What the FLQ Has Been Reduced To

38 years of pouting turns ugly

Whatever one may think about Pierre Trudeau, one has to hand it to him: when a small band of Quebecois separatists crossed the line, he knew exactly what to do.

When Canada was facing a domestic terror threat, he battened down the hatches and dealt with it. While his evoking the War Measures Act has remained one of the great historical controversies in Canadian history -- some insist it was necessary to deal with the FLQ, others point to the number of innocent FLQ sympathizers summarily rounded up under the Act -- one almost has to feel sorry for what the FLQ has become.

Once, they were big, brave little men -- kidnapping British Trade Commissioner James Cross and kidnapping (and later killing) Quebec Minister of Labour Pierre Laporte.

Now, they're reduced to spray-painting "traitor" and "FLQ" on his grave.

Although they did allegedly circulate a letter threatening attacks in Montreal last year, those attacks never took place. It seems that vandalizing graves is as ambitious as the all-new, all-bitter FLQ gets these days.

Seems like this is one bogeyman of Canadian history that may not have gone quietly into the good night. But all the same, they've clearly seen better days.