his concession remarks, he said that his administration had “transformed Montreal forever.”
Those words in the bowels of defeat are hard for any rational citizen to stomach.
It’s the closing act of a narcissistic, entitled one-term wonder.
Are there any other people in our country right now that might be governing in a Coderre-like trance state?
Some might suggest the shoe fits Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
He’s another lifelong Liberal surrounded by people who tell him what he wants to hear, a coterie of pundits, pollsters, academics and other experts saying he is just too likable and relatable to be beatable.
And maybe they’re right. Maybe it won’t matter that he wanted to be seen as the author of democratic electoral reform until he wrote it off.
Maybe it won’t matter that the self-appointed cock of the middle-class walk is being plucked hourly.
Maybe it won’t matter that he spoke thousands of words about tax fairness while the Paradise Papers point to many, including Liberals, who have profited from the lack of fairness in the system.
Maybe it won’t matter that the narcissist in the PMO, who is only too willing to do a selfie with anyone who asks, won’t do the one I am asking for:
Prime Minister, would you please go to Paradise in the Cayman Islands and take a selfie next to the stash of millions of dollars being hidden from Canadian taxpayers by Trudeau loving Liberals?
Charles Adler is host of Charles Adler Tonight on CKNW, CHED, CJOB, and AM770 and a columnist for Global News.
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