That’s fine with me. I don’t cry for the loss of Andrew Coyne’s dream state. I don’t want the homogeneous (although supposedly diverse), post-national liberal “civic nationalist” polity which there are only individuals and governments. (And by governments, he means the Federal government, with the judiciary at the apex.) Yuck.
The trouble is not with the Québécois (OK, there are troubles there — an overweening state, an excessive reaction to a Catholic past, but the point is, those are NOT OUR TROUBLES). The trouble is us, our inability to reestablish an identity when the British Empire passed away, other than the identity of consumers and rights holders. ~Pithlord
Reihan has a few words to say about the demise of the dream that was Canada. The short version? “Weird. Very weird.”
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November 28th, 2006 at 5:24 pm
A.K.B. Cusack
I don’t see what all the fuss is about. Landed empires such as Canada and the United States cover territories stretching across continents, and are of a size that makes Austria-Hungary seem small. Yet the Austro-Hungarian empire incorporated dozens of nations and nationalities, while it seems Canada only has two or three. So what if the fact that Quebec is a distinct nation is given legal sanction? I don’t think that merely giving legal recognition to reality is much of an offense against order and tradition.
But then I’ve always been somewhat baffled as to why Canada wants Quebec. Quebec remaining in Canada is certainly good for Quebec in that it provides one last remaining barrier to Quebec becoming an even more inconsequential, isolated, overly inward-looking, modernist backwater. But what good is Quebec to the rest of Canada except for making official national events awkwardly bi-lingual. Did anyone watch Stephen Harper’s address welcoming John Howard to Parliament? All that periodic speaking in French just to satisfy the emotions of a few left-wing nationalists. If the parliamentary delegation from Quebec were gentlemen, they would kindly refuse the offer insist, out of courtesy to their fellow Canadians, that proceedings be carried out in English.