Free Republic

Too close for some people's comfort Those who think Canadians are manifestly distinct from the folks next door may be disappointed by a new study Terry O'Neill - February 27, 2006 The drumstick of Canadian nationalism beats with predictable regularity on the head of Uncle Sam. Ask many Canadians to define their country, and chances are they'll do so by contrasting it, superiorly, to the United States. As former prime minister Paul Martin put it during the election campaign, while his attack ads were busy painting Tory leader Stephen Harper as "[George] Bush's new best friend," Canadians see America as...

What's wrong with paying off our debt or cutting taxes so Canadians all benefit, asks Rondi Adamson Before we even discuss how our federal budget surplus might be spent, we have to try and figure out whether that surplus is more than $3 billion (announced by Finance Minister Ralph Goodale in the spring), or $1.6 billion (announced this week). Funny how those projections keep changing — not "ha! ha! funny," of course. Even funnier still was how Prime Minister Paul Martin, in May, was eager to sell out his one positive legacy to Canadians. With the deficit tackled, and taxes...

Rondi Adamson says critics firing arrows at the wrong targets If only George Bush had treated the United Nations with more respect these past four years, not only would Katrina's aftermath have been different, but hurricane season this year may have been avoided altogether. This is close to the level of silliness we have been hearing since Aug. 31. The initial charge, that Bush underfunded levees, was quickly debunked. In The New York Times of Aug. 31, Shea Penland, director of the Pontchartrain Institute for Environmental Studies at the University of New Orleans, said the break in the levee surprised...