Shut Up And Listen 109

Canada And The US
George Bush cancelled his May visit to Canada earlier this week. Instead, he will pay host to Australia’s Prime Minister around that time. Canada did not become involved in the Iraqi war, Australia did. Do I have to draw you a picture?
	Of course, the news of this has got the pro-US, pro-war Canadians hopping. “We’ve fucked it up” this and “Kill Chretien” that is what they’re shouting to the moon. These are the people that say we should have went with America just because they’re right next to us geographically essentially. Bullshit about loyalty to our friend and neighbour, which really translates to being scared that the US might not like us thinking for ourselves and using our choice not to fall in line.
	America is not a friend to anyone in any consistent sense, okay? America does things out of interest for America. Let me ask you something. If America and Canada are such good friends, why are their tariffs on soft wood lumber despite the fact that Canada, the US and Mexico are all part of a free trade agreement? Oh, I’m sorry that the US soft wood lumber industry can’t compete with Canada’s so they feel the need to break an international agreement to get in the game (of course, Canada gives government subsidies to farmers to assist them also--something that has to be added to that is that whether or not that is an infraction of the NAFTA agreement is far more debatable than tariffs placed on soft wood lumber). All I’m saying is that most of the time we benefit from things the US does only as a pleasant side-effect of them benefiting from it. They’re the kind of friend who will only give you a ride if they happen to be going to that part of town also.
	Now, about them not liking us not going into Iraq with them: who gives a fuck? Canada said they’d only go in with UN approval. There wasn’t UN approval. End of story. The US knew we said that. Not like we pulled out at the last minute or anything. Canada wants to recognise that maybe the world has entered a phase where multilateral action is the appropriate kind.
	Besides, part of this war was supposed to be about bringing freedom to the Iraqi people, and guess what, Canada used its freedom as a sovereign nation to not just be the US’ sidekick. I won’t say that the majority of Canadians agree with the decision, because I don’t trust polls either way. All I do know is that our “democratically elected government” said no just like their “democratically elected government” said yes. Yeah, freedom is a bitch when it doesn’t go the way you like, but suck it up.
	Besides, why should we automatically fall in line with the US? Something I find funny about all those people who think we should, they always begin or end their spiels by saying how they’re “ashamed to be Canadians” because we essentially won’t be Americans. Not like we’ve totally abandoned the US either. Our forces are still assisting with the “war on terrorism” in various countries abroad. It obviously wasn’t a decision made out of spite against the US or anything. It was just a situation we didn’t feel as comfortable getting into. I mean, we said that although we weren’t going to be involved, we were behind the US and hoped they could succeed in their goals (a few comments from MPs aside, of course).
	Yeah, it would be a different story if our Prime Minister stood up in Parliament and said “Fuck the United States. We hope they get their asses handed to them.” But that didn’t happen. We just said we weren’t going to send in troops and that was it.
	And in this situation especially, it’s rather easy to see why a country might want to sit it out. The evidence and justification were flimsy, shifty and almost non-existent often. Even if you’re pro-war you can see why someone might not be. I’m anti-war, but even I can see why some are/were for it. I’m not so stuck in my own ideals that I can’t at least see the other side of things.
	I’m not saying that Bush and his people should just forgive and forget right away, but I’m telling people to calm the fuck down about this. It wasn’t that big of a deal. Especially since it’s not like Bush has visited Canada before. Or been able to name our Prime Minister correctly. Hell, his cancellation seems par for the course almost. I know I don’t care too much. Maybe I should, but even I’d like to think that the US isn’t so petty as to economically try and retaliate against us over this. I mean, they’re not that big of assholes.