He's what the Canadians call great. (chortle!)

He was a man who defined Canada and gave our nation legitimacy around the world. He was an intellectual who was respected around the world but whose brilliance was often lost on closed-minded conservatives. Canada really distinguished itself as a nation under his watch and I think it was during this period that Canadians really came to understand the value and potential of our nation.

he was the one who gave us us our freedom.

Not only a great personality, Pierre E. Trudeau was indeed an honest politician, which is a very seldom or never seen atribute for a politician. A very clever individual, human, progresist, a truly democrat and a strong will. As a new canadian I am learning a lot about canadian history, social, economics and politics, there are very remarkable names in it history, but the greatest is, no doubt about it, Pierre Elliot Trudeau.

I think he is Canada's own JFK, hugely popular, man in the time of a crisis, but real over rated.

He called Chairman Mao - the communist leader of China who, over decades of control, effected the murder of over 60 million Chinese citizens - a great man who did much for his people. Trudeau was the first in a line of propaganda savvy liberal politicians in Canada that extends to the present day prime minister Paul Martin. He decimated the Canadian economy, being a key player in the devaluation of Canadian currency from $1.4 American to sub $0.80. Much can be said about Trudeau, it behooves me to think that Canadians in general would regard him as a great man.

Pierre Trudeau was the biggest S.O.B. to ever serve as Prime Minister. He was so consumed with making a great legacy for himself with the constitution/charter of rights that he casually threw aside the interests of most Canadians. Oh, he had the balls to deal with the FLQ all right, but where was his bombastic courage during World War II? If people want to make Canada better, they should just undo most of what Trudeau did. And regarding his funeral in a Catholic cathedral, as the legalizer of abortion in Canada, Trudeau should have been excommunicated from the Catholic church. Even in death, Trudeau managed to mess with Canadian's minds.

It was once said of Trudeau that he was the only leader that Canada produced worthy of assassination. A quick man with a quip himself, he once said other members of Parliament were nobodies when they get 100 feet from Parliament Hill, and in responding to a question in the House said The Honourable Member disagrees. I can hear him shaking his head.

For a country that is perceived as very bland and efficient, Canada has produced it's fair share of colorful leaders. Pierre Trudeau was one of them. He was a very cunning politician who never did anything small, these attributes in and of themselves made him highly controversial. He was sympatheic to Marxist ideas for a time during the 1950's when he organized various labor movements in Quebec. He was an thorn on the side of both the religious establishment and the business community, making him a target from the get-go. Trudeau ran for and won the leadership in 1968 primarily by mobilizing the counterculture groups that supported change at the time. Despite his stepping on many conservatives toes, Trudeau was very popular among his countrymen, especially at the beginning. He was known for enacting national healthcare and economic development projects. It would surprise some that Canada had its own domestic terrorist groups during the 1970's. During the October Crisis of 1970, Trudeau was forced to declare martial law when a terrorist group seeking liberation for Quebec killed a foreign government official and a cabinet minister. Some considered his actions over the top, but Trudeau showed guts by taking a confident approach to stopping terrorism. In foreign policy, Trudeau sought to make Canada more independent from the United States by opposing US actions in Vietnam and being the first Western leader to visit Red China. Richard Nixon hated the man with a passion because he considered him a socialist, but Jimmy Carter had a good relationship with him. He got Canada out of NATO and reduced military spending. He led with flair, but it wasn't all great by any stretch of the imagination. Most of his policies were too big and too ambitious. Trudeau left Canada with lots of inflation, debt, and unemployment in some part because of his economic policies. But he was an effective leader in other respects. The situation in Quebec might have spun out of control had it not been for Trudeau's balanced yet forceful approach to the situation. He also revised the constitution in the early 1980's to include new civil rights that are seem to be very popular with the people. He was popular leader, not everyone really agreed with him, but he fit with his times. He was an agent for change in many respects.