When former Conservative finance minister Michael Wilson arrived in Washington three years ago to take up his post as Canada's ambassador, he had an underling arrange a couple of meet-and-greet receptions for some U.S. opinion leaders the embassy thought were worth cultivating.

Wilson had a banner made up for the occasion and positioned himself in front of it to make a little speech on the special relationship Canada and the U.S. enjoy.

"Partners In The War On Terror," it proclaimed.

In this May 1, 2003, file photo, President Bush declares the end of major combat in Iraq as he speaks aboard the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln off the California coast. (J.Scott Applewhite/Associated Press)

In that banner was Canada's message: don't worry, we've signed up. We're with you. Your enemies are our enemies. We're on board. Hoo-ah.

This week, I sent a simple question to Wilson's people at the Canadian embassy here: "Is Canada still a partner in the war on terror?"

The embassy's reply: "The question does not warrant a response."

Because as Michael Wilson and everybody else here knows, the "war on terror" is no longer a phrase to be used in correct Washington company. It is in bad odour. A brutish thing from the past. An ex-slogan. Dead as Monty Python's Norwegian Blue parrot.

The notice went out

The death of the Bush administration's signature slogan was first announced in an internal memo from Barack Obama's White House last month: "This administration prefers to avoid using the term 'Global War On Terror (GWOT),'" the directive advised workers at the Pentagon.

A few days later, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton confirmed GWOT's demise to reporters, but offered no explanation for the change. "I think that speaks for itself, obviously," was all she would say.

Meanwhile, a senior adviser in the office of Prime Minister Stephen Harper in Ottawa (the same PMO that provided ambassador Wilson with his talking points here three years ago) confirmed the changed state of affairs: "Hillary's answer is the best one," he told me. "It's fairly obvious and no one is interested in commenting past that."

But a Canadian diplomat allowed himself to be teased out a little further on the subject. The phrase was never terribly popular with some Canadians anyway, he allowed.

But, he noted: "Rarely is Canada the creator of the bumper sticker. We went along with it, as did (then British prime minister Tony) Blair, (then Australian prime minister John) Howard, and (then French interior minister Nicolas) Sarkozy. Which means we were in good company."

Eye of the beholder

Both the PMO guy and the diplomat stressed that slogans like these are transitory in any event and ultimately meaningless.

For example, they observed, nobody ever talks anymore about Newt Gingrich's "Contract With America," or George Bush Sr.'s "Thousand Points of Light," or Bill Clinton's "Bridge to Tomorrow." All evaporated with the political fog of their day.

True enough. But the difference here is that none of those little jingles came with a threat attached. As GWOT certainly did.

When he coined the term following the events of Sept. 11, 2001, George W. Bush told the world that, where this war was concerned, you were either with the United States or you were with the terrorists.

Now, some pointed out at the time that a real war on terror was going to be an awfully complicated thing, because terror is a rather fluid term, which nations tend to define according to their own national interest.

Taken together, the world community's list of terrorist groups is endless and sometimes even a tad hypocritical.

China, for example, has labelled Tibetan monks and Falun Gong practitioners terrorists. A few years ago, Britain denounced the 1946 bombing of Jerusalem's King David Hotel by Jewish extremists as "an act of terrorism." (Benjamin Netahyahu, now Israel's prime minister, had just praised it as "a great operation" carried out by "fighters for freedom.")

Back in the 1980s, the U.S. government affixed the freedom fighter label to the murderous anti-Communist insurgents in Central America as well as to the bearded Taliban, at least during that Cold War period when they were playing polo with the severed heads of Russian soldiers

Hoo-ah

But in the aftermath of 9/11, George W. Bush and his top officials made it clear they considered all such arguments about terror to be relativist drivel.

Their war on terror spoke for itself. They were prepared, in the words of Dick Cheney, to "go over to the dark side" to conduct it and, if countries like Canada wished to continue lucrative and friendly relations with Washington, well, they had better get with the program.

Inevitably, of course, it became clear that this war, like the definition of terrorism itself, would be selective. The enemy was usually Arab and almost always Muslim.

Bush's administration defined an international conspiracy and came up with a term to knit the disparate enemy: "Islamofascism." (A term that could also be applied to some of Washington's staunchest allies in the Middle East.)

Ultimately, Bush invaded a country that had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks, killing tens of thousands, and described it as the "central front in the war on terror."

Then he was gone and so was his war. Though not entirely.

The new regime in Washington has shown an unhesitating willingness to attack the people who actually did support and plan the 9/11 attacks by beefing up American forces in Afghanistan and allowing drone missile attacks in Pakistan.

Obama is also allowing the CIA to kidnap and assassinate al-Qaeda leaders whenever possible.

But there is no more of this high-stakes, worldwide Islamofascism talk. Quite the opposite, in fact.

Obama is now trying to persuade the Muslim world that this clash of civilizations business is just not on and he's been apologizing for what he calls America's "arrogance."

Canada's view on all this?

We're with you. We're there. We're on board. Hoo-ah.

As our diplomat put it, with a barely subdued grin: "We are partners in what Barack Obama no longer calls the war on terror."