The Foreign Service Journal, September 2008

McCain, too, has pledged to end American dependence on foreign oil. At stake are U.S. plans to spend $53 billion to expand or modify refineries to handle the heavy oil from Alberta. Still, Thomas d’Aquino, president of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, says it is too easy to say a Republican president would be more understanding of Canadian issues and better for the country. He believes Obama would grasp the intricacies of the bilateral relation- ship, whether the issue is military cooperation under the North American Aerospace Defense Command or in Afghanistan, technological cooperation to combat global warming, or trade disputes. Besides, NAFTA has been kicked around on both sides of the border for years. Former Prime Minister Chretien once vowed to rip up the agreement if elected in 1993. He was, yet NAFTA survived intact. Ups and Downs The history of Canada-U.S. relations has had its infa- mous flare-ups and its periods of coziness. President Lyndon Johnson once lectured Prime Minister Lester Pearson, accusing him of “pissing on his rug’’ after the Canadian came to Philadelphia’s Temple University to deliver a speech against the Vietnam War. According to Canadian lore, LBJ demonstrated his irri- tation with Pearson by grabbing him by the lapels as he made his point. Johnson’s successor, Richard Nixon, thought Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau was a communist, according to archived tapes. It was following a 1969 meeting with Nixon that Trudeau offered the enduring metaphor of life in the U.S. shadow. “Living next to you is in some ways like sleeping with an elephant,’’ Trudeau said. “No matter how friendly and even-tempered is the beast, if I can call it that, one is affected by every twitch and grunt.” Prime Minister Jean Chretien angered Pres. Bush by not only refusing his entreaties to join the “coalition of the willing’’ in Iraq, but challenging the wisdom of the invasion thereafter. That was seen in Washington as a breach of an understanding that Canada would stay out of the war, but not speak ill of the American effort. On the other hand, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and President Ron- ald Reagan were so close that they sang “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling” at the so-called Shamrock Summit in Quebec City in 1985. Later Mulron- ey risked ridicule and a voter backlash at home to continue his close rela- tionship with President George H.W. Bush. There has been one common thread through all the theatrics over the years, however. On key issues of trade and security, the interests of both countries depend too heavily on smooth relations with each other to allow anything other than continuation of a cordial, productive relationship. From the Canadian perspective, the need to protect its sovereignty while acknowledging its need to work with the “elephant” will prevail whether McCain or Obama takes the Oval Office in January. n F O C U S S E P T E M B E R 2 0 0 8 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 23 John McCain’s views on trading relations and the value of the alliance make him a comfortable choice for Canadians.