US and us

Canada and the United States Part 1: Blame Canada

I’ve been seeing this thing quite a lot on MySpace lately – a “Presidential speech I’d like to hear.”  I’ll tell you this, it isn’t one I’d like to hear – it’s a bit of xenophobic flag-waving nationalistic garbage that plays on the polarized nature of American politics, insisting on the same polarization in the rest of the world. Whoever wrote the thing has divided the world’s nations into two lists, because ideologues are genetically incapable of thinking in numbers greater than two. On the first list, the short list, are the countries that supported the American war in Iraq. You know – Great Britain, Lithuania, Poland, and those others. On the other list, the long list, is the rest of the world. If this fictitious president had a “Dead to Me” board like Stephen Colbert, it is here that the rest of the world would go. Except, perhaps, for Canada and Mexico – singled out for special admonition by this xenophobic POTUS. These would go on the Presidential equivalent of Colbert’s “On Notice” board.

This speech post is not unique in its criticism of Canada. The far right in America accuses Canada of being a conduit for terrorists, for being soft on terror because we didn’t go to Iraq. I’ve read some blogs, some editorials, some mindless rants from the Coulter-Limbaugh ilk and among a certain segment of the American population, there’s a palpable sense of anti-Canadianism, the “blame Canada” crowd. Of course, there is a far larger “Blame Mexico” crowd, but I can’t speak for Mexico. Charlene asked me to do a Canada-US relations blog and simultaneously appointed me the Canadian voice of reason. So although I am not a fierce nationalist by any stretch, I am here to fly my maple leaf and put the blame Canada crowd on my own “On Notice” board. I believe there is hope for them yet, or else they would be Dead To Me. Some of this has been culled from responses I have left on conservative blogs in response to anti-Canadian sentiment.

Whether you like it or not (and many here in Canada don’t like it any more than some Americans do, less even), Canada and the United States are inextricably entwined – culturally, economically, historically, geographically and in matters of security. Canada is the single largest provider of natural resources to the United States, whose economic system could not continue to function as it does without that influx of resources. Likewise, the United States is the single biggest market for Canadian good and resources. Hundreds of billions of dollars worth of goods cross the border in one direction or the other every year – it is the single largest bilateral trading relationship in the history of the nation-state. For the most part, American culture is Canadian culture. There are some anomalies, but generally in Canada, the top selling books and films and music and so on are American. But then, many of the top ‘American’ stars are actually Canadian. It is a tangled and complex relationship. Too complex to do it adequate justice and full treatment in a single blog. It will take four blogs to do that.

This one is about the war on terror, because this is what most knots the knickers of the anti-Canada crowd. On issues of security, Canada is the most enduring ally the United States has ever known. By force of geography, American security concerns are Canadian security concerns insofar as forces that actually threaten the continent go. (This is why we are fighting right alongside you in Afghanistan, but are not in Iraq. We interpreted the Iraqi threat differently and it is important for Americans to remember that ally does not mean blind adherence to White House foreign policy.)

The talk is that we are soft on terror, that we refused to help the United States fight its war and are, therefore, not a good ally. Canada is a small country, population-wise, and its military is stretched to the limit fighting the war in Afghanistan against the Taliban and al Qaeda, who actually attacked the United States. We could not have contributed forces to the Iraq misadventure, even had we wanted to. Canadians – who broadly support the Afghanistan mission (despite the growing casualty list) – spoke in mass to object to any involvement in Iraq because they see it for what it is: an illegal war. There is argument about that, obviously, but before spitting on Canada for not helping America, remember that on September 11th, we took in American planes and citizens, 33,000 of them, when US airspace was cleared and planes diverted. Remember that we were first in line to say we’d do whatever we could in Afghanistan because we agreed that the real enemy lived there, and then we put our soldiers lives on the line to back up our talk. And remember that we didn’t divert the mass of our resources away from the real enemy in a so-called preemptive war.

Canada is an ally, but as I said, ally doesn’t mean blind adherence to US foreign policy when we see it as detrimental to the greater good or to our national good. And if you can’t take it from me that Canada is a friend, maybe you can take it from Secretary Rice, who spent the most recent anniversary of September 11th in my hometown of Halifax, Nova Scotia. Here is just part of what she said about Canada. I won’t say this often about Condoleeza Rice, but listen to her: she makes a good case.

“It is often the darkest of times though that summons the better angels of our nature. It is often in those times that we see the good side of the human spirit. And this was certainly true on September 11th, especially among the people of Canada. On that morning, hundreds of planes bound for the United States were ordered to land immediately in the nearest county — the nearest country. For more than 33,000 people aboard 224 flights, that country was Canada.

When these travelers arrived here in Halifax, or in Gander, or Moncton or Vancouver, most were weary and confused and scared. In fact many, shut off from the news, didn’t know where they were or why there were there. And then they learned of the attacks.

All across this country, you and your fellow Canadians greeted your guests with warm hands and comforting words and clean clothes. You opened your churches, your community centers, your own homes, to offer a bed or a blanket, a warm place to stay no matter how long. You took to your kitchens to prepare meals for thousands of hungry people and you gave everyone a chance to call their loved ones and tell them not to worry, to tell their loved ones, “I’m safe, I’m well. I’m in Canada.”

Here in Halifax that morning, local radio stations begged people to call the Red Cross and volunteer their homes. Within hours, those same stations were begging people not to call anymore. The outpouring of support was just so overwhelming. One Haligonian called and left a message anyway, saying simply, “I only have one bed, but I can sleep on the sofa.”

Five years ago, thousands of Canadians, including many of you here today whose stories we’ve heard, lifted up my countrymen and lifted up my country with countless acts of unmatched compassion. So today, on the fifth anniversary of the September 11th attacks, I bring this message to the men and women of Halifax and to every citizen of this great nation:

On behalf of President Bush and on behalf of the American people, thank you. Thank you for your generosity. Thank you for your sacrifice. Thank you for your compassion, for your skill, for your professionalism, for your caring. And thank you for your friendship.”

Canada and the U.S. Part 2: A (wildly incomplete but still mostly accurate) Political Primer

I write mostly about American politics, but get asked from time to time (by American readers) about the Canadian system. And since I wrote a Canada-US relations blog yesterday and called it ‘part 1′ on a whim, I thought I’d actually do a part 2 and use it to talk about our political systems. Does it get any sexier than that?

The systems of Canada and the United States have much in common. They are, for example, both broken. A key difference though is that the Canadian system was born broken while the American system has had brokenness thrust upon it. I’ll try to explain what I mean by that, in time. For now, I focus on some essential differences between our systems.

The President of Canada is actually called the Prime Minister (PM), his office is called the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) and his residence 24 Sussex Drive. It all lacks the glam and glitz of names like the Oval Office and The White House, but it is often winter in Canada, and especially in Ottawa, so when it comes to naming things, we avoid flights of fancy, call them what they are and get the hell in out of the cold. Probably we have a beer or two.

At the moment, the Prime Minister (PM) of Canada is a squirrelly little policy wonk called Stephen Harper. He is like George Bush, but smart, and less hawkish. The PM of Canada is not directly elected by the voters, but not in the same way as the American President isn’t. We have no arcane electoral college gathering in election years to decide whether this is the time they finally tell the voters to fuck right off and we’ll choose the next President for you thank-you-very-much. (I know it isn’t likely, but it is at least a legal possibility, and I like possibilities. Still, since it didn’t happen in 2000, I’m guessing it’s a non-starter even if it is technically possible.) One becomes PM of Canada and (as we have no constitutionally entrenched separation of powers in place to prevent a deterioration into a dictatorial police state) head of the legislative and executive branches of government by leading the party who obtained the most seats in the House of Commons. The House of Commons is very like the American House of Representatives and is the primary lawmaking body in Canada. As head of the largest party, it is improbable that a Prime Minister’s party would control fewer seats in the House of Commons than an opposition party, such as the situation Mr. Bush currently finds himself in. (An opposition party is something you will hear in Canadian politics, but not in American, where the pretty firmly entrenched two-party system ensures that the definite article ‘the’ is sufficient when describing political opposition. In Canada, by contrast, we currently have a House of Commons composed of four different political parties, with a fifth trying to weasel its way in.)

There is also a second legislative chamber, a senate, just as in America, because our founders, too, saw the wisdom of a house of “sober second thought.” They just failed to provide one. Whereas in America, Senators are subject to election once every six years, in Canada a Senatorial term lasts until age 75. And they’re appointed by the Prime Minister, which at least theoretically adds enormous power to that office. This is a major flaw in Canadian democracy as there is nothing remotely democratic about it. It would go beyond flaw, though, to become a major calamity if the Senate in Canada actually wielded real muscle rather than the theoretical power they do hold. I will say this for our current PM, the squirrelly wonk – that he is a democrat at heart (that’s small ‘d’), and he has pledged to make a senate that is accountable to the electorate it is alleged to serve. Whether the current hodgepodge that is the Canadian Parliament will allow that before we are subject to another general election remains to be seen.

We have no fixed dates for general elections as in the US, although many – including me – think we should. Instead, election calls may happen in one of two ways. Usually, election timing is a Prime Ministerial prerogative, which goes way beyond theory in adding enormous power to that office. Canadian law requires a federal election at least once every five years, although in practice, they have tended to be nearer to four years apart. The other way an election may be called in Canada is if the House of Commons passes a vote of no-confidence in the sitting government, either explicitly or by defeating the government on one of its own money bills. This only happens when the government is a minority one, such as our current government. That is, while the government party has more seats than any other individual party, it still has fewer than half the total seats in the House of Commons. The Conservative ruling party of today holds just 125 of the 308 seats of our legislature, which means the remaining three parties together form a substantial majority and are likely to bring the government down when the right cause presents itself. Amazingly, this will happen at almost the exact moment that the opposition parties find they have enough money at the ready to fund another election. If Canada has another election this spring (as is widely speculated by me), it will be our fifth in ten years, so Canadians suffer from what is called “election fatigue”. Traditionally, we counter the effects of election fatigue by not voting and with our excellent Canadian beer. (This is another critical difference between Canada and the US – the beer thing, not the not voting thing, voter apathy is one thing our countries share in spades – but one that is beyond the scope of this blog. Buy me a beer one day and I’ll tell you all about it.)

The last point I’ll observe here – I have guilty TV to go watch – is that while the American President is the head of state, the Canadian Prime Minister is just the head of the government. The official Canadian head of state is called the Governor General and is another appointed position, like our senators. The Governor General acts as the representative of the British Crown in Canada, to which we are still officially and enigmatically tied. It is my opinion that this is both anachronistic and undemocratic. To say nothing of an enormous waste of resources. Canada will be 140 years old on its next birthday, which is young in terms of nation-states, but still old enough to leave the nest. It may be time to tell our monarchical mom to please fuck off now, that we’re all grown up. The US fought a war to do it, but that’s just not Canada’s style.

Here endeth the lesson.

Canada and the United States Part 3, which should have been part 1: The Relationship

This should have been part one in my Canada-US blogs, becasue it looks at the relationship as a whole. But it is part 3 instead, because when I was looking for it (I wrote it a few months back), I couldn’t find it and had assumed my son deleted it. Instead, he had only changed the name to “Stoop Joxing Arunda-US Realsdfasugdcoyrfihrtlkgdjfgoiah”. He has a curious system when he is rearranmging and renaming my files. The rename for this file seems to have been a mix of its original title (“Canada-US Realms”), plus a Hawksley Workman song (“Stop Joking Around”), plus some sort of frantic siezure that sent him flailing at the keyboard (“sdfasugdcoyrfihrtlkgdjfgoiah”). Plus he moved the file to a Windows System folder. I should probably install something to save my work from his disruptive hands. Someday I will.

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I had a professor in Canada-US relations once who, for the purposes of study, liked to break down the relationship between the two countries into several ‘realms’: social, cultural, economic and political. I’m more of a “big picture” guy, and always preferred to try to view the relationship holistically. Though academically useful, perhaps, to compartmentalize aspects of the relationship of Canada and the United States, such an approach is not always conducive to an understanding of this complex bilateral association. The relationship enjoyed by Canada and the United States is probably unique among nations. Although it clearly functions in the social, cultural, economic and political realms, these realms become so intricately interwoven that in observing the relationship as a whole they become difficult to individually discern. Remarkable in its complexity, the relationship between Canada and the US is much more remarkable still on the realization that the vast majority of it runs smoothly. It is the bumps in an otherwise smooth road that garner much of the media attention, but these bumps are just that and cannot be called descriptive of the relationship as a whole.

The most obvious level of this relationship is the ‘official’ one – that is, the governmental relationship between Ottawa and Washington and, to a lesser public (but perhaps more substantive) degree, between the state and provincial capitals directly. The political relationships are indeed prominent, but they tend to be more reflective of the exisiting bilateral relationship than they are integral in setting the tone. In addressing the softwood lumber issue, for example, political figures in both countries are responding to non-governmental domestic economic interests. They help establish the laws which guide activities in other realms of the relationship rather than proactively set the agenda themselves. Political relations may be strained by times, as they were under Prime Minister Chretien and President Bush the younger, or they may be extraordinarily close, such as was enjoyed under the stewardships of Mulroney and Reagan – but in the end, this political relationship has strikingly little bearing on the day to day continuity of our peaceable cross-border relations.

Likewise, much in the economic and cultural realms is driven by the social similarities between Canada and the United States. In Canada, the highest grossing films, best selling books and music, top rated TV shows and most popular internet sites are usually American. These are, of course, driven by economic motives and not by some corporate American motive (nefarious or otherwise) to dominate Canadian culture with its own. Instead, because Canada and the United States share a common culture with, most critically, a common dominant language, this ‘cross-border pop culture’ is possible. The language connection becomes most obvious when it is considered that the trends which keep American popular culture in the Canadian mainstream do not tend to happen in Quebec, where the most popular of the popular culture is almost always domestic. When considered next to the undeniable asymmetry that is a consequence of sheer difference in size, it seems almost inevitable that American output should have come to dominate Canadian culture outside Quebec. We may be bitter about that in Canada, even as we embrace it, but we should never be surprised.

Economically, so thoroughly integrated have they become that it is virtually impossible to distinguish between the systems. Natural resources, capital and consumer goods move across the border in one direction or the other almost as freely as between individual states or individual provinces. In 2005 alone, nearly 475 billion dollars worth of goods crossed the Canada-US border. There are no two other countries that share such a massive amount of trade. The Free Trade Agreement of the 1980s and its Mexico encompassing successor, NAFTA, far from being a radical shift in the bilateral relationship (such as was presented by political and editorial opponents of the agreements) seem instead to have been logical steps in the process of economic integration that has been ongoing since the early part of the twentieth century. So inevitable is this process that most entrepreneurs with cross-border associations have come to view these two resource and market rich countries as a single domestic unit. The bilateral relationship exists on many levels, the vast majority of it out of the public eye and out of governmental purview. While it is true that to grasp the significance of the economic relationship, for example, it would behoove us to devote study to that area, we could not generate a full understanding of even that level without also studying the political and cultural interplay of the two nations. Likewise, one could not begin to comprehend the closeness of the political relationship (also unique in the world) without an understanding of the shared social history of the two peoples. This unique relationship – the most complex and interwoven in the history of nation-states – can be studied by dividing it into various realms, but thus broken into its constituent parts it becomes decidedly less meaningful and remarkable than the whole.

Canada and the United States Part 4: Sovereignty on Ice

I have been doing a series of blogs on Canada and the United States.  As I get to part four, it seems a little late to offer this disclaimer:  in no way can i claim to be an expert on Canada-US relations.  I have studied it a little, read some here and there, and take an active layman’s interest in it – but I am not an expert.  My opinions may even be ill-informed  and illogically derived.  They are certainly subject to change on either a whim or on the introduction of new evidence.  My opinion on the Northwest Passage through Canada’s Arctic waters is that it’s ours, but we won’t mind sharing it if you treat it nicely and leave it in the condition you found it.  My opinion is also that it is a critical issue to Canada’s future – for both the well being of our country and the environemental well being of that fragile landscape.

Under the water and ice of the Arctic Circle lies a vast reservoir of natural resources, including up to a quarter of the world’s supply of fossil fuels. Furthermore, it is projected that the Northwest Passage through the Canadian Arctic will one day soon become an important shipping lane, reducing the journey from Atlantic to Pacific by thousands of miles. The Canadian Arctic is poised to become a critical economic zone but the issue of Canadian sovereignty over her Arctic waters remains unresolved. Canada should act immediately to establish and secure authority over this important region, asserting total sovereignty and with it, control over mineral resources and right of access.

Canada has a long standing claim of sovereignty over these waters, but according to the Canadian American Strategic Review, “many nations now challenge our claim to this channel. Why? Because the Arctic ecosystem is warming up at an alarming rate. Soon the Northwest Passage will be coveted as the shortest, safest, cheapest route between Shanghai and Rotterdam. There will be growing pressure to ‘globalize’ our internal waterway”. Indeed, there are existing territorial disputes in various combinations among virtually all the Arctic nations – including Russia, Denmark, Norway, the U.S. and Canada. (The dispute with Denmark – over tiny Hans Island – has always stuck in my craw, and I have more than once facetiously advocated a preemptive war with the Danish over their absurd claim. Part of me thinks Canada should grab Greenland while its at it, and while preemptive war is all the rage. Instead of war, the two countries tend to alternate visits to the island, raising the flag of their home country. It’s classic Canadian, really.)

There are no outstanding land disputes between Canada and the United States, but there is a direct territorial conflict between them over the marine border of Alaska and which portion of the mineral rich Beaufort Sea that encompasses. A second and, to Canada, more important dispute relates to right of access through the Northwest Passage. The position of the United States is that the Northwest Passage is an international waterway and so right of passage is guaranteed. The position of the Canadian government is predictably contrary to this. I can say with some authority that in this matter the United States is completely wrong.

In 1969 the American supertanker Manhattan, in a deliberate test of Canada’s sovereignty claims, went through the passage without Canadian consent. Fears about the consequences of a tanker accident to such a fragile environment led the Canadian government to enact the Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act, which declared Canadian control over the water around its Arctic territory “seaward one hundred nautical miles from the nearest Canadian land”. The right and intent to assume responsibility over the Arctic was thus established in Canadian law.

In 1985, the United States acted to again show that it did not recognize Canadian sovereignty over those waters and sent its icebreaker Polar Sea through the Northwest Passage. The U.S. claimed, accurately, that their ship had simply taken the most direct route from Greenland to Alaska, but even if this was the motivation, “the U.S. government was careful not to make a request for permission to make the crossing and thereby imply in any way recognition of Canada’s claim to the strait”. It was another deliberate provocation aimed at testing our claim over the Arctic.

At the time, there occurred a summit between Prime Minister Mulroney and President Reagan. Summits are the highest level of diplomatic encounters and reserved for subjects of great mutual importance, but the 1985 crossing of the Polar Sea generated such popular resentment in Canada at the perceived encroachment of sovereignty that Mulroney found it politically necessary to address the issue at the summit. The end result, the Arctic Cooperation Agreement of 1988, established terms whereby the United States promised to always ask Canada’s permission before crossing the Northwest Passage and Canada, in turn, agreed to always grant that permission. Former Ambassador to the U.S., Derek Burney, describes the agreement as neighborly, “I don’t mind you cutting across my lawn to go to the corner store provided you ask first.” It was a diplomatic solution allowing both governments to save face, but their fundamental positions remained “entrenched and unresolved”.

Several other promises were made by the Mulroney government, including one in 1987 to install a censoring system in the North to detect the presence of foreign submarines. That promise remained unfulfilled and in 1995, in response to the revelation that American nuclear submarines had been operating in the Arctic under waters Canada claimed, the Canadian Arctic Resources Committee lobbied the Chretien administration to fulfill the “1987 promise to install an Arctic Subsurface Surveillance System (ARCSSS) in the Northwest Passage…needed to detect foreign submarines thought to travel through Canadian Arctic waters challenging our sovereignty”.

The lobbying was unsuccessful. The Chretien government’s position did not differ radically from that of Mulroney’s. That is, Canada continued to claim sovereignty but failed to act to assert it and American submarines continued to have unfettered access to the Canadian Arctic. The issue remained low on the public radar and so tended to stay removed from political discourse.

That changed in 2005 when Conservative leader Stephen Harper made Arctic sovereignty a campaign issue with a promise to defend the north militarily. His Arctic defence plan calls for Canada to “place anti-submarine sensors in the Northwest Passage, and to build and deploy three heavy, troop-carrying naval icebreakers to enforce Canada’s exclusive jurisdiction in its Arctic waters”. In fact, the assertion of Arctic sovereignty became a prominent point of Mr. Harper’s campaign, with Harper announcing eight specific points of action his government would take to aid that assertion. In addition to those mentioned above, Harper promised to enhance Northern support on the ground and in the air. An increased monitoring from the skies, including through the deployment of aerial drones, and the promise to “expand and revitalize the Canadian Rangers, the vital northern defence force that helps establish our sovereignty in remote Arctic communities” rounded out those promises.

In the days following Harper’s election win, Ambassador David Wilkins made a public statement regarding the Conservative plan for the North, bluntly expressing Washington’s perspective: “We don’t recognize Canada’s claims to those waters… Most other countries do not recognize their claim.” He alluded to the 1988 Arctic Cooperation Agreement saying “we have agreed to disagree, and there’s no reason to say ‘There’s a problem occurring…”. In other words, Canadian sovereignty over the Northwest Passage was, to Washington, a non-starter and so preferably a non-issue. For the United States at least, though the status quo left the issue unresolved, it did so in favour of the American position in its failure to explicitly recognize Canadian sovereignty; and at least the status quo was functional. Prime Minister Harper has been silent on the issue since winning the election, suggesting that Canadian sovereignty is a worthwhile thing to campaign on, less worthwhile to actually assert.

In requiring the permission of the Canadian government to send its ships through the Northwest Passage, The Arctic Cooperation Agreement does, however, seem to give at least tacit American acceptance to the notion of Canadian sovereignty in the Arctic. Even if that sovereignty is weakened to the point of symbolism as it is by the requirement of Canada to grant right of passage if asked, it is still sovereignty, if only in principle.

As the economic expansion of the Arctic continues, Canada should use that principle as the justification for action. To safeguard environmental and security concerns, resource development and shipping and must be closely monitored and controlled. Because it is Canadian land and Canadian citizens that are most directly affected by the potential use and misuse of the Northwest Passage, Canada must ensure that the safety standards established within it are her own. In order to secure this role for itself in the future Canada must act now to assert her right of control of the area.

An important means toward this objective is to establish and ensure a prominent presence of the Canadian military in the Arctic. This could take place along the lines that Mr. Harper has suggested but it must be done with the acceptance, if not the outright support, of the U.S. administration. The means toward this is to link the issue to military spending and intra-continental security.

Security has long been the paramount concern of the American presidency and in post September 11 America this concern is both enhanced and redefined. The attacks in 2001 demonstrated to the United States a dangerous vulnerability. It was not simply that they were subject to the violence of terrorism, a threat many nations the world over live with daily, but also to the economic consequences of subsequent disruptions in air and sea traffic and stock market closures. The threats had changed. The overt threat no longer came from armies, and in an increasingly complex globalized economy, homeland security required the defense of infrastructure and the continued supply and free flow of critical raw materials and consumer goods.

It is an issue of some historical longevity that the U.S. government would like Canada to increase its military spending in general and its focus on continental security in specific. Former ambassador Paul Cellucci expressed in 2002 that the “Bush administration is urging Ottawa to substantially increase defence spending”. A satirical column from the National Review (“Bomb Canada”) echoed the sentiment, calling on the U.S. itself to bomb Canada so Ottawa would be motivated to increase defence spending “to keep the Canadians from being conquered by the United States. In effect, it would be a war to keep Canada free.” There’s a perverse kind of logic in that. But the Bush administration got its wish without resorting to arms. The Conservative government of Stephen Harper has significantly increased our military spending, even if relatively few of its resources have been devoted to the protection of the Arctic.

If proximity didn’t make Canada a critical factor in American security, economics would. Canada is the largest trading partner of the United States – indeed, as I am apparently keen on observing – the trading relationship of the two countries is the largest bilateral one in the world. Canada is the largest supplier of natural resources to American industry and the largest foreign consumer of its goods. The continued smooth operation of the American economy depends, in large measure, on this continued free flow. It is little wonder, then, that the US takes the security of Canada seriously.

It has been somewhat of a political tradition in Ottawa to depend upon the United States for defense against external threat. Even if we put aside the just belief that the greatest threat was actually from the United States itself (the defence against which can only be to be the best friend we can), it was rightly believed that any other threat to Canada was likewise a threat to the United States and so America would move to respond. As far back as 1938, President Roosevelt declared the American intention to act in the face of a threat to Canada, with Mackenzie King’s diplomatic response that “enemy forces should not be able to pursue their way either by land, sea or air to the United States across Canada”.

But self defence is, or ought to be, the primary concern for a nation state. It is as true now as it was in 1938 or through the Cold War that Canada must either act to provide for the security of its own economy and infrastructure or the United States will do it for her. Our sovereignty in the Arctic is too important to leave its security wholly to the United States.

The U.S. National Strategy for Maritime Security, detailed in September 2005, describes “three broad principles” behind its strategy: “First, preserving the freedom of the seas is a top national priority… Second, the United States Government must facilitate and defend commerce…[and] Third, the United States Government must facilitate the movement of desirable goods and people across our borders, while screening out dangerous people and material.”

These are principles that ought equally to guide Canadian own Maritime defence strategy and as the Arctic grows commercially these principles justify, or even compel, Canada’s move to facilitate and defend its economic and security interests there. Of course, it has always been in Canada’s best interests to act in cooperation with the United States whenever possible.

The United States is not readily going to rescind the existing policy of regarding the Northwest Passage as international waters. And even if it is currently against primarily American claims that Canada needs to defend its sovereignty, it should neither entertain nor project the folly that it could do so using military force. A joint bilateral force responsible for Arctic patrol would therefore be a feasible option. Similar structures are already in place at the bilateral and multilateral levels with organizations such as NORAD and the Arctic Council. To make the objective more politically palatable to the U.S., the joint force could be developed as a stage toward the continental perimeter security desired by U.S. defence strategy. To safeguard sovereignty claims, though, any joint force responsible for the Northwest Passage should remain under Canadian command.

It is essential that Canada move to take control of its Arctic waters before the projected thaws open up the northern shipping lanes and expand resource opportunities. Prime Ministers back to Trudeau have waxed rhetorical about Canada’s responsibility to, and over, the north, but it is only by having Canadian assets in place, enabling Canada to physically assert its will where necessary, that Canadian sovereignty over the Northwest Passage assumes real meaning.

Canada and the United States Part 5: Nationalism in Two Fast Sterotypes

Nationalism is okay, in moderation.  I sometimes stick a flag in my window on Canada Day. And sometimes it’s even a Canadian Flag. I like it when a Canadian team wins in the Olympics, too.  And it evokes a very special kind of national pride when a Canadian team wins while they are playing against the Americans.  Nothing warms the heart of a Canuck quite like one of our own kicking some American ass.  Canadians remember their country’s role in World War Two because it helped conquer evil.  We remember our role in the War of 1812 because (our sense of distant history is such that) we’re pretty sure we heard somewhere that that’s when some Canadians burned down the White House.  To steal a Monty Python line, we’re not just proud of that, we’re smug about it.  (For the record, our guys burned the White House – and a whole bunch of other shit in Washington – in retaliation for Americans having entered Toronto, burning our Parliament and a bunch of other shit there.   Given that broad Canadian resentment toward America is approached in scope only by the broad Canadian resentment for Toronto, it is possible that the sacking of that city would elicit less Canadian sympathy today than it did during the War of 1812.)  So what if the story is somewhat apocryphal (Canada didn’t technically exist as an ‘autonomous’ political unit, so the best we can accurately say is that the British burned down the White House, but this is never how we repeat the story to each other), and so what if it glories in the wanton destruction of an important political symbol of our closest friend and ally.  We kicked American ass, as the story goes on this side of the border, and how often do we get to do that?  Sure, we may get pissed at the big bullies from time to time, but we understand that deep down you’re a lovable giant, just selfish and retarded.  And we may even  have some unusually directed anger toward the current occupant of the White House, but we would never dream of burning it down again.  We settle for besting the United States in Olympic Hockey and the court of world opinion.

If I have a grasp of nationalism in the United States, the most extreme nationalists tend to the extreme right wingers.  Don’t get me wrong, here: I am not talking about those who simply take pride in their country.  There is much to be proud of in the United States, just as there is in Canada or Japan or Germany.  I’m talking about the “My country right or wrong” crowd, who take a dangerous amount of pride in their country.  No, if I have my stereotypes right, you can recognize the fervent American nationalist by his  love for the flag, hot dogs and freedom: the freedom to, depending on the historical era in which he finds himself, advocate incinerating the ‘towel-heads’, nuking the ‘gooks’, and being better dead than red.  It is as much a certainty that he hates Fidel Castro as it is that he can’t name any specific reason why.  He frequently extols the virtues of American freedom of speech but often grows increasingly angry when others try to exercise it.  He holds a deep admiration for the fundamental constitutional freedom of religion that allows him, and every American, to freely choose Christianity or a lifetime in hell.  He loves money, he loves guns.  But, most fundamentally, he loves America.

The Canadian nationalist, by contrast, is more likely to come at you from the left wing of the political spectrum.  You’ll recognize him by the permanent contemptuous sneer and his pervasive, smug and ill-fitting sense of superiority.  He talks about David Suzuki and Tommy Douglas, regards Lester Pearson as a crown prince, and thinks Rick Mercer’s ‘Talking to Americans’ is just about the funniest things ever seen on Canadian TV because it shows how stupid Americans and their leaders really are.  (Just in passing, if you are unfamiliar with Rick Mercer and his Talking to Americans pieces, you should really check them out as they are just about the funniest things ever seen on Canadian TV.)   The Canadian nationalist probably has a collection of books by Maude Barlow and Mel Hurtig.  He hates our current Prime Minister.  He is just enormously insecure with his own country’s fairly marginal international role and seeks to elevate his own status by denigrating that of others.  You see, the fervent Canadian nationalist is not fundamentally pro-Canada so much as he is fundamentally anti-America.

He uses the words “American-style” as an argument against anything you can name and can be periodically heard to declare: “we burned down their White House once before and we can damned well do it again.”  But he doesn’t mean it.  Not really.  He’s just letting off steam.

Canada and the United States Part 6: Canada – A Multi-Party Sham of a System

In the last line of a blog, I once glibly dismissed the American democracy as a “binary sham of a system.” As a rule the American system is two-party only. Really, its essentially one-party, but let me not digress into the Rant of the Ruling Elite, wherein distinct political parties are maintained purely to maintain the fiction of democratic participation, the fiction of choice. No, I will not go to that place, but suffice it to say that if you are neither Donkey nor Elephant, you are almost certainly unelectable in Presidential politics. Ask Ross Perot or Ralph Nader. Strong Independents like these men have sometimes thrown ripples into the two-party pond (as Unity 08 is attempting to poise itself to do in the upcoming Presidential race), but ripples dissipate quickly, their effects (if any) vanishing with them. I have not come here to rant about the USA, an action which I have (at least) temporarily disavowed, but rather to use this aspect of its system as a demonstration of something the Canadian system is not.

The Canadian democracy is decidedly multi-party. (A small aside here to note that The Rant of the Ruling Elite into which I failed to digress in the last paragraph would be equally applicable to Canadian society (which would be as plain as the nose on your face to you if you had heard the Rant and bothered to Listen), and that the Canadian democracy is therefore probably more accurately called a democratic fiction or, at best, a “democracy”, where the quotations are actually part of the word, but these are terms which I will not use here because to fully grok their meanings requires first, as a primer, The Rant of the Ruling Elite. I’m glad to have that small aside aside.) Currently in the Canadian Parliament there are four parties represented and – get this – one of them is actually ideologically committed to the dissolution of the current model of the Canadian state through Quebec secession. That’s crazy stuff. I could be wrong, here (and I could do some research, Google being just clicks away, but it’s easier to just say stuff and admit you could be wrong), but I think Canada may be the only country in the world with the means of secession dealt with in law. Our own code of law provides for the breakup of the union. Although the law (The Clarity Act) is heavily weighted in favour of federalism, I believe it is still somewhat progressive in that it recognizes, very fundamentally, that some subsection of the larger state, some nation within a nation, might have a very legitimate claim to the right of self-determination. It doesn’t make it easy to obtain, it is true, but the recognition of the principle, even, surely makes it unique, or at least rare, among nation-states. Now, that was a digression, unintended and moderately unwelcome. My point was that the Canadian Parliament is diverse.

It is true that the best chance you have at becoming Prime Minister in Canada is to be the leader of either the Liberals or the Conservatives. More specifically, the best chance is if you lead the Liberal party since every single person elected to head that party since Wilfred Laurier took the helm in 1887 has, at some point, also been Prime Minister, with the notable exception of the current leader, Stephane Dion. The Liberals are not called The Natural Governing Party purely out of whimsy; there is also some sarcastic spite. But Conservatives do elect a PM from time to time – the current PM, for example, heads the Conservative Party. He used to head the now defunct Canadian Alliance Party which used to be the now defunct Reform Party which was formed as a splinter group from the now defunct Progressive Conservative Party which was born of a merger of the now defunct Progressive Party and the once defunct but now reborn Conservative Party. Canadian Politics is dynamic, and if it always comes back to the same place, at least it takes the scenic route.

The two other parties currently in our Parliament besides the Liberals and Conservatives are the Bloq Quebecois, the aforementioned secessionists, and the New Democratic Party, once the closest thing to electable Communists English North America could produce. Although they always elect members to Parliament and they have a reasonably loud voice in national discourse, nobody believes they can ever assume actual power at the federal level for the very good (if circular) reason that there is no way in hell they could do so.

Four parties is pretty multi-faceted, but not multi-faceted enough, and coming from far behind, a fifth horse is in the race. They are the Greens and though if there is anything I am not, it is a joiner, I decided a few elections ago that they were the horse I would bet on. There is some hope that they will actually elect a member or two to Parliament in the coming election. To that end, the leader of the Greens – Elizabeth May – has actually endorsed Liberal leader for Prime Minister, in exchange for which, the Liberals will not field a candidate in May’s own riding. This riding is currently held by a Conservative cabinet minister, Peter MacKay, who is very popular with Conservatives but produces bile in the throats of those who do not fly that particular ideological flag. I’m not sure if Elizabeth May actually believes she can beat MacKay on his home turf, but I rather suspect she knows she cannot. What she does guarantee through this bold choice of a riding and her deal with the Liberals, which is controversial even within both parties, is that she will generate more free publicity and press for the Green Party and its messages than has ever been conceivable before. This might be just what the Green Party needs, and a vigorous dose of the Green Party is just what Canada needs, in my opinion.

The next election in Canada is not a long, long way off. If it’s another year, this will have been a banner life for a fragile minority government. All of the parties are gearing themselves up. Riding associations are nominating candidates, organizers are organizing, wonks are wonking. Once upon a time I thought it would come this summer, but with the Bloc Quebecois’ provincial secessionist counterparts, The Parti Quebecois, in a kind of disarry, and with their own fortunes tarnished in the last election, they may be in no hurry to head back to the polls. And in this strange land of Canadian politics, this secessionist party can hold the balance of power and prop up the current government if it chooses. That is at least one step less bizarre than its former formal title of Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition. I am excited at the prospect of another election, though doubtful that we will cast the Conservatives from power. I think it likely that the composition of the government will barely change at all, that Stephen Harper will continue to head a minority government, that Stephane Dion will resign having made history at becoming the first elected Liberal Party leader to never sit as Prime Minister, that the NDP and the Bloq will hover right around their current totals, or even lose a few, and that the Greens will have won a seat or two.

I look forward to writing about it in my usual unbiased style. I would like to try working in some respect on a political campaign, actually, and hereby offer such assistance as I can to any local Green Party types who may be peeking. In the interest of full disclosure, though, any acceptance of my offer should be accompanied with the understanding that I have no actual skills.