Originally Posted by: SPLIsn't it logic that they would vote for Kerry over Bush? What exactly is there to be afraid of? What is the link/point you are trying to make?
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Consider that at the end of the Second World War, Canada was the fourth most powerful nation in the world, after the US, the UK, and Russia. We had the world's third largest navy, with the second largest Merchant Marine fleet. Our economy was one of the world's strongest. Our aerospace industry was second only to the US.
After 40 years of almost uninterrupted Liberal Party rule, our armed forces have been reduced to the status of poorly-armed scouts. We haven't been able to deliver on our commitments to NATO or the UN in decades. The equipment our forces have to work with is so old and poorly maintained that a lot of it has become more hazardous to our personnel than hostile forces. One contributing factor in the death of four of our soldiers in Afghanistan who were bombed by a US airman was the inability of our forces to co-ordinate communications with the US forces. Six of our soldiers died when a Sea King helicopter suffered massive mechanical failure in flight. One of our sailors was killed, and several more seriously injured, when a bagain-basement rustbucket subamarine we bought from the UK caught fire as it was being sailed to Canada on it's first voyage! Our forces personnel are among the best-trained in the world, but the Liberals have ignored their needs for so long that they have become irrelevant to the rest of the world.
Our aerospace industry used to be world-class. Canadian manufacturing and training facilities were a major contributor to the Allied victory. After costs on the Avro Arrow fighter-interceptor were allowed to run out of control under the Liberals, a newly-elected Conservative government felt obliged to make political points by cancelling the project in favour of a US Bowmark missile-based defence system that never materialised. (Kind of like the anti-missile system being proposed these days). The resulting scattering of the engineering talent from that project decimated our industry while dispersing people to the US and the UK. More recently (1993), the Liberals cancelled a contract to buy EH-101 helicopters to replace the Sea Kings that have been in use since the 60's. The cancellation of various contracts cost over a billion dollars in penalties to foreign companies, and deepened the recession here by causing major cutbacks throughout the industry. A series of contracts to buy less-capable Sikorsky helicopters is still being negotiated, and won't see delivery of any machines for another 8 years at least.
On other fronts, our national symbols have been eroded in favour of Liberal Party Trudeau-speak. (Pierre Trudeau was our Prime Minister during most of the socialist erosion of our national sovereinty and identity). Our flag, the Red Ensign was replaced with a modified version of the Liberal Party logo. Our Dominion Day national holiday was renamed Canada Day. Can you picture the reaction in the US to a proposal to change Independance Day to America Day? Or picture the French allowing Bastille Day to be renamed France Day?
The Federal government has co-opted so many areas of Provincial jurisdiction, and raised taxes to fund their interference, that we now pay more than 50% of our earnings in various forms of tax. Meanwhile the economies of the provinces have been distorted to the point that most of them no longer function. In 1949, Newfoundland very narrowly voted to join the Dominion of Canada. At the time, they had a diversified economy, and were a net exporter. Now, they have almost no industry at all, except the ruined fishery (destroyed by Federal mismanagement) and some potentially lucrative off-shore oil fields that the Feds are looking to take over. The Liberals introduced the concept of Regional Equalisation Payments in order drain money from functioning economies to help subsidise the disastrous results of Federal mismanagement. Ontario's manufacturing sector, Alberta's oilpatch, and British Columbia's forestry industry are paying billions of dollars every year to the rest of the provinces, which have become dependant on these extorted handouts instead of creating viable economies. This year, it looks like the provincial Liberal government of British Columbia has screwed up their economy to the point that they will be looking for a handout instead of contributing to the pot.
Picture how badly the US would be crippled if most of the individual States were dependant for their survival on handouts from the Federal government. Thanks to your system of checks and balances, such a top-heavy concentration of power is unlikely. Here, our system is badly dysfunctional, but because the people who have thepower to make the necessary changes are also the ones who benefit from that dysfunction, change is unlikely to happen until the voters realise just how much we have lost by allowing too much government involvement in our lives.
After 4 decades of Liberal Party rule, Canadian identity involves jurisdictional squabbles among various levels of government. Our status in the world community is a joke. We are on Al Quaida's hit list, but they haven't got 'round to us yet. They don't need to hurry - our own government has rendered us incapable of defending ourselves.
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Lordathestrings
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