so, this cabinet shift...

substantively, what he's done is move what are probably his two most capable and knowledgeable mps out of cabinet roles and into the civil service. you could look at this either way.

see, in canada, most of the actual work is bureaucratic. that's the actual reason why it takes a few years for a new government to do anything. the ministers can change the direction of things, but they are expected to ultimately be figureheads and ultimately defer to the authority of the bureaucrats. we're getting to the point now where things should be starting to spin in a less conservative direction.

so, you could argue that putting these two capable ministers (mccallum and dion) in the civil service is a better use of their talents. we're not yet sure where dion is going, but sending mccallum to china is certainly a boost of confidence, if nothing else.

but, you could also argue that these two capable and knowledgeable ministers are looking for a way out of a government that is leaning further to the right than they'd like. i'm very surprised that dion would decide to leave his riding - he may be being pushed out. and, that's a very ominous signal that trudeau is planning on swinging hard to the right.

it's unfortunate, but not entirely unexpected. they're going to have to learn the hard way that a world of open markets isn't the vision that canadians voted for, and isn't the vision that canadians want.

so, this actually doesn't appear to have anything to do with adjusting to trump at all. this appears to be about the trudeau government learning the wrong lessons from the election, and deciding to follow barack obama into the dustbin of history.

pity.