Dear Editor
The United States set Canada up for failure in the Huawei incident. Mrs Meng, arrested by Canada for the United States, has been a pawn of the U.S. government from the start. I distinctly heard Mr. Trump say: “If we get a good trade deal with China, maybe I’ll let her go.” Our two Michaels, shortly after the Meng arrest, are still paying the price. I realize that extradition treaties are binding, but after Trump’s quote, is there not a back door to get out of this kind of abuse? When China protested her arrest, we heard that Canada is a “rule of law” country. Trade and diplomacy with China is still suffering.
Jody Wilson Raybould, ex-Attorney General of Canada, received many calls about SNC-Lavalin. The PMO wanted the firm to be offered a mediation process rather than the Criminal Court system. On top of all the pressure she received, she recorded a phone call apparently from Michael Wernick, top civil servant in Canada. The part of the call that stands out is: “The Prime Minister is going to get this done one way or the other.” Wasn’t Ms. Raybould’s office supposed to be independent of the PMO? Apparently not! This decision came back to haunt the PMO as the “rule of law” excuse in the Meng incident didn’t seem to apply to the SNC Lavalin case, and China threw that in our face, rightly so! We know this incident was the cause of Ms. Raybould and Minister Philpott being expelled from caucus.
For some unknown reason, I followed the Trump impeachment quite closely. Knowing the tribal instincts of the U.S. two party system, I was skeptical that the process would go anywhere in the long run and I was correct. The evidence presented during the impeachment was compelling and seemed to build a foolproof case against Mr. Trump. I guess the curve ball came during the show-trial, without witnesses or documents (which is unbelievable in itself). The senators all took an oath to vote their consciences (before the Almighty, I might add) to no avail, in the end. Senator Romney is paying a big price for voting his conscience.
I must say that all three of these incidents left a very bad taste in my mouth, the latter being the worst, with some actual nausea at the vote to acquit.
If this is democracy, then I think a new system is in order. This is not working well. I can’t imagine what that new system would look like.
Tony Murdoch
Battleford
