For some time now, writers in the United States have been noticing changes in Canada. And they do not like what they are seeing. These writers are looking at Canada and seeing it becoming as arrogant as America.
Americans are no longer looking north and seeing those quiet, polite Canadians. They are seeing a far more aggressive country with more internal conflicts. They are seeing a far more war-like country seeking to show a fighting spirit. They are seeing a country that was gradually weaning itself from being a British colony re-insert the royals back into the military and other institutions. They are seeing a Canadian government that puts a price on its friendship.
Americans are surprised how hard the Canadian Government, Alberta and Saskatchewan are arguing for the completion of the Keystone XL pipeline to the Texas Gulf ports. They have also been caught off guard by the governments’ efforts to send bitumen to Canada’s east and west coasts. They were disappointed that Canadians did not really want to sell them bitumen slurry from the tar sands for a $20 a barrel discount. Those greedy Canucks want full world price that they know they can get from the Chinese.
Americans refer to the Canadian tar sands product as dirty oil and they are right. The stuff can be refined into synthetic oil and oil products but the cost is high in processing and increased carbon emissions. And the thought of that slurry going through a pipeline that could foul the Ogallala Aquifer in Nebraska had environmentalists in a hell of a flap.
Many Americans had admired Canada for not participating in the Gulf Wars that had been arranged by the Bushes (père et fils). Canada’s eager participation in one of the most dangerous regions of the Afghanistan War corrected that impression. Canada’s military was under new management.
The new, more aggressive Canadian military wanted fighter jets and what better than the proposed F-35 stealth fighter of the American military. Just why Canada would want to use a short range attack fighter to maintain its authority over the vast reaches of the Canadian Arctic made no sense to many Americans and Canadians.
This is a new country to the north of the United States and Stephen Harper and his friends are not going to let us forget it. At least not until Canadians come to their senses and get rid of the Harper Conservatives.
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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry
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