Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks during the National Caucus holiday reception, on Dec. 17, in Ottawa.Dave Chan/The Globe and Mail
On 30 Rock, there’s a moment in which Tina Fey’s character, Liz Lemon, says, “What a week, huh?” to Alec Baldwin’s Jack Donaghy in exhausted sympathy. He shoots back: “Lemon, it’s Wednesday.”
This week, the Ottawa bubble was Liz Lemon – except that it was only Tuesday by the time the Liberal Party of Canada and assorted hangers-on gathered for their Christmas party the day after Chrystia Freeland drove a sleigh over the Prime Minister’s face.
The evening started with an awkward cocktail mingle, like a wedding where they ran out of budget or interest at one specific point in the planning. It was all scrawny red and gold balloon bouquets, cheap-looking banquet chairs and way too much space. The dress code was flummoxing too, running the gamut from “I just left the office” to “I just came from the Oscars.”
Eventually, the 2,000-odd guests drifted into a hangar-sized room for dinner. Here, the holly jolly atmosphere conjured up by the Rogers Centre convention venue in the heart of downtown Ottawa was tragically, hilariously at odds with the moment.
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Oh, look, two big screens broadcasting a merrily crackling fireplace on each side of the snowflake-festooned stage, with Christmas tunes floating through the air. How cozy and festive! But anyway, do you think he lasts the week? The night? Is there enough snow up at Harrington Lake for him to go have a think?
A little after 7 p.m., one woman remarked the bar had been closed down. Another woman lamented she had found that out the hard way.
What was interesting is that this exchange didn’t carry the pent-up energy of, oh I don’t know, a government publicly disintegrating in real time. The women sounded like they wanted a drink, but not like they needed one.
And that was the vibe of the evening: neither here nor there. Not devastated, but not jubilant either. Not panicked, but not in denial. Everyone was just kind of – there, waiting to see.
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Except for one person. One person was really there, and that person was Ms. Freeland, who appeared just inside the doors of the dining room a little after 7:30 p.m. wearing a Liberal-red dress and Liberal-red shoes. Or she was wearing an outfit the colour of revenge, because who can really say any more?
House Leader Karina Gould approached and folded Ms. Freeland into a big hug. A couple of minutes later, the erstwhile cabinet minister stood talking with MP Adam van Koeverden, their heads bent close, before he parted ways with an affectionate one-armed squeeze.
In between these interludes with caucus colleagues, a steady stream of people approached for photos with her – despite the fact it was almost impossible to see her from more than a few feet away as she was one of the shortest people in the area. Later in the evening, once everyone realized she was there, she did draw a much bigger receiving line.
A woman standing near the doors remarked earnestly to a man wearing his own red regalia that she was so proud of Ms. Freeland.
The freshly former finance minister left cabinet with a spectacularly public middle finger of a resignation letter seven hours before she was to deliver a major economic update she apparently hated, but which she had spent the previous month shilling to the country with varying levels of enthusiasm and efficacy. People find their heroes in all sorts of places, of course, but it also seems like Ms. Freeland’s exit is being hailed as a useful crowbar for people who have another resignation in mind.
It was only the announcement that dinner was about to start and that people needed to sit down that ended this laying on of hands and selfies after her arrival.
Brenda Shanahan, the Liberal caucus chair, tried to warm up the crowd before introducing the “very, very special speaker” of the night in the form of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Her attempt at triumphal political banter was mildly heartbreaking, but hollering, “We are Liberals!” on this particular Tuesday surely ranks as one of the underrated political comedy moments of the year. Yes, you sure are Liberals, and have you gotten a load of yourselves lately?
The ovation that greeted Mr. Trudeau was sluggish and concentrated on the tables nearest the front, while the back of the room mostly went about its business. But once the Prime Minister had bounded onto the snowflake-flecked stage in his navy suit and red tie, many people even in the delinquent back rows held their phones aloft to capture their own bad photos of the moment.
Liberal MP and caucus chair Brenda Shanahan warmed up the crowd before introducing Mr. Trudeau as the 'very, very special speaker' of the night, which was greeted by a sluggish ovation.Spencer Colby/The Canadian Press
“It has been an eventful couple of days. It hasn’t been easy, and that’s why I’m so happy to see you guys. You know, it’s hard not to feel happy when we’re like this – among Liberals, among family. Because that’s what we really are – a big family,” Mr. Trudeau said. Then he added, in that half-swallowed ironic voice he uses when he’s teeing up a good line, “Now, like most families, sometimes we have fights around the holidays.”
And that – eventful couple of days, family Christmas fights amirite? – was the entirety of his acknowledgment of the existential crisis in which his government, his party and his own leadership are currently mired.
Mr. Trudeau then riffed through a bunch of shout-outs to various staffers and groups. He made a joke about how Toronto needed to “stay with us” after he spoke in French for a bit, and asked whether we couldn’t have some precedented times for a change.
Then he turned his attention to Pierre Poilievre, listing off the various sins of “the current Grinch – I mean leader” of the Conservatives. The room gave Mr. Trudeau a reaction no more than lukewarm to the idea that Mr. Poilievre voted against the holiday GST break, though they roared with Pavlovian enthusiasm every time he mentioned abortion rights.
For his dismount, Mr. Trudeau returned to a rhetorical idea he’s brandished again and again over the last rocky year or two: that Canadians know what Liberals stand for and are deeply aligned with them. This seems intended at once to paint the Conservatives as the aberration, and to call the electorate back to its natural home with the Liberal Party of Canada.
A greener economy, fairness for everyone, a woman’s right to choose – all the Liberal erogenous zones were there.
“We stand for reconciliation. We stand against those who think they can exploit the vulnerable. We stand against hate and division. We stand with workers and the middle class,” Mr. Trudeau roared through his big finish. But his thunder was not met by lightning in the room.
“We stand with Canadians. We stand up for Canada!” the Prime Minister bellowed to close. He may have overextended himself to compensate for the crowd, because he choked on his last line, turning away from the microphone to cough before turning back with a self-deprecating smile.
A while later the photo line began, which is a whole production they do at these events because so many people want a photo with the big boss. The queue would put a mall Santa to shame. People fixed their hair while they waited, then nervously smoothed their clothes just before stepping across the stage to greet the Prime Minister.
Over and over: a big smile as though he’d been waiting just for them, a clasped hand, maybe a few words with people he actually knew, then a quick pivot toward his photographer and he was onto the next.
Christmas music was still wafting over the crowd. The speakers were playing O Come Let Us Adore Him. For the moment at least, here in this room, a few hundred people still wanted to do just that.