Bob Stanfield’s Fatal Football

When I read the kiddie press chortling and cackling about Joe Biden’s “fumbles”, my mind goes back to the 1974 Canadian election.

Pierre Trudeau’s government had fallen in a confidence vote and the country went to the polls. Without doubt, Trudeau was clever and charming and energetic, and all told not a bad Prime Minister. Whether the same can be said of his son is up to you.

The Conservatives had just come out of a nasty civil war (what’s new?) and had chosen Robert Lorne Stanfield as their new chief. Stanfield had served several terms as Premier of Nova Scotia, and by any measure had done a wonderful job. He was low-key, self-effacing, a true team player, intelligent, and quite witty. After his passing, he was fondly remembered as “the best Prime Minister we never had”.

Unfortunately for him and for Canadians he was bald and looked older than his age, and was not terribly athletic. Put up against the mischievous, clever, athletic, and impish Trudeau, Stanfield was at a bit of a charm disadvantage.

As it happened, Stanfield at one campaign stop chose to get involved in a bit of football tossing, perhaps to dispel the notion that he was a total geek. And, as it happened, he was amazingly good, passing and catching with ease. Except for one. The one.

The next morning every newspaper in the country featured Standfield’s Fumble, every newscast had a great laugh about it, and Stanfield’s polling numbers slid off the charts.

To make matters worse, Stanfield had been proposing wage and price controls to wrestle down vicious inflation. Although most economists agreed with the notion, Pierre Trudeau mocked the idea with the slogan “Zap! You’re frozen!”

The Conservatives lost seats, as did the New Democrats and the Creditistes, handing Trudeau a tidy majority. In 1975 the victorious Trudeau introduced wage and price controls. The Liberal version was inefficient, costly, created all kinds of artificialities and inefficiencies, and Canadians hated it. Served us right.

Not long after, when asked about his treatment by the press, Stanfield had this to say: “If tomorrow morning I walked across the surface of the Ottawa River, the headlines would be ‘Stanfield Can’t Swim!’”

Just saying.