Pubdate: Sun, 07 Dec 2003 Source: Seattle Times (WA) Copyright: 2003 The Seattle Times Company Contact: http://www.seattletimes.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/409 Author: James Vesely, Times editorial page editor BORDERLANDS: CANADA RULES BUT WHO'S BEHIND IT? A FASCINATING news report last week revealed that Canada and the United States are more estranged than ever in their modern history. Two neighbors of North America are drifting apart, both socially and politically. The separation is post 9-11 but aggravated by differing national agendas in Ottawa and Washington, D.C. The story in The New York Times showed two societies diverging dramatically on social issues. A relationship that once accepted cross-border Canadians and Americans as two peas of the same pod has split along the same fracture lines that divide Americans from each other. Canadians are more tolerant of gay and lesbian marriage than most Americans. Two provinces of Canada -- and that's where significant power resides within the Canadian confederation -- have made homosexual marriage legal. Canadians tolerate marijuana smoking much more than most Americans. The Canadian national government has moved to decriminalize possession of small amounts of marijuana. Outgoing Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien was quoted that in retirement he might just sit back and enjoy a joint. You can image Clinton joking like that, but hardly Bush, and hardly former Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney. Canadians feel remote from Republicans in Washington, D.C. Canadians don't agree with the war in Iraq, and many Canadians believe the U.S. is too unilateralist. Canadians who voted in Liberal governments, including Chretien's, don't think much of President Bush. Canadians are going to church in smaller numbers, at rates dropping steadily from 1950s levels of attendance, while Americans are becoming more churched, especially in the growing evangelical movements. Answering a poll conducted by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, roughly 68 percent of Canadians responded it is not necessary to believe in God to be moral, while only 40 percent of Americans thought so. Accepting of gay marriage, reluctant to make pot-smoking criminal, distrustful of Republicans, unchurched ... Hey, wait a minute! These aren't Canadians, they're Seattleites! Indeed, any measure of current Canadian attitudes is almost duplicative of recent voting patterns in urban Seattle. Seattle residents voted to marginalize marijuana law enforcement by police, a step toward decriminalization. Bush has as much chance of carrying Seattle precincts in 2004 as Canadian glaciers to melt -- or, maybe less. The convergence of attitudes continues: In Seattle, gay and lesbian marriages are seen as a simple matter of equality. Seattle residents and people across the Pacific Northwest, just like Canadians, have one of the lowest church membership ratios to population of any region in the country. In nearby Vancouver, B.C., medicinal-marijuana smoking is considered as normal as in many European cities, notably Amsterdam. A significant number of Seattleites would agree that medical use of marijuana is both necessary and humane. A recent, massive Canadian project to limit development on 529 million acres of boreal forest is especially attuned to Seattle's environmental ethic. Merging the desires of native peoples with a broad forest-preservation initiative would be right up Seattle's alley. Canada has moved to preserve 25 percent of what's left of the world's forests. Put something like that on the ballot in Seattle and the result would be overwhelming approval. Exactly how Seattleites took over Canada is unclear. Future historians may have to ask the hard questions about who actually runs the Discovery Channel. The decline of Disney and the rise of Animal Planet certainly was an overlooked signal in media mind control. Starbucks as Seattle's cultural weapon needs major study. No matter how you cut it, the makeover of Canada into a giant Seattle is just about complete. Prime Minister Greg Nickels has only a few months to wait before the government changes hands. James Vesely's column appears Sunday on editorial pages of The Times. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom