When There's A Slow News Day...
....you gotta go with whatever you can get and this one will do. The headline is the story:
Canada wins food fight with U.S.
I wonder who had to clean up afterwards. Personally, I'd have sent both to their rooms - without supper.
I'll wait until I see whether the U.S. appeals before I go "Nah, Nah, Nah, Nah, Nah, Nah!"
Canada wins food fight with U.S.
I wonder who had to clean up afterwards. Personally, I'd have sent both to their rooms - without supper.
I'll wait until I see whether the U.S. appeals before I go "Nah, Nah, Nah, Nah, Nah, Nah!"
Labels: humor, I've got too much time on my hands, trivia, you can't make this shit up
posted by Louise at 8:05 pm
2 Comments:
Speaking as one Yank who buys a lot of Canajun products -beer, maple syrup, and I presume I've consumed a lot of Canajun meat and grains over the years, no doubt much other stuff, I don't keep track- I don't see what the problem is with requiring a "Product of ______" or "Made in ______" label.
I like to know where I'm buying from. I won't buy any Chinese food products (no effective consumer protections and the less money spent in China, the better for the US). I've stopped eating pistachio products (almost all pistachios sold in the US are from Iran and, as with China, I don't like doing business with enemy nations).
Neither I nor anyone I know has any problem with Canadian exports to the US. Believe it or not, the vast majority of Americans have a very positive view of Canada and Canadians. A plurality of Americans are also aware of the enormous, mutually beneficial bilateral trade between our nations.
I don't see why a simple labeling requirement should bother any reasonable person. Of course "reasonable" leaves out those tiresome, reflexively anti-American Canadians. Now about those Canadian content broadcast quota requirements, when Hollywood can produce programming just as well...
The "problem", as described in the article is:
"...the U.S. rule created unnecessary paperwork and additional red tape. Industry groups say the rules have cost Canadian ranchers millions with their products being discriminated against in U.S. markets.
It required U.S. packers to track and notify customers of the origin of meat and certain other agricultural products at every stage of production, including retail.
In effect, Canada argued in a complaint filed in late 2008, the rules forced U.S. processors to segregate Canadian animals and meat, leading some processors to shun Canadian products due to extra costs.
The Canadian Cattlemen’s Association — calling itself “extremely pleased” by the WTO ruling — estimated that the U.S. regulations devalued Canadian cattle by $100 a head, an association spokesperson said Friday.
The United States remains Canada’s biggest foreign market for cattle and hogs.
Compared to volumes of three years ago, Canadian cattle shipments to the United States are down by more than half so far this year and hog exports are down 40 per cent."
Red tape and bureaucracy costs, and even American livestock producers opposed it:
"The 215-page WTO report said the U.S. regulations did not qualify as consumer labelling with regard to origin and therefore violated trade rules.
U.S. meat processors, who also bore extra costs due to the regulations, expressed support for the WTO ruling as well.
“We’ve contended for years in statements, letters and comments that this law was not just costly and cumbersome but a violation of our country’s WTO obligations,” American Meat Institute president Patrick Boyle said in an email statement.
The U.S. National Pork Producers Council opposed the regulations from the beginning, because the costs outweighed the benefits, said council president Doug Wolf.
The United States would be wise to comply with the ruling, he said, or risk “retaliation from and a trade war with Canada and Mexico.”"
"Neither I nor anyone I know has any problem with Canadian exports to the US. Believe it or not, the vast majority of Americans have a very positive view of Canada and Canadians."
I guess I'm visiting the wrong American blogs, then. Some of the things that some of the commenters say about Canada and Canadians hurt my feewings.
There's a huge amount of misinformation and "wide brush" painting on display. They think we're all leftards. For example, Canada's acceptance of draft-dodgers from the Viet Nam war era still sticks in their craw, but they seem totally oblivious to the fact that due to our allegiance to the US, Canadians were dieing in Afghanistan. The Viet Nam war was over a long time ago. Maybe they're pissed off by Jean Chretien's decision to stay out of Iraq, too, but that was a decision that pissed me off, too. (In fact the whole LPoC approach to our armed forces annoyed me. We're "peacekeepers", you know, and Yanks are war mongers.)
I also don't like seeing comments from Canadians on the same blogs that amount to grovelling. Pisses me off. But I try to ignore it and let it roll off my back. One can have loyalty and pride in being Canadian without dissing the USA, but nor does it mean one has to grovel and lick ass. There seems to be a shortage of the happy middle.
(You touched a nerve.)
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