It took NDP leader-elect Jagmeet Singh's decisive first-round KO of three seasoned opponents for the realization to dawn upon the Canadian political class that Justin Trudeau is now the old, white guy in the room.

But then again, nothing about Trudeau was ever fresh or new.  He simply told us he represented "real change", and Canadians chose to believe him.  So starved for nice-looking things are they, apparently, that they took the first available option and have stubbornly clung to him ever since, flaws be damned.

Never mind that Trudeau has consistently played up his nostalgic appeal for Canadians who still have fond memories of his father, and that he's been as quick to remind Canadians and the world media that "Canada Is Back" now that he's in charge, almost as much as he and his team remind us that it is the Current Year.  Not content with rethinking elements as basic as space and time, our Prime Minister now wishes to be both a thing and its opposite, hopeful as always that the voters will find some way to not notice.

Well, hopefully now that there is another federal leader who can match Trudeau in the style-over-substance department, Canadians will start to realize that our multitude-containing Prime Minister is at odds with himself in a few other domains most notably, how First Nations continue to suffer under his rule despite his noble rhetoric at the UN, or how his professed feminism doesn't extend to forcing female Conservative MPs to accept committee chair jobs they don't want.

Or maybe we could let the scales fall from our eyes entirely and realize that the Liberals not the Conservatives have always been the party of the status quo.

If you doubt this assertion, consider how many times it has been said that the Conservatives are out of touch with mainstream Canadian opinion.  How many times have Conservatives been accused of having hidden agendas, polarizing the discourse, being divisive.  The labels stick to the CPC in a way they never could to the Liberals.

So now that we are finally, slowly, becoming aware of the manifold contradictions of Justin Trudeau, perhaps we can confront one more: If the Conservative Party are the ones pushing a scary agenda, then they cannot also be the ones pushing for things to stay the same.

Since the unavoidable implication of the recent news coverage of Jagmeet Singh's refusal to unequivocally condemn the Air India bombing and his professed admiration of Fidel Castro is that he, too, will take the NDP in a dangerously radical direction, the lot of defending Canada from threats to of the harmonious consensus would inevitably have to fall on the Liberals.

But it isn't just by process of elimination that the Liberals become the party of the status quo.  Indeed, even when the Liberals appear to be doing something controversial or groundbreaking, it is always backed up by carefully focus grouped, politically neutral language meant to shush their opponents or blunt criticism.

Those who are concerned about the government's recent stabs at tax reform must explain why they oppose "tax fairness".  Alternately, the Liberals invoke the Charter and Omar's Khadr's Rights guaranteed thereby to challenge critics who raise their eyebrows at the size of his $10.5 million compensation package.

And if an issue does become too politically charged or divisive such as the Energy East pipeline the Liberals will simply twiddle their thumbs as the National Energy Board drags things out with reviews and red tape until the clock runs out.

One wonders why a party whose organizing principle seems to be "take the path of least resistance" would ever be mistaken for change agents.  It also begs the question of why voters assumed things would be different in the first place.

Unless, of course, the "real change" they wanted was a reversion back to the status quo…..

Written by Josh Lieblein