Bitter Truths about Canada's Folly

 

Further Thoughts on the 51st State Thing

 

I have been looking through a picture book inherited from my uncle, on the Irish influence on the American culture.

Reading it, it becomes obvious to me that the American Irish culture is also my culture. I remember reading the “Bringing Up Father” Sunday strip at my grandparents’ house. Only now do I realize that I unconsciously identified Jiggs and Maggie with my grandfather and grandmother. And yes, corned beef and cabbage was a favourite meal growing up. Grandma would sing us to sleep to “Sidewalks of New York.” 

We never did think of ourselves as different. At least not we Irish. We were just Irish who happened to have settled north instead of south of the border. Was it because of some deep loyalty to Britain or the crown? Hardly. It was originally, surely, just from hardscrabble necessity. We all did what we could and made what we could of the chances we had in the places we landed. From our perspective, the border between us was arbitrary. We were one people. Cousin Fergus was doing very well in the States.

Given that Canada and the US have generally accepted immigrants from the same places, is this not probably true of all other ethnic groups? Do Canadian Jews consider themselves a different culture than American Jews? Canadian Italians than American Italians? 

I have a warm attachment to American culture. It is my culture, as it is the culture in which I grew up. Watching Roy Rogers and dreaming of being a cowboy. Reading the adventures of Tom Swift. Watching anything from Disney. Playing baseball into the dusk—did you know that the first baseball game was played in Ontario? We loved anything from England too, but it always came to us as something admired, but exotic. Admired, perhaps, largely for being exotic. We were Americans, and perhaps lower class because of it.

I cannot see a problem with Canada joining the US. Canadian independence has always felt a little forced, like adolescent rebellion. It might be like growing up.

The Annexation Tango

 

I am now seeing a growing chorus of Canadians on X pointing out the advantages of annexation to the States. 

Really. It only took a few days for Trump to create a groundswell of support for the idea. He has an uncanny knack for “reading the room”; in this case without even being in the room. What this really is, I think, is the essential talent of prophecy. As Blake said, the prophet does not really predict the future, but sees the present more clearly than others. Trump is uncommonly unburdened by the delusions that blind most of us.

The best argument to my mind is the rights guaranteed by the US Constitution. It is not enough to get rid of Trudeau. Trudeau has demonstrated that the protections supposedly written into our Canadian Constitution are not worth the sheepskin they are printed on.

It’s all about what deal could be negotiated. Kevin O’Leary is proposing a union like the EU, with a shared currency and shared passport. Trump has suggested Canada come in as one state.

My problem with O’Leary’s suggestion is that, for such a union to be palatable to the much larger US, it would really mean the US made the rules, and Canadians would have no vote, so long as we stayed independent.

My problem with Trump’s suggestion is that it would offer no venue for Quebec to preserve its linguistic and cultural distinctiveness. And Canada would be underrepresented in Congress in relation to its population, with only two senators.

Ten new states, each of the provinces joining as states, would cause the least disruption and be easiest constitutionally. However, this would give Canada more representation than its current population would warrant; the US might well object. A compromise: five new states, and three new territories: British Columbia, Canada West (Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba), Ontario, Quebec, and Atlantic Canada (New Brunswick, PEI, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador). This would give Canada Senate representation matching its population, recognize regional differences, and preserve the name “Canada” in at least two new states. 

The main objection, Stateside, will no doubt be that Canadian voters tilt left, so they will skew American politics. But perhaps not; having experienced a hard left government in Trudeau, Canadians may be reliably right wing from now on. Just as Cuban refugees or Vietnamese are in the States, or the Poles and Hungarians are in the EU.