Prime Minister Carney’s speech at Davos yesterday should have made every Canadian proud and thankful. Finally, a firm and intelligent response to threats and bullying, instead of the cringing and toadying by the leaders of so many other countries and institutions. Just imagine what Pierre Poilievre would have said if he’d been at the podium.
We should take Mark Carney’s speech as inspiration to stand up against the bullies, regardless of their apparent power, and stand in solidarity with the resisters, whether in Greenland or Minnesota. It is up to each of us to stand behind what our Prime Minister has said and pull together to resist, however we are able, if we are to have any chance of surviving as an independent country.
We are confronted with an existential crisis such as we have not seen in our lifetimes. Take a look at the map. If annexing Greenland is allegedly essential to US security, then so is taking over our territorial North. Nunavut, the NWT, and the Yukon close the ring between Greenland and Alaska. And then the Americans foment trouble in Alberta and they have the final spoke in the ring and Canada is dismembered. Don’t think for a moment they aren’t working on that, or that some of our fellow citizens are colluding with them whether out of ignorance, frustration, or malevolence. So wake up, folks, this is our May 1940 moment. We owe our fellow citizens north of 60 more than handwringing and lamentation.
No surprise that the usual crowd of smart-asses and anger merchants on the fringe right had nothing positive to say about our Prime Minister’s speech. Nor any surprise that the usual cast of think tank and media commentators counselled caution and toadying for fear of aggravating the beast, mainly with respect to tariffs as though they were the worst of our problems.
I was however distressed by the response of many on the left, at least judging by what appeared on my Facebook account this morning. Some dismiss Carney’s speech as mere hypocrisy; neo-liberal words on behalf of Wall Street and the “deep state”, whose crimes no matter how distant must be addressed before we Canadians can be permitted to do anything on our own behalf. Then there is the “so-called Canada” crowd, the sack-cloth and ashes people who tell us that Canadians have been collectively guilty of such morally heinous crimes for so long that we have nothing to be proud of, nothing worth standing up and fighting for, and so we should likewise do nothing in our own defence until these are fully and finally rectified. Further, from the Marxists and post-modernists, that we can only rely for our salvation on the revolutionary fervour of the oppressed and dispossessed wherever they might be (and in whose ranks none of those whose words I am reading actually fall, so far as I am aware). And finally that any of our potential allies in Europe or elsewhere are so tainted by the same criminal history that they too should be condemned to whatever fate might befall them.
If I am lampooning any of my readers it is out of exasperation rather than anger. If I have misunderstood or misinterpreted anyone’s words, I am open to correction. But only by means of reasoned argument, not by mere likes or dislikes. Dialogue must continue, even if difficult.
Yesterday we got the wake-up call we desperately needed. We have choices to make and to act on. If you are among those whose sentiments I noted above, would you have been marching in the streets of London in May 1940 to protest confronting Nazi Germany because really Britain was no different, or somebody might get hurt? Our country is far from perfect, and we have much to fix. But will you say that everything must be fully repented and finally fixed before we have any right to stand up for ourselves as a nation? Tell me where else you would rather live, and who you would rather look to for mutual support.
By all means continue to read the likes of Chris Hedges and Noam Chomsky, but also be mindful that critical commentary on its own will not secure the future for ourselves or our children. Unaccompanied by considered strategy and action, and the difficult choices involved, such commentary leads us only down rabbit-holes of despair.
We Canadians are going to have to work together and make alliances and find common ground with as many of our fellow citizens as we can manage, from all parts of our country. That includes folks who see the world quite differently, and with whom we might not agree on every issue or even many. If we claim to value diversity, then that has to apply to opinion and perspective as well as to identity. If moral purity prevents us finding common ground, if all we can do is call out moral failings and wring our hands, we are done.
We are facing difficult and challenging times beyond our previous imaginings. There is suffering and sacrifice to come, likely beyond mere inconvenience and discomfort. There will be hard choices to make, but if we fail to stand up when we have the chance, our children and grandchildren will not forgive us, nor should they. Our Prime Minister’s words are only as good as we choose to make them. So let’s get on with it in a collective spirit.