Basic HTML Version
.
PAGE 10
PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, JUNE 24, 1986
I'm a mailman and I see your literature coming through. I read
it but I'd like to receive my own.
(Memphis, TN)
I need to reorder some back issues of your magazines because
the mailman was so interested and asked so many questions, I
gave him mine!
(Harrisburg, PA)
I work in the post office and as I was sorting the mail an ad
for the booklet
.
•ooes God Exist?• caught my eye.
It had a
phone number on it, so I thought, Why not call?•
(Chicopee, MA)
--Richard Rice, Mail Processing Center
ON THE WORLD SCENE
U.S.-CANADA •TIFF•--oR RIFT?: SOUTHERN AFRICA'S EMERGENCY:
PASSING OF AN ERA
o.s.-Canada •Tiff•--or Rift?
Ominous trends usually start small, the
1
•mustard seed" principle holding true. With this in mind, we may someday
!
look back to a day in May, 1986 when the United States suddenly imposed a
U
S per cent tariff on the importation of Canadian cedar roofing materials
s the start of something big.
Canada's stunned Prime Minister Brian
Mulroney called the action •bizarre• and instructed his government to
respond with hiked tariffs on sales of American books, magazines and some
omputer components.
(
Mr.
Mulroney was well aware of the politics behind the American action •
. ·
He knew the U.S. move was taken because of charges in the U.S. Congress
1 that the Reagan administration was not doing enough to protect U.S.
ndustries affected by imports� But Washington's action played into the
hands of Mulroney's critics who have charged that he has been too pro-
American in his policies.
Indeed he and Mr. Reagan had enjoyed a warm
elationship, seeing eye-to-eye on a number of issues from economic policy
o North American defense matters.
Vice President George Bush was dispatched to Ottawa to try to heal the
rift. But he only made things worse when he not only said the Reagan
administration would not back down on the roofing materials case, but he
referred to the entire matter as only a "tiff.•
The eruption of the mini-trade war comes at an awkward time. Both nations
had been discussing implementation of a free trade agreement, now very
much clouded. In fact, the free trade proposal, which would amount to a
virtually open-border economy, is viewed by
Mr.
Mulroney's political
opposition, and many Canadians in general, as a serious threat to Canadian
sovereignty and uniqueness. "Are we to become nothing other than America's
51st state?" is a common question.
·
/what is clearly at stake
/:� Y two countries in the
( rld' s most successful
is the closest economic relationship enjoyed by
world. Canada and the
u:s.
have developed the
common market, exchanging an incredible $116