Pierre, Justin, Michel and Sacha Trudeau

It gets “better”: Trudeau Sr. slept with lots of female “journalists” who are still taking up space at various papers, which helps explain all the ditzy “he haunts us still” hagiographies. Meanwhile, Coyne’s son was conceived with cockroach-like Globe & Mail columnist Michael “Yes, He’s Still Alive” Valpy. At least she and Valpy were married, but that didn’t stop Coyne and Trudeau from vacationing together in (where else?) Cuba.

And speaking of the Coyne of the realm, pundit Andrew is another winner of the Canadian Media Elite Genetic Lottery, being Deborah’s cousin. Here, Andrew Coyne, the son of the former governor of the Bank of Canada, sarcastically describes the $500 in taxpayer cash he gets for appearing on the CBC as “princely” while mocking an upstart rival news network’s alleged “sense of entitlement to the public’s money.” The taxpayers from whom a billion bucks a year is extorted to prop up our unwatched state broadcaster (and its inbred lineups of guests) would likely use a different word than “princely” to describe Mr. Coyne.

With its bottomless reserve of Fulfords and Richlers and Lewises, the Canadian media elite is far more incestuous than the mythological “Ozarks” they delight in mocking. And now this in-your-face interbreeding has spilled over into national politics. Why did Pierre Trudeau work so diligently to put even more daylight between us and the Queen, when most of us are now seemingly content to observe this game of neo-Habsburgian musical chairs with little more than a shrug?

Some Canadian conservatives are cheering openly for Justin Trudeau’s victory. They contend that Justin is so transparently vacant that his presence on the Liberal ticket will guarantee Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper an even larger majority government in the next election. In Washington, DC last weekend, I met not a few American right-wingers who scoffed at the very idea that Canada’s JFK, Jr. could possibly become the next prime minister.

“Er, who’s still living in that big white house down the street again?” I’d reply.

Unlike my compatriots north of the 49th, I find it perfectly easy to imagine Justin Trudeau moving back into 24 Sussex Drive. The same Canadians who irrationally claim to loathe anything “American” actually pine for a photogenic, dynastic Kennedy family of their own.

Alas, there’s never an avalanche around when you need one.