Trade Minister Jim Peterson Is A Fool

The good news is that Canada has won another round in the long line of disputes over Canada's lumber industry. The bad news is that our idiot government thinks this will change anything.

"We are extremely pleased that the (panel) dismissed the claims of the United States," Trade Minister Jim Peterson said in a statement. "This is a binding decision that clearly eliminates the basis for U.S.-imposed duties on Canadian softwood lumber.

"We fully expect the United States to abide by this ruling, stop collecting duties and refund the duties collected over the past three years."

Oh, yeah right. The US Congress will do no such thing. Or if they do, they'll replace the duties on Canadian lumber with something equally noxious.

I don't get why this is so difficult - NAFTA was incredibly bad for Canada. We surrendered any hope of charting a separate course from the Empire, in exchange for what was supposed to be unfettered access to the US market. Of course, Canada has never, ever, gotten what it wanted from the deal, while the US has essentially continued it's practice of domestic protectionism.

David Orchard is right - if you're for globalization, NAFTA is a wreck. Better to work through the WTO, where Canada has repeatedly been supported by international law. However, this works against America's long practice of using bilateral deals to squeeze smaller countries, rather than working through multilateral organizations. Canada wasn't the first example of this - I think Israel's free trade agreement with the US is seen as the watershed event - and it hasn't been the last.

Trying to make one-on-one deals with the 800-lb gorilla is simply a ridiculous notion, and Canada should give it up.

(via Timmy the G.)