This morning we watched a short documentary produced by Democracy Now! It revealed that three of their most accomplished journalists, including the host Amy Goodman, were arrested and charged with felonies at the Republican Convention last week.

Why should we be concerned, here in Canada, in Cumberland, in particular, with all the US election hoopla, the oil wars, the crackdown on citizens rights in the US? The answer is quite simple. Our government has been controlled by the same forces that are in control in the States. Harper, as well as PMs in the past, have received their marching orders from the White House, and our health, economic, agricultural, and military policies are being "harmonized" with those south of our border, as we speak.

Does it alarm you that our citizens may soon be subjected to the same paramilitary troops as the people in the States? Would you allow the use of voting machines in the next election after finding the statistics on voting fraud in nearly every precinct in America? Does it concern you that our own troops are dying while defending American oil interests, and you have been told it is all about taking down the Taliban? Does it not horrify you to hear Harper claim that Canada does not practice torture, when it is clear that an innocent man was tortured for information in Canada's "care".

Do we not see the results of media censorship in this country? Are you aware that there is a surveillance camera at every intersection in Courtenay? Ready to watch anything the authorities deem neccessary to watch. Movements of citizens. Movements of the press. If you think that the degradation of the Bill of Rights in the United States does not concern us, consider the effect that Nazi Germany had on the surrounding countries in Europe.

It is much later than you think.