Bush Will Sell His Message Before Election (A Canadian who actually gets it)

The Montreal Gazette ^ | February 10, 2004 | William Watson

[quidnunc]

In a brilliantly titled cover story ("Canadians to Bush: Hope you lose, eh") Maclean's magazine reports only 15 per cent of Canadians told its pollster they would vote for George Bush if they had a say in the coming U.S. presidential election.

Fully 40 per cent said they would definitely vote for someone else. The rest of us responded we'd either consider voting for someone else, didn't know or refused to say (afraid of angering the White House, I suppose, and further poisoning Canada-U.S. relations).

Lord knows there's lots to dislike about George W. Bush. He has a funny accent. He mangles the English language. He's aggressively unintellectual and yet at the same time cocksure of himself, even a bit of a bully. Come to think of it, that description fits a recent retiree from Canadian politics, a constantly underestimated fellow who didn't do at all badly with voters.

But Jean Chrétien never dressed up in a flight suit — the one time he donned a peacekeepers' helmet he had it on backward — and strut around the deck of an aircraft carrier. Of course, we don't have an aircraft carrier, which explains the biggest difference between Canada's leaders and Bush: Ours don't conduct wars of choice. Apart from simple anti-Americanism, whose political importance in this country can never be underestimated, Iraq is why Bush doesn't poll well here.

Perhaps we can all agree, with his swagger, his lack of curiosity, his mean streak and so on, George W. Bush isn't our kind of guy. But our kind of guy — intellectual, articulate, sensitive to the infinite complexities of the modern world and, therefore, wary of ever actually doing anything — might not be the kind of guy America, or the world, needs in the White House post 9/11.

-snip-

[q_an_a]

this is an "interesting" commentary. the writer explains how brillant all Canadians are as a result of their ____(money which is worth less than ours),____ their health care which rations medicine, _____takes forever for transplants and allows the elderly to have no care over the age of ___. These issues are part of why they are smarter than all Americans.

Then he tells us how smart was Klinton, but it was President Bush that won seats for the first time in 100 years for his party. President Bush got Libya and Iran to admit that Pakistan was supplying them weapons. Gee he must not be as smart as Klinton or Creatin.

Then in the last couple of paragraphs he mentions that if people want to be safe President Bush IS THE CHOICE. It takes a heck of a long time for him to make his point.

[tkathy]

"But our kind of guy — intellectual, articulate, sensitive to the infinite complexities of the modern world and, therefore, wary of ever actually doing anything — might not be the kind of guy America, or the world, needs in the White House post 9/11."

Kerry is exactly the kind of intellectual, articulate, sensitive wuss that America, or the world, does not need.

[daybreakcoming]

Having many friends in the Canadian West, I can tell you there is a world of difference in their attitudes toward the US and the US president than that which usually comes out of Quebec and Montreal areas. They are very supportive and have actually had rallies which you will never ever hear about in the media.

[PhilipFreneau]

>> It takes a heck of a long time for him to make his point.

He is playing the talk-radio seminar caller. He really likes Bush, but saying so up front will cause the leftists to immediately turn him off. Better to say how great the leftists are (how he has voted for them forever, etc.), then tweak in the point that Bush is probably the best man for the job at this point in history considering how many mad dogs are running around loose and how sensitive (e.g., wimpy) the leftists are.

[pfflier]

15 per cent of Canadians told its pollster they would vote for George Bush

Unreported: 100% of Americans wouldn't live in Canada.

My mother was Canadian by birth and American by choice.

[schaketo]

But our kind of guy — intellectual, articulate, sensitive to the infinite complexities of the modern world and, therefore, wary of ever actually doing anything

Sounds like a commercial for “Queer Eye”

[albertabound]

Sure as hell sums up my attitude. When he said " either you are with us or are with the terrorists", he meant it and Canadians who misunderstand him are in for a rude awakening. He stuck a dagger in the heart of Islamofacism and the gutless liberals on both sides of the border are safer today because of it.

[OldPossum]

I always shake my head in puzzlement when I read that Bush has a "lack of curiosity." How do they know this? Do they have access to his library? Where's the evidence?

.

[feedback doctor]

Unreported: 100% of Americans wouldn't live in Canada.

I am a hockey dad. I was speaking with another hockey dad about sending our sons to a hockey camp in Canada. The other dad is a Doctor. He said he would never let his son go to Canada. A friend of his had taken his son to a camp. The kid had an appendicitis and was taken to a hospital emergency room. After quite a while the dad realized that his son would not get medical attention in time. He had offered to pay extra to get his son seen in time. Of course he was warned that even suggesting it was illegal. He took his son over the border to Buffalo NY and just in time to save his life.
A few months ago there was an article in the local paper about how some people (liberals) are moving to Canada because Americans are so greedy. We heard some sob story from some woman who says she was so ashamed to be an American, because Americans did not want to share their wealth by paying for health insurance of others. Come to find out, she didn't want to spend her own money for her own insurance, she wanted others to, Talk about greedy.

[albertabound]

Sounds like a wives tale to me. Canada is far from a third world country and nobody is turned away. Our health care professionals are first rate. While I do not support universal health care, it is not the boogyman many portray it to be. With Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal and Calgary ranked in the top 20 Cities in the world by a recent poll, patients are not exactly dying in the streets, particularly our American friends.

[albertabound]

P.S. send your hockey puck to Calgary, he will feel right at home. As a former hockey Dad myself I get your concern but don't deprive him of a great experience on these grounds.

[feedback doctor]

Sounds like a wives tale to me. Canada is far from a third world country and nobody is turned away. Our health care professionals are first rate.

Not a wives tale, I know that for sure. He was not turned away, but he was told he had to wait, and that wait would have been a little too long. I know you have some first rate health professionals, because they are getting good jobs when they come to the states. I know all Canadians are not anti-US, but my experience thru hockey is that many think they are superior to Americans. And the worst racism I've seen came from Canadians, and also from folks in Philly, PA.
On another subject. Do you know why Canadians can get cheaper drugs than we can in the US? Is it their laws on controlling prices? What if the US adopted similar laws, would drug prices drop in the states? No, it would not drop prices, it would end the availability of newer better drugs. It costs a lot of money to develop new drugs, and most never make it to market. To pay for this the drug makers must sell their products at prices to make up for the high costs. Since Canada keeps the price down, folks in the US pay higher prices. If Canada changed their laws, their prices would rise some, and ours would fall. If the US imposed similar laws to control prices, the drug manufacturers would see no incentive to lose money, and would therefor stop trying to develop new drugs.

I thank God for Canada and hockey. But I am glad I have my freedom here. Maybe Don Cherry will end up wanting more freedom of expression and move to the states!

[ConservativeStLouisGuy]

Bush Will Sell His Message Before Election - William Watson

In a brilliantly titled cover story ("Canadians to Bush: Hope you lose, eh") Maclean's magazine reports only 15 per cent of Canadians told its pollster they would vote for George Bush if they had a say in the coming U.S. presidential election.

Fully 40 per cent said they would definitely vote for someone else. The rest of us responded we'd either consider voting for someone else, didn't know or refused to say (afraid of angering the White House, I suppose, and further poisoning Canada-U.S. relations).

Lord knows there's lots to dislike about George W. Bush. He has a funny accent. He mangles the English language. He's aggressively unintellectual and yet at the same time cocksure of himself, even a bit of a bully. Come to think of it, that description fits a recent retiree from Canadian politics, a constantly underestimated fellow who didn't do at all badly with voters.

But Jean Chrétien never dressed up in a flight suit - the one time he donned a peacekeepers' helmet he had it on backward - and strut around the deck of an aircraft carrier. Of course, we don't have an aircraft carrier, which explains the biggest difference between Canada's leaders and Bush: Ours don't conduct wars of choice. Apart from simple anti-Americanism, whose political importance in this country can never be underestimated, Iraq is why Bush doesn't poll well here.

Perhaps we can all agree, with his swagger, his lack of curiosity, his mean streak and so on, George W. Bush isn't our kind of guy. But our kind of guy - intellectual, articulate, sensitive to the infinite complexities of the modern world and, therefore, wary of ever actually doing anything - might not be the kind of guy America, or the world, needs in the White House post 9/11.

Bush does often muff the details. In terms of encyclopedic knowledge, he's clearly no Clinton. But, as you'd expect of a Harvard Business School grad, he thinks big-picture: Go to Mars, build democracy in the Middle East, fix social security, beat the Democrats to a drug plan for senior citizens. And he is dogged and tenacious, two essential attributes in a wartime leader.

In his book The Right Man, ex-White House speechwriter David Frum confirms what many people have always suspected, the president "made the big decisions" on war in Afghanistan and Iraq "in the first 48 hours after Sept. 11, and he adhered to those decisions."

People are beginning to forget Sept. 11. The United States takes the worst hit it has ever taken. More Americans die than died at Pearl Harbor on that other iconic date, Dec. 7, 1941. The shock and devastation lift the scales from people's imaginations. Mega-terrorism making use of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons now seems a distinct possibility - in fact, a virtual certainty if you extend the horizon far enough out. (Does anyone seriously doubt we will live to see such things?)

And you, as president of the United States, are faced by Saddam Hussein, an enemy whom your own father humiliated in 1991, who probably hates you, who gives every evidence of hating the United States and who has a history of very active interest in chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. Do you take the risk of leaving this person in power?

Bush decided no. Canadians evidently think that was the wrong answer. Since Saddam was never a threat to us, perhaps that's not surprising. But to assume he was not a threat to the United States, which is what the Democratic presidential candidates now argue, or that he could have been contained by the very intelligence services that have failed so spectacularly on weapons of mass destruction, is another thing entirely. It will be surprising if by November the tenacious, plain-spoken Mr. Bush can't make that clear to U.S. voters.

_________________________________

This article is spot-on! Living here in Toronto and reading/listening to the (Liberal) media up here the author of the article raises a lot of the "objections" about President Bush up here -- but he doesn't fall for those "objections"....he has a mind of his own (rare for people up here as they're all a bunch of lemmings who blindly accept what their media/politicians tell them about President Bush and the United States)....

Worthy of a full posting....

FReegards,

- ConservativeStLouisGuy

[albertabound]

He made the choice not to have his son treated, right?Waiting periods in emergency rooms on both sides of the border are not unusual and I certainly sympathize with his decision to get his son treated ASAP. With respect to drug prices, Milton Friedman seems to blame the FDA and the drug manufacturing industries (see attached link)I am no expert in this matter and cannot offer an opinion. While our liberals are a pain in the butt, we are no less free up here than you were under Clinton. No offense intended, just tying to counter some stereotyping. Half my family is American so I have viable means of comparison.

[streetpreacher]

I think David Gergen was one of the first to make this charge. What a spineless weasel. Has about as much conviction as Dick Morris.

[streetpreacher]

Waiting periods in emergency rooms on both sides of the border are not unusual and I certainly sympathize with his decision to get his son treated ASAP.

For appendicitis?!! A waiting period could mean the difference between life and death. My wife had to go to the ER and they rushed her in for immediate surgery. They took it out just in time as it exploded. A wait a few seconds longer would have killed her!

If this happened in the U.S., it would be considered criminal and some trial lawyer would be adding to his earthly treasure. But I surmise from your post that this is standard healthcare in Canada.

[Snowyman]

On another subject. Do you know why Canadians can get cheaper drugs than we can in the US? Is it their laws on controlling prices? What if the US adopted similar laws, would drug prices drop in the states? No, it would not drop prices, it would end the availability of newer better drugs. It costs a lot of money to develop new drugs, and most never make it to market. To pay for this the drug makers must sell their products at prices to make up for the high costs. Since Canada keeps the price down, folks in the US pay higher prices.

. It's called marketing to a population that uses 42% of the world's prescription drugs , double per person than Canadians do. And pay the highest prices in the world. The price of drugs in Canada has no bearing on the price of drugs in the USA

A drug price in Canada is based on the average price in 6 first world countries , one of which is the US plus a factor for R&D that is carried out in Canada . It's based on existing prices, not some imagined figure . You make the false assumption that drugs companies are American . They are not . Lilly , for example , is based in the USA but operates in over 150 countries. Bayer and GlaxoSmith are European. All use the tax advantages and grants offered by all governments , not just the USA.

He took his son over the border to Buffalo NY

If the boy was suffering from appendicitis , were his life was in danger and were time may have been of essence , unless the Canadian hospital was literally within spitting distance of Buffalo , the father was an idiot . Does Niagara Falls Ont . have a hockey school?

( I know a young woman who , last April , developed a case of flesh eating disease which localized in the lymph glands in her groin and went to an ER with a sore stomach. Within 2 hours she was being helicoptered 260 miles to a hospital in Toronto in the middle of the SARS problem , where she was given a 5 % chance of living , went into toxic shock , actually received last rites, her heart stopped twice and recalls nothing of 3 entire days . Ten months later she's back skiing .

Sorry a vague story about a father having to wait just doesn't cut it.)