If it makes Americans feel good, Canadians are willing to say they are grateful for being defended, but, in secret, many scratch their heads about for what it is they are supposed to be grateful. Canada does not have a serious enemy in the world. The only country in a good position to threaten Canada is, in fact, the United States, but that does make a convincing argument to keep right on saying thanks for all that defense, especially with Pat's crowd running the place.

The world, quite correctly, does not regard Canada as a partner in America's uglier plots and stunts, and Canada enjoys a significant margin of safety from terror simply by virtue of that fact.

America makes a lot of enemies pushing people around, claiming high ideals all the while. Nobody likes a bully, and most people are repelled by noisy hypocrisy. America maintains its bloated, costly, and increasingly dangerous armed forces precisely to do all that pushing and protect itself from the consequences.

Looked at in this way, calls by Americans like Buchanan - or for that matter America's current, intrusive Ambassador to Ottawa, Mr. Cellucci - for Canada to spend a great deal more on defense really amount to demands that Canada subsidize America's efforts to impose its often poorly informed and generally selfish notions on the world.

I once read an article written by a man who grew up with Buchanan. He described what an unpleasant street-tough Pat was, a bare-knuckles troublemaker who roamed his neighborhood territory, always ready for an argument and a fight - a regular backyard brown shirt.

That story might not be worth relating so many years later, had Pat demonstrated some capacity for growth, but he hasn't, not a bit. He's too old and puffy to use his fists now, so he's substituted his mouth. And if you listen carefully to what he says and the way he says it, you just might recognize the shrill and painful sounds of a badly abused child

[John Chuckman is former chief economist for a large Canadian oil company. He has many interests and is a lifelong student of history. He writes with a passionate desire for honesty, the rule of reason, and concern for human decency. He is a member of no political party and takes exception to what has been called America's "culture of complaint" with its habit of reducing every important issue to an unproductive argument between two simplistically defined groups. John regards it as a badge of honor to have left the United States as a poor young man from the South Side of Chicago when the country embarked on the pointless murder of something like three million Vietnamese in their own land because they happened to embrace the wrong economic loyalties. He lives in Canada, which he is fond of calling "the peaceable kingdom."]

John Chuckman encourages your comments: jchuckman@YellowTimes.org

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