it depends a lot on what you're projecting. for example, you might not consider the role that canada played in facilitating between the united states and cuba to be very important, but people that live in angola or south africa may disagree. or, you may play down how important canada was in disarmament discussions, but the russians remember - as do the indians as well as the chinese.

on the other hand? sure: we don't strike a lot of fear in the hearts of the world. but, we didn't use to want to, either. we used to want to get in between people that hated each other and try and strike a deal, from the suez canal to the panama canal.

we were actually very good at this. if you look at the major steps forward of the post-war period, we're very important in almost all of them - but we play a facilitating role in the background, rather than a direct role. that doesn't negate our importance. in fact, if you look carefully, it magnifies it. a lot of these things would not have happened without us.

and, thus when trudeau says that people listened, he is right - if you take the comments in the context of being a mediator, rather than in the context of being declarative. and, suggesting that we're irrelevant now and therefore always have been is nothing short of orwellian revisionism.

www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-election-2015-neil-macdonald-munk-debate-1.3247934