Brian Crossman is a partner in Estevan-based Independent Well Servicing. The opinions expressed in this column are the opinions of the author and not necessarily the opinions of Independent Well Servicing.
Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks during a news conference at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, Friday, Oct. 25, 2024, in Austin, Texas. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Well kids, we have survived another two elections, so far anyway. The incumbent Saskatchewan Party pulled it off again for a fifth consecutive term and of course, Donald J. Trump will once again be the president of the country just south of us, not as a true incumbent, but he was the commander-in-chief four years ago. And by all accounts Trump won a landslide, while Scott Moe and the Sask Party just squeaked in with a majority. Now, I’m not going into how and why (not too much anyway) things played out the way they did, but I did notice many interesting parallels between these two historic events.
During the past few years, the Sask Party has taken a lot of heat on health care and education. And in many cases, rightfully so. I get that a substantial portion of politics is name-calling, and it’s not a life for the “thin-of-skin,” but it comes with the job. But the opposition NDP was not above using quite a bit of excessive rhetoric in reference to Scott Moe and many Sask Party members. In all fairness, I think we all got weary about hearing the failures of the NDP going back multiple generations to the point that many voters had not even been born yet.
Mr. Trump has always been pretty good at speaking his mind (Remember “The Apprentice?”) and has never been afraid to sling a little mud. But monikers like “Fascist,” “Hitler” and “Tyrant” are used on Trump that is pretty much as far as one can go on the insult list. When you start using words like those to label people, those terms lose all meaning. They become slurs that reasonable people don’t pay attention to let alone get offended by. Just words, nothing more. I guess I’m saying when you use the worst possible insults during an election, or any time in history, what do you say when it is honestly warranted?
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The next step for our home and native land is coming next year. We will get to pick our next prime minister and with any luck it will be Pierre Poilievre. (I am unabashedly biased) Now Pierre has been very vocal and has used some name-calling in reference to the current prime minister and the leader of the NDP Jagmeet Singh to point out their many failures. (They have returned the favor many times as well) In fairness, those two make it pretty damn easy. When nine years of failed policy combined with one party propping up another to barely cling onto power is the best you can do, it is clearly time for change.
All this name-calling reminds me of the time the truckers’ freedom convoy went to Ottawa. Names like “fringe minority” come to mind and being told they were an “insult to memory and truth” are only two such examples. (White supremist was also used, even with many ethnic groups being well-represented in the protest) Refusing to meet with them, sending the RCMP to force them out strongly indicates a form of tyranny in my opinion.
Fast-forward to our current place in history. Not long ago, the Canadian prime minister was calling many Conservative Party members “MAGA,” a reference to being right-wing, I suppose. But judging what has happened with the recent polling in Canada and the election in the USA last week this strategy is flawed and destined to fail. It is one thing for the voters to hurl insults toward leaders, but it is quite another for the reverse to happen. Calling the voters “despicable,” “deplorable,” “garbage” and many other derogatory terms is not a plan. (Many of us, have used the” F—K Trudeau” line a lot, so we are guilty as well.) And we all tend to listen to the choir we preach to. The Liberals are aligned with the “Laurentian Elite,” the NDP with the extreme “socialist/communist” and the Conservatives with business and working people. And in the past few years, the working people and the middle class feel largely ignored, by the way of cost of living and the bleak future of doing better than your parents. Basically, the things that truly matter to voters.
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When you combine all this together, we can see what really happened in the recent elections. In Saskatchewan, the incumbent Sask Party was told by voters in the two major cities that the problems with health care and education are not acceptable. The NDP made large gains because of this. The premier came out and promised to resolve this, and history will determine if that works out. In the USA, the Democrats got beat by Trump for reasons not exactly the same, but not totally different either. People want and need hope, security and to not be insulted at the same time. Next year in Canada, I predict a similar outcome. The voters here want to be respected, be able to support their families and have the potential for a decent future.
Once again, you might ask, how is this “patch-related?” (I may have to trademark that.) Glad you asked. The energy industry is driven largely by the working class, and the revenue derived from it is a huge driver of the economy on every level. So, when the Feds impose carbon taxes, emissions caps (on the cleanest oilpatch on the planet) and impose regulatory roadblocks this causes untold billions of investment dollars to flow to other jurisdictions. In other words, “not Canada.” And that boils my potato. (I nearly said, “burns my ass….”) So hopefully we can survive the next twelve months, learn lessons from the USA election and do the right thing here at home. As all of us reasonable people keep saying, use our revenue from industry to help fund the future. And that helps all Canadians, no matter what political party you support. And that, my friends, is doing the right thing.
Brian Crossman is a partner at Independent Well Servicing in Estevan. He would like to remind everyone to be respectful, and home, work and during election time. Like Patrick Swayze said in the movie Roadhouse, “Be nice.”
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