by MARIS PAEZ VICTOR
The melodic Canadian national anthem proclaims that its sons and daughters “stand on guard for thee.” Well, now is the time as Canada faces insults, lies and threats from Trump. The idea that the US would annex Canada and make it one of its states, has provoked palpable indignation among Canadian people, Indigenous and non-indigenous. Ironically, Canada, which celebrates its “special relationship” with the USA, has been thrust into the category of nations vilified by the US: the long-standing animosity towards Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua remains, but now Trump has added US allies Canada, Panama, Denmark (EU), and Colombia. One can only wonder who will be next.
Canadian spokespersons deny these outrages but at the same time add with a bit of a whine: “but, but, we are your best friends!” To its detriment, Canada has long ignored Henry Kissinger, well-known former US Secretary of State, who declared that the US has no friends, only interests.
It has been a rude awakening for all Canadians, especially its elites. Suddenly, they are mentioning “Canadian sovereignty,” a concept that it seemed only the Quebecois and indigenous peoples understood. Certainly, sovereignty is a concept that Canadian governments have often willfully ignored or belittled with respect to other countries such as Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba, Haiti, among others.
Unlike his father Pierre who was a Canadian nationalist, in 2017 Trudeau the younger astonishingly expressed the view that Canada is a “post-national” country and that “there is no core identity, no mainstream in Canada.”
This would not have been acceptable to the working classes in towns, cities, farms, factories, logging camps, fishing towns, throughout the country where the Maple Leaf flag flies proudly, had Trudeau’s concept been actually discussed in participation with the people of Canada. It was a sheer urban elitist commentary. An example of how far the Canadian political elites especially, have problems listening to their own people. In fact, the real defense of Canada will lie as it always has done, in the hands of its working and middle classes, and ironically, with the indigenous peoples, and their pressure and votes upon the political elites. Unlike in the US, there is in Canada a working Parliament where, despite lobbyists, votes do count, and not vast fortunes of the billionaires.
Trudeau is an ideological product of the financial and commercial elites that embraced globalization and the US empire, wanting to “play with the big boys.” After World War II, Canadian political and cultural elites basically decided to join US imperial capitalism. In the 1960s the Canadian intellectual, George Grant, railed against this situation, mourning what he felt was the end of Canada as an independent state as the ruling class looked to the US for its final authority in politics and culture (George Grant, Lament for a Nation: The Defeat of Canadian Nationalism, 1965). Through the years, the US has repeatedly attempted to dominate Canada over lumber, water, fishing rights, and other trade issues.
Although there have been almost constant US/Canada trade disagreements that federal and provincial officials have had to contend with, at another level, Canadian elites threw their hat and their county into the hands of the US empire that was consolidating south of their borders. So, they send their children to Ivy League universities, approve of mergers with US corporations, and take vacations in Florida. Canadian media increasingly relies on US outlets such as Associated Press for much of its news, and most significantly, Canada backs the US in almost every vote at the UN and backs US foreign policy, whether it be a sensible one or an irresponsible regime change adventure. There were exceptions with two Liberal Prime Ministers who withstood tremendous US pressure: Pierre Trudeau who refused to break relations with China or Cuba during the Cold War and Jean Chretien who refused to join the US invasion of Iraq.
The US has, to a certain extent, already “invaded” Canada in a back-handed, quiet, sort of way. The symbol of US “takeover” is plainly visible in Ottawa, where the enormous, ugly, US fortress-like embassy was planted in the middle of the nation’s capital, like a giant carbuncle proclaiming: “we are a permanent feature of your nation.”
It is surprising especially to many of us in Canada of Latin American origin, how unconcerned most Canadians have been about the encroaching US influence in its political and cultural life. A great scandal was whipped up when there were accusations of China influencing Canadian politics, but when US ambassadors publicly weighed in with their opinions, nobody bats an eye.
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