Saturday, January 23, 2010

No-prorogue protests in 70 cities across Canada

We went to the no-prorogue demonstration today in Montreal. It was one of about 70 demonstrations across Canada and around the world against Canadian PM Stephen Harper taking liberties with democracy, shutting down our Parliament. It was interesting to see how that Facebook group (now with over 212,000 members) translated out into the real world, and we thought something maybe interesting or educational for our kids to witness. It was ok. There were maybe 400-500 people. One representative from each opposition party spoke.

Justin Trudeau was up on the stage/platform (in front of the statue at Phillips Square) with one of his small children and left just before it was over and walked right in front of us.

Justin-stroller

He had one of those flimsy-looking strollers with narrow wheels and the ice on the ground was all rutted and frozen so he could barely push it. He apparently hadn't spent enough time around the stroller :) to know to pull it over the ruts instead. Sort of a cool and humanizing slice of life. It was maybe surprising there was not an entourage and it's just him all by himself, wrestling that stroller out through the back edge of the crowd and onward to the rest of his day...

As for our kids... they were more interested in what was on the menu later...:^O

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