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Photo by Sean Kilpatrick/CP

As we swing closer to the 21st it is very clear that, outside some political comet-strike, only Trudeau and Andrew Scheer have a chance of leading the country for the next four years. And whether Trudeau retains office or Scheer assumes office depends entirely on Mr. Trudeau.

To look for electricity in the Scheer campaign, to find moments that gripped your attention, or times when his speaking extorted a “Wow” from an audience, would be like trying to start a fire by rubbing a bar of soap over a piece of scrap iron. Scheer is perfectly armoured against any visitations of charisma. In the charisma department Trudeau is (make that was) Christmas while Scheer is the entire 40 days of Lent with a couple of extra Ash Wednesdays added for tone.

It didn’t begin this way, but the election has evolved into a referendum on the prime minister’s judgment and conduct. And, through various revelations and some stunts of his own, Trudeau has made it that. Incidentally, the attempt to make “impersonation of an insurance broker” — a charge laid against Scheer — a campaign issue was one of the funniest things I’ve seen in 50 years of campaign politics. Maybe by campaign’s end the Liberals will have dug up something really explosive, like Scheer claiming to have been a shoe salesman during one of his student breaks, when he really only made it as far as men’s hosiery and underwear.

Photo by David Kawai/Bloomberg

Every time Mr. Trudeau is not kind to himself, he is kind to Mr. Scheer. The almanacs of West Point Grey Academy and some film from a white-water rafting costume day threatened his entire campaign. To very many people, the blackface photos and him head-to-toe black scrambling around some beach looked to be what they were — a real mockery. It says something very strong about the Trudeau legacy and his own image-making over the past four years (and perhaps excessive charity from some of the media) that he survived those exposures.