Woe Canada

One thing that has struck me as a sort of corollary to my quixotic quest for an embassy badge is that another way I could have avoided that whole migraine would have been if Canada were as involved as Australia in the coalition efforts. Think about this fact: Australia is the only country to fight alongside the United States in every major conflict since World War I (yes, that obviously includes Vietnam -- but not minor hemispheric interventions like Grenada and Panama).

Moreover, I encounter the occasional Brit (though most are in the south, overseeing Basra and the Gulf ports), and a quick glance at the organizational chart reveals Koreans, Poles, Romanians, and several other countries in the command structure. And that's not to mention some of the smaller delegations from the smallest countries.

Why are Latvia and Honduras helping the cause but not the country that depends wholly and directly on the US for its national security? And from my most recent reading of Canadian politics, even the Canucks' involvement in Afghanistan has lost public support. True north strong and free indeed!

Yes, when I walk into the DFAC (dining mess) and see the flags of all the coalition members on the ceiling and walls, it hurts not to see the Canadian standard. Despite the emergence of a Conservative minority government, with a leader, Stephen Harper, who seems to have his head screwed on right (probably because he's the rare prime minister, English- or French-speaking, not hailing from Quebec), I am increasingly ashamed of the color of my passport.

It reminds me of when I got pulled over for speeding on Lakeshore Drive in Chicago in the spring of 2003 when we had first gone into Iraq, a move over which the Liberal government of then-PM Jean "Don't Call Me Cretin" Chretien made a big stink. The burly cop grimaced when he saw my Ontario driver's license (when I finished being a student I changed to Mississippi, and now D.C -- though I specifically declined the "taxation without representation" tag) and asked me how he thought his buddies would react if he took me "back to the precinct."

"You've got me all wrong, officer," I wearily explained. "I'm down here because I don't want to be associated with those people." I was referring to the vehement anti-war protesters, but I wonder whether now that doesn't mean most of the country.