There is a silver lining to the election, if various powers that be take advantage of it.
It’s obvious that the past four years have been a turning point for the Americans. Suddenly they see terrorists everywhere, partly because of fearmongering and partly because they’ve created some of those threats themselves. And I don’t just mean arming Saddam and the like; I mean allowing North Korea to continue their nuclear arms program when they could easily have held the stalemate. I mean allowing Iran to come ever closer to dangling a nuclear sword of Damocles over our heads. The evidence is mounting that the United States is now on the decline; an overextended military, a failing economy, and an increasingly ideology-driven, intolerant society.
The obvious emerging world power is China. But that doesn’t mean Canada can’t play a larger role in the new world order. Imagine, for a moment, if Canada eased its immigration laws to let in all the Americans threatening to leave the country after the election. Imagine if many of them actually came. You could very well be looking at a reverse brain drain the likes of which Canada hasn’t seen in quite a while. If we began to assert an independent political stance on world issues, if we began to rebuild our military forces to ensure our own protection, and if we encouraged the growth of new industries in a more forgiving social climate, there’s the slight possibility that we could benefit immensely from the Americans’ loss. We could take this opportunity to take on the best and brightest of the United States, the ones who saw fit to jump off a sinking ship—the same way every victorious country has pillaged the scientific and artisitic minds of the nations they conquered. Only we’d never have to fire a shot; we’ve already won their hearts and minds.
None of this will actually come to pass, of course; it’s a pipe dream even under the best of circumstances. But in light of a CNN poll stating over half the country is so deluded as to believe Bush will successfully unite the nation, I have to believe there’s a ray of hope, however small, to be had.