We've always been here Steve. Where have you been?

Scott picked up on this Halifax Daily News editorial from yesterday, repeated in the Star, which questions the angle offered by Harper that somehow Canada is back on the world stage as a major player.

Stephen Harper conveyed a robust and somewhat self-congratulatory message to the country during his Canada Day address on Sunday.

"The news is spreading throughout the world: Canada's back," the Prime Minister said on Parliament Hill. "Canada's back as a vital player on the global stage."

Really? When did we ever go away?

It's not as though the missions in Afghanistan and Haiti began during the watch of Harper's Conservative government. The Conservatives inherited those deployments from the Liberals.

In short, Harper is taking credit for something he didn't do. He is also suggesting that Canada has not been present, or had lost its credibility, in international affairs.

That, of course, is an outright falsehood. What he describes as being a "vital player on the global stage" is, in fact, a sucking up to the worst US presidential administration in history.

Harper's view of being present on the global stage is myopic. He limits the scope of global effectiveness to having troops deployed, (and being killed), and acting as a water-carrier for US foreign policy, the likes of which the majority of that country's own population disagrees with.

Canada, the international player, had developed a strong reputation as an honest broker on the global stage with no interventionist agenda and no imperialist tendencies. Harper's rhetoric diminishes that standing and ignores the occasions in which Canada played a major role in critical diplomatic events.

Pulling one of those events out at random, the change of sovereignty of Hong Kong was almost derailed over the issue of a Court of Final Appeal in that former British colony. Had it not been for the direct actions of the Canadian High Commissioner at the time, Garrett Lambert, the entire process of returning Hong Kong to the Chinese, something both Britain and China wanted, was destined to go sideways. At issue was the establishment of protection and 50 years worth of insulation of Hong Kongese from the politically influenced Supreme Court of China. Lambert saved the day, although he never sought credit for his actions and, until recently, no one has ever asked about it.

Lambert was a senior diplomat, who turned down a posting as ambassador to Australia in 1994 in favour of the more junior post of high commissioner to Hong Kong. He knew it would be the centre of world attention until July 1, 1997 when China took over and that's where he wanted to be.

To understand how Lambert was able to salvage an independent high court for Hong Kong, one has to recall the immense influence Canada wielded at the time in the former British colony.

This is the world stage from which Harper suggests Canada was absent.

In fact, Harper may have it exactly backward. Given that he believes and promotes the concept that global recognition comes only when Canada has a presence on foreign soil with troops staring down rifle sights, and to support any number of unpopular Bush administration foreign policy flops, Canada may actually have a long row to hoe to regain a position of respect among world players. Harper has hitched his wagon exclusively to the globally maligned Bush star.

We will have to work hard to crawl out from under that pile.