...if we try to run Canada they way the Liberals have been doing it for the last generation, Canada has no future with or without Quebec.
You ask why I make this assertion. It would certainly be controversial among most Canadians -- not all, though, since Condor agreed without blinking.
First, I'm not suggesting that the U.S. has imperial designs. Rather, I'm suggesting something that would happen practically by default.
I'll summarize what will follow in this way: over top of existing fault lines, the Liberals are laying a combination of maladroit administration and a world view that is, I think, alien to all but a minority of Canadians.
The contention of maladroit administration isn't that tough to support. The latest example came yesterday from the auditor general. As part of the emotional response to a deranged psycho who murdered a number of women in Montreal a dozen years ago, the feds decided that all rifles in Canada had to be registered. The initial estimate for the cost of this registry (the merit of which I would call debatable at best) was $2 million (net of registration fees); the auditor general said yesterday that not only had the government spent $1 billion so far (with fewer than half of the rifles registered), but that for the first time ever they couldn't get enough information to complete the audit. Believe it or not, this is not that unusual.
This government does not do well even the things everyone agrees it should be doing. It focuses resources on the things about which it can issue press releases and have reps appear at ribbon cuttings with cheques in hand. Non-sexy things, like the RCMP, the military, and the justice system, are neglected, the two former in fact being fiscally starved. I could go on ....
More fundamentally, the government is run by people who have a U.N. sort of worldview. [lengthy digression: The only reason that makes sense to me for their determination to ratify Kyoto is that it strengthens the U.N. in an important way. Kyoto is the first time the U.N. has tried to make this kind of agreement, where people agree to do something and where they can be punished for not complying. And Canada, who has been a cheerleader for the U.N. almost since the beginning, agreed to be the only country to take a bullet at Kyoto, for symbolic reasons. Even proponents agree that Kyoto is merely step one, and a baby step at that. Once Kyoto is ratified and implemented, the next Kyoto becomes easier.]
It seems to me that the government's whole approach to questions which touch upon sovereignty is consistent with this approach. Their remarkably low-key reaction to illegal immigration is one. (Their pandering to the immigrant communities is a mix of this worldview and simple politics, a happy union for them). The U.N. thinks we should take more refugees, so Canada signs on. A rational approach would be to look at what our economy needs in terms of skills and education, and go for that. Instead, we focus on family-reunification and refugees, and make the hurdles so high for skilled workers that they go elsewhere.
Their world view is aggressively internationalist -- so much so that fundamental aspects of sovereignty are eroded.
Their fiscal policies are motivated by political considerations first, political considerations second, and only somewhere far down the line by economics.
In 1976, the Canadian dollar was worth U.S.$1.06. Today it's worth U.S.$0.64. Apologists can give you a bunch of reasons -- in 1976 the separatists were first elected in Quebec, for example. True, as far as it goes. That started the slide. But more to the point, it's a reflection of the fact that not only does government account for half the economy, they do things badly. Taxes are a huge drain. Used properly, to do well the things government should be doing, the cost of taxes is accepted in a democratic society. I would submit that the decline in the value of the Canadian dollar reflects in large part the fact the government does not use effectively or well the taxes it collects. That imposes a tremendous cost on productivity. The net result is that the standard of living of Canadians declines, or at best fails to keep pace with our neighbours.
There has been a discussion underway over the last couple of years about the merits of "dollarization." The discussion has been serious enough to merit a comment from the Governor of the Bank of Canada. That tells me that even sensible people who ought to know that there's no panacea to be had are giving up on sovereignty.
The Canadian government has spent a generation trying to create, to engineer, a new "Canadian identity" that's favourable to the Liberals' internationalism. The problem is that people know in their guts that it's phony. What the Liberals have instead succeeded in doing is undermining that visceral attachment to the country that the WWII generation and their ancestors had. Now they tell us that medicare is a defining characteristic of Canada. A social program, for goodness sake! That's supposed to be our soul?? We could be talking about some real accomplishments. We could talk about some real sacrifices -- we have Vimy Ridge, in something the same way as you have Valley Forge. But people know that the ersatz pap they're being fed isn't satisfying.
Condor's analogy was the glassy-eyed spoiled kid who is given everything so why leave home. Well, we're creating that. We're actively undermining the work ethic with programs like "Employment Insurance" (which is so badly named as to be almost laughable). We're taxing and pissing it away.
Surely anyone who actually read this far has got to be wondering when I'm going to tie this together. It's this. Canada is becomming polarized between those who like being given things and those who have to pay for them. We're making it increasingly attractive for the doers to leave -- either to go from Saint John to Toronto, or St. John's to Calgary (which has been going on forever), or to move to Dallas. People are losing patience with a system that is run badly and inefficiently and that they have no meaningful prospect of influencing. There is tremendous dissatisfaction with the status quo. And the resulting apathy and frustration are undermining the attachment to Canada. The government has discouraged genuine nationalism, and will reap the reward. In short, the situation is not sustainable.
I wouldn't be particularly surprised to see dollarization happen within the next ten or so years. Not for a second am I naive enough to think that with that will come a seat at the Fed. But I do think that somehow Canadians will decide that the answer to the relative decline in our standard of living is to adopt the U.S. dollar, regardless of the fact that in so doing they renounce control over their monetary policy. That will be the first step. After that, it will be easy for Canada to go out with a whimper.
The fault lines I referred to would include Quebec. They would include the vast gulf between Alberta's contribution to the economy and her political influence. Those are already exacerbated by the shortcomings of our political system. The combination of frustration, impotence and apathy will prove deadly.
I haven't really offered up anything more here than the outline of a term paper. One day I'll have to write the whole thing, but this isn't the forum for it. |
