RE: Is there a Parallel?? llahsram, you asked,
"Why, too, you might ask, can't Canadian businessmen be the acquirers, not the sellers."
Good question! I looked it up in Wikipedia:
"Since the 1980s, Canada's levels of investment and ownership in foreign companies have been larger than foreign investment and ownership in Canada. In some smaller countries, such as Montenegro, Canadian investment is sizable enough to make up a major portion of the economy. In the British province of Northern Ireland, for example, Canada is the largest foreign investor. By becoming foreign owners themselves, Canadians have become far less politically concerned about investment within Canada."
So it seems that we aren't as backward as we think.