Pessimists

The new softwood lumber agreement has revealed the liberal’s basic pessimism - they are saying that the glass is only eighty percent full.
The Liberal government ragged on the problem of softwood lumber tariffs for 8 years and got no where. Stephen Harper makes one visit and a month later there is a tentative agreement. I would call that very fast and effective work.
The cry from the Liberals and others; “We only got four of the five billion that the U.S. took in tariffs.”
Lets live in the real world for a while shall we. The U.S. is the world’s only super power. They do what they want in any sphere from trade to military policy. There are powerful lobby political groups in the U.S. representing the states which produce large amounts of lumber. They are constantly lobbying for higher tariffs on Canadian lumber. Our Liberal Prime Ministers went to talk about the lumber issue and got nowhere. The President would not take the political heat it would cost him to lift the tariffs. If the Liberals had not been playing to what they thought were Canadian prejudices against the U.S. by their stupid public remarks the lumber tariffs might not even have be in place. The problems in the lumber industry lie at the Liberal’s door.
What do we have now? We get back four billion dollars. Yes it is not five billion dollars. Did you expect the U.S. to roll over an play dead? That one billion gives the president some breathing room with the political groups which he wants to keep on side to pass the rest of his legislation. If the rumors are correct we also get a guaranteed piece of the U.S. lumber market (34 percent). Churchill knew what he was talking about when he said; “You can trust no country beyond its own self interest.” Stephen Harper has done very well in dealing with our great neighbor would does not have to listen to anyone. Quite an accomplishment. Maybe his secret agenda is to do thinks right in this country for a change.
Don Cook