Midterm: What does it mean for Canada?

[Ani_Ibi]

Midterm: What does it mean for Canada?

Here are some responses from various ambassadors, focussing on free-trade and security. There hasn’t been enough time for responses which give more depth yet.

I can’t quote from the webpage, but generally folks seem to think that the Dems will adopt a more protectionist stance which will operate against free-trade with Canada. The US and Canada comprise the world’s largest trade partnership. Canada sends 84% of its exports to the US.

As for security: we still have a Conservative government up here. A minority government. The Liberals are campaiging for their leadership convention in Spring 07. Looks like Rae (a former NDP socialist provincial leader) and Kennedy (a former food bank director) are thought to be talking coalition. This would operate against the pro-Iraq Ignatieff (an ex Harvard scholar).

 

[Ani_Ibi]

Alan Freeman on the U.S. midterm elections

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Now can they tell us what they stand for?

With John Kerry likely having ruled himself out of serious contention in 2008 by his campaign gaffe insulting U.S. troops, New York Senator Hillary Clinton – who won easy re-election last night – remains the front-runner if money and insider support are the sole indicators.

But the campaign’s real winner in the Democratic presidential sweepstakes was Barack Obama, the junior senator from Illinois who was a consistent audience pleaser for Democrats across the country. He is a consummate politician with good looks and a sure popular touch, and what he lacks in experience and gravitas he more than makes up for in the excitement he generated at every campaign appearance.

It demonstrates the hunger of the party for an alternative to Senator Clinton’s brainy but decidedly cool approach. But until the Democrats figure out who they want to lead them going forward and what they really believe in, their biggest risk is to appear without direction.

 

[didymus]

Midterm: What does it mean for Canada?

Here are some responses from various ambassadors, focussing on free-trade and security. There hasn’t been enough time for responses which give more depth yet.

I can’t quote from the webpage, but generally folks seem to think that the Dems will adopt a more protectionist stance which will operate against free-trade with Canada. The US and Canada comprise the world’s largest trade partnership. Canada sends 84% of its exports to the US.

As for security: we still have a Conservative government up here. A minority government. The Liberals are campaiging for their leadership convention in Spring 07. Looks like Rae (a former NDP socialist provincial leader) and Kennedy (a former food bank director) are thought to be talking coalition. This would operate against the pro-Iraq Ignatieff (an ex Harvard scholar).

Well, the good news is the Dems are too chicken to invade Canada
As for trade issues, isn’t it the Bush administration that violated NAFTA on soft limber and other issues?

From the article:
That could now prove to be a problem for Michael Wilson, Canada’s current ambassador, because the Democratic party’s stronghold is in the northeastern part of the country, including several states along the Canada-U.S. border that are involved in resource production, said Allan Gotlieb, Canada’s ambassador for most of the 1980s, when the North American Free Trade Agreement was signed.
“What I’d call Gotlieb’s law when I was down there is that the closer your constituency is to Canada the more anti-Canadian you’re likely to be,” he said from his Toronto law offices. “It’s counterintuitive, isn’t it?”

All I can say is that here in upstate NY (and Vermont and New Hampshire) we love you (or at least your $$$) and people are having conniptions because Homeland Security wants to make everybody show passports crossing the border starting next year or 08, forget which. That would kill tourism, plus a lot of casual cross-border commerce.