1 North American country?

[3.4 slow to go]

http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate...d/11999447.htm

hard on radio last night about a plan to basically expand borders to Canadas north border, and Mexicos' southern border. I'm trying to verify the story, or nix it, but supposedly it started w/a bbq out in tx w/Mr. Bush & the Canexican crew. Think NAFTA to an extreme, a European Union involving the US, Canada, and Mexico.

Just a rumor. Maybe somene should snopes it.

[Skapimp]

http://www.spp.gov/

more info.

[andrew.brandon]

I think the basic idea is a step in the right direction if not for the security reasons then for the possibly ecnomic ones. kinda gives off that no borders on earth in the future vibe like you see in sci fi movies. but you will run into a tremendus hurdle with a functioning goverment. it would almost need to be set up like the UN is today. and we can see how inefficent that can be sometimes. but thats my $.02

[96RS Alex]

We already have a real threat and that is China. They are in a bidding war for Unocal, an American fuel/oil refinery corp. Economically, I'd say this was forseen a long time ago during the Clinton administration and then NAFTA was born. Makes sense to compete with 1 billion Chinese who are well up on their way to a prosperous and booming economy. Optimistically, this is good for business as I seen a report for example about Burger King establishing their 1st franchise there to capture sales vs McDonalds. In the long run however, this superpower is ramping up their military inventory to unseen heights and that has many in Congress concerned. I hope that we as a world can co-exist w/ no problems but all this competition is spelling out incredible and radical change for the future of the USA. Chinas oil consumption will outstrip our needs very very soon if not 20 yrs from now. I hope the US is prepared to unleash new technologies aimed at fuel conservation & we desperately need it. Scary times I would say.

[V6Bob]

The joker in these alliances is how much power gets transferred from the individual nations to the joint alliance. The European Union is continually thrashing that issue. Trade/travel between EU countries is pretty much an EU function, military is mostly run by individual nations. A lot of stuff is somewhere in between.

[Everglades W68]

I highly doubt it would ever come to pass.

Canada is far too different and rightly proud of their sovereign nation. As far as Mexico, we can't get over the hurdles to make Puerto Rico a state, much less a giant nation like Mexico that has many of the same issues (and more) on a much bigger scale.

On a side note, the EU lately has been seeing their union beginning to unravel a bit and talk has increased lately about major European countries re-issuing their own currencies in place of the Euro.

[3.4 slow to go]

how well is our border protection doing? pretty much nonexistant already.

[speedracer95v6]

I rather think we should consolidate our governments into a very large federal organization. I mean hell, get rid of border security in the north completely (thus freeing man power to watch the ports, etc.) and in the south focus on the central american border...which is kinda small...and the ports, etc. as well.

It would be awesome for Mexico in particular, because with a strong (very strong) central government with a massive military to back up police, crime would drop there and with total free trade and movement the standard of living would rise there.

I personally would like to see a united western hemisphere, but that might take a little longer.

If there is stable regional government (basically continental here and split regions in eurasia/africa), it would be much easier to form a global government. That's what we need to straighten a lot of crap out. Would eliminate wars at least. I mean hell, with no one to fight we could focus on defending Earth from whoever (whenever they decide to attack...war of the worlds has me paranoid).