"Both main English parties are strong believers in shadowing and supporting American foreign policy."

That is also true, to a considerable extent, of Canada's government...although it is far less to the right politically speaking than the USA. At present, over 75% of Canadians would vote for Obama, not McCain...and we are in Afghanistan despite the fact that the majority of our public would prefer that we were not.

The reason for that is simple. Our government doesn't really serve the Canadian people, it serves its corporate financial backers, and they are the same people whom the British and American governments serve.

Elections are held to give people the impression that their opinion still matters. It doesn't matter much. The party machines don't serve the public either, you see, but they blow off a great deal of hot air trying to act as if they do, (and I'm sure that most of their party members at the lower levels innocently believe that stuff too). They will promise you anything when they want your vote. ;-) Once elected, they'll do something else entirely, because they don't work for you. They'll do what they had planned to do anyway, but what they didn't bother mentioning to you when they were courting your votes...and you won't be able to stop them, because once they're in...they're in till the next election. So you'll finally get disgusted and vote them out, and then the other corporate servant party will do the very same thing to you...in a slightly different manner, perhaps, but essentially the same thing.

And once again you'll get blindsided. That's what happened to people in the UK when they elected Tony Blair's government.