Conservative Donnybrook

While I’m on the subject of Canada, ABC News published this story about Corey Glass, who deserted his unit in 2006 after complaining of stress and receiving a leave stateside from the Iraqi theater. He dodged the Army for eight months and then crossed the border into Canada. It turns out, the Canadian government has elected to deport Mr. Glass after requesting status as a refugee from the United States. Ironically, the Army doesn’t care; he received a general discharge under honorable conditions in December 2006.

Astoundingly (and outrageously), even though the discharge is a less than an honorable discharge, Mr. Glass remains eligible for many veteran benefits. Even though, he left his unit while his brothers-in-arms were engaged in combat operations, the taxpayers of this country may be saddled with paying his education through the G.I. Bill.

According to Army spokesman, Lt. Col. Anne Edgecomb, “”Most deserters are discharged administratively and not court-martialed. If someone deserts and that’s their only offense, we’re not going to send someone out to find you.” In 2006 alone, there were 3,301 deserters from the Army – soldiers that may still receive benefits.

On the bright side, even though “Canadians overwhelmingly support giving American deserters refugee status,” and the Canadian Parliament voted to grant refugee status to American skulkers, Prime Minister Harper has, to his credit, “overlook[ed] the resolution.”

Two stories caught my eye today.

In the first, it appears that Canadians have been taken in by Obama’s squishy message of hope you can believe in, whatever that means. Apparently, Canadians believe in it even though Obama’s trade policy would play havoc with the Canadian economy. Meanwhile, the Mexicans, showing a level of intelligence orders of magnitude higher than the Canucks are skeptical of Obama’s risky trade schemes. Of course, it may well be that Canadians, like American workers, are losing jobs to Mexico and they view a little protectionism as a good thing.

Of course, Canadians (and Brazilians) might be forgiven for being sucked in considering that Obama’s official trade stance consists of a load of double-speak. On the one hand, there’s this:

Fight for Fair Trade: Obama will fight for a trade policy that opens up foreign markets to support good American jobs. He will use trade agreements to spread good labor and environmental standards around the world and stand firm against agreements like the Central American Free Trade Agreement that fail to live up to those important benchmarks. Obama will also pressure the World Trade Organization to enforce trade agreements and stop countries from continuing unfair government subsidies to foreign exporters and nontariff barriers on U.S. exports.

(emphasis added). I read this to mean that Big Government, Leftist, anti-freedom regulation is coming to a country like yours, Mr. and Mrs. McKenzie through the use of multinational, unelected organizations.

On the other hand, there’s this:

Amend the North American Free Trade Agreement: Obama believes that NAFTA and its potential were oversold to the American people. Obama will work with the leaders of Canada and Mexico to fix NAFTA so that it works for American workers.

On this, the Mexicans are right. Mr. and Mrs. McKenzie, you’re about to be screwed as tariffs and duties are placed on the goods that flow from your country into the United States.

Although it appears that Obama opposes NAFTA from the statements above, his next statement belies that notion:

Improve Transition Assistance: To help all workers adapt to a rapidly changing economy, Obama would update the existing system of Trade Adjustment Assistance by extending it to service industries, creating flexible education accounts to help workers retrain, and providing retraining assistance for workers in sectors of the economy vulnerable to dislocation before they lose their jobs.

As I read this, it looks like a government give-away to people who are retooling to be trained in service jobs (read: “would you like fries with that?”). Of course, what retraining is required to take a job flipping hamburgers or greeting customers to Wal-Mart?

In stark contrast, John McCain is unequivocally in favor of free trade, scoring a 100% mark from the CATO Institute on the issue.

The Colombian military continued their string of stunning defeats of the FARC terrorist with the freeing of several hostages, including three Americans and French-Colombian Ingrid Bentancourt today.  This year alone top FARC leaders have been killed, over a thousand former terrorists have surrendered and secret documents have been seized.  FARC is dying out.

All of this comes as a direct result of the United States’ intervention in the South American nation.  Far from direct U.S. combat roles, American soldiers have trained, equipped and funded the Colombian military for years and results are finally beginning to show.  The impact has been so large that former FARC terrorist  Diego Canizares commented “If it keeps up like this, in two years the guerrillas will disappear completely.”  The series of victories could not have happened without U.S. intervention.  Terrorist attacks are down, funding for FARC is at an all time low and defeat seems imminent. 

President Alvaro Uribe has made the destruction of FARC a top priority.  So far he has achieved more than any of his predecessors over the past 44 years.  A fine job he has done.

This is just another example of the positive role the United States can play in our hemisphere.  I have said it before and I will say it again: the United States ought to spend more time and resources with our neighbors.  The United States of America is great, imagine what a free and democratic American hemisphere could be.  The time has come for an economic as well as military Monroe doctrine to take hold.

A recent advertising circular which was sent to Scottish homes has Muslim knickers in a bunch. Of course, that is nothing new – Muslims appear to be the most easily offended group of people on the planet, rioting over cartoons, for instance. Just wait until Rebel, the recruit-in-training, pokes his nose under some woman’s burka because she’s laden with high explosives – it will be accounted a religious hate crime and the fur will really fly then. If there were ever a reason to take a hard look at immigration policies in the United States, this might give one pause about whom we allow into this country.