Foreign Policy

"In the world of Canada-U.S. relationship, access is worth its weight in gold," former prime minister Brian Mulroney, 2011.

Mulroney knew whereof he spoke. He enjoyed warm personal relations with two presidents, Republicans Ronald Reagan and the first George Bush. These relationships at the top translated into access lower down the political ladder as Canadian ministers and senior bureaucrats could make Canada’s voice heard in Washington.

As U.S. President Barack Obama enters the final year of his presidency his popular support level has slipped below the 50 per cent mark overall, but in the area of foreign policy it is significantly lower, and has regularly registered below 40 per cent in public approval for some months.

Much of the problem seems to stem from international events and the ubiquity of terrorism pursued by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), among others, that do not comport with the kind of world that the president aspires to.

They say nature abhors a vacuum. So do political parties. We are seeing that this season in both the Republican party in the United States and the Conservative party in Canada.

Let’s start south of the border. Since losing their second consecutive presidential election in 2012, the Republicans have been reduced to a shell of their former selves. They have no leader, no direction and no policies other than to use their muscle in Congress to obstruct any initiatives advanced by Barack Obama and the Democrats.

BY GEOFFREY STEVENS

There was something profoundly sad, almost pathetic, about the performance of President Barack Obama in his nationally televised town hall meeting on gun control last week.

Published Nov. 18, 2015 in the Waterloo Region Record. 

As people begin to move beyond the hand-wringing, and "thoughts and prayers" stage of reacting to the bloody carnage in Paris, it is perhaps useful to examine the impact of the Nov. 13 nihilistic rampage on related matters.