The timid soul

THE EDITOR, Madam:

A favourite comic strip called “The Timid Soul” was first published by New York World in 1924, and was syndicated in many other newspapers until its creator H.T. Webster died in 1952. The wimpy lead comic character was Caspar Milquetoast, who the cartoonist described as “the man who speaks softly and gets hit with a big stick”.

Although the comic strip and many newspapers of that era have long faded into history, the term “milquetoast” has remained in the lexicon – as an adjective meaning feeble, insipid or bland. Looking at the dearth of political leadership in today’s world, so many elected to govern large countries and organisations can be described as extremely milquetoast.

Nowhere was this more apparent than in the East Room of the White House on August 18, when presidents of France, Finland, Ukraine and the European Commission, along with the Prime Ministers of Italy and Great Britain, the Chancellor of Germany and the Secretary-General of NATO all sat around a large table for a press conference. President Trump sat in the middle of this pathetic bunch of sycophants soaking in the kudos, as each leader tried to outdo each other in praising their host. A truly disgusting and stomach-turning display by timid souls in a milquetoast meltdown, before they met behind closed doors for a briefing on Mr. Trump’s Alaskan Summit with Russia’s Vladimir Putin a few days earlier.

A few days later, Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney announced that he had a “productive and wide-ranging” telephone conversation with President Trump on the previous day, and that he would now remove Canadian retaliatory tariffs on US imports. A definite step back from pledges that PM Carney adopted in his successful election campaign a few months ago; telling the electorate that he was well-equipped to handle President Trump’s belligerent attitude with trade tariffs, and threats to annex Canada as a 51st State.

He promised that his government would adopt an aggressive strategy of “Elbows Up”, made famous by yesteryear’s hockey legend Gordie Howe, to handle the belligerence from Washington, even appearing in advertisements with “Saturday Night Live” comedian Mike Myers. Apparently, PM Carney has forgotten about ‘elbows up’, showing instead his timid stance by joining those aforementioned pitiful European leaders and others in realizing that President Trump is the ringmaster, and they are all ready to please him by jumping through hoops when he cracks the whip, just like Caspar Milquetoast, the Timid Soul.

BERNIE SMITH

Parksville, BC

Canada