D_Gunther Snotpole
Account Disabled
Well, I can't see us passing a law absolving us from paying debts owed to individual Quebec individuals and institutions. Perhaps we could, and perhaps we could make it stick. Don't know.
However, the national debt is no longer (I don't think) owed mostly to Canadians. So if such a law were passed, it might cost Quebecers something, but nothing like a quarter of the national debt or anything close to it.
That is essentially the point I'm making about the EI surplus as well. The federal debt is about ten times greater. If Quebecers are thinking money, they will be quite prepared to give up the EI surplus.
The other thing is, Does the EI surplus really exist? It's kind of a theoretical figure. There is no EI fund. Surplus money is simply put into general coffers. Overpayment can be calculated, but no fund as such exists. So what could be divided? (I'm not saying that arrangements wouldn't be made.)
You say if Canada can be divided, so can Quebec. That certainly sounds reasonable. But it's not nearly as practical. If Quebec were divided into something like cantons, you would have a pretty precise parallel. Some of the cantons could vote to leave Quebec, just as Quebec, one of the provinces, had decided to leave Canada. But there are no cantons ... just general areas where separatist sentiment is weaker than the overall sentiment.
Maybe the First Nations could vote to leave Quebec and make the decision stick. I don't know. Their psychological and spiritual link with land is obvious, but the legal status is more dubious.
It was Trudeau who first said, "If Canada is divisible, so is Quebec." But that hasn't been a show stopper.
Parizeau is considered a brilliant economist; he is a former finance minister, a prime architect of the Quiet Revolution (a driver, among other things, he himself, behind setting up the Caisse de depot), and former premier. He may disagree with you about the economic effects of partition, or may simply, because they conflict with his larger mission, choose to ignore them. I doubt that his understanding is dismissable. (I might add that Trudeau himself said that an independent Quebec could work, and he would remain living in Quebec in the unfortunate event that separation came to pass. "La separation ne sera pas un drame," he said.)
Is Parizeau a racist, as you say? When offering a program of ethnic nationalism, we can easily make him seem so. On that model, virtually all Israeli politicians would be racists. Are they, on a personal level?
A drunk? Well, hasn't been in years. However, in his salad days, he did seem to emulate John A. Macdonald, whose vision, as you know, became Canada.
I think, if we have a divorce, it will probably be more like the Czechoslovak Velvet Divorce.
But I don't want a divorce, any more than you do.
However, the national debt is no longer (I don't think) owed mostly to Canadians. So if such a law were passed, it might cost Quebecers something, but nothing like a quarter of the national debt or anything close to it.
That is essentially the point I'm making about the EI surplus as well. The federal debt is about ten times greater. If Quebecers are thinking money, they will be quite prepared to give up the EI surplus.
The other thing is, Does the EI surplus really exist? It's kind of a theoretical figure. There is no EI fund. Surplus money is simply put into general coffers. Overpayment can be calculated, but no fund as such exists. So what could be divided? (I'm not saying that arrangements wouldn't be made.)
You say if Canada can be divided, so can Quebec. That certainly sounds reasonable. But it's not nearly as practical. If Quebec were divided into something like cantons, you would have a pretty precise parallel. Some of the cantons could vote to leave Quebec, just as Quebec, one of the provinces, had decided to leave Canada. But there are no cantons ... just general areas where separatist sentiment is weaker than the overall sentiment.
Maybe the First Nations could vote to leave Quebec and make the decision stick. I don't know. Their psychological and spiritual link with land is obvious, but the legal status is more dubious.
It was Trudeau who first said, "If Canada is divisible, so is Quebec." But that hasn't been a show stopper.
Parizeau is considered a brilliant economist; he is a former finance minister, a prime architect of the Quiet Revolution (a driver, among other things, he himself, behind setting up the Caisse de depot), and former premier. He may disagree with you about the economic effects of partition, or may simply, because they conflict with his larger mission, choose to ignore them. I doubt that his understanding is dismissable. (I might add that Trudeau himself said that an independent Quebec could work, and he would remain living in Quebec in the unfortunate event that separation came to pass. "La separation ne sera pas un drame," he said.)
Is Parizeau a racist, as you say? When offering a program of ethnic nationalism, we can easily make him seem so. On that model, virtually all Israeli politicians would be racists. Are they, on a personal level?
A drunk? Well, hasn't been in years. However, in his salad days, he did seem to emulate John A. Macdonald, whose vision, as you know, became Canada.
I think, if we have a divorce, it will probably be more like the Czechoslovak Velvet Divorce.
But I don't want a divorce, any more than you do.