TORONTO: Prime Minister Stephen Harper has proposed that Quebeckers be recognized as a nation within Canada, injecting himself into a growing debate over how to distinguish the relationship between the French-speaking province and the rest of the predominantly English-speaking country.

The surprise motion by Harper and his Conservative Party hinges on a battle between separatist and federalist politicians over four words, "within a united Canada."

The separatist Bloc Québécois on Thursday introduced a motion in the House of Commons that would recognize Quebec as a nation.

Harper on Wednesday tried to pre- empt that motion by introducing a measure of his own, with the same wording but adding "within a united Canada" at the end. The leaders of both federalist parties in opposition, the Liberal Party and the New Democratic Party, support Harper's proposal.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/23/news/canada.php

Do you think that we will we have to go through customs?

HarryP:

I wouldn't sweat it. Quebec has been wanting to go it alone ever since Gen. Wolfe whupped it back in 1759 - never satisfied..

Latest foray into this morass of ' Independence' had the separatiste element suggesting that they would be their own country, but use Canadian money and get to keep a whackload of ' federal ' stuff..[ yeah right..] before that they threatened to ' form an alliance' with the US and use American currency as their standard [ like that would happen ] but, of course America really wants another foreign speaking minority [and a French one at that ] getting in its way..

All a crock as the sepratiste element - the Francophone Quebecers - don't represent Quebec, which includes aboriginal peoples, English-speaking Quebecers and, of course, a whole slew of allophones [ those who speak neither English or French the immigrants from all over who fled to Canada to escape dumbass partisan politics and aren't about to get involved in another mess ]..

Harper's little coup of declaiming Quebec a ' nation ' within Canada pulled the cork out of their bottle and now they're going to grumble and fight among themselves for a few more years and leave everyone else alone..as it should be..

More problematic and tiresome is the weekend results where the Liberals [ our version of the Democraps ] have just elected a new leader who is soft on ' gung ho ' stuff and is a warm fuzzy for saving the 'environment ' and other touchy-feely stuff [ not that breathing clean air isn't important ] so that we now have a more polarized political situation with Harper leading the Conservatives [ Republicans-lite Canada edition ] and Dion leading the lefties..

With a big budget debate coming up in the early spring, and harper leading a minority Government that needs the sup[port of smaller parties to hold onto office..this could trigger an election which could turn things around regarding our committment to Afghanistan, etc.. [ not good in my books ]..even though it was the Liberals who initially sent the military into Afghanland, they have been grumbling loudly over the ' change in mission ' from ' peacekeeping to war and how we should ' re-evaluate ' our response [ read pull out early and let the Afghans go t*ts up ]..while the Harper Government is all for ' staying the course' but is also grumbling about the NATO partners not pulling their weight and sticking their troops in hot spots to get shot at as well.

US/Britain?Dutch/Canadians taking all the hits while the Germans, Spanish and others sit back and take it easy in the provinces where there is no Taliban presence and, well.. old story..NATO talk not meeting the walk...

interesting times in the True North...as always...