Official Canada has been losing it’s collectivist mind over Donald Trump since before he ever won the 2016 presidential election. Some Canadians seem to think we should attack him on every front. Writers like Scott Gilmore at Macleans have called for using the Magnitsky act type provisions to freeze Trump’s assets.
It’s a load of crap and hyperbole.
Anyone that thinks we can win a trade war with the United States is fooling themselves. As Lorne Gunter points out, their economy is growing at 4% while ours was just downgraded to an expected 1.5% growth rate. The Americans have record unemployment, a huge investment in jobs, machinery and infrastructure.
We do not.
There is also the fact that we export about 76% of all of our exports to the US while they export 18% of their goods to us. Notice the imbalance? Dollar wise the trade is similar, as a proportion of the total economy it isn’t even close.
So how should Canada be handling Trump?
Well until recently I actually thought Trudeau and his cabinet were doing a good job in a bad situation. Even Trump supporters need to admit that he is erratic and temperamental.
But then before the G7 things started to go badly. There was the leaking to CNN’s Jim Acosta of a story designed to make Trump look bad. There were the childish antics of presenting Trump with a photo of his grandfather’s first hotel, in Canada, often dubbed a brothel by Trump’s critics. And Chrystia Freeland referred to Trump to Hitler in the New York Times.
Then of course there was Trump’s infamous blow up on Air Force One, threatening more tariffs on Canada. We’ve since learned that Trump was reacting to him granting Trudeau what he wanted in a meeting only to see Trudeau attack Trump in his closing news conference at the G7.
So how should Canada handle Trump?
I know some Canadians want to shut the border, boycott American goods, enter into an all out trade war with the U.S. None of those are realistic of feasible ideas.
My friend and regular guest on my radio show Geoffrey Johnston want to tone things down. Not a bad idea.
In his latest column for the Kingston Whig-Standard, Geoffrey suggests that Canada can inflict significant pain the U.S. economy. Yet on the radio he suggested that we take the negotiations away from Trump and Trudeau and down to the high level bureaucrats.
In a normal presidency, I would agree. With Trump, he has the final say on any issue that grabs his attention and right now, that would be trade with Canada.
My suggestion is use our current greatest asset, Trudeau’s ability to charm Trump should be engaged.
While we disagree on some points, we agree that we need to take the Canada-U.S. relationship seriously. Listen to what an impassioned but respectful debate on politics can sound like.
Canada’s Foreign Minister Christina Freeland frames the trade dispute in terms of an existential struggle between the forces of good vs. evil. In an interview with NY Times (published June 9), she compares Trump to Hitler and the populist voters to ignoramuses who supported Hitler. In the interview she quotes Hitler as saying: “I will tell you what has carried me to the position I have reached. Our political problems appeared complicated. The German people could make nothing of them. … I, on the other hand … reduced them to the simplest terms. The masses realized this and followed me.” Freeland then makes the comparison: “How do you attract voters and public support compared with the flashiness of exciting, chaotic, fact-ignoring populism? The reason Hitler won was because all of the other politicians were giving complicated and difficult explanations about difficult things. Hitler just told people simple things that they wanted to hear.”
On June 13, just days after the NY Times interview is published, Freeland is awarded the Diplomat of the year Award. (These people have no shame.). She gives another speech at the award ceremony inferring that Trump is a totalitarian who must be stood up to. Her most revealing comment is: “And within the club of wealthy Western democracies, we’re seeing homegrown anti-democratic movements on the rise. Whether comprising neo-Nazis, white supremacists, “incels,” nativists or radical anti-globalists, such movements seek to undermine democracy from within.”
Freeland makes no mention of the alt-left SJWs and the Antifa forces. Why? Why does she not call them out? Because she thinks these forces are democratic on the side of good? It’s more like Freeland is a globalist of the Soros ilk, determined to take Trump down. And so she gets the Diplomat of the Year award as Canada’s Foreign Minister who is dragging Canadians into a trade war for her ideological beliefs.