U.S. president Gerald Ford told Congress in 1974: “A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take from you everything you have.” That goes for rights too.
Canada Shows Why It’s Called ‘American Exceptionalism’
It’s shocking to me that some people are surprised by how the situation with the Freedom Convoy went down. It was never going to end well, the odds of them winning were as long as a summer day for a very simple reason: Canada is not the United States.
That may seem obvious, and in the easiest way, it is. But in the way that matters most, it’s probably not that clear.
We have a tendency to think things that simply are not true, like the Iraqi people yearned to be free and democratic when in reality they simply wanted Saddam dead so they could return to settling ancient tribal scores. They had no idea what “freedom” meant, and the concept of individual liberty never occurred to them. It went over like introducing Sharia Law to San Francisco would.
One thing to notice about the coverage of the Canadian Freedom Convoy is how the American media, particularly from conservative outlets, didn’t reflect the will of Canadians. You’d think Justin Trudeau going full totalitarian, turning into a little Fidel Castro (like father, like son – look it up), would bring about a collapse in his popularity, but it hasn’t. Most Canadians were upset he didn’t act sooner.
Canada is not like the United States. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms grants Canadians various rights that, if you don’t think about it, are similar in a lot of ways to the rights we enjoy here. But there’s a major difference.
Our Constitution grants exactly zero rights to anyone, it acknowledges the rights with which we were born and denies the federal government the ability to infringe upon them. The Canadian Charter gives citizens certain rights, explicitly. If a government can grant rights, there is no justification for them not being able to take them away, temporarily or permanently.
When Trudeau invoked emergency powers, US conservatives recoiled in horror. Canadians did not.
I grew up in Detroit, just across the river from Windsor, Ontario. We had channel 9, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and were able to watch local and national news, as well as the Olympics, through the eyes of Canadians. They are very nationalistic, loyal to the country. The concept of individual liberty we take for granted is as “Canadian” as it is native to Democrats here. They simply aren’t interested.
It’s easy to look at Canada, the UK, Australia, New Zealand, etc., and think they’re just like us because we have so much in common. We speak the same language, enjoy many of the same movies and much of the same music – who doesn’t like Hugh Jackman?
But there’s significantly more we do not share than we do. First and foremost, among them is our commitment to individual liberty.
Yes, some people share those values in those countries, but their culture is completely different. The Canadian truckers, as righteous as their cause was, were never going to win because the politicians they were opposing had the loyalty of the public because the public was used to obeying in the first place.
We don’t obey in this country. At least, we don’t all obey in this country. And we have our Constitution to back us up. The Constitution can’t be “set aside” like the Charter in Canada, unless, of course, Democrats had enough justices on the Supreme Court (thank God they do not).
Watching police roll over actual peaceful protesters, arresting as many as they can get their hands on for the crime of upsetting the state would lead to more people taking to the streets in this country, whereas in those countries listed above it led to nothing.
It’s not just Canada, Australia has seen violent police actions against people protesting lockdowns peacefully. Black Lives Matter/ANTIFA deliberately inflicted billions in economic and property damage around the US and the world while beating holy hell out of those who objected, killing dozens and trying to murder hundreds more, all of which is on videotape, and the leaders of these countries joined them for photo-ops. There were no crackdowns against literal violence, just as Hitler never criticized the Brownshirts, while they were useful. Eventually, movements like BLM/ANTIFA outlive their usefulness, but they haven’t yet for the left.
But the fight for individual freedom has no place on the left; it will never be useful, so it must be destroyed. Hearing US pundits try to lecture or appeal to Canadian authorities is kind of funny. They don’t care. You’re American. Are you going to do something differently because some mouthy jackass from Edmonton is displeased with you? No, you aren’t. Why would the reverse be looked at differently?
They know this, of course, it’s all for show; it’s to look tough and principled to a domestic audience. Canada was going to do, and will always do what they want. It’s fine, it’s their country. It’s what they vote for and tolerate. If Trudeau were really unpopular, Parliament would hold a vote of no confidence and force a new election. There isn’t even talk of that. They don’t have to wait 4 years to rid themselves of a leader, they could do it in a few weeks. That they haven’t even tried tells you something.
There is no place in the world like the United States, where you are born with your rights and the government is prevented from infringing upon them. Lots of places seem like us, but they aren’t. In those countries, for example, you can face jail time for speech, for saying things that upset people who seem to make their living finding new and creative ways to get upset. While Democrats would like nothing more than to bring that level of control here, they can’t. Our Constitution wouldn’t allow it and our people wouldn’t stand for it. The professional pearl-clutching class of aspiring victims don’t have the power they so desperately desire here, they just have to settle for getting CNN and MSNBC contracts.