Canada Will Never Be the 51st State

Murray Dobbin has an interesting and alarming article in the Tyee about the latest stealth attempts at what's often called "deep integration" with the United States.

If the machinations going on in this country regarding so-called "deep integration" were instead a communist conspiracy to take over the country (you will, of course, have to try hard to imagine this) the news media would be blaring the story.

Pundits would pontificate, editorialists would erupt, security forces would be unleashed.

Instead, a virtual conspiracy to make the country disappear through assimilation into the U.S. gets barely a mention.

But news of the scheme -- formally called the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPP) -- is finally breaking out of the secret chambers of the ruling elite and the federal government. This is both good news and bad. It's good that ordinary citizens are finally getting a glimpse of the betrayal of their country. The news is bad because it reflects just how much of this scheme is already being implemented.

Dobbin goes into the grim details, but I'd like to focus on one idea that comes up in the comments more than in the article itself (though the article itself uses some of its phraseology). It's one of the most abiding Canadian myths, a phrase that trips off of the Canadian tongue far too easily: that one day, Canada may be slurped up in a political union with the USA, only to become --and here's the magic phrase -- "the 51st state."

Not gonna happen, not ever.

A political takeover, as suggested by the "51st state" canard, would give Canadians a fair amount of control over who goes to Washington. A State of Canada, with a population equal to that of California, would have big-time representation in both Congress and the Electoral College, resulting in a profound and lasting change to American politics. Also, the high percentage of Canadians who speak a language other than English would lead to a lasting change in American culture. All those French speakers, and all those recent immigrants, many of them from Middle Eastern countries, would seriously change the cultural landscape of the USA. Not to mention the First Nations who have treaties with Canada but not with the USA; all of those treaties would be a serious complication for the American government.

Think the ruling classes in the USA would ever let any of that happen? Forget it. The price would be far too high. Besides, most Americans see statehood as a privilege -- and it's one that they just don't hand out anymore. Hell, Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia (America's freaking capital!) have been trying to get statehood for decades. That's never going to happen either. Think Canadians could just jump the queue ahead of all those American citizens who don't have statehood? Nuh-uh.

Now, I realize that many thoughtful Canadians no longer take the "51st state" canard literally (although many, unfortunately, still do). Instead, the term "51st state" is often used metaphorically, to describe what may happen as the USA takes over more and more of Canadian policy. But even using it metaphorically is a bad idea, because it's misleading. It suggests, for all the reasons I've mentioned, a greater amount of Canadian influence than is actually being contemplated right now. It vastly undersells the danger.

See, if you look at what's happening with the SPP, it's far more insidious than any political union. The American elites have figured out that they have no need to try to take over Canada in a political union, because Canadian elites are willing just to sell the place to them, bit by bit, with no political accountability whatsoever.

For example, here are a few details, again taken from Dobbin's article:

Pesticides 'harmonized.' The most thoroughly reported story (though even this did not go much beyond the CanWest chain) was the revelation that Canada was about to "harmonize" its regulations, setting limits for pesticide residue on fruits and vegetables. In 40 per cent of the cases, the U.S. allows for higher levels. Richard Aucoin, chief registrar of the Pest Management Regulatory Agency, which sets Canada's pesticide levels, said that Canada's higher levels were a "trade irritant"....

Council of corporate power. The SPP initiative began in earnest back in 2002 with the Canadian Council of Chief Executives (formerly the BCNI), the most powerful corporate body in the country. It continues it leadership role, but does not promote the scheme just in its own name. It instead has helped create several supportive bodies that now help drive the agenda. Included in these are the North American Competitive Council (NACC), which includes CEOs of the largest North American corporations, and which institutionalizes the exclusively corporate nature of the agreement. The NACC is the only advisory group to the three NAFTA/SPP governments....

Water and oil giveaways. The deep integrationists clearly see Canadian water as a North American resource, not a Canadian resource. At yet another very private meeting, held in Calgary on April 27th under the auspices of yet another forum, it was made clear that water is on the table for negotiation.

And so on. This is basically a corporate empire, not a political one in the usual sense, and as such it is accountable to no one. Indeed, the whole idea is to undercut democratic accountability, and replace it with corporate rule on a continent-wide scale. No provincial, state, or national government is ultimately in charge here, because policy will essentially be dictated by corporations alone, shielded from the actual forces of the marketplace by regulations they like, and the governments will simply enact those policies and regulations despite what the citizens want or need.

What's in store, if this plan continues, is effectively the reduction of Canada -- and the rest of North America too -- to the status of a new form of colony, in service not to any political crown but to corporations. And it's thereby the reduction of Canadians -- and everyone else but a few -- from citizens to subjects.

It's important to name these transitions accurately -- from country to colony, from citizen to subject -- because those who are in charge of this plan are more subtle than the old political imperialists were. They won't ever name these transitions themselves; instead, they will pretend that none of it is happening. It's just, they will say, making the business environment better, which will help everyone. Unlike the old political imperialists, the new economic overlords will not flaunt their overlord status. They know how to market themselves, and they know better than to be overtly alarming in their proclamations. Since they won't name what's really happening, the rest of us have to, and we must be both as blunt and as accurate as possible about it. We're already much too far down this road, and it's partly because we haven't clearly named it for what it is.

So, no more of this "51st state" stuff, please. What's being contemplated is nothing so congenial as that.