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It was wrong, and deeply unethical

There is plenty of disquieting material in the report, but most striking is the light it shines on Trudeau, and the character that resides beneath the carefully-crafted public image he and his aides work so hard to present. There is evidently something in Justin Trudeau that compels him to place himself above ordinary people, above the accepted norms of government, above the rules that protect the sanctity of legal independence.

Confronted with the report, the prime minister professed to accept responsibility, while making clear he doesn’t really mean it.

“We recognize the way that this happened shouldn’t have happened. I take responsibility for the mistakes that I made,” Trudeau said. “Where I disagree with the commissioner is where he says that any contact with the attorney general on this issue was improper.”

Photo by Chris Wattie/Reuters

He repeated his determination to never apologize for “standing up for Canadian jobs,” as if breaking the law is justified if a job is at stake. Can all Canadians now feel free to break windows or steal cars if a job is in danger?

How many times now has the prime minister refused to accept blame for his or his government’s actions? His close friend and aide Gerald Butts claims Trudeau’s calamitous trip to India was the fault of Indian leaders who “were out to screw us.” The two-year vendetta against Vice-Admiral Mark Norman for allegedly leaking cabinet secrets, abandoned in May at the cost of a presumably hefty confidential settlement, was pinned on Chief of Defence Staff Gen. Jonathan Vance.