When Barack Obama visited Canada back in 2009, he was at the height of his popularity at home. But his domestic polling ratings were dwarfed by the stratospheric support levels for the newly-installed President north of the border. Indeed, in his chit-chat with Governor-General Michaëlle Jean in Ottawa, Mr. Obama joked that if things turned sour for him at home, he could always get elected in Canada.
To say things have turned sour for the President at home would be an understatement: in a recent USA Today Gallup poll, Mr. Obama’s approval rating stood at 41 per cent. Though no one should count out the Democrats in November, or Mr. Obama in 2012, here in Canada there is still no doubt that he could still sweep to electoral victory — notwithstanding his Administration’s decision to proceed with the trial of Omar Khadr.
Still, reporting of the trial may remind Canadians that there are still 176 men held in custody at Guantanamo, eight months after the President’s self-imposed deadline for closing the camp. Though the process put in effect by the Bush Administration has been modified, the fact of the matter is that the trial is being conducted before a military commission with jurors drawn from the ranks of American troops. And, while the prosecution of Mr. Khadr has been condemned by Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, the Obama Administration demonstrably does not accept the argument that it has no right under the laws of war to try someone who was a juvenile when he allegedly threw a grenade that killed a U.S. medic.
In Canadian reporting of the Khadr case, much too has been made of the Obama Administration’s unhappiness at having to proceed with the trial; notably, the reporting has been bereft of spokespersons willing to speak on the record. Moreover, had Mr. Obama given even the least signal to Prime Minister Stephen Harper that he would welcome a request for Mr. Khadr’s repatriation, it’s inconceivable that Canada would have insisted that the trial go forward. Absent such a request, it would have been inconceivable for the government to make such a request on the basis of the refrain “A Canadian is a Canadian is a Canadian.” Not of an Administration in which Harold Koh, the legal adviser to the State Department — reported to be at the centre of opposition to trying Omar Khadr — has justified the targeted assassination of U.S. citizens in these terms:
"Some have argued that the use of lethal force against specific individuals fails to provide adequate process and thus constitutes unlawful extrajudicial killing. But a state that is engaged in an armed conflict or in legitimate self-defense is not required to provide targets with legal process before the state may use lethal force."
I don’t know whether Mr. Obama’s standing in Canada will decline in the coming weeks. But the Khadr trial does provide a good opportunity for Canadians to consider differences between our country and the United States — differences that can’t all be put down to the incumbency of George W. Bush, as was the tendency in much of our public discourse for most of the past decade.
