Trudeau’s pot gamble
Liberal leader’s admission he’s toked while MP could cost party votes
Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau’s surprise admission that he had a puff of pot after becoming an MP has thrown a wild card into federal politics, but whether it turns out to be more smoke than fire is anybody’s guess.
“The bigger danger for politicians isn’t so much (about whether) you smoke some pot,” said Yaroslav Baran, a longtime Conservative strategist. “Potentially the bigger danger is when you scratch the surface of the issue.”
Pollster Darrell Bricker from Ipsos Reid said people who are already likely to vote Liberal, including urban dwellers, college-educated people and the more affluent Canadians, might see smoking pot as no big deal.
Bricker said that while a strong majority of Canadians — more than 60 per cent — tend to favour looser marijuana laws, Trudeau’s admission could cause some concern among voters he needs to build support for the Liberals.
“It’s something that will at least get people’s attention and they’ll ask some questions,” said Bricker. “What I’m thinking of here are immigrant voters, particularly first-generation Canadians living in the 905 (region around the city of Toronto) and that’s where the Liberals have to win.”
The Conservatives have rejected calls for legalization or decriminalization of marijuana while the NDP has proposed to decriminalize consumption of the substance.
Trudeau’s admission to the Huffington Post Canada, about taking a puff from a joint passed around at a party after his election as an MP, provoked a firestorm of comments, jokes and attacks on political talk shows and social media websites Thursday.
Harper told reporters that Trudeau’s actions spoke for themselves, as other Conservatives such as Justice Minister Peter MacKay accused the Liberal leader of setting a bad example by “flouting” Canadian laws.
Baran, a principal at consulting and lobbying firm Earnscliffe Strategy Group, told Postmedia News that there was nothing wrong with a debate about marijuana. And at the end of the day, he said that most people probably don’t care much about whether someone has smoked pot, but he suggested Trudeau has taken a risk by revealing he broke the law as an MP.
“Following the laws of the land in the meantime is a much safer political route for someone who wants to be prime minister,” said Baran.
Trudeau, himself, joked on his Twitter page that he made a mistake that was drawing “vicious attacks” because he had openly admitted in the interview that he didn’t drink coffee.
Trudeau supporter Amanda Alvaro, founding director of Narrative PR, a communications firm, suggested the Liberal leader is drawing Harper into a debate that the Conservatives would rather avoid, while distracting them from their own party’s issues and priorities.
“Because it can become so high profile I think it does put the onus on people who defend the status quo to have to provide the evidence and facts that marijuana should remain illegal,” said Alvaro.
“And whenever you’re in a defensive position, you’re put on your back foot and it’s not the position you want to be in. You’d rather be leading the agenda.”
But Baran said he didn’t expect the incident would knock the Conservative government off its agenda, joking that it wouldn’t likely garner a mention in a new throne speech that reopens Parliament in the fall. ❚ Former Republican vicepresidential candidate Sarah Palin ❚ Former U.S. House speaker Newt Gingrich ❚ Finance Minister Jim Flaherty ❚ Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall ❚ Former Calif. governor Arnold Schwarzenegger