Leave it to Quebec Premiere Francois Legault to pour gasoline on the smouldering embers of Justin's reconciliation initiative.
According to the Preem, there's AK-47s in Injun country, a fact that prevents the SQ, Quebec's biggest and baddest biker gang, from making short work of this latest bout of uppity hooliganism.
Not so fast, Mr. Legault! In the first place, I have a hunch that the SQ have way more in their toolkit than AK-47s.
Secondly, the concept of 'sovereignty' would suggest that it is the government of the Mohawk territory that has the right to decide what sort of weaponry is permissible there. Canada has no more jurisdiction over Kahnawake territory than it does over Michigan or New York State, which is to say none, at least insofar as we are to take Trudeau's ruminations on "nation to nation negotiations" seriously.
Finally, after four hundred years of our genocidal policies, our unilateral abrogation of treaties, our endless broken promises, maybe it's time to stop blaming the First Nations when they make these modest gestures to assert, however haltingly, the sovereignty that even our Prime Minister acknowledges is their due.
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