On 2025-08-26 6:12 PM, BTR1701 wrote:
The momentum is building.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_HJx9zx6MQ&t=187s
The momentum to leave Canada has been building for a long time. Most
people, even foreigners, have heard about Quebec considering separation
over the years, especially in 1980 and 1995 when they had referenda on
the subject. (The 1980 referendum was 60/40 in favour of staying in
Canada but the 1995 referendum was extremely close, 50.5/49.5.)
But the West has been at least restless for a good bit of that time too.
I remember a Francophone work colleague based in Quebec but who
regularly worked out of our office doing an assignment in Alberta in the
early 90s. When he came back, he said he thought Quebec was angry about
the deal it was getting but Alberta was even more so!
Many Westerners have seethed with frustration in the past decades but
now they're actually starting to work toward their own referendum on separation, a referendum that may well succeed given the West's
frustration with the Liberals and their relentless indifference to the situation in the West. That's one of the many reasons I was so eager to
see the Liberals turfed at our most recent election. But that didn't
happen.
The West still has one VERY large problem if they separate, even if
Alberta AND Saskatchewan AND Manitoba AND Interior BC jointly decide to
leave together, which would take some kind of miracle: the new country, whatever it would be called, would be landlocked. It would have borders
only with Canada and the US but wouldn't have ANY sea coast, not one
meter. That means the only people that could possibly buy their
resources would be Canada and the US. They'd have no access to the
Pacific, Atlantic or Arctic Oceans (unless they also persuaded Yukon or Northwest Territory to join them, which would surely be even harder to manage.) Unless they can negotiate some kind of corridor through what
remains of Canada, they're not going to be able to get their oil,
natural gas, timber, etc. to market except through the US or Canada
which will surely not make it easy. That means they'll be at the mercy
of two foreign countries instead of one and I don't see any compelling
reason to think Ottawa will be terribly co-operative with a corridor
given the inevitable bitterness on both sides after separation.
Unless they can persuade coastal BC to join their project - which is a
pretty dubious proposition in my opinion given the "progressive"
influence there - they're going to have insurmountable problems with
their economy right out of the gate.
--
Rhino
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