Summary
Mark Carney, frontrunner for Canadian Liberal Party leadership and potential prime minister, stated Canada will stand up to a bully after Trump imposed 25% tariffs on Canadian imports.
Carney vowed to retaliate by matching the US tariffs dollar for dollar, asserting Canada would not cave in despite mounting pressure.
He criticized Trump for undermining trade agreements, warning that the tariffs would damage the US global reputation and economic stability.
Outgoing Prime Minister Trudeau promised a forceful, immediate response, emphasizing unity as Canada defends its economic interests, ensuring national prosperity.
Good on Canada and Mexico for sticking to their guns and not rolling over for Trump. Show him that winning trade wars isn’t as easy as he likes to think it is, and then force him into favorable terms when he implodes his own economy.
This isn’t a bully, our organizations and institutions are under attack from an unelected billionaire who bought the president while he was still a candidate. This is a coup by neo Nazis. We are fucked and they will start a war with you.
God I hate trade wars, but good on Canada for not rolling over for Trump.
I mean honestly, what’s the alternative?
This is basic game theory as far as I can see.
I really really hope they continue resisting. My biggest fear is everyone gives him what he wants and the idiots I’m surrounded by cheer his victory.
the idiots I’m surrounded by cheer his victory.
That’s kinda the American way, sadly.
“Matching the US tariffs dollar for dollar” is such a stupid policy.
A better policy would be stopping flows of Canadian dollars to the US. Declare that US patents are no longer valid in Canada. Pass a law requiring that Apple and Google allow competing app stores on their phones with no strings attached. Remove any penalty from jailbreaking phones and allow anybody who wants to sell jailbreaking kits. Declare a universal right to repair in Canada, so that Canadian farmers don’t have to pay John Deere if they want to repair their tractors. Say that all copyrights belonging to the Hollywood copyright cartel are no longer recognized, and let people trade their music, tv and movies freely.
Nobody’s going to be brave enough to do that. But, really, the US declaring a 25% across-the-board tariff on Canada is basically an economic nuke. Don’t respond with a measured and exactly equal economic war response. Canada can’t win by fighting by those rules.
Edit: Better yet, because it’s more likely to be possible, just decriminalize it. Don’t change the laws. Just make it clear to police and prosecutors that someone who infringes on American IP should be treated like someone smoking pot in public in 2015. Imagine someone setting up a little kiosk in the Eaton Centre selling the latest movies and software for pennies while the cops just ignored them. If John Deere tries to get someone charged for selling “fix your tractor” software bundles that bypass the access controls on tractors, the police should just laugh at them. Picture a kiosk that roots your phone and lets you install a Canadian app store where the vendor’s cut is only 5% not 30%, and all the profits stay in Canada. A thriving business could be set up where you bring in your HP printer, and walk out with a device that can use any ink at all. Canada could even host How-Tos and tools for the rest of the world on how to take control over your electronics. Can you imagine how quickly Tim Apple would book a flight to Mar A Lago to beg with Trump to back down?
I think this is much more likely in Mexico though. The respect for US intellectual property is already pretty low there to begin with. But, formally, the government still officially respects US IP. What if they let off the brakes entirely and just let the “invisible hand of the market” work without the handcuffs of IP law?
You are not wrong in some of theses but they would requiere a legal framework that does not exist today to be created in a hurry.
Tariffs are literally easier so they are the first step and it does not mean they would be the last
Doesn’t the Tariffs Basically invalidate the old trade agreements, making them worthless so now the other countries can do whatever they want?
I would think so but don’t really know from a legal standpoint
What’s clear now is that a contract with the USA is not worth an “Elon’s promise” so any current agreement is basically null and void
Stop! You are making too much sense!
If y’all want to burn the white house down again, I’ll bring marshmallows for us to roast on the flames.
I wanna see people partying like it’s 1812
I’d rather they burn down Mar-a-lago. The White House is a nice historic building.
“Why don’t you want to join the land of the free and home of the brave?”
Because if we gave in to the pressure and joined, we would be neither.
Canada should join the EU.
I’m an expat who has been a permanent resident of Canada since 2017, and it’s a horror show watching Trump receive a second term and then turn on Canada. I know his threat of invasion/buying Canada or whatever is all peacocking, but if in ten years I’ve been thrust back into the American healthcare system, I’ll throw myself off of a bridge.
Genuine curiosity, why do you call yourself an “expat” instead of “immigrant”? Is there a difference?
It’s the (stupid) legal term of an American who has moved abroad. Even my tax returns are done through “expat services”.
I wish I could be called an expat instead of an immigrant, sounds less of a stigma, lucky you. Best of luck out there!
That’s the point. There’s a pretentious implication that your priviledged when the term “expat” is used, but their just emmigrants of priviledged western nations.
Its the same with the UK “expats.” When brexit first happened many UK expats were blown away that Spain was treating them like Immigrants even though they were.
You could just start telling everyone your an expat of your country of origin. I don’t know if it will help you, but it certainly will make you sound more pretentious
That stigma was mostly created by Americans … They just don’t want it for themselves
I don’t know a single person who isn’t for a harsh retaliation. I haven’t felt this united with my fellow Canadians ever.
There are plenty of people in the US cheering for harsh retaliation, too. Despite being directly harmed by it.
This man is going out of his way to hurt everyone he can regardless, and everyone who can do anything here is just sitting down, shutting up, and obeying in advance.
I am glad that other countries are ready and willing to to hit this bully back. Seems like the best hope we have is from people on the outside.
I’m in the US. Fucking make it hurt. Maybe it’ll make the shitstains finally learn, or at least kill off enough that this shit won’t be a worry in the near figure.
Is it gonna suck for me? Yup. But it is anyways, so instead of the frog in the pot lets flambe this shit.
I’m cheering for harsh retaliation because it’s the only language the orange man will understand. If the economy has to collapse for us to have any chance of getting Americans to ditch their support of fascism, well we’ve already fucked up a million times to get this far so we’ll have to struggle through it.
Smith isn’t, and, as an Albertan, it’s goddamn embarassing. Nothing authoritarians like more than a bigger authoritarian.
Ford is also an authoritarian, though, and he’s putting up a fight. Or at least he says he’s going to put up a fight. I’m worried that he’s just making a show of things so that he can roll over after the election’s over and we can’t get rid of him.
Heard an old bitch (Alberta) complaining yesterday in my store about something Joe Biden did.
And Scott Moe in Saskatchewan.
Honestly, all of this “51st state” bullshit has been a gift to Canada. For far too long the leaders on the right have been appealing to Canadian MAGA by emulating and praising everything Trump and his ilk do, and now they’re being forced to either turn on Trump or turn on Canada. In something like a week he’s shattered the alliance between the American right and the Canadian right, and left them absolutely spinning in the wind, searching for some sense of identity.
A smarter version of Trump would have kept his mouth shut until Pollievre was in, and then started to lean on him through back channels for consessions, just like Bush did with Harper. That filthy traitor would gladly give Trump everything he wants without a fight. But for Trump it’s about the fight; slapping tariffs on other countries makes his tiny dick feel a little less tiny.
When your main identity is nationalism it just doesn’t make sense to work together with any foreign leader.
As if the Australian ScoMo wasn’t bad enough, now there’s two of them…
Canadian oil would be hit with lower tariffs of 10%, which would take effect later, on 18 February.
Cool we could put 15% on oil going to US and help trump keep his 25% on everything promises.
This is a workable method to deal with these four years, a clever leader deciding strategy suggested by very clever advisors can beat a strategy suggested by very clever advisors decided upon by an unclever leader.
