In Ireland, a familiar story on on refugees

Canadians like to boast about being a country of immigrants and refugees, but our bragging rights only go so far.

- MARTIN REGG COHN

Rows of tents sit outside the International Protection Office in Dublin last month. An influx of migration to Ireland has ratcheted up economic and political pressures in a country that, like Canada, prides itself on laying out the welcome mat, Martin Regg Cohn writes.

Take a look around.

Much of our moral superiority derives from looking down on the increasingly coarse political discourse of Americans. We reflexively turn our noses up at seeming U.S. paranoia over illegal migrants and fantasies of building a border wall.

But at the first sign of surging migration — legal or illegal — Canadians can get their backs up faster than anyone.

The latest controversy over abuses of student visas and work permits serves a reminder that we can be sticklers for rules no less than others. And let’s not forget the furor over unauthorized border crossings at Roxham Road, until Ottawa persuaded Washington to close the Canada-U.S. gap last year.

Yet even these occasional flashpoints consume us, rising to the top of our news cycle. Imagine how much more vexed and obsessed Canadians would be if not for our unrivalled geographical isolation, which shields us from the crises that unavoidably preoccupy others.

Set aside the border with Mexico for a moment. Consider instead the Mediterranean and the English Channel, which link all of Europe to all of Africa and the Middle East — tempting countless boat people to risk drowning as they escape old miseries for new opportunities.