I am glad that most Canadians are not obnoxious blowhards like the one who wrote this letter to the Seattle Times:
It wasn't that long ago when a single cow in Alberta was discovered to have mad-cow disease. The United States immediately closed its borders to all Canadian products that contained beef, beef by-products, milk and cheese. We were told that these actions had to be taken for health reasons and health reasons alone.
I'm sure the United States cares for the health and welfare of all citizens of the world and not just its own populace. So I trust that the United States will immediately ban all exports of American beef, beef by-products, milk and cheese for at least as long as it banned Canadian products, or until it can assure the world that it is not exporting poisoned products to unsuspecting buyers.
I'm sure that Canada will have to ban American imports anyway to assure the purity of the Canadian product.
How does it feel now that the shoe is on the other hoof?
Well, since I don't recall Canada banning the export of their beef, as this jerk advocates the US doing, I don't think it's a case of "the shoe being on the other hoof". I support Canada's right to block beef and dairy imports from the US, just as I supported the US ban on importing Canadian beef (just the beef, we didn't stop the sale of dairy products, as the letter writer asserts). His supercilious turn of phrase about our "care for the health and welfare" of the rest of the world would be justified if we had advocated a worldwide ban of Canadian products, but in this instance it is just a snotty sneer from a disaffected anti-American twit. In fact, it's worse, since the cow originated FROM CANADA (fourth paragraph). If he wants to go on a crusade, I would suggest he look to Canada first, rather than mindlessly bash the United States.
We have had a ban on importing live animals from Canada since their BSE outbreak in May, but this animal was imported before the ban was implemented. A plan to reopen the American market to Canadian livestock may well be shelved. To true believers such as our corrospondent above, however, such facts are just more proof that the US is trying to impose its evil hegemony upon the rest of the world.
posted on December 29, 2003 08:42 AM
