I remember a few weeks back how when Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin made the decision to not support Bush's BMD plan, the howl from the Canadian media and pundits was almost unanimous: Martin was either wrong to back out of BMD, or he was scorned for how he dithered before he finally reacted to the issue. (He originally was for being in the talks 2 year ago.. but has slowly backed away from that position)
Well, Canadians do not apparently share the views of the pundits... In fact, they massively give Martin a big "thumbs-up" for his stance.
About 57 per cent of Canadians supported Martin's decision and only 26 per cent were opposed, according to a Decima Inc. poll obtained by The Canadian Press.
Martin gets thumbs-up on missiles stance
Decima's poll says that virtually every political constituency you can name - young people, older people, women, men, urban and rural dwellers, people living in different provinces, Liberal Party Supporters, Bloc Quebecois and NDP Party Supporters - a majority approved of Martin's stance.
The only group that did not? As you might guess, it would be Conservative Party supporters - and even then, a sizable minority (35%) supported Martin's decision. I must also note that even in Alberta - the province that is the Conservative's main bastion of support - while it had the most people opposed to Martin's decision in the provinces, a majority (50%) supported him, while only 35% opposed it.
I've seen a few Canadian Conservative supporters on some Canadian blog sites assert that a silent majority of Canadians would support BMD talks... and if they didnt agree with it,they'd at least respect Conservative leader Stephen Harper for being firm on the issue while Martin dithered. (Sorta sounds like the Bush line, doesnt it?)
This is apparently the logic that caused Harper to state that if a Conservative government were elected in the next election, he would immediately re-join BMD talks with the US.
These poll results would fly in the face of those assertions.. I welcome Harper trying to use this as an election issue.. It insures he loses further support among the Canadian public
Update [2005-3-22 21:49:9 by tribe34]: Slightly off-topic, but I've added this just because I just love this clip, and because this guy was constantly harping at us about how we lost our soverignty by refusing to join BMD: please check out Canadian comedian Rick Mercer's skit on former US Ambassador Paul Cellucci's departure from Canada on his show 'Monday Report'
The Paul Cellucci Departure Tribute