I saw the press conference this morning. Actually, the main thrust of the conference was about the defection of Scott Brison, a gay former candidate for the leadership of the Progressive Conservatives, from the new Conservative Party of Canada (merger between the PCs and the Alliance party) to the Liberal Party of Canada. This is in a context of [link|http://z.iwethey.org/forums/render/content/show?contentid=129377|remarks ] made last week by the Alliance family critic. Brison is known as a policy wonk and an idea man, and his defection represents a major coup for the Liberals in Atlantic Canada and a major setback for the new CPC, both in the Maritimes and as trying to represent itself as more than the party of rural rednecks.

At any rate, here's what you can expect to see from Martin. He was responding specifically to comments by Wolfowitz wrt the bidding process for contracts in Iraq.

He will NOT move to withdraw our troops from Afghanistan. In fact, I think you can expect to see more money for our military, and an eventual ramping up of our presence there over the course of the next couple of years. For better or for worse, Afghanistan is going to be the Canadian front on the War on Terror, but it won't be done via the same means that the US are taking to it. What you can expect to see happening in Afghanistan is the armed forces there doing more to engage the various factions in dialogue, in an attempt to demonstrate that there are other ways to settle tribal and religious disputes than via muerta. I've heard rumours that officers have been making solo trips into the hills to talk with people, working on the cultural tradition of hospitality (once you're a guest, you are part of the tribe until you leave).

I don't think you'll see a withdrawal of CDN money from Iraq either. As Martin put it in the conference (paraphrasing), "whatever may be the case with contracts, it is crucially important that we contribute to the rebuildin of Iraq to the greatest extent that we can; there is a lot of suffering over there and we need to do what we can to ameliorate it as quickly as possible, and to help Iraq become a self-directed state as soon as possible". In other words, he's willing to take the hit on the contracting because he sees the crucial importance of making sure that Iraq doesn't become a failed state.

What you CAN expect to see is a new intransigence wrt things like the softwood lumber dispute; last week Canada basically rolled over on the issue of tariffs and import quotas, despite the fact that the WTO and the NAFTA panel both think the US is full of shit on it. I wouldn't be surprised to see a NAFTA challenge on the IRaq contract decision as well; Mexico would be a willing partner on that issue.

One effect of your terrible administration has been the driving together of Mexican and Canadian interests wrt trade with the US. You can expect to see more cooperation between these two in the future.

Finally, from his personal demeanour while making the comments, I think it's safe to say that while Martin was sympathetic to the US administration in certain ways, he has come to realise that the current US admin's goals can be most accurately described as looter economics, and that they are simply not people to be trusted.

--\n-------------------------------------------------------------------\n* Jack Troughton                            jake at consultron.ca *\n* [link|http://consultron.ca|http://consultron.ca]                   [link|irc://irc.ecomstation.ca|irc://irc.ecomstation.ca] *\n* Kingston Ontario Canada               [link|news://news.consultron.ca|news://news.consultron.ca] *\n-------------------------------------------------------------------