To Be or Not to Be (a Politician)

I never wanted to be a politician. I have never had the desire to be that much in the public eye, to be accountable for and to have to defend the decisions made by other people or to be publically derided by those who disagree with those decisions.  A politician is someone who has to pretend as if (1) they have all of the answers and (2) that they like listening to others prattle on with long winded self-interested stories. I know that no one, least of all me has all of the answers and I really dislike pretending that I like someone when I think they are a bit of a fool or worse.

None-the-less I can admire some politicians for their stick-to-it-ness.  Take for example Trudeau, Notley and Horgan - a strange collection/combination of politicians if there ever was one - who are meeting on Sunday to discuss what to do about the expansion of the Kinder Morgan pipeline. A federal Prime Minister who skates somewhere on the poorly defined ideological border of liberalism, progressive conservatism with the odd bit of new age socialism scattered about, is meeting with two NDP premiers who are on the diametrically opposite sides of the issue of whether or not the pipeline should be expanded. All three of the leaders are well and truly entrenched into their position, buttressed by their own statements made in the press and supported by the most vocal and demanding of their supporters. At this point in the discussion it is not clear to me as to whether or not any of the three leaders actually believes in the rhetoric that has been spouted about.  All three of the leaders have other issues to deal with. This issue, as important as it is to those folks living in Southern BC and along the coast, and as vital as it is to those Albertans who have spent their entire working lives on the roller coaster of bust and boom oil prices, may not the most important issue that any of the three governments need to deal with.

No matter what the three leaders talk about tomorrow, no matter what they finally agree or disagree about, at least one of them will be in a position of losing face, of appearing to "give into the opposition". At least one of them will need to leave the meeting saying "the  fight is not yet over".

Of course some might argue that Canada was built and has been strengthened by its capacity to find the middle road, to develop strategies based on consensus and compromise, of finding ways where the majority benefit and the minority do not lose. Those people would argue that leaders are not lessened when they look past the loudest of advocates to what people really need and want and address those issues, that one's status is increased, not decrease, when one works collaboratively with someone else.

However, it would appear to me the three leaders meeting tomorrow, although they might be really nice people in private and that they may in fact have a lot in common with each other, are not allowed to be themselves. That no matter how much they might want to find a solution that makes sense to most of the people, their political futures might lie in them being obstinate and inflexible.  

And that is why I could never be a politician.