The Editor,
Re. "Nexen deal good for our economy" (Face to Face, The Tri-City News, Sept. 28).
I am disturbed by the approach advocated by Face to Face columnist Andy Radia. Like most right-wing thinkers, his whole outlook seems to be the quarterly report-view and what is good for the "economy."
It is this approach that has brought about the mess we are in today. Why does China have all this cash that allows them to go on buying company after company abroad? Because we let it happen by buying the cheap and sometimes tainted junk produced there under incredible conditions, in the process putting our own companies out of business. Its high time we stopped that.
Canada should not be looking at what is good for the "economy" (meaning "well-connected shareholders") but at what is good for the country because, in the end, this will end up being good for our economy as a whole.
As Face to Face columnist Jim Nelson points out, we should take an example from Norway. We should stop listening to the doom-and-gloom prophets who fear the withdrawal of the companies. Where are they going to go? They cannot take our resources with them, so they will stay.
Instead of throwing our resources at them, we need to make them pay for the privilege of extracting them. Imagine what that would do to the economy of this country.
M. Guenther, Port Coquitlam
