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Great news! In the happy near future,
people with AIDS are no longer to be
automatically barred from Canada. Not
that they are now, really. Refugees, who
are mostly phony, already get the green
light. So do relatives of
"Canadians" already here. But
now "the last barrier" is
coming down, just like for women in
submarines.
Let's send the news to South Africa,
where it is said that about 20 per cent
of the black population is HIV-positive.
I mean, we must maintain our reputation
for liberal thought and action, and I
liked Immigration Minister Elinor
Caplan's comment that "we can't
shrink-wrap our borders". That
would never do.
Not to be outdone, Health Minister
Allan Rock said the idea was to
eliminate the stigma that too often
attaches to those living with HIV.
Just the kind of health minister we
need. Dr. Rock also assures us that the
disease is not transmitted through
casual contact, and that its spread can
be slowed down.
There we see the power of positive
thinking. Pity it can't be applied to
TB, though, which is on the up and up
(another cause for rejoicing). According
to doctors here in British Columbia at
least fifty per cent of cases result
from immigrants who either came in with
it or have kindly donated it to the
locals.
Cost? Don't be mean-spirited,
although I see from the public prints
that in 1997 Health Canada predicted
that AIDS would cost our economy $22.2
billion in the following five years, and
that the bill for each case involves
indirect costs of $600,000 over a
lifetime. Not much, considering the joy
we can bring to the world by letting in
a few thousand more AIDS sufferers.
Our national motto should be changed
from Sea to Sea, to Our Door Is Always
Open, which used to be the fashion in
labor disputes. Today we are laboring to
give it real meaning.
Consider: homosexuals, who now rule
the roost (if I may use that
expression), and can get in (if I may
use that expression, too) by claiming
that the police in their country don't
like them.
Refugees? Teenagers can now be
accepted as refugees by claiming that
their daddies didn't love them. Parental
abuse, and all that. A "first"
for our refugee system, it has been
announced with pride.
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Terrorists are especially welcome.
According to the Toronto police about
eight thousand Tamil terrorists are on
the loose in that city. Not to mention
the guys who come in here en route to
the U.S. with the intention of blowing
up a few buildings. In the spirit of
anti-racism, which is always good, they
can even get Canadian cabinet ministers
to attend their banquets.
And I especially liked the picture of
a grinning Sri Lankan who applied for
refugee status in Montreal "because
Canada is the best country for
refugees". He was later arrested
for being a high-ranking terrorist
leader. Never mind, plenty of lawyers
paid for by the beaming Canadian
taxpayer will be helping him in court
over the next three years or so.
Ordinary criminals are also welcome,
and have been for years. But now we get
headlines that read, "Immigration
system unfair to criminals, court
rules." Yes, ever mindful or our
welfare the federal court has ruled that
a guy who had been convicted of drug
trafficking and robbery and numerous
other crimes couldn't be sent back to
Guyana.
An author in Toronto who has written
ten books on the subject told a police
convention recently that Canada is a
welcome wagon for undesirables and a
free market for the underworld, with 18
major criminal syndicates operating
across the country.
That's the stuff. Canada cares!
And as we all know now, we wouldn't
dream of sending murderers back to their
own jurisdictions if they face the death
penalty. That what our Supremos in the
highest court in the land say we
wouldn't dream of doing, anyway.
But here an awkward thought occurs to
me. Suppose Timothy McVeigh had been
smart enough to slip over the border to
Canada instead of waiting around for the
FBI to pick him up.
Would he have found sanctuary here,
just like hiding in a church in medieval
times? True, he wiped out 168 men, women
and children, but principle is
principle, you know, and justice is
always blind. Or as the Caplan girl
says, we can't shrink-wrap our borders.
Spies? We love them, too, judging
from a court decision that questioned
whether a Chinese student who was spying
on other students for Peking was really
a danger to Canadian security.
The 20th. century was supposed to
belong to Canada. In the 21st century
Canada belongs to the world. AIDS and
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