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Culture War Roundup for the week of January 6, 2025

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Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has resigned, a sign of yet more changing of the times as the Prime Minister since 2015 marks the end of an decade of Liberal Party rule of Canada, and possibly yet another political dynasty scalp Donald Trump may claim. While Trudeau's critics and issues go far beyond Trump, the internal-party revolt since the US 2024 election will put another person on the podium right as Donald Trump assumes office, part of a broader realignment in the West as governments including Germany, France, and others have seen falls- several deliberate- to re-roll priorities and mandates in (temporal) alignment with the change in the US presidency. (Canada's 2025 election, much like Germany's, is/was scheduled for October. Canada's parliament is suspended until 24 March where a new PM will (hopefully) be chosen.)

Broadly associated with the more progressive-woke politics, Trudeau's liberals are expected to face a shellacking, though whether that's as part of Canada's experience of the anti-incumbant wave of the last decade, a backlash to progressive politics, or Trudeau's own personal contribution. (Last year, 49% of respondents in a Canadian survey characterized the PM as 'Arrogant,' which is often just the first and more polite words in some lists.)

A (much) longer political obituary can be read here for those who are curious. Regardless of one's views of the man, the sun will continue to rise, the earth rotate, and life will go on.

But we may never get another world leader on camera in blackface.

On a very charitable read, he could be pushing for a voluntary merger.

Of course, either that or a military annexation is completely absurd. I mean, his ambitions for Greenland are absurd, but this is topping that by a lot. One should hold a bingo game about which country he talks about wanting to get home into his Reich next. UK? Ireland? Cuba? Germany? North Korea? Israel? Belarus? Antarctica? The Mariana Trench?

Edit: also the fact that he would graciously give a whole US state (i.e., two senators, just like Hawaii) to Canada is a clear indication that he is not trying to persuade anyone. But of course, if the ten provinces were added as individual states, the US might not much like the shift of the power balance.