Rebranding Canada

Back in the late 50's my folks, DPs fairly recent off the boat, moved us to a sleepy town in south Ontario, where I bore the distinction of being the only kid in Grade one who couldn't speak English.

My mother tongue was German, and this was in the day when you still had ex-army dudes on mechanic's creepers sitting outside the Iroquois Hotel with their tin cups and no legs.

It was not always the best of times.

But I grew up with a certain sense of what this adopted country was all about.

My dear daddy told me many times that we ended up in Canada because it was a less militaristic society than some of the other options.

That was one thing that always stuck in my mind.

The fact that Canada, very early on, was a destination for escaped slaves instead of the place they were escaping was something that stuck with me too.

We seemed to be just a bit ahead of the curve on all sorts of compassionate causes.

We were peace-keepers, not war-mongers. We cared about the environment. We believed in free health care for everybody and we brought in gun control.

That was then.

This is now;

• Here's a story about Steven Harper praising  the new Australian PM on scuttling the carbon tax
• Here's a story about Canada weaseling loopholes into the international prohibition against cluster bombs
• Here's John Baird poo-poohing the Iran deal negotiated this weekend

There's a certain trend evident here. Where once upon a time Canada aligned herself with the progressive nations on the planet, we are now relegated to that rump of rogue states who are perpetually pro-war and anti-environment.

When did we vote for that?