The Canada-US Project : Deep integration redux

But first : a quiz !
Can you spot the main difference between the two pictures below?
Take your time ... don't rush it ...







[The answer is in comments.]
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In the top picture, Harper is holding the latest Canadian foray into deep integration : From Correct to Inspired : A Blueprint for Canada-US Engagement from the Canada-US Project.

Appearing with him are Canada-US Project luminaries (L to R) Colin Robertson, on loan from the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade to Carleton University to direct the project; Fen Osler Hampson, Canada-US Project co-chair and director of the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs at Carleton University; and Derek Burney, former Canadian ambassador to the US and co-chair of the Canada-US Project at Carleton.


Contributors to the "blueprint" include Thomas D'Aquino of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives; Perrin Beatty of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce; three former American ambassadors to Canada : David Wilkins, James Blanchard, and Gordon Giffin; and serial Canada-basher Michael "Canada blew it!" Hart.

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"Blueprint" authors Fen Hampson and Michael "Canada blew it!" Hart appeared before the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development on Feb 23 to complain that the Canada - US relationship has :

"an awful lot of informal, below-the-radar relationships," Mr. Hart said.
"I mean hundreds of relationships among officials and so on, but none of that is provided with a kind of from-the-top political guidance as to what the objectives are."

The two professors went on to say Canada must redefine its relationship with the U.S. in a way that will strengthen security but also enhance trade. Ideally, they recommended broadening, among other things, NORAD to create a secure land, sea and air perimeter around North America, while dropping the national border to create a Schengen-type arrangement.

The Schengen Area is a group of twenty-five European countries which have abolished all border controls between each other.

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Two days later Thomas d'Aquino of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives told the Commons' Foreign Affairs committee on Feb. 25 that the North American Security and Prosperity Partnership "is probably dead." However something else will inevitably replace it, he said.
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The Canada-US Project is certainly making a good run at it.
Here's some random quotes from their above-mentioned "Blueprint for Canada-US Engagement" :

• The two governments should re-examine the benefits of a perimeter approach to the border.
• The two governments should also take a blowtorch to regulatory differentiation and overlap that serve no useful purpose other than to preserve some government jobs and to perpetuate a preference for differentiation for its own sake.

• On Afghanistan :
  Canada certainly has earned the right in blood and treasure to influence stronger US leadership and to spur a more substantive, more cohesive international effort.
• Domestically, the enthusiasm that greeted the election of Obama will fade in the face of the persistent unease of Canadians about getting too close to Canada’s giant neighbour.
• Crisis, a convergence of national interests, and the need for economic recovery should help to bring us together. Canadians are ready ... They accept that the border has become dysfunctional and that minor regulatory differences make little sense.
• Obstacles to achieving this agenda are chronic indifference in Washington and wariness or narcissism in Canada.

• Redefining the way the two governments manage the interoperability of Canadian and US forces is an important next step. Putting NORAD on a permanent footing was a start, but there is a need for appropriate institutions for land and maritime forces as well.
• Canada’s role in Afghanistan is proving critical to re-establishing its credentials as a credible security partner. The government will need to be prepared to offer help in other trouble spots.
• As Obama takes office, he will pursue a faster drawdown in Iraq with compensatory emphasis on Afghanistan. This may put pressure on the prime minister’s vow to take Canadian combat troops out of Afghanistan by 2011. Cutting Canada’s losses on a costly and unpopular mission may prove popular at home but will at the same time reduce Canadian influence and visibility with a new administration.

• The most pressing bilateral issue is the need to re-think the architecture for managing North America’s common economic space.
• Re-imagining the border. ... the border has become an instrument to address yesterday’s problems. It may be time to resurrect the “perimeter” concept and find a better balance between security and economics. Integrating national regulatory regimes into one that applies on both sides of the border. But to make this work, the two governments must also develop joint rules and procedures to coordinate regulatory policy on an ongoing basis.

• Building an enhanced capacity for joint rule making.
  The two governments may need to establish a few institutions that are capable of providing political leadership as well as political oversight.
  Part of the solution may lie in making better use of the “hidden wiring” in the relationship. Over many years, relations have grown and deepened at many levels – from the state-provincial and business-to-business to nongovernmental, and legislative levels.
• [I]t is not in Canada’s best interests to restrict energy exports to the United States at this time – a situation that will remain unchanged for quite a number of years.

• The third major challenge is to bring the rules governing the cross-border movement of goods and services into line with the reality of deep integration. Border security has become economic protectionism in a new guise.
• Additionally, it is critical that the two governments find a joint approach to border management in the event of a major terrorist attack in either the United States or Canada. There is no agreed contingency plan to deal with such a crisis.

• Finally, the smooth operation of the integrated Canada-US economy requires that the two countries come to grips with what some have called the narcissism of small differences in the regulatory structures of the two countries.
  Health Canada spends an enormous amount of time and money testing drugs that have already been tested and approved by the US Food and Drug Administration.
• North American economic integration has grown and an enhanced Canada-US trading relationship needs to reflect that reality. Canada can speed the process of convergence by making a concerted effort to align a wide range of regulatory requirements with those in place in the United States.
• [O]nly Canada’s inveterate anti-Americans can take satisfaction in seeing their neighbours in such trouble. The over-hyped talk among the pundits about the death of the American market economy model is nonsense.

Apparently their polls that show that "95% of Canadians desire the federal government to have a closer relationship with the US", hindered only by "the chattering classes" - a rather odd reference given that co-author Derek Burney is Chairman of the Board of Canwest Global Communications Corp. - but doesn't all this sound like a blueprint for SPP on steroids to you?

OK, on to the exciting quiz answer....
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"Here's how we fix Canada's political mess"

is an article by Preston Manning in today's G&M, in which he advises dissolving the coalition and preparing for "the next election" to "give Canada the broadly supported majority government it needs in times like these."

But first, let's review some quotes from a book Preston wrote with Mike Harris last year, published by the Fraser Institute and "guided" by the Montreal Economic Institute, with help from Michael Hart, member of the Task Force on the Future of North America. You can read the whole thing yourself online :

International Leadership by a Canada Strong and Free :

~ Deepening integration with the US economy must be on the agenda as the best way for Canadians to increase our trade, prosperity, and leadership potential.

~For Canada, Mexico’s presence at the NAFTA table is no reason to avoid action on our urgent national interest in pursuing a formal structure to manage irreversible economic and security integration with the United States.

~The 2005 Security and Prosperity Initiative adopted by Prime Minister Martin and President Bush and confirmed by the Harper government a year later laid a promising foundation. Both governments now receive regular status reports on its implementation. The earlier Smart Border Accord gave security and access to the United States a higher priority than before September 11. Both, however, operate within existing laws and policies and are therefore limited in scope. Extracting the full benefit of deeper integration requires a more ambitious initiative.

~ The federal government should revisit the decision not to participate in the Ballistic Missile Defence program

~The central importance of good US-Canada relations to Canada’s interests across virtually every domestic and international issue requires that the federal government make that relationship its highest international priority.

~ In order to facilitate the integrated coordination of their two economies, the two governments need to create a customs union involving a common external tariff, a joint approach to the treatment of third-country goods, a fully integrated energy market, a common approach to trade remedies, and an integrated government procurement regime.

~Government has no place in the decision-making of Canadian consumers, importers, or exporters.

~If Canadians wish to contribute to global peace and security they can only do so effectively as partners with the United States.

~There is much to be said for Canada and the United States developing a North American energy security accord that looks at the best way to develop and distribute the continent’s resources to the benefit of people on both sides of the border.

Thanks, Presto, for coming out for Steve like this. I'm sure he appreciates your continued support in today's G&M.

"International Leadership by a Canada Strong and Free"
Available at Chapters.Indigo.ca for just $19.95!

SPP : Now with 100% more North America!

With the April 21 SPP leaders' summit looming on the still devastated New Orleans horizon, suddenly all the usual deep integration players are "North Americans" looking for the next new and improved incarnation of the SPP.

Why? Well because we ruined the last one.

Barbara Yaffe, Vancouver Sun :

"Canada-U.S. efforts to resolve post-9/11 border problems plaguing North America's economy have fallen victim to conspiracy theories.
The Security and Prosperity Partnership, launched in 2005, is so misunderstood by the public and so discredited by opposition groups it should be relaunched and rebranded.
That's the view of Simon Fraser University political scientist Alexander Moens who has just completed a study of the SPP for the Fraser Institute. Moens asserts "the time has come to rebrand the talks and give them a clear mandate."

In a not very remarkable coincidence, this is also the view of the US right wing think tank Hudson Institute in their study, "Negotiating North America : The SPP" : who note that due to "xenophobes who fear fictitious superhighways" ... "it may ultimately be necessary to re-design and re-launch a new process to take up the work of the SPP under a new acronym."

Happily Moens has come up with one already :

"He's calling for the SPP to be replaced by NASRA, which stands for a North American Standards and Regulations Area. It "would include further economic integration beyond free trade but not political integration."

North American Standards and Regulation Area?

Good god man but that's a lame-ass name.

Would it have killed you to call it the N.A. Standards and Regulation Anschluss?

Moens attended the Network on North American Studies in Canada conference in Vancouver in March, where he chaired a presentation from a book project entitled The North American Experiment.

NNASC, according to their website, is "a new initiative between Canada and the U.S., in partnership with leading universities, government agencies, think tanks and civil society. It is a unique private sector-public sector partnership"

Another presentation at the same conference was "Managing Shared Resources Across North American Borders" chaired by Rick Van Schoik of Arizona State University who is also a director of The North American Center for Transborder Studies. In a recent essay "North America's Forgotten Agenda : Getting Development Back on Track", he lists among his key recommendations : "Implement a North American security perimeter".

Van Shoik will head ASU's participation in the Dept of Homeland Security's new $15M "Center of Excellence for Border Security and Immigration" :

"The establishment of the center by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security follows more than two years of work assembling a team of U.S. universities, Mexican and Canadian institutions government agencies, technology companies and national laboratories."

Did I mention this Vancouver conference was funded in part by Dept of Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada and that they also participated in Van Shoik's session?

On March 29 NNASC held a panel discussion "Bridging the North American Divide From Economic Integration to Community" in San Francisco, featuring Dan Schwanen from the Center for International Global Innovation. In his essay "North American Integration Post Bush", Schwanen admires the success of the Dec 2001 Smart Borders initiative and proposes a similar "Smart North American Economy" within a "North America that badly needs rethinking".

See what I mean? It's all North America all the time in the tanks.

And finally in Tuesday's Financial Post ,ubiquitous professional Canada slaggers Michael Hart and Bill Dymond from Carleton University quote from their C.D. Howe Institute paper in which they advise dropping the SPP in favour of a whole new agreement :

"What Canada needs is a trade policy that recognizes the increasing importance of global value chains and the critical role of Canada-U.S. integration in gaining full benefit from their exploitation...

The only cost that would arise is political : in Canadians' exaggerated preoccupation with ephemeral concepts of sovereignty and nationhood."

Fuck you, Michael "Canada blew it!" Hart, NAFTA and FTA negotiator, former official at the Dept of Foreign Affairs and Int. Trade, and sometime deep integration teacher at the North American University.
Too bad we had you defending our 'exaggerated preoccupation with ephemeral concepts like sovereignty and nationhood' when you were our voice at NAFTA.

But no worries, as Barbara Yaffe reassures us :

"Conspiracy theorists should recognize that the governments directing the SPP are separate entities, with politicians looking out for their own respective national interest.
No Canadian government interested in reelection is going to sell out to U.S. interests on border policy."

UPDATE : POGGE nails it!

Polls vs pols, deep integration edition

An update on yesterday's Globe&Mail poll :

80% of 11,590 G&M respondants - at one vote only per IP - are not too keen on the whole deep integration "mutually beneficial public policy agenda" thing. Yeah, us! The poll was still open for voting , last time I looked.

And in a fortuitous coincidence, right across from the poll and linked on the same G&M page is an opinion piece from ubiquitous deep integration media darling Michael Hart and William Dymond, who proudly inform us they are "former officials involved in the negotiation first of the Canada-U.S. free-trade Agreement (FTA) and then of NAFTA".

You'll recall Michael Hart of Carleton U., a former official at Foreign Affairs and Int. Trade and sometime deep integration teacher at the North American University, from his February piece in the Natty Post : Canada blew it! :

"The crisis of Sept. 11, 2001, provided a perfect opportunity to seize the moment to re-imagine the border, but Canada blew it."

in which he bewailed the loss of this unique opportunity to implement "the structural and institutional changes of deep integration" because of "nationalist phobias". Silly us.

Perhaps you also recall his statement to the Int. Trade Committee on SPP in May last year :

"We have made a political choice that we wanted a more deeply integrated North American economy," Hart said. "That means a willingness on our part to, for example, strengthen the perimeter around North America in order to deal with security issues that are uppermost in American minds."

In their new G&M piece, "The sabre-rattling on NAFTA is worrying, but take it as an opportunity", Hart and Dymond warn that "If our neighbours elect a Democratic president, Senate and House on Nov. 4, things could get ugly", but then take some comfort that unlike Paul Martin, whose relationship with the US was marked by "petulance and prickly self-righteousness", at least "the Harper government brought maturity and perspective".

Well ok then.

They then pose a number of questions to us, most notable for the facility with which they replace the word "Canada" with their preferred term, "North America" :

"What can we do together to promote our common interests in the security of the Arctic, the sustainable exploitation of Arctic energy supplies, and environmentally responsible navigation through Arctic waters?"

"What kind of legislative and other programs can we pursue in order to ensure long-term North American energy security?"

"What kind of institutional capacity do we need to have in place to facilitate and promote the governance of North American economic and security concerns and to ensure appropriate co-operation at the state/provincial and legislative levels?"

Gosh, Mike, Bill, I'm guessing your answer to the questions is whatever you quislings decide to call the next incarnation of the SPP, but our answer is right up there at the top in those G&M poll results.