The difference with US-Canada relations is this: You are our largest trading 'partner'. The NAFTA agreement was a sellout by the then Conservative government (Canadian Conservatives are somewhat like American Republicans). When we declined to go fight along side troops in the present Iraq war, our economy was damaged. By the US. It was punitive.

It made no nevermind to Bush and the crew that we had troops in Afghanistan, that we took losses as well. (Hell, loyalty. One American general did a book on the Gulf War. He listed the countries that were part of the coalition forces. Didn't mention Canada.) What mattered was that we weren't dancing to his tune. It has damaged the relationship between the countries, and I think it will be a difficult 'rent in the fabric of our friendship' to repair.

I understand that trade is trade. This time, a sovereign country's refusal to participate in a non-UN sanctioned war resulted in some serious slaps on the old economic peepee. Don't think your neighbours to the north are not aware of what happened and why. One friggin' cow that likely came from the US to begin with caused a massive retaliation to the Canadian beef industry. You don't really think that was about meat, do you? No sir. We have been friendly in the past, and we have usually had very good relations with the US. Those days is gone from my perspective. It may be something fundamental to the Canadian character: we don't like being told what to do! Hell, we don't even like it when OUR government tries to tell us what to do. And when they do, half of us don't listen, anyway (and the other half's too cold to hear).


I don't think the the USA is the evil empire, Strick. I do think it has some evil people hijacking its government. Wish it wasn't so.