I haven't had time to read any responses to my post about Bush-haters, except for tone.def's. tone.def is right in that I made up a new identity for my post (WDW1979 Canadian), but that is only because I was on my lunch hour at work and did not have access to my list of passwords and I did not remember the one for "WDW1979 from Canada", which I normally use on Disboards. Maybe you think I am an American who is just trying to pose as a Canadian, but nope, I was born in Nova Scotia and have lived all of my life in Canada. Besides, in my post I was able to name Paul Martin as the Prime Minister of Canada, and you would probably have to ask 10,000 Americans before you found one who could name Paul Martin as the Canadian Prime Minister.
Listen, there are a million great things about Canada and Canadians, I was just trying to make the point that sometimes my fellow Canadians can be sanctimonious and snobby, particularly when it comes to the United States. Maybe I was a little too harsh in my post titled, "Oh those Bush-haters, you have to feel sorry for them", but I was provoked by people on the Canadian board of Disboards who said that Bush didn't really win in 2000 (the Michael "let's make stuff up" Moore crowd), who said that said that he should be impeached, and who said that he makes their skin crawl, and who said how great it is to not be American.
The United States carries a great burden that we in Canada do not. Without the United States, England would be run under the approval of Hitler's minions (like Vichy France). Without the United States, Japan would have continued its genocidal slaughter against much of Asia. Withouth the United States, most of the world would be dominated by the influence of a still intact Soviet Union. The world has been a very dangerous place since, well, forever. We as Canadians have the liberty to pretend to always "take the higher road" because it doesn't have any consequences. Canadians don't have to concern themselves with how dangerous the world is because there is a country next door who will always make sure that we don't have to worry. Just because we live in Canada and its 2005 doesn't mean that history has ended and our world will always be song and flowers.
It may seem that we have all gotten past the upheavals and turbulence of history, but to believe that you would be forgetting human nature. Hundreds of thousands of Americans lie in cemetaries all over the world as a result of stopping fascists from taking over the world in the 1940's. 38,000 young Americans died protecting South Korea from communist North Korea and communist China. South Korea is a free, prosperous country as a result, while North Korea is a living nightmare. South Vietnam was not quite as lucky as South Korea, but 57,000 young Americans died trying to help them, too. While hundreds of thousands of young Americans waited in military bases in West Germany to protect it and the rest of Western Europe from the Soviet Union, Ronald Reagan went to the Brandeburg gate in West Berlin and proclaimed, "Mr. Gorbechov, tear down this wall!" Today, the mothers and fathers of thousands of young Americans worry about their sons and daughters coming home from Iraq while they try to protect Iraqi citizens attempting to vote on a constitution. Depite what Michael Moore tells you, George Bush did not invade Iraq to get its oil. If the United States wanted Iraqi oil, all it would have had to do was play nice with Saddam Hussien and say "Saddam, what you to the Shiites and Kurds is your business. What you do harbouring terrorists is your business. We'll keep sending you billions for your oil as long as you keep the oil flowing". Saddam would have been plenty happy to keep the oil spigots flowing fast so long as he was gettting his billions. That would have been the easy way to get Iraqi oil. But the mom and dad of my wife's cousin, a young American Marine who spent most of 2004 in Iraq, voted for George Bush in November 2004 even as they worried about the life of their son. In my office, a (Canadian) mom worried about her daughter's husband, a young American Marine who was fighting in Iraq in 2004. I have known that mom for years where I work, and though she had never been a loud pro-American like me (or even a quiet pro-American), she does not have any hate for George Bush or the job that her son-in-law does to fight terrorists in Iraq so that it may become a democratic country.
I remember March 2001 when I was in Brazil on business. On that trip, two Canadian consultants who were with me were making jokes about how stupid George Bush was, and how dumb he was to try to develop a ballistic missle defence system. I told them that the world is a dangerous place and you never know what will happen, and the Americans have to have a national defence. One of the consultants laughed at me and said, "come on, tell me, who is going to attack the United States?". I said "how am I supposed to know". The consultants weren't laughing so hard five months later when parts of New York and Washington were on fire.
Now of course, the terrorists did not attack the United States with ballistic missles, but the President of the United States has to prepare for all threats, and the threats in the future won't all be hijacked airliners. Besides, you ask Japan about ballistic missle defence. Japan has gone in on ballistic missle defence with the United States because it is scared of North Korea, who test fired a ballistic missle over Japan a few years ago.
Canadians put up a big fuss about how we can't allow the weaponization of space. Well, that certainly would be nice, but unfortunately Americans have to live in the real world. Canadians can be sanctimonious and say "we will not participate in ballistic missle defence because we are proudly against the weaponization of space". Sigh, the Land of Pretend. You can pretend that space won't be weaponized, but it will be. We can join hands from Newfoundland to British Columbia and sing "Give Peace A Chance" till the cows come home, but no matter, at some point in time there will be weapons in space. China and numerous other military powers aren't going to sing John Lennon songs with peace loving Canadians and agree to never weaponize space. Canada can afford to lift its nose to the idea of ballistic missle defence or the weaponization of space, partly because we live in a country of tranquil isolation from danger, and partly we know that the Americans will protect us anyway, even if we don't want them to.
Of course, to some of you, all this talk may seem fanciful. It is so easy to think catastrophic things won't happen, and to sit back and criticize George Bush. But you have to cut him a little slack, because as President he has to worry about current and future threats, and sometimes he has to take actions that he believes will stop those threats. That doesn't mean he will always be 100% correct, but he doesn't make the decisions he does just for the heck of it. He is just doing what he thinks is right. He is not the devil.
The terrorism of September 11, 2001 seems a long time ago now, and the horror and enormous destruction of that day is easy to forget. Most people these days, particularly outside the USA, think of it as an unfortunate event akin to a hurricance or a natural disaster. So why does Bush keeping harping on about it. It's been four years, let it go. But don't you remember that day? Don't you remember how shocking it was, with people on fire jumping from the World Trade Center and the enormous clouds of dust billowing down the canyons of the streets of New York as tens of thousands of people ran for their lives, then reports of the Pentagon in Washington on fire and people running from the White House and the capitol buildings of Congress as reports came in of another hijacked plane headed for Washington, a plane that was prevented from smashing into that city because the Americans on board fought hand to hand to stop the terrorists, terrorists who had slit the throats of the female flight attendants with box cutters? Don't you remember the wild chaos of that September day, thinking, "oh my God, what is happening, what is going to happen next???".
It is easy to laugh at the Americans now, to laugh at George Bush who is so concerned with weapons of mass destruction. But when you go to Disney World you must be aware of the security searches that now take place before you enter any of the parks. That only started after the terrorist attacks, and the Disney Company is not paying legions of security staff and inconveniencing millions of tourists just for the fun of it. And look closely when the monorail passes just outside the Magic Kingdom, on the access road that leads in past Space Mountain, and you will see in the pavement a large square slab of metal. That slab of metal was installed after the terrorist attacks in 2001 and is actually the top of a 20,000 pound device designed to pop up out of the pavement and stop trucks packed with explosives from driving down the access roads that lead into the Magic Kingdom. So laugh at the Americans all you want, and hate George Bush as much as you want. We as Canadians, have that luxury. But just remember that as you are eating that wonderful Disney World popcorn as you pass from the Town Square onto Main Street USA, there are people in the world who have planned to blow that street to smithereens, and you and your little kids along with it. Go ahead, laugh long and loud at that "stupid, idiotic, monkey-brained tongue-tied warmonger" George Bush. I am sure it doesn't bother him. He is far more concerned with making sure your children are free to enjoy their day, without being burned to a crisp.
The following is from USA Today (
http://www.usatoday.com/news/sept11/2001/11/26/cover.htm):
"Perhaps most telling about the minds of those who trained here is a document found at the camp. "I am interested in suicide operations," wrote Damir Bajrami, a 24-year-old ethnic Albanian from Kosovo, on his entry application in April 2001. "I have Kosovo Liberation Army combat experience against Serb and American forces. I need no further training. I recommend (suicide) operations against (amusement) parks like Disney."
For info on the anti-terrorist barricades in Disney World see
http://www.mickeynews.com/News/PrintStory.asp_Q_id_E_5154Terror_A_cat_E_MK, which copies a news article from the Orlando Sentinal, some of which reads:
"Walt Disney World has installed high-security, anti-terrorist barricades similar to those protecting the White House, U.S. embassies and nuclear-waste depots. The hydraulically powered steel barricades block the service entrances of the giant resort's four theme parks and were apparently designed to stop a 20,000-pound truck bomb traveling 70 miles per hour."
Also see
http://www.mouseplanet.com/david/patience.htm (search on "next intended target was
Disneyland")
Oh, yes, the world can be a very dark and terrible place. All Canadians have to worry about is getting their next Tim Hortons coffee, and what long-term effect the hockey stike will have on the NHL. But George Bush doesn't have time to live in the Land of Pretend, play nice guy, close his eyes to danger, and hope that statements of understanding from the United Nations will protect the world.
I just think you need to live out west here for a while to really experience how frustrating Canadian politics is.
