When Friendship Becomes Servitude

A large part of the problem is that Canada’s political elites are loathe to regard their own country as a sovereign state and exercise that sovereignty as mandated to them by the people of Canada. Where sovereignty is not exercised it ceases to exist-there is a vacuum-and living on the doorstep of the world’s singular super power that vacuum will quickly be filled. Where successive Canadian governments find themselves shirking sovereignty the US in turn comes to see any disagreement not as a legitimate expression of sovereignty or self-interest but as civil disobedience or anti-Americanism. It also sees this failure to exercise sovereignty as a sign of weakness and will take full advantage of it, and also become contemptuous in its attitude toward this country. Instead of having harmony between nations we really have a thinly veiled servitude that Canada inflicts on itself and the US is more than willing to impose. There are any number of manifestations of the sorry state of the Canada/US relationship, but one of the most immediate is the pending agreement on softwood lumber. It is not about free trade but restrictive trade embodying flagrant American protectionism. A settlement that should be somewhat in Canada’s favor is punitive. When International Trade Minister David Emerson felt it necessary to betray his constituents and jump to Harper’s conservatives his defection was defended as necessary. He supposedly had the expertise to deal effectively with the softwood lumber issue. But the deal is a sham. As freelance business writer Don Whiteley surmised in the June 21st National Post: "The next time the federal government wants to negotiate anything with the United States, it should outsource the job to some one who knows how to do it. There must be some American mercenaries who would take it on." Whiteley also reported that the Vancouver Sun published details of a “leaked” letter from the Bush administration to its lumber lobby confirming that its objective was to hobble the Canadian forest industry for at least seven years. It has achieved just that, and no doubt, as the saying goes, US negotiators are laughing all the way to the bank with a billion-dollar bonus in seized duties they refuse to repay. PM Harper then shuffles off to Washington bearing gifts. At home, though, he must defend the indefensible. Quite clearly both Harper and Emerson were not concerned with a deal that would serve the best interests of the Canadian softwood lumber industry, but one that would serve as a facile political expedient. When the Mulroney Conservatives initiated the original free trade agreement it was purportedly to overcome US protectionism and gain immunity from US trade law. Neither objective has ever been achieved. Prior to the agreement our two countries did in fact have a healthy and vigorous true free trade arrangement--a virtually duty-free free flow of goods and services. The FTA and the subsequent NAFTA are really blueprints for corporate and investor rights and privileges. They are invasive and designed to create captive economies. Thanks to Mulroney, Canada went from a free-trade economy to a captive economy. This is a fundamental reason the pending softwood agreement lumber is a sham. American negotiators know they are dealing with a captive economy, as well as a compliant government unwilling to assume risk or retaliation. Mulroney’s finance minister, Michael Wilson, now Canada’s ambassador to Washington, recently appeared before a committee of Congress. The tone of his testimony was not that of one government diplomat conferring with others but that of an underling reporting to head office. His deference was total and utterly obliging though he was so bold as to remind Congress that Canada, not Saudi Arabia, is America’s major supplier of fossil fuels. Wilson’s predecessor, Frank McKenna, is now, among other things, active in the Liberal Party of Canada’s policy renewal and one of his chief objectives is to convince the party to reverse its opposition to US missile defense. Mr. Mckenna’s naiveté is of a similar strain to that of Mr. Emerson. Mckenna should be advised that missile defense is largely a make-work project (less politely known as “corporate welfare”) for the military industrial complex. The war on terror and the “axis of evil” are in large part fabrications to justify ludicrous military spending. Furthermore, in spite of massive expenditures dating back to the Reagan era reliable missile defense performance has not been achieved. Experts within the US military concede that it is at least 20 years in the future and will require hundreds of billions more in development costs. Dennis Jett, former US diplomat, and now a dean of international studies at the University of Florida states in an article titled, Missile Dysfunction: There is no real threat of a North Korean attack. Intercontinental missiles can be tracked on radar and therefore their origin is unambiguous. Kim Jong II knows he would be toast shortly after he launched. Dictators are ruthless, but they are not crazy and they are not suicidal. They get up every day and the only thing on their agenda is survival and maintaining their power. They leave the jihads to others. Jett rightly implies that the North Korean imbroglio is largely a tempest in a teapot. State-of-the-art US Patriot missiles were used in the Gulf War with only limited success against Saddam Hussein’s WWII vintage Scud missiles (derivative of the German V2 rockets). These same Patriot missiles have now been deployed to Japan to deter a spurious North Korean threat. Instead of becoming but one more lobbyist for the US military industrial complex, Mr. McKenna should undertake a more critical and discerning analysis of the Bush administration’s real motives when it comes to missile defense. In her book, Bushworld, New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd adroitly observes: "As the brazen Bush imperialists try to install a new democracy in Iraq they are finding the old democracy of our reluctant allies inconvenient." But Dowd should have expanded this statement one step further-–America is finding its own democratic values inconvenient as it passes laws like the Patriot Act, rescinding civil liberties and granting security agencies Draconian powers. Allies like Canada and Britain have been all too willing to submit to this nefarious over reaction to the war on terrorism, 9/11, and the phantom “axis of evil,” that very dangerously result in a serious erosion of democratic values. At the current G8 summit the US president is in no position to be lecturing his Russian counterpart on civil liberties and democratic values. When a country goes into the heat of empire building-neo-imperialism-lies (some very big lies), deceptions, propaganda, implanting the culture of fear, along with a revoking of democratic values become the necessary instruments of despots. Canada’s political elites seem incapable of distinguishing between cooperation and co-option, comity and contempt, or friendship and servitude. They fail to understand that sovereignty not exercised is automatically ceded-especially when dealing with a rapacious superpower. Nor do they understand bully psychology--the more submissive the victim, the more demanded. The US is a notorious bully on trade issues and Canada must take a harder line in dealing with them Our elites appear absurd as they try to defend the indefensible. The pending softwood lumber agreement is a sellout by any standard. It is clear that Canada’s negotiators capitulated to US negotiators, and in turn to their Canadian political masters who wanted a quick expedient resolution to the impasse. The guiding principle was that any deal will do. The fact that our prime minister is so determined to foreclose any further discussion of the softwood lumber agreement is merely mute testimony of his determination to be a lap dog at King George’s court. Whether it is softwood lumber, the war in Afghanistan, missile defense, security issues, or civil liberties Canada can ill afford to simply be lap dog to the empire. Canada’s political elites must realize that unless they are willing to exercise some modest measure of sovereignty and risk the servitude will simply become more enveloping. Another aspect of friendship we should not ignore is the necessity to caution a friend about their excessive behavior. Not only is the present US administration making onerous demands on its allies; it is also radically altering the fabric of America itself. Where global domination may have irresistible appeal it is hollowing the American homeland and creating an imperial overreach that is arguably not sustainable and potentially implosive. [Proofreader's note: this article was edited for spelling and typos on July 28, 2006]