Skip to main content

“I am a Canadian, free to speak without fear, free to worship in my own way, free to stand for what I think right, free to oppose what I believe wrong, or free to choose those who shall govern my country. This heritage of freedom I pledge to uphold for myself and all mankind.” ~~ John G. Diefenbaker

FELDSTED - Two years after the change was to happen, they announce the change they promised five years earlier and bury overrun costs as best as they can


Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats have sat on the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) 2.0 ratification to avoid giving President Trump a “win” with an improved NAFTA. Minor changes by the Congress are window dressing to justify the delay in US approval of the deal.
Christina Freeland

Trips by recently appointed Deputy Prime Minister of Canada, Christina Freeland, to the US and Mexico, are also window dressing. This is the tiresome nonsense that governments love. They announce a grand change to programs with great gusto. Two years later they re-announce the same change in an economic update.



Two years after the change was to happen, they announce the change they promised five years earlier and bury overrun costs as best as they can while expecting us to cheer their accomplishment.
NAFTA never died; the agreement kept working while the “negotiations” bored us stiff. Now our taxpayers will shell out a couple of billion dollars to cover the losses of Canadian dairy farmers and our steel and aluminum smelters and foundries while our economy drops a few hundred million a year in auto parts we once made and are now made in the USA.
The US won major concessions while boosting its manufacturing sector and economy. We came out battered at best.


NAFTA amendment negotiations started in August 2017. In November 2018 (15 months later) we were told the amended agreement was complete and ready for ratification. Now we are told that the deal is again ready for ratification again (12 months later, 27 months in all).

“This has been a long, arduous and at times fraught negotiation,” said Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland, who was in Mexico City for the elaborate signing ceremony.

Give us a break ducks; original negotiations took 15 months of on and off meetings. Ratification delays have taken another year of intermittent negotiations; nothing lasting long enough to cause a sweat. You are regurgitating the euphoria of government announcements on NAFTA in November last year and they have gone rancid in the interim.
At best we survived the negotiations and have nothing to cheer over.

John Feldsted
Political Commentator, Consultant & Strategist
Winnipeg, Manitoba
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

FORSETH -- Focus on the nine things I mentioned. That’s what will allow the Conservative Party to win the next election

IMAGE CREDIT:   Darryl Dyck, the Canadian Press. I thought I had already made up my mind who I would be ranking on my ballot, in the Conservative Party of BC leadership race; now I am not so sure.  That means that, at least for me, and perhaps many others, it’s a good thing voting hasn’t already taken place. There were initially only one or two of the candidates that I thought might be a little too right of centre for my liking, now it seems that list is growing. I consider myself more closely aligned with what used to be called a Progressive Conservative, regardless, I feel more than comfortable within the Conservative Party of BC.  Some, however, in messages to me on my political Facebook page, have been rather, shall we say, a bit mean-spirited in comments they’ve made about my ‘purity’ as a conservative. To tell you the truth, I really don’t care! Some leadership candidates, in comments made online, have also been raising the issue of who is a pure enough conservati...
Post a Comment
Read more

WARD STAMER -- Those are REAL forestry numbers, not just made-up numbers

The following is a condensed version of remarks Kamloops – North Thompson MLA Ward Stamer’s made, regarding Forestry, in the BC Legislature, on Tuesday afternoon (02/24/2026)   Let’s talk a little bit, when we talk about Budget 2026, about the forest industry, which is near and dear to my heart. Forestry remains one of British Columbia’s foundational industries. It’s a pillar that built this province. Entire communities depend upon it. Interior towns, northern communities, Vancouver Island regions, the Kootenays, the Lower Mainland, with manufacturing facilities in Surrey and Maple Ridge, just to name a few — everywhere in BC is touched by forestry. One word that was not mentioned in Budget 2026 was forestry. That’s a shame, an incredible shame. It wasn’t an oversight – it was intentional. This government has driven forestry into the ground .... INTO THE GROUND! We can talk a little bit about some of the initiatives that this government has brought forth, to try to resurrect ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Your government has a gambling problem (Troy Media)

Provinces call it “revenue,” but it looks a lot like exploitation of the marginalized The odds of winning Lotto Max are about 1 in 33 million. You’re statistically more likely to be struck by lightning than to win it. But your government is betting that statistics won’t hold you back; they’re counting on it. Across Canada, provincial governments not only regulate gambling, they also maintain a monopoly on lottery and gaming by owning and operating the entire legal market. That means every scratch card is government-issued, gambling odds are government-set, casino ads are government-funded and lottery billboards are government-paid. And these are not incidental government activities. They generate significant revenues that governments have powerful incentives to expand, not constrain. It would be one thing for our governments to encourage us to engage in healthy activities. We can quibble about whether the government should be trying to convince us to be more active or eat more vegetabl...
Post a Comment
Read more

Labels

Show more