text: Many of the writer's suggestions are valid and should certainly be explored. If Canada is expending funds that are not appropriately assigned as defence spending they should be re-assigned correctly. 
  
  Some people, (good people ? :-) ), are suggesting that Canada can argue that it does not need to increase defence spending to the 2%  because we are active in NATO and do the "difficult" jobs. This argument is fine until the next "Iraq" comes along. It would be difficult, after making such an argument, to decline involvement in the way that Cretien did.  Far better to retain our full independence in decision-making and pony up our "fair" share. This poses financial problems of course, since our PM has already racked up the deficit to $30 billion.