FROLITICKS

Well, listen up you weak-kneed socialist-loving Canadians. Republican candidate for President, Ben Carson, now says he wants soldiers and the national guard stationed not only along the Mexican border — but also at certain unspecified spots along the Canadian border.  Remember that last fall, former presidential candidate Wisconsin Republican Gov. Scott Walker had expressed interest in building a wall along the U.S.-Canada border. The Republicans appear to be implying that Canada is some sort of terrorist haven — with certain Americans expressing concern about Islamic State radicals crossing into the U.S. through Canada.

However, history has shown that the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and most recent Boston Marathon bombings and San Bernardino shootings were carried out by home grown American terrorists. So far, there has been little evidence of any large or small scale threat from Canada in terms of potential Islamic State radicals. If anything, Americans have more concerns about their own citizens who have travelled to the Middle East to join ISIS. Just as Canada is concerned about the few Canadian nationals who have done the same thing.

Let’s face it, both the U.S. Homeland Security and Canada’s Canadian Security Intelligence Service share their terrorist-watch lists. The Federal Bureau of Investigation and Royal Canadian Mounted Police are keeping an eye on potentially radicalized individuals in their respective countries.  Never-the-less, the most recent polls indicate that national security is now the No. 1 concern of American voters. I’m confident that this concern is right up there among key issues for Canadians.  However, additional security measures adopted more than a decade ago after the 9-11 attacks continue to impact trade and cross-border traffic.  Both countries have been looking at ways to ease the border backlog, partly by screening people at checkpoints away from the actual frontier.  After all, the U.S. is still Canada’s largest trade partner, and there is a lot at stake for the economies of both countries.

If dispatching American troops to the border with Canada makes Americans feel safer, so be it.  I doubt it very much if Canada would react in kind, particularly given that our armed forces have better things to do with their limited resources. Indeed, American troops may help to keep some gun smugglers from entering into Canada, given that the vast majority of illegal weapons have their origin in the States. Stopping access to guns by Canadian criminal elements is by far a much bigger issue for Canada.