July 12, 2006: Double standard

Double standard for US critics Winnipeg Sun, July 9, 2006, via W -- and thanks.
www.winnipegsun.com/Comment/Editorial/2006/07/08/1675065.html

[....] So what happened when former American vice-president Al Gore, the subject of a fawning interview in Rolling Stone magazine this month, made the same kind of drug addict comparison, only using the Alberta oilsands as the focal point?

Federal Liberal MP Keith Martin said that Gore's book, An Inconvenient Truth, on which his documentary movie is based, should be "required reading for everyone."

That view -- echoed by other Liberal politicians -- is typical of the double standard that exists in this country when it comes to Americans telling Canadians what to do.

Al Gore can compare oilsands workers to junkies. Michael Moore can warn Canadians not to elect Stephen Harper as prime minister, saying it would take our country "backwards." Robert F. Kennedy Jr. can declare that hog farming in parts of Western Canada should be outlawed. Apparently, this is all perfectly acceptable American interference in the Canadian realm.

As long as the Americans are of the left-wing variety and speaking out against capitalism and big business or in favour of the environment (and preferably all three), they can lecture Canadians to their hearts' content and we're supposed to listen. [....]