Caro Amici

Tags

Canada., July, NAFTA, tariffs, Trade, Trump, USA, World

Today is the second day of the Dog days of Summer and it really feels like it, hot and humid with a light breeze at 28C. I am glad we live by the river and the entrance to the Sea which keeps things reasonably cool.

I am thinking of decades ago the 1960’s, 70’s, 80’s when relations with our Southern neighbour was far more friendly and casual than they are today. The world changes and if once you were on speaking terms with your neighbour well today it is a different story.  I speak here of Government to Government bilateral relations which have soured considerably over the NAFTA negotiations and tactics of the US Administration to exploit its position.

I miss the days of yore when we could travel to the USA for fun and cross the border without a fuss, a simple smile and a hello. It has become so complicated now to cross the border by car or plane that frankly why bother. You do not know what agent you will get if he will be some paranoid wrap in the flag idiot seeing enemies in every Canadian or if he will be business as usual. At any rate those guys do all they can to make you fell as un-welcomed as possible, I am sure the US tourism industry does not need that kind of help from its government.

Now that Canada has been declared an enemy country causing harm to the National Security of the USA, why should I visit or buy American products for that matter. Canadians are looking for Canadian made or made in other countries products. Here in Charlottetown where we receive a lot of American tourist, the tone is still friendly as long as no one display Trump paraphernalia or MAGA hats.

However today as I was presenting the Shame and Prejudice by Canadian Artist Kent Monkman, our new Summer exhibit at the Art Gallery, I met with several American visitors, they were passengers on the cruise ship in port and were spending the day in town.  I met quite a few very nice people who reminded me that Americans are people with whom you can have good conversations. It is the old saying; do not confuse the citizens with their government, the two are quite different. Many Americans have to live with the fact that at the moment they have a President who is embarrassing them around the world. Like all people they have to live with the government they have and with the obtuse and stupid views of so many in Congress, Senate and White House.

The policies of the Trump Administration are doing harm to the Canadian Economy, Canada being the first trading partner of the USA, our economies are closely intertwined  especially in the auto sector. Damage is also being done to the economies of other countries in Europe, in Asia and Mexico. Next week the NATO meeting will most probably not go well at all and then Trump meets Putin. The USA new friends the former Soviet Union and North Korea, we live in a very strange time.

Many in Canada now understand that it is time to abandon US markets and concentrate on the European Union and the Trans-Pacific region. Once this shift starts it will not revert and lasting damage will have been done to the US economy. Canada is also imposing strategic tariffs against goods produced in States controlled by Republicans who support Trump.

So given this grim picture, one can only hope that Americans will wake up in November and get rid of the GOP members in Congress and Senate for the sake of the USA if you do not want to become another failed State.  Maybe the 40 million Americans who did not vote in the last Presidential election will feel remorse and be running to the poles, let’s hope so.

Happy 4th of July.

Public Library in Detroit, Michigan

Things are unravelling

Tags

border, Canada., Decrees, mexico, NAFTA, Peace, refugees, Trump, UN, UNHCR, USA

We are Saturday night 28 January it is the Lunar New Year, one year ago tonight we were in Charlottetown with our friends looking for a place to eat, we went to the Delta Hotel and crashed the Chinese New Year Banquet Dinner, we then went to The Place Next Door because the Merchantman was full of diners and painters, it was a special evening of Art in the Dark. There we met Nathan and Katie who were moving out of what would become our home in Charlottetown on Water Street.

One year later, here we are with our friends at the Confederation Centre Art Gallery for the opening of the Winter show.

However all is not well, tonight because of the travel ban on 7 countries imposed by Trump, tens of thousands of Canadians can no longer go to the USA because they were born in one those 7 countries. Regardless of the fact that they are Canadians and hold Canadian passports, they are barred from entering the USA. The White House has not bothered to inform my government of this fact. Other Canadians who tried to enter the USA today have been checked to ensure that they do not hold hostile anti-Trump views, carrying an iPhone or a computer leads to verification of accounts, they are reviewed especially Facebook for any comment deemed anti-Trump. Many have been refused entry on the spot. This is what happens in totalitarian States not in the USA, but things have changed.

Our Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has shown great courage and decency by upholding the Canadian Value of welcoming those who need our help. At this point we should be reminded that Canada was the founding nation of the United Nation High Commission for Refugee (UNHCR) and also of the UN Peace Keeping Corps, our former Prime Minister the late Lester B.Pearson won the Nobel Peace Prize for that initiative.

Though this week we heard a lot about Mexico and the wall, the fact that President Trump has said he now wants to renegotiate NAFTA, a treaty I worked on during the implementing phase all those years ago, without so much as giving a formal notification to Canada or Mexico and uses language that is condescending and patronizing as if we owed something to the USA, such language and attitude is totally unacceptable. The Government of Canada reminded the White House that 35 million American jobs depend on trade with Canada, we are your #1 Trading partner and Mexico is also equally important, trade imbalance not withstanding.

We will also remind the White House that the use of Torture is unacceptable to Canada and this policy of the Trump administration puts in jeopardy any military or intelligence operation.

When terrorists struck on September 11, 2001 all flights to the Atlantic seaboard of the USA were diverted to Newfoundland and Labrador in Canada, we took care, fed and housed thousands of American passengers for several days, we did not have to do it but we did out of decency and in an act of friendship.

When in 1979 the revolution in Teheran cause the departure of the Shah and the US Embassy was overran, it was Canada who saved a group of American Diplomats and their families and sheltered them and eventually arranged secretly to have them leave Iran at great cost to us, I would also like to remind readers that the UK and France had refused to help those same Americans.

It seems that more than 200 years of good cooperation, trade and friendly relations are now forgotten in the blink of an eye because of the election of one man who is surrounded by a bunch of ignorant people, not to mention the Republican party who is silent and complicit. The actions and decrees of Mr Trump this week are a dark stain on the USA and the American people and a threat to World Peace, I am not exaggerating.

Prime Minister Trudeau showing great courage and decency in welcoming Syrian Refugees to Canada, the very threat President Trump denounces.  

 

Changing Nation

Tags

abortion, Canada., immigration, mexico, Muslims, NAFTA, Ottawa, refugee, Syria, Trudeau, Trump, USA

Contrary to what is happening in the USA and all the negative news this week coming from the White House which cause many to shudder and worry about the future of our little planet now that the Doomsday clock is 2.30 minutes from Midnight, loosing 30 seconds since last Friday. The reasons being lost opportunity to tackle climate change, pollution and nuclear proliferation, President Trump simply add to the toxic mix.

Today in Canada several articles gives Canadians hope, one being that the  Government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced that they will set up a special fund and work with The Netherlands to offer support and services in reproductive rights to women who may loose out because of the Trump decision to cut funding on abortion. In Canada abortion is available under our Health Care system to all women from Sea to shining Sea and this for the last 35 years, in other words that battle has been over for a long time in our Dominion. This plan would extend aid to women in third world countries.

The other news also goes a long way to show how Canadians have governed themselves very differently if compared to the USA. In 1990 the Government of Canada at the time under a Conservative Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, the author of NAFTA, decided to open the flood gates of Immigration to all. Canada has always been a country of immigration, in fact the very first government department to be created by the new Federal Government after Confederation in 1867 was the Department of Immigration. The Prime Minister at the time Sir John A. Macdonald believed that a country as vast as Canada had to increase its population which stood at a few million people. Most immigrant then came from Eastern and Southern Europe. Number of immigrants from Europe started to dwindle seriously in the 1970’s, so a solution had to be found. Today on any given year 40% of our immigrants come from the Philippine, China and India, the balance come from Africa, South America and some from Europe. Many senior Ministers in Provincial and Federal Governments are themselves immigrants, the current Minister of Immigration was a Muslim refugee from Somalia. Our Minister of National Defence is a soldier who served in Afghanistan and Sikh immigrant from the Punjab in India. Others are from Afghanistan, Iran, Chile, etc, Muslims, Christians, Sikhs etc. Quite the mix of population and the same applies to Mayors of major Canadian cities, Canadians don’t care about your background as long as you have that popular appeal. We can understand the alarm and disapproval in Canada when we see how Mexico is being treated, our NAFTA partner. Close to one million Canadians live permanently in Mexico and another million visit each Winter.

The latest statistics from the Federal Government shows that by 2036 in 19 years Canada will have a population mix of 50% brown and 50% white. One third of Canadians will have been born abroad, another 20% will have at least one parent who will be an immigrant. Every large city in Canada will have 33% of its population born abroad.

Canada is officially bilingual, French and English, however by 2036 only 18% will actually have French as a first language and around 53% will have English, the rest will have another language which is not French or English. Already it is fairly common in schools to have upwards of 40 languages being spoken by students.

Canada is losing its old-time religion. Ninety per cent of Canadians identified as Christians in 1970. Today, it’s 66%, and will be just over one 50% by 2036. Christianity is not being displaced by other religions – only 7 per cent, at most, will identify as Muslim by 2036 – but by no religion at all. A quarter of all Canadians today identify with no faith, and that number could reach 33% by 2036.  Religion simply does not play much in our Society and not at all in Politics.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau welcoming a group of Muslim women in Parliament

The fact that Canada has deliberately transformed the makeup of its population in a way no other country has managed, or even attempted, speaks to the tolerant, diverse society in which we live.

As for Canadian politicians who think they can exploit the Nativist trend like in the USA to get elected, this is very unlikely to work. There is no future courting the angry white vote in Canada. There just aren’t enough angry white voters.

Lastly on the Democracy index compiled by Economic Intelligence groups Canada ranks at #6 in the world in terms of the quality of its democracy and openness in governance. The other five countries ahead of us are the Scandinavians. The USA has dropped at #21 and is no longer considered a full democracy.

This news on the 150th Anniversary of our Confederation is great to hear and makes me happy as a Canadian. It is truly something to celebrate.

Canadians on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Canada Day!