'What happened to Queen and Country?' - we grew up, evolved into a distinct and independent nation ... she is still our Queen of course, we would defend her against aggression, unquestionably ... and we find her particularly useful in expressing our distinction from the US, so she serves an eminently practical purpose
But to ally ourselves militarily with the UK in actions outside defense of Britain and North America - no way imho, and for this principal reason - the UK is far too lock-step with the US ... look at Blair, he comes across as more dubyaesque than Dubya some days, channelling Kissinger or something ..... no, i'd like to see my country play the supposed function of the house of lords or your senate - 'chamber of sober second thought' ... alliance when necessary, not necessarily alliance ... also there is the question of brute size - the UK is far more militarily powerful than is Canada
'And Canada is in NATO. You could be dragged into the defense of Germany' - yes, and i don't disagree with this, properly designed and regulated it is not necessarily a bad thing, of course we must defend Germany when reason to do so presents itself .... i'm talking more about how we do that, than of the circumstances in which we do so, though the latter comes into it as well, of course, and strongly sometimes .... depends on the situation, each one is a new story
'A US coverup would be extrememly stupid. I doubt it will happen. If it does, I'll go over the hill in the next Congressional and Presidential elections. ' - i know that of you, now .... all kidding aside, we understand and like you estadounidenses [that's 'unitedstatesers', the correct term in spanish, something lacking in english-g-] a whole hell of a lot better than we understand or like some of the decisions made by your rulers .... which rulers we pretty much understand, fwiw, we have here a breed of our own, lord help the species if they ever had such imperial power
I would like to see more direct canadian contact with Latinoamérica south of the Río Bravo ... more two-way trade and travel, more cooperation in international affairs, more finding of common ground .... military alliances, well maybe no real call for them at this time, still i can imagine canadians beside mexicanos in a peacekeeper or peacemaker force between israeli and palestinian, for example
And when the US is unjustly attacked, we must be there, of course, we are the next-door neighbours, not separate from something like that ... in the first moments of seeing those planes into the towers, we saw that as an attack on us, not just on the US, but on all of us in the civilised world ... and still do, positions taken by certain US and non-US factions notwithstanding ... it is in the grey-zone details of how and where and when to respond that we'll disagree at times, and i think it likely that canadians will find more common ground with the danes, the anzacs, dutch, mexicanos, and in so doing be of more net long-term benefit to legitimate goals of the US |
