Category Archives: Canada

Updated: White South African Granted Asylum In Canada

Canada, Conservatism, Crime, Criminal Injustice, Democracy, IMMIGRATION, Republicans, South-Africa

He was called a “white dog” and a “settler” by his black countrymen, and was attacked seven times by said people, including three stabbings inflicted during muggings and robberies. Then he moved to Canada, which has granted him refugee status. Now “Brandon Huntley, 31, originally from Cape Town, South Africa” gets to live where his life will not be imperiled daily.

The British Telegraph reports on this landmark case: “It is thought to be the first time a white South African man has been granted refugee status in Canada claiming he was the victim of black aggression.”

“‘I find that the claimant would stand out like a ‘sore thumb’ due to his colour in any part of the country,’ tribunal panel chair William Davis was quoted as saying.”

The Ottawa Sun reveals more than the British paper is prepared to:

The decision also took into account testimony by Laura Kaplan, 41, the sister of Huntley’s lawyer, who immigrated to Canada last year from her native South Africa.

Laura Kaplan testified about being threatened by armed black South Africans and the torture of her brother Robert in 1997 when a gang of black men broke into his house, tortured him for eight hours, shot him three times and left him for dead.

Davis said the evidence of Huntley and Laura Kaplan “show a picture of indifference and inability or unwillingness” of the South African government to protect “White South Africans from persecution by African South Africans.”

Reuters is quick to second the “The African National Congress’ response: “The ANC views the granting by Canada of a refugee status to South African citizen Brandon Huntley on the grounds that Africans would ‘persecute’ him, as racist,’ the party said in a statement.”

That’s rich. The sadistic atrocities described in this article could not possibly be a manifestation of seething racial hatred, now could they?

On the status of mercy in America I quote the American Renaissance: “there has been a trickle of South Africans applying for asylum in the United States on the grounds of racial persecution. Almost all have been deported.”

Update (Sept. 2): The Republicans, the Party of Lincoln, are least likely to feel sympathy for the plight of South African whites.

Here’s a relevant excerpt from my book, © Into the Cannibals’ Pot: Lessons For America From Post-Apartheid South Africa:

Ronald Reagan favored ‘constructive engagement’ with South Africa, together with a tough resistance to communist advances in the Third World. But political pressure, not least from the Republican majority, mounted for an increasingly punitive stance toward Pretoria. This entailed an ‘elaborate sanctions structure,’ disinvestment, and a prohibition on sharing intelligence with the South Africans.

For advocating ‘constructive engagement,’ members of his Republican party issued a coruscating attack on Reagan. Senator Lowell P. Weicker Jr., in particular, stated: ‘For this moment, at least, the President has become an irrelevancy to the ideals, heartfelt and spoken, of America.’ Republicans had slipped between the sheets with the fashionable left.

The radical Republicans like to forget how completely conservative Reagan was about forcing change in South Africa. Conservative and wise. There is not one Republican, bar Ron Paul, who is as weary of democracy and mass society as was Reagan.

Update VI: The Swine (AKA The State) Are AWOL

Canada, Europe, Healthcare, Homeland Security, IMMIGRATION, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, libertarianism, Liberty, Natural Law, Objectivism, The State

The excerpt is from my new, WND column, “The Swine (AKA The State) Are AWOL.” If you miss the column on WND.com, you can catch it weekly on Taki’s Magazine, the following day. It’s now up. (May 2)

“Whether they are armed with bombs or bacteria, stopping weaponized individuals from harming others—intentionally or unintentionally—falls perfectly within the purview of the ‘night-watchman state of classical-liberal theory,’ in the words of the philosopher Robert Nozick. …

“A well-policed barrier is the definitive, non-aggressive method of defense against these ailments and afflictions. You don’t attack, arrest, or otherwise molest undesirables; you keep them at bay, away.”

“Libertarian and leftist protest over any impediment to the free flow of people across borders is predicated not on the negative, leave-me-alone rights of the individual, but on the positive, manufactured right of human kind to venture wherever, whenever.”

Read “The Swine Are Loose,” (Taki title) to learn what “the quintessential ‘Renaissance woman,’ the late, dazzling, Madeleine Pelner Cosman, Ph.D., Esq.—expert aviator, health-care policy analyst, marksman, and musician—had to say about “the effects on the health system of the bleeding Southwestern border.”

Update I (May 1): I don’t think I’ve made any dogmatic statements about Objectivist thinking per se. What I will say is this: From all warring Objectivist sources, I’ve read oodles about waging war on the world, but very little that is coherent about stopping the Third World from invading the US.

As I wrote in 2004, “Inviting an invasion by foreigners and instigating one against them are two sides of the same neoconservative coin.” I have seen no evidence that “real” Randians have departed from this neoconservative perversion.

Yes, some Objectivists say borders ought to be protected against dem terrorists, but has any dared to venture that defending the country’s borders may have more than just a security dimension?
By all means, enlighten me (with citations/links, please).

The title of my near-complete book manuscript, Into the Cannibal’s Pot, is meant as a metaphor, and is inspired by Ayn Rand’s wise counsel against prostrating civilization to savagery. I have no doubt she’d have been appalled by the free-for-all on the border with Mexico — and not just because of the possibility of infiltration by a couple of malevolent Muslims.

By all means, provide links to a coherent, Rand-stamped, non-neoconservative view of immigration that does not focus exclusively on security to the detriment of cultural components, which are as essential to the survival of American liberty.

Update II: I don’t buy the allegation that views on immigration among Objectivists are shaped by the validity/legality of Ayn Rand’s visa. Rand was not swayed by positive law. Likewise, Objectivists would—or should—argue from the natural law.

Update IV (May 2): The Hispanic influx into the US is unprecedented. Writes my WND colleague, Vox Day:

“To describe the discourse concerning the mass inflow of foreigners that has taken place over the last 29 years [as] ‘the immigration debate’ is to use a misnomer. What has taken place since the 1980 U.S. census is nothing less than a mass migration of the sort that irretrievably transformed historical civilizations everywhere from Hellenic Greece to Moorish Spain. In 1980, the number of Hispanics living in the United States was 14.6 million. In 2008, it was 45.5 million. Hispanics now account for 15 percent of the total population, and because they are the fastest-growing population segment, the census bureau expects their numbers to increase by a further 67 million by 2050.”

Update V (May 3): Sigh. “The Swine Are AWOL (Or Loose)” was not complicated, at least not to the sensible, straight-thinking.

* The dread diseases delineated in the column happen to hail not from the first world, but from Latin America, with which we have an open border.
* The state has a minimal duty. It is not to “control disease” or test every human being crossing the border, but to enforce a border.
* Currently about a million, poor, deprived, and often depraved, ill people cross over each and every year into the US. By enforcing the border, so that far fewer get through, the number of locals killed or sickened by criminals or carriers will be reduced. Not eliminated; reduced. Is that simple logic unclear? I don’t think so.
* This policy should not be egalitarian, naturally. Canada and Europe are first-world destinations. The diseases making a come-back in the US do not come from North America or the Continent. We have a contiguous border with the first-world Canada, and the third, or second-world Mexico. We do not share a border with Europe, naturally.

Update VII (May 4): Jack writes:

Seems that the comments are closed for this item, so will send just one of the citations/links you asked for.

Within the narrow confines of the original article, I thought it was in writing but the only reference I could find was Yaron Brook stating that people carrying infectious diseases is one of the groups that would be excluded from coming into the country. (Bottom of the page, last video, within the first minute.)

Cheers
Jack

An Interview With Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper

Canada, Economy, Energy, Free Markets, Taxation

Larry Kudlow (I’m not a fan, as you know) interviews Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper (with whom I corresponded once or twice when I lived and wrote in Canada).

“Mr. Harper,” writes Kudlow, “is a trained economist and quite an impressive statesman. Our northern neighbors are lucky to have him at the helm. We covered a wide range of key topics including the ailing banking system, the risks of protectionism, oil sands, and autos. As you’ll see, Mr. Harper offered some very wise observations and insight.

LARRY KUDLOW: All right. We are honored to welcome Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper to the program. Mr. Prime Minister, thank you very much.

PRIME MINISTER STEPHEN HARPER: It’s nice to be here, Larry.

KUDLOW: Let me begin with an interesting subject here, banking. Everybody’s talking about banking. The Canadian banks appear to be in much better shape than the American banks. They have fewer toxic assets. Their losses aren’t nearly as bad. No one’s talking about bankruptcy up there. I want to learn from our northern cousins. What can you tell us? Why are Canadian banks looking better than our banks?

HARPER: Well first of all I can tell you, it is true. We have, I think, the only banks in the western world where we’re not looking at bailouts or anything like that.

KUDLOW: No TARP money sir, if I’m not mistaken? No TARP money?

HARPER: We haven’t got any TARP money. We’ve gone in and done some market transactions with our banks to improve liquidity. But I think the reasons are really complex, Larry. You know, first of all, our banks are private. We don’t have a Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac equivalent mucking around in the system.

KUDLOW: Is that a lesson right there Prime Minister?

HARPER: Well, I think my observation is those are institutions with a difficult private/public mix. And sometimes private/ public mixes have benefits and sometimes they have the worst of both worlds. We don’t have anything like that. We do have though, a strong system of regulation, and activist regulators, who go and meet with the sector. But they’re macro, prudential kind of regulations. They don’t try and micromanage banks’ decisions. We try and establish good oversight and transparency.

KUDLOW: Do you have leverage and borrowing ratios that might have been enforced? Because that’s clearly one of the breakdowns here in the states?

HARPER: Well, we do have leverage ratios. What’s ironic is that our own banks had not actually achieved those ratios. They were actually working under them. Part of what we…

KUDLOW: They were under leveraged?

HARPER: They were under leveraged.

KUDLOW: Wait, wait. Canadian banks were under leveraged?

HARPER: Under what they could have been.

KUDLOW: I didn’t know there was such a thing on this entire planet earth.

HARPER: Well I think part of what we have done is through the system of regulation we’ve had, we’ve encouraged a fairly cautious culture in the banks. For example, our banks, when they sign mortgages, largely hold those mortgages rather than trading them. So they have a lot more interest in the underlying quality of those mortgages. And we avoided the sub-prime kind of problem.

KUDLOW: Did I hear you at your final news conference with President Obama last week — you turned down, or your government or the regulators turned down a merger from one of the large Canadian banks. Is “too big to fail” solved in part by not letting them get so big? Is that a model that needs to be more regulated?

HARPER: Well I think the truth is we already have a highly concentrated sector. We have only six major banks that have most of the market. We have only three major insurance firms. And the banks also generally control the major brokerages. So obviously, to go any farther in terms of concentration without opening up the Canadian market itself would be a highly controversial decision.

KUDLOW: I want to ask you another economic question. You’re in a recession, but really, it just began. Your unemployment rate is a little bit less than the United States. Your stock market has been hit bad, as hard as our stock market, so it’s been very poor. However, from a little bit of research, the top federal personal tax rate in Canada, if I have this right, is 29 percent. Ours is 35. Mr. Obama says he’s going to push it up to 40, back pre-Bush. Is that true, 29 percent?

HARPER: Well in fairness it’s 29 percent, but there is a provincial tax put on top of that.

KUDLOW: Well we have that too.

HARPER: I think our combined income tax rate is still higher than yours.

KUDLOW: Really? How high are the provincial?

HARPER: At the highest, they’re about half, my recollection is about half of what the federal would be. On top of that they kick in at a much lower level of income. Ours kick in at about $130,000. Obviously, looking into the future, when we have a bit more fiscal room, that is something we would like to tackle. We’re bringing the corporate rate down. Our corporate tax rates will be the lowest in the G7 in the few years.

KUDLOW: Nineteen percent, is that correct? Nineteen percent?

HARPER: I think it’s down to 18 and a half, or 18.

KUDLOW: Wow. We’re at 35 percent.

HARPER: It’ll be at 15 percent in 2012. So we’ll have the lowest in the G7.

KUDLOW: Looking ahead to try to get through this banking mess, and try to get out of this most difficult recession, given the fact that Canadian banks have had a good performance, and given the fact that your tax rates — what advice would you give the United States from your perch?

HARPER: You know Larry, I’ve been asked that several times today, and unfortunately a lot of my advice would be don’t get into this mess in the first place. These are not easy things to deal with. You know, obviously we’ve got a drop in activity like you’ve got here. That’s why we’ve got a stimulus package. We don’t have a banking mess. We don’t have a mortgage mess. The truth of the matter is the president’s administration is going to look at a lot of polices, I know a lot of polices you don’t like, because a lot of them do have very serious long-run dangers. But the fact of the matter is they’ve got to do some things now that stop the continuing drop in economic activity. And the short term is going to drive a lot of decisions, for better or worse.

KUDLOW: Well if Canada is lowering its tax burdens, wouldn’t that be a reasonable example to your friends in the south?

HARPER: Well let me be clear though. When we lowered our tax burdens — and we did this in our first stimulus package over a year ago — we did that knowing we could lower our tax burdens while keeping our structural budget surplus in the long term. We could afford those tax cuts without going into deficit, immediately or in the long term. We’ve now done a second stimulus that is spending. It is short term. We’ll come out of it and we’ll go back into surplus. But we believe strongly in Canada, there’s a strong consensus, that we should keep our budget in a surplus position structurally in the long term. So we will only cut taxes if we are sure that is affordable.

KUDLOW: All right. And these tax rates, particularly the business tax rates, that’s law?

HARPER: That’s law.

KUDLOW: 19 percent or 18 percent, that’s done?

HARPER: Those are all legislated and they’ll come in.

KUDLOW: All right, let me move on quickly. Energy and climate change. The Canadian oil sands. We’ve had all the major CEOs on this program several times. Canada is our biggest importer, our biggest source. Now, problem. The Obama administration — Carol Browner — his top energy person who was up at the conference you just completed, they are against the Canadian oil sands because of the carbon emissions issue. Some states like California may actually try to stop the importation of energy and oil from the Canadian sands. What can you tell us? How is this going to be resolved?

HARPER: Well first of all, let me be clear about the importation of oil sands oil. Regardless of what any legislature does, the United States will be importing this oil. Because there is absolutely no doubt if you look at the supply and demand pattern into the future, the United States is going to need Canadian oil. It is the one secure, growing, market-based source of energy that the United States has. So there will be no choice but to import oil sands. We…

KUDLOW: Well you say that. But that’s an economic decision. But what about the political, legislative route? Did you talk to President Obama about that? His whole campaign, and as I said, he’s got Carol Browner running this from the White House; he’s got people all over his administration totally hostile to the oil sands because of the carbon problem.

HARPER: Well, and look, we believe there is also, there is a carbon problem there, Larry. And we’re prepared to work to reduce the carbon footprint of the oil sands. But as President Obama himself said, when he talked about the oil sands, he also talked about coal-fired electricity in the United States. Carbon emissions from coal-fired electricity in the United States are 40X the emission of the oil sands. So we’ll take care of, we’ll work on that problem, just as we expect the United States to be working on the problem of coal-fired electricity.

KUDLOW: But you don’t think the flow of your exports of the oil sands will be stopped? You don’t think that flow will be stopped because of the environmental, climate change considerations?

HARPER: I think that policy — any policy like that — is completely unrealistic. If you look at American needs for energy and where Americans can get supply at a reasonable price, it’s completely unrealistic. But it doesn’t mean that we will shirk our environmental responsibilities. We are making significant investments, carbon capture and storage, and other things, that your government is also doing. And we will do what we can to reduce the carbon footprint. But there should be no illusion that economic reality will hit those environmental polices pretty hard when one goes to implement them.

KUDLOW: One can only hope on that point. As I understand it, your latest fiscal package actually lowered import barriers in a number of places which you believe helps Canada and helps the rest of the world. Now the Unites States stimulus package raises import barriers with a “Buy America” provision for iron and steel and other infrastructure materials. Did you talk to President Obama? How’s this going to be resolved? You’re going one way, they’re going another.

HARPER: Look, we certainly raised our concerns. And as you know that provision was modified in the Senate to insure that they would conform with all existing trade obligations. There are trade provisions that allow you to have preferences in government procurement. But we think it’s very important, if we’re going to kickstart this global economy, that administrations around the world avoid turning stimulus packages into protectionism. Because if you try and stimulate a national economy at the expense of the global economy, we’re going to make the whole situation worse around the world. I think–my conversations with the president — I am quite convinced he understands that, he understands how serious it is to avoid a protectionist drift in this present economic climate.

KUDLOW: All right, last one Prime Minister. You have up in Canada if I’m not mistaken about a fifth of the General Motors/UAW workforce. You have given them some money as we have. How much money are you going to be prepared to give? They’re going to come back for much more in the next tranche, I guess at the end of March. How much money will you and the taxpayers of Canada be prepared to give?

HARPER: Well Larry we haven’t decided that. We’re doing due diligence on these guys. They’ve submitted our plans. We’re going to watch what’s being done in the United States. I mean, we’re under no illusion about why we’re doing this. The United States is engaged in a politically-directed restructuring of the industry. We came to the conclusion, whether one is for it or against it, that we have to put our skin in the game…

KUDLOW: And if I may, politically-directed, as opposed to let’s say, bankruptcy directed.

HARPER: Right, right. Absolutely. We came to the conclusion that if we don’t put our 20 percent skin in the game, we’re going to end up with an industry that’s restructured out of Canada entirely. We know it’s going to be a smaller industry in the future. There are some very difficult decisions that are going to have to be made. I hope both of our governments are willing to impose those decisions on all of the participants, on all of the players. Because that’s the only way we’re going to make sure…

KUDLOW: You’re kind of stuck, you’re kind of stuck. If we throw money at them you’re going to have to throw more money at them. Is that what you’re saying?

HARPER: I think if we’re not in the game the industry will be restructured out of Canada. And it’s frankly too important an industry to Canada. It’s probably close to 10 percent of our GDP that depends on that industry. A huge percentage in the province of Ontario, our industrial heartland. But we as governments, both Canadian and American governments, we have to make the industry, all of the players in the industry, make the difficult decisions necessary to make those sustainable companies.

KUDLOW: All right. Prime Minster, thank you very much.

HARPER: Thank you Larry.

KUDLOW: I really appreciate it. You’re terrific to come on.

HARPER: I appreciate it.

KUDLOW: All right, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

Updated: O Canada (Or, Go Canada)

Affirmative Action, America, Canada, Economy, IMMIGRATION, The State

As I said in “Republicans, Repent!”: “Socialism is secondary to state squandering—and a consequence of it.” The US is becoming more statist than Canada because the American state is accrediting through squandering. (It is also far more authoritarian than Canada.)

In the context of this Christian Science Monitor report, I would imagine that Canadian banks were not compelled by law, under left-liberal government programs, to lend to those unworthy of credit.

This, The Christian Science Monitor doesn’t say:

“Among industrialized countries, Canada is the only one not to have seen a major bank fail. The World Economic Forum ranked Canada’s banking system as the healthiest in the world in 2008, while the US took the 40th spot. And while Canada’s largest five banks reaped profits of $8.2 billion, the top five US banks lost a combined total of $8.3 billion last year.

Stronger federal regulations and lower leverage ratios borne by Canadian banks have allowed them to weather the global banking storm. Canadian financial institutions didn’t engage in the subprime mortgage lending that sideswiped the US banking industry and forced millions of American homeowners into foreclosure.”

Update (Feb. 22): There are other factors that explain why Canada’s banks are not buckling under. Canada has a stricter, immigration system. A point system. When it comes to legal immigration, it awards pointers for knowledge of the country’s languages: French and English.
The country’s traditional source of immigrants is China. The Chinese are affluent, and, well, unlikely to default on their mortgages. They are not as politically aggressive and voracious as are America’s minority communities. Naturally, Canada does not have a large, identity politicking Hispanic community.