13 January 2009

 

 

 

If war is God's way of teaching Americans geography, then surely the Almighty's method of briefing U.S. politicians about Canada is to make them president. …

 

Not knowing much about the north has southern limitations. When oil supply and national security often cohabit a single sentence, it's important to know that Canada is pumping energy into America and blood into Afghanistan. And this financial crisis makes it more vital than ever to grasp that common prosperity

turns on two countries expanding, not shrinking, their shared economic space.

 

Those truths we take to be self-evident. But it's also true, if not so widely embraced, that being a Washington wallflower is underrated. Again unlike Mexico, Canada isn't a U.S. problem….

 

Close as neighbours are, the U.S. wants more help in Afghanistan than Ottawa is now prepared to give and rising American protectionism, real or rhetorical, is a Canadian fear exacerbated by a border thickened by post-9/11 red tape.

 

International affairs and domestic affluence are bound by a singular theme the Prime Minister will whisper into the presidential ear: Canada is part of the solution to America's problems. Ottawa will support a more collegial U.S. agenda in international forums. Canada's fiscal prudence and financial caution offer useful U.S. models as well as some continental stability. And two countries that have moved beyond trading with each other to building things together can best become more globally competitive through closer co-operation….

 

Still, there's beguiling opportunity in U.S. change at the top. Canada not only has a once in eight years opportunity to bring a new president up to speed on why Canada is so important to America, it can, and should, use serial world crises to put new energy into sustaining a relationship that too often is left to just muddle along….