Wednesday, October 21, 2015

Elections matter

An example of how elections matter: yesterday, Canada elected a new government. And today, its pulling out of the US bombing campaign against Iraq and Syria:
Canadian Liberal prime minister designate Justin Trudeau has confirmed that Canada will withdraw its fighter jets from the US-led mission against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.

In his first news conference following the sweeping majority Liberal victory in Canada’s federal election, the visibly fatigued leader said he had spoken with US president Barack Obama in a phone call during which he discussed his intention to pull Canada’s fighter jets out of the anti-Isis campaign.

[...]

He did not set out a timeline for the withdrawal. Canada currently has six CF-18 fighter jets taking part in the US-led bombing campaign. They were due to remain in the region until March 2016.


Good. And hopefully they'll stay out. Meanwhile, it seems the trick is to force political candidates to make foreign policy commitments, so they can then be held to them.