Report offers 'User's guide' to a new Canada-U.S. trade deal

A day before Prime Minister Stephen Harper is set to meet U.S. President Barack Obama at the White House, the Canadian Defence & Foreign Affairs Institute has released a report on the potential future of the bilateral relationship.

The report (embedded below) by former diplomat Colin Robertson argues that in order to create "smart growth and jobs" in a post-NAFTA Canada, progress must be made in three key areas: "a common security perimeter, a rationalized regulatory regime that reduces red tape and a compatible approach to the stewardship and development of resources." That last area includes a common approach to tackling climate change.

His report, titled 'Now for the Hard Part': A User's Guide to Renewing the Canadian-American Partnership, then goes on to lay out a "plan of action" - both a way of getting things done but also what Robertson expects will actually happen, based on his research into what has been written and said on both sides of the border in recent decades.

The report envisions a much closer Canada-U.S. "partnership" than some Canadians might be prepared to accept.

http://www.cbc.ca/politics/insidepolitics/2011/02/report-offers-users-guide-to-renewing-canada-us-relationship.html

Remove our oil exports and there is no benefit to Canada from the NAFTA agreement. Without NAFTA we would still be selling all we can produce. Never mind lumber.

But that is what we want.