Progressive and Polite

Our Neighbors (Neighbours in their charming dialect) to the North seem to have a better idea on “The Issues of the Day”. In true Canadian fashion, they are polite about it.

When North Vietnamese gunboats may (or may not) have attacked a US ship in the Gulf of Tonkin, the US Congress approved a “resolution” that led to 58,000 Americans being killed there. Canada refused to swallow the “Domino Theory”, feeling that North Vietnamese gunboats were unlikely to attack Vancouver any time soon. Polite as always, they allowed macho young Canadians to volunteer for service in the US Army and 30,000 Canucks actually did.

In 2003, Canadian intelligence services determined that Iraq did not have an active Weapons of Mass Destruction program. All those United Nations investigations over all those years couldn’t have missed it, could they? Again, Canada politely announced that it would participate only in a UN-approved, multi-national action in Iraq. When the United Nations failed to authorize military action and the US and the UK decided to go it alone, Canada stood on the sidelines which turned out to be the right place to be.

Abortion has been a hot issue for nearly fifty years on our side of the border. Not so in Canada. It is legal there at all stages of pregnancy and is publicly funded as a medical procedure. Canadians are politely chuckling at the madness going on in the US court system. “A $10 K bounty to any Texas citizen who turns in a woman seeking an abortion or who unmasks a medical professional providing one? Ontario is civilized unlike Texas.”

Canadians are clever as well as polite. Quebec was concerned with its COVID vaccination rate. The provincial government then required that a “vaccination passport” be shown in order to enter province-run liquor and cannabis stores. (It goes without saying that recreational marijuana is legal in Canada). The number of first-time inoculations quickly quadrupled. Again, Canadians are politely chuckling as Biden’s inoculation mandate for workplaces with more than 100 employees went down in flames. “No one wants to go to work, Joe. No one will suffer a “Fauci Ouchie” to do so. An inoculation is a small price to pay for a good, stiff drink or a toke though.”

Progressive and polite. There’s a lot to like about Canada. Now if they’ll only take those damn geese and hockey players with mullets back.

By Ed Dufton