Posted on 12/16/2005 7:18:13 PM PST by quidnunc
Toronto – When United States Ambassador David Wilkins warned the prime minister to stop chest-thumping, it was more than an off-the-cuff remark amplified in the heat of a federal election campaign, social activist Maude Barlow says.
It represented the latest example of American conservatism creeping into Canadian politics and posing a risk to our national values of tolerance and independence, the national chairwoman of the Council of Canadians says.
"Absolutely, and it's just this notion that you can make it public as ambassador … that you have a right to interfere in Canadian politics and bring this brand of conservatism north," Barlow said in a phone interview from Hong Kong, where she is attending the World Trade Organization meeting.
"An ambassador's role in the past has always been in the background, you work quietly in the background to influence policy and improve relations between your countries. You don't use that position to impose your brand of political conservatism or social conservatism on a democratic country."
In a poll given to The Canadian Press, 58 per cent of respondents indicated they are concerned that America's increasing conservatism is a threat to the Canadian way of life.
"It says to me that Canadians are worried about the influence of particularly the religious right, and that kind of fundamental social conservatism that we see in the Bush administration moving into Canada," Barlow said.
-snip-
Barry Cooper, a senior fellow at the right-wing Fraser Institute think-tank, said Barlow's fears of an orchestrated attempt by American right-wingers to infiltrate the Canadian electorate are unfounded.
"It's a very deliberate bit of propaganda by the nationalist left," said Cooper, also a professor of political science at the University of Alberta.
"They hate the United States, it's just as simple that, and they'll use just about any way of getting that on to the political consciousness of most Canadians."
Whether or not it signified a rising conservative presence, University of Toronto history professor Michael Bliss said Wilkins's rebuke of Martin went against "the ABC's of diplomacy."
"It was in some ways the sharpest criticism of the Canadian government in many years, partly because of the timing," Bliss said. "He was really saying that the Americans are very annoyed with Paul Martin and have very little confidence in his judgment."
-snip-
Damned straight! Common sense conservatism is socialism's greatest threat.
Canadian liberalism is hazardous to the Canadian way of life.
Canada better get its collective head out of its Klintoon.
Hey Oh Canada, just STF up.
What a bunch of pathetic losers. Sounds like they're talking about terrorists.
Shut up, eh.
It's just modern diplomacy - similar to Fox's efforts to dictate to the US on immigration.
Paul Martin ought to take notice of the predictment of Mr. Saddam Hussein.....and profit by his example.
Oh, I don't know, the US could always build the same fence along the northern border that we're going to build on the southern border. The only stretch that should be left open is from the eastern border of Alberta to the western border of Alberta.
Canadians are almost as pathetic as the French.
At least a threat to Quebec...
Remember Quebec and the Battle for Quebec 1775 .... Jihad for Canada... and all that crap. I lay dibs on the cedar trees.
Thereby joining the growing majority of Canadians
What do mean "almost"?
At least someone understood the message.
I lived in Toronto for several years, and I can confirm that Canada is one spoiled brat of a country.
An absolutely correct assessment. On both counts!
Hell, if you gave a poll to AMERICAN PRESS more than 58 percent would be concerned with American conservatism. Furthermore, the writer has it a little mixed up. "Tolerance and Independence" are conservative values, not liberal ones. Liberals want to control everyone and insist you act speek, and even Think the way they do.
Canadians have got to open up to the world to show everyone that their supposed "tolerance" means something. Glad to see them adopting Conservatism.
Remember, the Unibomber was real near the Canadian border. We have more of him, and we know where Canada is.
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