Monday, January 15, 2018

Blue Monday and the Gloomy Canadians



Today is Blue Monday, the day some say is the most depressing day of the year. For obvious reasons.

AS the Christmas memories fade, all we are left with are a hammered bank account, a bulge around the waist, gloomy weather and a return to work after weeks of partying. 

These factors all come together in a perfect storm for a single day believed to be the most depressing of the year which has been dubbed 'Blue Monday'.

And although I should be immune. I'm happy, I didn't spend much at Christmas, I didn't put on any pounds. And the only thing making me blue, literally, are the extremely cold temperatures this winter.

I did find something really depressing, so I could join in the collective misery.



This ugly poll. 

More Canadians than ever before dislike Mr. Trudeau's Liberal government, whose approval ratings are now identical to Mr. Harper's before the last election, according to a new poll being released on Monday by Nanos Research and the Institute for Research on Public Policy. 

The share of Canadians who say Mr. Trudeau's government is doing a bad job has jumped to 39 per cent from 33 per cent a year ago and 23 per cent in 2015, according to the annual Mood of Canada survey, conducted in late December.

For although the poll doesn't really tell me anything we didn't know. 

The thirty percent of Canadians who support the Cons, and about half the NDP, think Trudeau is doing a bad job.

This is depressingly predictable.

Respondents who disapprove of Mr. Trudeau's Liberals are most likely to be male, ages 55 or over and live on the Prairies.

And when I first glanced at the story, I shuddered to think how some of the other dotards in this country must be reacting...



But then I took a closer look at the poll, and I realized they wouldn't be celebrating for long.

The survey results are not all bad for Mr. Trudeau. Sixty-one per cent of respondents still rate the Trudeau Liberals' performance as average or better. And most Canadians remain satisfied with the direction the country is taking and believe Canada's reputation around the world is on the upswing.

And that nothing had really changed.

Another silver lining for the Liberals is that neither the Conservatives nor the NDP have so far capitalized on the government's missteps. Other recent polls show the Liberals have maintained and even expanded their lead in recent months.


CBC's Poll Tracker – a weighted aggregate of all publicly available opinion polls – suggests the Liberals would win another majority if an election were held now.

Except the looks on their faces...



Which tells me that while today may be Blue Monday, 2019 is shaping up to be a VERY good year.

And so is 2018. 

For while real depression is a serious problem in this country...



And we need to do much much more to help those who suffer from it.

I do find that many Canadians are addicted to misery. Even though in the time of Trump the American dream has moved North. 

By virtually every measure, Canada has surpassed the United States as the shining city on the hill, where everyone is safe to reach their potential. And people around the world have begun to notice. From the United States, refugees and asylum seekers are now fleeing into Canada hoping for a fair immigration hearing and a better future. In Latin America, there are reports of economic migrants heading north, intending to cross the U.S. border and keep moving, into Canada. And, overseas, ESL students are increasingly choosing Canada over the U.S.

Whether it was due to geography or history or maybe even policy, we have arrived. Everything America once aspired to be, we now are. Not only have we achieved the fabled American Dream, we are arguably among the safest, healthiest, happiest human beings to have ever existed.

And what we should be doing is thinking a little bigger, and making more of our good fortune.  

And what are we doing with this incredible good fortune? If we are painfully honest with ourselves, not much. We measure out our lives in coffee spoons and Caribbean holidays, a nation of overweight middle-class suburbanites, upset that a carbon tax adds an extra 5¢ at Tim Hortons, or one less day at the beach in Jamaica. 

No generation of Canadians has ever had more and been able achieve more than us—and no generation has been less ambitious. We have all the tools and all the opportunity to do great things, but no purpose, no national project, no imagination and no sense of determination.

But then I'm not a gloomy person, I'm an optimistic one. I strongly believe that despair is the mortal enemy of change.

So the only questions I have are, how can we crush the Cons so they can never recover?

And where will I be when the church bells start ringing to announce that Harper Two has gone down, just like the first one?

Will I be at The Wizard's place in the Scottish highlands?



Having completed my mission to Canada.

Or will I still be here freezing my behind off?

Waiting for the Zamboni to hurry up and finish before I turn blue...



So I can skate some more, and then rush off and start partying for at least a week.

Yes, as I said, life is too short to be gloomy.

But wowser, wowser, wowser, he does drive them crazy...



Happy Blue Monday everybody !!!

20 comments:

  1. Anonymous9:41 AM

    It's such a weird poll, average to good pretty much reads as "approve." So a 61% approval with a little bit of "you can do a bit better." I expect some big policy announcements before 2019 and that should send his majority through the roof.

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    1. Jackie Blue5:06 PM

      Well, legal weed is coming by this summer. The G7 summit is in Québec this year and if Hair Drumpfsterfire is still in office, let alone hasn't croaked from a fast-food and stress-induced heart attack, he's going to put on another spectacular show of dopey, losing failure, this time on JT's turf. Trudeau could spend the whole conference doing absolutely nothing but binge-watching Star Wars and he'd still look bigly better compared to the dotard. 'Course, he won't do that; he'll have proactive discussions with the European leaders and Abe of Japan, and be a gracious host to the embarrassing drunk uncle at the table, no matter how much pain his jaw must be in by now from having to grit his teeth in a forced smile meeting Darth Cheddar. Canadians will be reminded over and over again of just how good they've got it. If Harper or Scheer was in charge, either one would be canoodling over freedom fries with Fat Donnie like a bad imitation of Lady & The Tramp. Or should I say Andy & The Trump? Complete with Ernst Steve-ro Blowhard's evil Siamese cats! Yuck!

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    2. Anonymous7:04 PM

      This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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    3. hi anon @9:41AM...yes, there's something not quite right about this poll. I don't know if it's the questions, or maybe it was just taken at a time when due to the holiday season the samples were skewed. As a reader pointed out, the Globe splashed it all over the front page, only to shrink it quickly. So they knew it was less than advertised, or little more than click bait...

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    4. Hi Jackie... yes, I think Justin Trudeau will have many opportunities to boost the size of his next majority, with legal marijuana being a big one. Also, as you point out, the comparison between him and Trump can only help Trudeau, as the Trumpster becomes more and more unhinged. It won't be easy keeping his cool, but the cooler he remains, the more Canadian he will look, and the more popular he will become...

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    5. Hi anon@7:04 pm...how many times have I got to tell you Cons that I am not interested in having you deposit your vulgar Trump talking points here. Or your drive by comments that make little or no sense. If you want to make a point use clean language, argue that pint rationally as possible, and I will publish your comment. If not take them to The Rebel for they're not wanted here. Thanks.

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  2. The Scottish Highlands aren't precisely the Caribbean either!

    Pretty though.

    Don't fret; Mayor Valérie Plante has already lost her sheen due to a (minor) rise in property taxes needed because of the dodgy accounting of the Coderre administration. This always happens.

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    1. hi lagatta...I don't mind the Canadian cold, especially if the sky is a bright blue, and there is clean snow on the ground.
      And no, the highlands aren't the Caribbean, alas. But the Moray where my family lives is favoured by a warm current, and even though it's way up north is milder than many places in Britain. As for Valérie Plante, I'm not worried about her. She might lose a few points due to the new found greed of Canadians, but her core qualities will survive and prosper...

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  3. The difference between Harper and JT is that the press polished Harpers knob and the press does everything possible to bring JT down. I do not trust the polls so far out from an election. They are tools of the deep state.

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    1. Hi Steve...I don't know if I would go so far to call polls tools of the deep state. But you're right, they don't mean that much so far from an election. And this poll is not much more than click bait. The Con media are anxious to keep Scheer's candidacy, alive so he can be elected and cut their corporate manager's taxes. But good luck with that one...

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  4. Anonymous2:01 PM

    The Globe should be ashamed of itself for hyping a meaningless poll like that one, and they know it. They made it their main headline, but very quickly all but buried it elsewhere. It would be unprecedented for a prime minister as popular as Justin Trudeau to lose after only one term in office, and whether the Con dotards like it or not, it's not going to happen this time.

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    1. hi anon@2:01... I agree with you, and it was that hype that motivated me to write that post. And thank you for noticing how the positioning of that story changed. Even Nik Nanos on his Twitter feed acknowledged that there was nothing extraordinary about a politician losing a few feathers after two years in power, and an an extremely long honeymoon. And yes also you're right when you point out that it's rare for a popular Prime Minister to be turfed after only mandate, so the poor desperate Cons don't have history on their side...

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  5. Anonymous2:57 PM

    When a country is so blessed, and still so many are so unhappy, is a country rotted with greed. Disgusting.

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    1. Hi anon@2:57pm....I don't disagree with you, but it's slightly more complex than that. As someone who has studied the effects of loneliness on society, you have to understand that such factors as the speed of change, and shifting populations and the the impact of the Internet also play a role. For the camp le a recent study showed the connection between loneliness and selfishness. I will try to write about some of this in 2018, because it's a very interesting subject, and could have a huge impact on our democracy...

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  6. Jackie Blue5:18 PM

    Hopefully you guys can manage another influx of the roughly quarter-million (!) desperate Salvadorans, Haitians, and other DREAM-ers getting kicked out as a result of Trump's "Operation Shithole" ethnic cleansing program (or should I say pogrom). Not to mention the looming prospect of anti-war resisters fleeing north if ever a missile alert over Hawaii turns out to be real and not just a false alarm. Plus ça change... "because it's 1968."

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    1. Hi Jackie...I hope we can absorb some of the people Trump is threatening to drive out of the US, but I fear we can't absorb such huge numbers without triggering an ugly backlash. I wish it wasn't so, but I saw it happen in the U.K in the lead up to Brexit, and haven't the slightest doubt it could happen here. If the Cons were decent they could join the other parties and welcome the newcomers, and that would defuse the situation. But they won't, they will seek to take advantage of the situation, and goodness knows what might happen...

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  7. Anonymous6:59 PM

    I'm not surprised that the prairies are full of Trudeau haters, that region is backward and racist and Canada's Alabama. What I find interesting is that while older men are anti-Trudeau older women apparently are not. I know women are smarter, but what can account for such a big gender gap?

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    1. Jackie Blue9:21 PM

      They probably see him as a "traitor"... their default position at the top of the hierarchy is slipping, and they blame the guy who they see as the poster child for upending the status quo. The women who are smart enough to support Trudeau and his policies see him as being an ally on their side, not necessarily against (white, straight) men per se but against a system that historically has and presently does prioritize their concerns and their position over that of all others. But for the older men (and it's not all older men, there are plenty of older men who support policies of gender equality and multicultural plurality, and a disturbing number of millennial "boys" who don't) who begrudge the fact that, as Bob Dylan said, "the times, they are a changin'," they need someone to lash out at. It's jealousy, pure and simple. Jealousy and discomfort with change.

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  8. Hi anon@6:59 pm...I wouldn't generalize about the prairies or any other region in Canada, but the gender gap is troubling enough. I can't be sure of course, and I also don't want to generalize, but judging from what I have personally seen and experienced those old male reactionaries hate Trudeau because he defends the rights of women and gay people. The two dotards I have had the most trouble with are both misogynistic and virulently homophobic. I will have more to say about both of them soon. But our consolation should be that they are on the wrong side of history, and the new generation will bury them and their bigotry forever...

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  9. I found a $5 bill on the sidewalk.....so my "Blue Monday" was not so blue! haha

    What if WE had DT as our PM????? Think about that for a second!

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