Tirade on Trudeau's Trashing of Alberta Premier Danielle Smith Over Trump's Trade Tariffs

Another strong and competent woman steals his thunder and gets under the proclaimed feminist's skin...

Does anyone think that Trudeau’s latest attacks on Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, because she isn’t buying to his idea of cutting off Alberta’s oil supply to the US to retaliate against incoming US President Trump’s tariff threats on Canada, are more extreme than usual? When it comes to Trudeau’s hatred of Alberta and its oil and Smith’s many push backs against his government's deluge of destructive policies aimed at killing the province’s energy industry it is not unusual to see her crossing swords with him and getting some heat for it.

But the temperature has gone up with these latest salvos from Trudeau — accusing her of selfishly “not putting Canada first” and again demonstrating the very height of his hypocrisy. Honestly, does anyone think that it could reach greater heights than it already has with this guy?

For him to think that suddenly Alberta’s oil industry, which he has, for nearly a decade, kneecapped and demonized with a host of draconian and economically crippling policies, is now his ace in the hole to battle Trump’s 25 percent tariff threats, is pretty rich. His government has done everything it can to destroy Alberta’s energy industry ranging from cancelling pipelines, delaying and disrupting energy projects, introducing unconstitutional impact assessment regulations and emissions caps to a de facto embargo on exporting natural gas that countries overseas actually asked for, but he said there is no ‘business case’ for, along with the tanker bans on the west coast and, of course, the never-ending and ever escalating carbon tax.

But now Trudeau wants to use the Alberta oil industry, as a perfect “Team Canada” bargaining chip to fight Trump. He is on the warpath against Smith, accusing her of ‘not standing up for Canada’ because she has said, a big no, to his idea shutting down Alberta’s energy exports to the US to retaliate against Trump’s tariff threats. Her concern and argument is economically sound and logical – things that are beyond Trudeau’s ken.

She knows doing so to Alberta’s primary customer, would send the US looking elsewhere for other alternatives – like Venezuela. And thanks to Trudeau’s green energy obsession which killed the development and even use of vital pipelines in Canada, he has essentially landlocked Alberta, which means the only country it currently sells the vast majority of one of the world’s cleanest and most ethically produced oil is the US — which it sells to at discount prices — because there is has little competition.

Now in his dressing down of Smith Trudeau made reference to the government’s ‘sacrificial’ purchase of the Trans Mountain pipeline to take Alberta oil to the west coast. He forgets to mention that the reason that the government purchased it was because the original contractors on the project Kinder-Morgan walked away from it due to delays and cost overruns primarily caused by the federal government’s imposition of increasing environmental regulations. The pipeline extension was finally completed in May of last year at a cost of $32 billion dollars to taxpayers. However, most of the oil now traversing that pipeline to the west coast goes south of the border due to pre-contracting arrangements made while the pipeline was under construction. It should also be noted that while it has certainly increased profits and production for the Alberta oil industry, it has also filled federal government coffers and those of other provinces, primarily Quebec, due to transfer payments.

Thus, this current situation, ironically is the primary reason for Canada’s trade surplus with the Americans that Trump is complaining about. As Alberta’s main customer, the US takes advantage of the discount price it gets for Alberta oil and thus buys tremendous amounts of it. Smith has been pretty adamant that she will not risk the backbone of the Alberta economy and thousands of good paying jobs it provides for Albertans in this prospective tariff war.

“Alberta will simply not agree to export tariffs and an outright ban on sending oil south of the border.”

It is interesting that Trudeau isn’t asking Ontario impose stop exports of its auto industry to the US, or for Quebec to consider doing so on its aluminum industry. Ontario Premier Doug Ford, has, however threatened to cut off electricity supplies to a number of the northern states, but it is Quebec that actually provides the bulk of that power and Premier François Legault hasn’t volunteered to stop selling electrical power its US customers to help fight this tariff war. And there is certainly no talk at all about making any changes to the supply management system for dairy, poultry and egg farmers from which Ontario benefits, but Quebec, again, is by far the biggest beneficiary. But Trudeau isn’t castigating them in the media in the same way he is doing so with Smith. Smith, herself, finds it all quite irritating and believes it could even provoke a national unity crisis and here she explains why.

Smith’s stonewalling of Trudeau on this matter, no doubt, has certainly rankled him. And you might have noticed in his little speech, he also mentioned her association with Kevin O’Leary and President Trump — it seemed a bit of an irritant to him. Might his tirade have anything to do with Smith upstaging him with her recent trip to Mar - a - Lago, where she received a far better reception from Trump than did Trudeau when he visited him there a few weeks earlier to plead his case for not imposing punishing tariffs on Canada.

A very friendly looking photo of Smith and O’Leary with Trump at what appears to be his golf course.

Smith travelled to Trump’s Palm Springs abode with Canadian businessman and investor Kevin O’Leary who was on his way there to discuss his own business plans and opportunities with the incoming president. She got far more one-on-one time with Trump, and her visit got far more media coverage than Trudeau’s and better headlines. She said in media interviews that she had not only spent time with Trump on Saturday at Mar - a - Lago, but also had a another chance to talk with him during lunch at his private golf course on Sunday. During her visit she also spent some time Canada’s most famous clinical psychologist Dr. Jordan Peterson and Rambo himself, Sylvester Stallone. This is what O’Leary had to say about her interactions with Trump and other members of his administration.

Smith has been quite circumspect about her interaction with Trump, only to she said she had friendly and constructive conversations with him and some of his upcoming cabinet members.

On the other hand Trudeau took part in what appeared to be a dinner party, that was not on his behalf, on his very brief visit to Mar - a - Lago. He shared a table with Trump and a number of Trump’s cabinet picks, some who have publicly expressed a distinct dislike for Trudeau. Trudeau did not get a private audience, but was left to discuss his tariff issues with Trump over dinner. The end result was Trump trolling Trudeau online suggesting that Canada become the US’s 51st state if its economy can’t handle his tariffs.

Smith, in taking the position she has on the tariff war, and doing her own lobbying for Alberta’s energy industry south of the border has done two things to get under Trudeau’s skin. She is purposefully pointed to how his obsession with climate change and his green energy policies have placed Canada in its vulnerable position with Trump. She notes that had he allowed for the increased capacity of the Energy East pipeline to move Alberta oil Canada’s east coast to ship it to European markets'; and if Northern Gateway had gone ahead — and the government’s tanker ban not been imposed — it would have allowed Alberta to sell its oil to burgeoning Asian markets from the West Coast. With these new lucrative markets Alberta might have had the the market diversity and leverage using its oil supply to the US, as a tactic against Trump’s potential tariffs without jeopardizing its entire energy-based economy.

It should be further noted that because Alberta worked hand in hand to reroute its oil in pipelines to market its product in the US, cutting off supplies to the Americans under the current circumstances could also result in cutting off supplies to Ontario and Quebec who also receive Alberta oil via those US pipelines.

So there are a lot of reasons for Trudeau to have issues with Danielle Smith — and she is a woman, after all. Now, to take an oft used phrase of Dr. Phil McGraw — that being that “the best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour” – what does Justin Trudeau do when strong competent women challenge him, embarrass him, or get in his way?

Wilson-Raybold, Philpott, and Caesar-Chavannes

Well, ask his former Justice Minister and Attorney General Jody Wilson-Reybold who he fired because to refused to use her position as Attorney General to help his friends at SNC Lavalin avoid criminal prosecution; ask his former Health Minister Jane Philpott, who he kicked out of the Liberal caucus when she resigned her cabinet post to protest his treatment of Wilson-Reybold. Then there is his former Parliamentary Secretary Celena Caesar-Chavannes, who tired of being used as what she viewed the ‘token black woman’ in the party and was subjected to his verbal abuse when she advised him she would not again as an MP for the party for that reason.

And how about Tamara Lich, who became the face of the Freedom Convoy and thus its de facto leader, and a thorn in Trudeau’s side? Upon his invocation of the Emergencies Act, she was arrested, handcuffed and spent over a month in jail, before ever going to trial — denied bail by a Liberal appointed judge — you connect the dots. She faces an array of mischief charges and is still awaiting a verdict on them. And finally, his Deputy Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, who he fired just a few weeks back for giving him push back on his GST holiday and $250 rebate cheque gimmick.

Trudeau has a proven and rather unsettling track record of dressing down, putting down, or taking down women who challenge him or get in is way. And Danielle Smith is no different, except in this case, he may have just met his match. She doesn’t work for him or is beholding to him in anyways and gives as good as she gets. This which is reflected in the most recent comments about the current Liberal government and its strategy for battling Trump, while she was in Washington, to attend Trump’s inauguration and do more networking.

"The Liberal government is not taking a Canada first approach to Trump's tariff threat. They are taking a Liberal party first approach by turning the US and the Trump administration into the 'bad guys' so they can campaign against them for their own personal and political benefit and its not good for the country. I am putting the country first and the relationship with the US first and hope we end up with a positive outcome.”

And maybe her doing so, is what just helped Canada dodge a tariff bullet on Trump’s inauguration day.