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Alias
Joined: 24 Jan 2003
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 Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 2:27 pm Post subject: |
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[quote="bonanzabucks"]
| Alias wrote: |
| He was a typical corrupt politician. But at least he kept us out of Iraq. |
That's not true. Canadian troops were involved in fighting because of troop exchanges with the British and Americans. Technically, Canada was involved, even though they denied it. They were even recently involved with the rescue of those two Canadian hostages last year. If Chretien really wanted to opt Canada out of the war, he would have called back his troops even though they were part of the exchange. He did not. Wonder why?
Technically? I'm talking about reality. Troop exchanges were going on before the war. Canada was not part of the Iraq invasion.  |
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Alias
Joined: 24 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 2:39 pm Post subject: |
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| Gopher wrote: |
Alias: the lecture invariably begins "In Canada..."
And most of us have heard the material that invariably follows as well. Really hard to see how this could come as news to anyone. |
That Canada is a utopia? No. I've never heard that.
| bonanzabucks wrote: |
| If Chretien really wanted to opt Canada out of the war... |
This is true. But most Canadians will go apoplectic over it. They prefer the fiction they have created for themselves ("Canada fights in Afghanistan but has nothing at all to do with Iraq").
Nevertheless, in multiple ways, immensely helpful or not, Canada and Canadian forces enabled and/or supported U.S. military action in the present Iraqi War/Occupation since Mar. 2003.
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Using the same logic Canada joined the Vietnam War as well. I guess Ann Coulter was right afterall. 
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NATO is voluntary. Canada ought to withdraw from that if it really wants to disavow American military action and/or demonstrate independence.
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Never said Canada was pacifist. Canada's membership in NATO has never been subject to much debate here. The NDP (Canada's left wing party) has called for Canada's withdrawl from NATO for the past 4 decades. That's about it. |
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bonanzabucks
Joined: 09 Jun 2007
Location: NYC
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| Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 4:22 pm Post subject: |
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| Technically? I'm talking about reality. Troop exchanges were going on before the war. Canada was not part of the Iraq invasion. |
How can they not be part of the invasion if they were on the ground participating in the war? Like I said, if Canada truly wanted to opt out, Chretien would have called back the troops. The reality was that Canadian troops were participating on the ground and participating in live combat and, yes, killing people. Troop exchange or not, they were fighting and part of the invasion, even if they didn't get political cover. The Canadian Government did the troops a great disservice by not publicly supporting them or by not calling them back before the war started. They could have done so and most certainly had the power to do it. But again, they did nothing and pretended as if nothing happened.
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| This is true. But most Canadians will go apoplectic over it. They prefer the fiction they have created for themselves ("Canada fights in Afghanistan but has nothing at all to do with Iraq"). |
Actually, most Canadians didn't even know there were troops in Iraq. This received very little press up there. |
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Alias
Joined: 24 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 5:50 pm Post subject: |
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If we use your logic Canada also participated in the Vietnam war. Quite possibly the Suez Canal crisis as well. History books will have to be re-written!
No one considered Canada to be a participant in the US/Anglo invasion of Iraq at the time. Certainly not the neo-cons when they announced the names of the "Coaltion of the Willing". While the right wing press here at home bemoaned the fact that we were not part of it. My guess is that the reason some on the right are trying to tenuously link Canada to the war is because it is so unpopular now. Unlike before.
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| The Canadian Government did the troops a great disservice by not publicly supporting them or by not calling them back before the war started. |
Why should they? The soldiers have the option not to fight if they don't want to. |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 5:54 pm Post subject: |
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| bonanzabucks wrote: |
| Actually, most Canadians didn't even know there were troops in Iraq. This received very little press up there. |
Understood.
My point is that most Canadian nationalists will resist, kicking and screaming, until the absolute bitter end, that their righteous Canada had anything at all to do with the Iraqi War. |
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Alias
Joined: 24 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 6:11 pm Post subject: |
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| Gopher wrote: |
| bonanzabucks wrote: |
| Actually, most Canadians didn't even know there were troops in Iraq. This received very little press up there. |
Understood.
My point is that most Canadian nationalists will resist, kicking and screaming, until the absolute bitter end, that their righteous Canada had anything at all to do with the Iraqi War. |
Becuase Canada didn't. It is not a nationalist position. Even the right wing in Canada never claimed such a thing. The neo-cons certainly didn't either (see above post) |
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twg
Joined: 02 Nov 2006
Location: Getting some fresh air...
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| Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 6:15 pm Post subject: |
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| Alias wrote: |
| Gopher wrote: |
| Alias: the lecture invariably begins "In Canada..." |
That Canada is a utopia? No. I've never heard that. |
Argue not with the chip on the shoulder. For the chip is mighty and impervious to all approaches and reason. The chip is a force of nature not unlike quicksand. |
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bonanzabucks
Joined: 09 Jun 2007
Location: NYC
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| Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 7:09 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| If we use your logic Canada also participated in the Vietnam war. Quite possibly the Suez Canal crisis as well. History books will have to be re-written! |
I admit, I don't know much about the Vietnam War. My understanding is that a lot of Canadians volunteered to go there and fight the Communists. To my knowledge, there were no troop exchanges, but if there were, correct me.
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| No one considered Canada to be a participant in the US/Anglo invasion of Iraq at the time. Certainly not the neo-cons when they announced the names of the "Coaltion of the Willing". While the right wing press here at home bemoaned the fact that we were not part of it. My guess is that the reason some on the right are trying to tenuously link Canada to the war is because it is so unpopular now. Unlike before. |
That's true, but don't forget that the government went out of their way to convince everyone how against the war they were and that they were not participating in any way, shape or form. But that ended up being a lie because Canada had officially sanctioned troops on the battlefield fighting in the war, whether they were on an officially sanctioned troop exchange or not. If they actually practiced what they preached, they would have brought back the troops, but it didn't happened. They acted like a bunch of hypocrites.
Remember that very few knew that Canada had troops there to begin with and even when it was discovered, it didn't get much press, so nobody made a big deal out of it.
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| Why should they? The soldiers have the option not to fight if they don't want to. |
No they don't. Soldiers have to do what they're told. If they don't, they get punished. The military is not a democracy and soldiers know that before they get in and they know that they have to obey orders. To me, because they were seeing combat, the Canadian Government sanctioned them to fight even if they were quiet about it. If they sanctioned them to be there, they should have been more supportive. What would have happened if one of those soldiers was killed? What would the reaction be? He shouldn't have been there to begin with? Again, if that's the case, why weren't they called back?
I find this quote very telling:
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U.S. Ambassador Paul Cellucci has said Canada has been a great partner in the war on terrorism and indirectly is giving more support to the Iraq campaign than most supporters of the U.S.-led coalition.
However, he also said Americans are disappointed Canada is not officially backing the war effort. |
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20030329/liberals_troops_030328
For a war Canada's officially against, they seemed to have done a lot more than those who supported it.
Look, I am a Canadian citizen like you. I never really cared for the war to begin with, but I just hate hypocrisy. Chretien was fully guilty of it here and if he had any respect for his troops, he would have publicly backed him or taken them out of harms way. And he did neither. I have friends in the Canadian Armed Forces and they absolutely despise him for that and the fact that he gutted the military. |
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Adventurer
Joined: 28 Jan 2006
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| Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 7:32 pm Post subject: |
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| I, for one, liked Prime Minister Jean Chretien. The man had years of political experience and service. I generally liked his foreign policy, his ways of trying to cultivate ties with other countries, his sense of humour, the team he had was pretty good, the reduction of debt which is very important, the improving of the economy.... Do I like the scandals that happened? No. I do not at all. I wouldn't use that to ignore all the years of service he provided to Canada. I wouldn't focus on the Iraq thing. He knew that the overwhelming majority of Quebecers were against the war to the tune of 80% and at most half supported going to war among English speaking Canadians making it not worth it to go to war. It was a smart political move not to go into a war when the opposition is extremely high. I didn't see most Canadians disliking Chretien. They made fun of him sometimes. Canadians voted for him 3 times, because they thought he did a good job. Canada has not participated directly in Iraq, but there is nothing wrong with helping the United States even though the United States has created more problems for itself in the short-run. Terrorism is bad for the whole world and what harms Americans may harm Canadians... In many cases, Canadians must help... |
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some waygug-in
Joined: 25 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 10:21 pm Post subject: |
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Leaving matters of the Iraq invasion aside....
I think it has to be mentioned that a lot of the reason for the success of Jean Cretien and his party was
due both directly and indirectly to people's
revulsion and rejection of the Mulroony conservatives.
If Mulroony and his band of cronies hadn't been the theiving scum that they were, the conservative party wouldn't have been so utterly irrelevant during the Cretien years.
Everyone knew that the liberals weren't great, but they were better than Lian' Brian's band of hoods and shaft-monkies.
Perhaps less so in later years, but the fact remains that many voted Liberal federally because there simply no other realistic options. |
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bonanzabucks
Joined: 09 Jun 2007
Location: NYC
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| Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 10:25 pm Post subject: |
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| some waygug-in wrote: |
Leaving matters of the Iraq invasion aside....
I think it has to be mentioned that a lot of the reason for the success of Jean Cretien and his party was
due both directly and indirectly to people's
revulsion and rejection of the Mulroony conservatives.
If Mulroony and his band of cronies hadn't been the theiving scum that they were, the conservative party wouldn't have been so utterly irrelevant during the Cretien years.
Everyone knew that the liberals weren't great, but they were better than Lian' Brian's band of hoods and shaft-monkies.
Perhaps less so in later years, but the fact remains that many voted Liberal federally because there simply no other realistic options. |
Remember when the Liberals won the first of the three elections? PC only won two seats that time. There used to be a joke that went as following: What does the PC party say when they go into a restaurant? "Table for two, please." |
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Geckoman
Joined: 07 Jun 2007
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| Posted: Sun Aug 05, 2007 4:15 am Post subject: Canada's Anti-American Culture! |
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You can often tell who is a Canadian by who is bashing America. Many Canadians love to bash America. Bashing America is part of the mainstream culture in Canada. So many Canadians get brainwashed by the mainstream anti-American culture of Canada and so become full-time America bashers. It's the truth.
If you ever spend much time with Canadians, particularly if you have gone up and lived among them in their country, you will discover a people that have an identity crisis. They are wantabee Brits and will praise England ("London is the greatest city in the world," etc.). After all, they still have the Queen of England as their head-of-state (and whom still has legal power). One would think that the head-of-state of Canada would at least be a Canadian. And they are haters of America and want everyone to know that they are not American. In their attempt to prove that they are not American they will bash America. But in reality Canadians are so much more similiar to Americans then they are to Brits.
It is this identity crisis of being a wantabee Brit and wanting to prove that they are not American that is the Canadian national character. The Canadian mainstream culture of being anti-America is quite sad. It really is. You might find a Vietnamese guy whose brother got killed by the American military during the Vietnam War, and that guy will say: "I have no hatred toward the US or the American people." And yet you will find Canadians who never suffered a single harm from America and yet who will have such venom of hatred toward America that it boggles the mind as to why this Canadian hates America so much. I speak the truth.
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enns
Joined: 02 May 2006
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| Posted: Sun Aug 05, 2007 4:43 am Post subject: |
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Adventurer,
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| the reduction of debt which is very important, the improving of the economy |
While it's true the debt was reduced and surpluses resulted, many sacrifices were made to achieve this. Our health care system went from #1 in the world under Mulroney(according to the WHO) to #34 under the Liberals. The military was left impoverished. Billions were wasted or stolen: look at the $1-$2 billion gun registry fiasco, adscam, and the HRDC boondoggle. And our environmental policies were possibly the worst of the entire developed world during this time.
Outside of debt reduction, are there any files that the Liberals did particularly well on?
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| It was a smart political move not to go into a war when the opposition is extremely high. I didn't see most Canadians disliking Chretien. They made fun of him sometimes. |
I agree it was a smart political move and that's where I agree with you. Whether is was for morally ethical reasons or not, Chretien had a knack for keen political judgments. His decision to send troops to Afghanistan, which I support, is being paid for by the Tories right now. Imagine if we were in Iraq at the moment too.
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| Canadians voted for him 3 times, because they thought he did a good job. |
I don't know if he was voted for because of a strong performance. Remember at this time that the right was in shambles, and vote splitting was rampant. If the Conservative party was to form 10 years earlier, they could have taken Chretien down in the tight 1997 campaign, or at least brought him to a minority.
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| Terrorism is bad for the whole world and what harms Americans may harm Canadians... In many cases, Canadians must help... |
I couldn't agree more. Canada needs to put up and not hide behind the US. This is a global problem, and I'm glad to see Harper standing up for the troops and the country.
And Geckoman, I agree, anti-Americanism in Canada is problematic. Like the rest of the world, we embrace everything about American culture, but tend to hate America, regardless of their politics. |
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On the other hand
Joined: 19 Apr 2003
Location: I walk along the avenue
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| Posted: Sun Aug 05, 2007 4:56 am Post subject: |
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Geckoman:
I agree that anti-Americanism is lame, especially in a country where few people alive have suffered anything at the hands of the US. However...
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| They are wantabee Brits and will praise England ("London is the greatest city in the world," etc.). After all, they still have the Queen of England as their head-of-state (and whom still has legal power). |
I think you're overstating Canadian Anglophilia. A bit of that survives on what might be called the "Tory Left"(who are usually not members of the actual Tory party.) And your average anti-American Canadian might pick up odds and ends of the ideology, and incorporate it into his rhetorical arsenal, without having much knowledge of the broader context.
As an example: 100 years ago a Canadian might have gone apoplectic recounting the War Of 1812, and gotten all weepy-eyed about how Laura Secord saved her nation from a Yankee invasion. The point is, at that time a Canadian patriot would have had some actual knowledge of what distinguished British North America from the United States.
Fast-forward to a self-righteous Canadian circa 2007, reading about racism in the states. He might say something like "goddam racist Americans, thank god we won the War Of 1812", without stopping to consider that Britain in 1812 was just as racist as the USA was.
Last edited by On the other hand on Sun Aug 05, 2007 5:01 am; edited 1 time in total |
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sundubuman
Joined: 04 Feb 2003
Location: seoul
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| Posted: Sun Aug 05, 2007 5:01 am Post subject: |
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I wonder how much the French/English divide contributes to the anti-American sentiment.
It's obvious that anglophone Canada has a lot more in common with the States than does Quebec.
Does America provide a sort of useful "other" that can help solidify a very obvious split Canadian identity?
And also, I wonder how will the rise of Calgary/Alberta affect the status quo? |
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