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If you live in the Detroit area, as I do, Canadian border issues are as much of a concern as U.S. ones.
Yesterday, trucks were backed up for hours at the Detroit/Windsor, Canada border because some Canadian Border Guards went on sort of a strike, walking off the job at the bridge and tunnel that links the two international cities. The reason they went on strike had nothing to do with money. It was much more important.
Canadian Border Guards are unarmed. They want to be able to carry guns, but, for now, they are only permitted to carry batons and pepper spray. Here in the states, our Customs and Border Protection officers are armed, as they should be–and as their Canadian counterparts should be, too.
Being a border guard is not a 100% safe proposition. There are a plethora of reasons the Canadian Border Guards deserve to carry guns. So, I’m glad they went on strike. It’s a matter of their own safety, when, say, an armed, extremist Muslim wants in to their country, and all they have to show in response is pepper spray, like some silly character on “Sex & the City.” They deserve better.
The guns are just the latest in a series of problems exposed by Canadian Border Guards in Canada’s National Post–problems that show Canada simply isn’t serious about combating terrorism (this isn’t new; it took the country forever to recognize that Hezbollah is a terrorist group).
Instead of ferreting out terrorists, they are pushed by the Canadian Government to let in more people, more quickly at the borders. Customs and Border Protection officers here in the U.S. say that is the same fact of life for them.
It’s time for both the U.S. and Canada to start getting tough, or we will both lose our countries to foreign invasion.