I know that a prime minister of Canada needs to be deeply respectful of the other levels of government - whether it be municipal, provincial, or even nation-to-nation relationships with aboriginal governments.
Of all the memories I have of my father and of our relationship, none is warmer and more poignant than what happened a year before he died, when he came to visit me while I was teaching at West Point Grey Academy in Vancouver.
If we wander around as politicians jumping at every shadow and desperately afraid of having our words taken out of context or attacks layered on in an unfair way, I think we're actually doing a disrespect to Canadians, to people's intelligence.
When my dad left public life, I was 13 years old. I went through my teen years and into adulthood in relative anonymity. After my dad's funeral, I was suddenly recognizable to people I passed on the street.
Let's not pretend we're in a global free market when it comes to agriculture. Every country protects, for good reason, its agricultural industries.
You know what, Nickelback's alright.
My father, his values were anchored in the time, but they were also timeless, whether it's bilingualism, multiculturalism or the charter of rights and freedoms.
I think this is the story of this country, that you get to come here and build a better future for yourself and for your neighbours than you could have anywhere else in the world.
We're actually able to approve pipelines at a time when everyone wants protection of the environment. We're being able to show that we get people's fears, and there are constructive ways of allaying them - and not just ways to lash out and give a big kick to the system.
Much more a skiing family than a hockey family, my dad wasn't a big fan of the arenas early in the morning on the weekends.
I'm not going to reduce the choices of Canadians at the ballot box by backroom deals or secret arrangements. I think that's a cause for cynicism more than anything else.
Every day, at home, I have the astonishing and humbling opportunity - together with my wife Sophie - to nurture empathy, compassion, self-love, and a keen sense of justice in our three kids.
Anytime I meet people who got to make the deliberate choice, whose parents chose Canada, I'm jealous. Because I think being able to choose it, rather than being Canadian by default, is an amazing statement of attachment to Canada.
I have spent an awful lot of time listening to Canadians, learning from them, working with them.
We need to make sure we're all working together to change mindsets, to change attitudes, and to fight against the bad habits that we have as a society.
I remember the bad times as a succession of painful emotional snapshots: Me walking into the library at 24 Sussex, seeing my mother in tears, and hearing her talk about leaving while my father stood facing her, stern and ashen.
Politicians are constantly stuck between what is politically expedient and politically beneficial and what is the responsible or right thing to do. It's a tension we all go through.
When I get out across the country and listen to people, the resentment that I see and the frustration that I see is that we have a generation of people who are fairly convinced that their kids are not going to have a better quality of life or a better future than they will.
It's always easy to look at either the politics of division or fear as effective tools in politics, but ultimately, even though they can be effective tools to help you get elected, they hinder your ability to actually get the job of building a better future for this country, for this community, done.
Big global players like China need to do a better job of respecting human rights.
