Canada cannot win a trade war with the US. When we are on our knees he’s going to ask for Yukon, nwt and nunavut. Saying basically nobody lives there and we don’t need it. He can easily buy out northern Canadians by offering lots of money or citizenship and the other 39 million Canadians will reluctantly agree it’s the best compromise.

He knows climate change is real and it makes the north more and more viable every day due to its resources and shipping route.

Another obvious hint at this was traitor Danielle Smith suggesting US military bases in the north just last week.

  • Kichae@lemmy.ca
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    1 month ago

    Trump wants us to kiss the ring, and his puppeteers want to break NATO. That’s all that’s going on here. There’s no grand plan. There’s just “satisfy the narcissist’s ego” and “destroy the military alliance threatening Russia”.

    • laranis@lemmy.zip
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      Absolutely. Power and leverage as a means to profit. That’s it. Trump is not a statesman, he’s not an economist, he doesn’t have some grand vision for a utopian America that can weather the coming climate onslaught. He sees a place he can apply pressure regardless of absolutely any other consideration and does it until someone offers him money to stop.

      This is what contemporary evil looks like.

  • Hemingways_Shotgun@lemmy.ca
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    I vote we put the United States on a time out.

    Every night, we turn off their power for half an hour until they smarten up. And increase the time if they continue to act like toddlers.

    And I want Trudeau to announce it exactly like that. “We are putting you under a time out every night because if you’re president wants to act like an unruly toddler, he’ll be treated like one.”

    • Bytemeister@lemmy.world
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      Don’t do it at night. Do it at 8AM and stop at 5PM.

      Turning off power at night hurts the common person. Turning off power during the day shuts down the businesses that overwhelmingly stumped for Trump to get a slightly lower tax rate.

  • DaddleDew@lemmy.world
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    Canada has the best weapon of all: Time. Things might get rough, but we all know that Trump has been getting old. Even if it takes longer than we hope, our economy will adapt to new markets, because it is what economies do.

    Just look at what Ukraine has been surviving through for crying out loud. We have it way easier in comparison.

    Canada will outlive Trump.

    • earphone843@sh.itjust.works
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      1 month ago

      Trump is a symptom, not the disease. He is and always has been a puppet. Musk is the one in charge now, and Putin is pulling his strings.

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    First of all, we don’t actually have to win the trade war. We just have to hang on for a few years. Trump is an old man. Even if he somehow manages to suspend elections in the US, he’ll drop over dead soon enough.

    Secondly, do you really think he can hold even Panama long-term against a hostile local population? I don’t. Greenland would be even more amusing, since I expect the entire EU would back Denmark. Up here, the weather is still plenty dangerous to anyone he might send—global warming hasn’t changed things that much yet. Plus, I don’t think his own troops would be too enthusiastic about conducting a war of aggression.

    Thirdly, I think you’ll find that most of this country wouldn’t sell Trump a load of organic fertilizer at this point, much less a substantial chunk of our territory. Not at any price. Everyone except a handful of Albertans is pissed off at him and his government in a big way.

    • horse_battery_staple@lemmy.world
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      Trump isn’t the problem, he’s a symptom. He’s following directions from people that are telling him he’ll profit from this. Vance would be pulling the same shit as he’s just Peter Thiel’s mouthpiece, and likely the reason Musk was able to slide into the Trump admin so quickly.

      However I will throw a party when Trump dies. Everyone is invited.

      • StopTouchingYourPhone@lemmy.world
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        Spot on. Project for a New American Century. Heritage Foundation. This situation didn’t suddenly start when the USA elected Trump the first time.

        These ghouls have plans, and Trump is the face of pay-to-play politics atm. Remove him and another evil belligerent twit gets tapped to take his place.

        Not to put too fine a point on it, but getting stuck on these individual men and how they personally feel or what they really think about anything has become an online diversion as productive as my Bejeweled habit (and I highly suspect seeing the volume of commentary on it increases voter apathy).

        [edit to delete speechifying. apparently I have a lot of feelings]

      • idiomaddict@lemmy.world
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        It’s a lot more dangerous for the US to nuke Canada than it was to nuke Japan. As for more conventional attacks, not only would a Guerilla war against people who know American culture so completely and in the Canadian landscape suck, but the Canadian military is, uh, not to be fucked with.

        The Canadians fought the Germans with a long, enduring, terrible, skilful patience

        -Philip Gibbs

        the troops that had the worst reputation for acts of violence against prisoners were the Canadians

        -Robert graves

        I don’t care for the English, Scotch, French, Australians or Belgians but damn you Canadians, you take no prisoners and you kill our wounded

        -unknown German colonel, as recalled by Canadian soldier Fred Hamilton

        Source

          • idiomaddict@lemmy.world
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            Over a hundred, in fact-it’s WWI. There have been plenty of more recent war crimes, but those are mostly related to cooperation with the US, so I left them out, lol.

        • humanspiral@lemmy.ca
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          I prefer nuclear war between Russia and US, to Canadian guerilla war no matter how confident you are of Canadians.

          Trump/US complaining about “having to defend Canada” is purely and only because Canada lets US explain who our enemies are. Only actual enemy of Canada is the US as this weekend showed them to be.

          By not treating US’s enemies as Canada’s enemies, then Canada, through NORAD, is the one defending the US. Demanding the US to pay significantly for the privilege of Canada defending them is necessary from an enemy. Nuclear weapons are a cheap and effective way of saying “STFU asshole”, and a path to ending wars quickly. US economy/debt level is incapable of absorbing a single nuclear strike. Fucking around is an insufficient response to their fucking around.

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        While it’s possible that they’ve changed procedures, I seem to recall reading somewhere that after Nixon made some problematic drunken phone calls, the US arranged things so that actually launching the missiles has to go through the Joint Chiefs of Staff, not just the president. Trump may only have the safety in his grip, not the trigger.

        Even if he does have the trigger, I’m betting someone would wrestle it out of his hands at that point—not because any of them give a damn about us, but because nuclear fallout in southern Ontario would likely devastate New England, given the general tendency of weather on this continent to move eastward. So you wanna have a revolution? Sending nuclear fallout in the direction of your largest population center is probably a good way to start one.

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    People fight much harder when they have a clear cause and clear enemy.

    Right now Trump is giving us one: we’re fighting for Canada, our home and native land. We’re fighting for ourselves, our neighbours, our friends, our families. We’re fighting for our way of life, our healthcare, we fight for everything.

    The US is fighting for nothing. Even MAGA conservatives don’t know what Trump is doing. Sun Tzu teaches that is the weakest position to fight from. The US people will falter before a unified and galvanized Canadian front will. Our backs are against the wall and the only option is to fight.

    My family came from a small northern Ontario mining community. Times were always hard there but people looked after each other. My grandma grew her own food to stretch their budget. She took in boarders who needed a place to stay and shared what she had. They made do with little and everyone supported each other — that is the Canadian spirit that makes this country great.

    Now it’s our turn. I’m supporting whatever our government decides, I want us to fight back tooth and nail. I want to support all the Canadians who are going out of work, and the Canadian businesses that are going to struggle, I’ll pay more taxes to support them, whatever is needed. I’m not buying American products wherever possible, local first always and forever after this. Anything but American. I’m increasing donations to my food bank. I need to start volunteering too.

    God keep our land glorious and free!

    O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

    O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

    • floofloof@lemmy.ca
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      I’m starting to wean myself off all US services and subscriptions, and avoid US products wherever possible. I’d encourage other Canadians to do the same and buy Canadian wherever you can.

  • Sunshine (she/her)@lemmy.ca
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    Cuba has an entire embargo and they didn’t capitulate. There’s not a snowball’s chance in hell of Canada selling our North.

    And byw our population is 41m.

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    1. Canada’s economy only looks bad if you use one metric on the economy, GDP. That metric happens to omit exports as well as public sector.
      E.G. the US spends twice what we do on healthcare, and huge profits are made from it. According to the GDP metric, that means it is better.

    In reality, Canadians are doing better than the Americans for health care access and we have the same number of doctors and nurses per capita. We also live longer and are healthier

    1. Canada supplies 60% of the US oil. If we want, we have them by the balls and there isn’t a damn thing they can do.
    • floofloof@lemmy.ca
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      Canada supplies 60% of the US oil. If we want, we have them by the balls and they’re isn’t a damn thing they can do.

      Canada supplies 60% of US oil imports. The USA also uses domestically produced oil. So it’s not true that Canada supplies 60% of their oil in total.

      This is a bit out of date but just for example:

      in 2020 America produced 18.4 million barrels of oil per day and consumed 18.12 million. And yet that same report reveals that the U.S. imported 7.86 million barrels of oil per day last year. Source

      That would make imported oil about 43% of what was consumed, and Canada’s contribution about 60% of that 43%, so about 26%.

  • lemmy_outta_here@lemmy.world
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    Canada alone might not win a trade war against the US. Good thing for us that Trump is on a streak for pissing off US allies. I really don’t care how bad Trump tries to make things in Canada, they are not going to get worse than they currently are in the states. Do you really think millions of Canadians would prefer school shootings to 25% tariffs? Will millions of Canadians trade in their health care and human rights for cheap iPhones? US can go fuck itself. Trump can go fuck his own face. I will die before I become a fucking American.

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    Trump loves to make bombastic threats, to cause pre-emptive capitulation like in the way newspapers and billionaires did.

    There is no way Trump will have the bandwidth to respond to Canada’s defensive action amidst the rest of the chaos he is causing in government and other fights he decides to pick throughout the week. He might get tired of bullying Canada and move on in a few weeks, might not.

    I imagine many Canadians who feel betrayed by our longstanding ally, will defend our sovereignty with whatever it takes. Americans will be unfocused and hampered by their own divisions and internal governmental dysfunction, and no one wants a trade war or real war anyway.

    • Grimpen@lemmy.ca
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      There are a few of causes for hope.

      First, Trump has surrounded himself with loyalists and sycophants, not competence. On the downside, this is how Putin ended up on year 3 of a 3-day “special military operation” in Ukraine. Trump is going to make incredibly stupid mistakes not just because he’s stupid, but everyone he has surrounded himself with will be telling him how wonderful and clever he is. On the other hand, this is a good way to get clobbered by reality.

      Canada and Mexico have responded with targeted tariffs and are also planning ahead to next steps. Heck, Canada just finalized a trade deal with Ecuador. Sure it’s not going to replace the US, but it shows many competent people are out there working for Canada. Meanwhile the US government apparatus is going to be gutted of competent people.

      Second, Canada does export a lot of raw materials, which should be easier to shift to other markets. Also things like hydo power and oil can probably absorb a fairly high increase in cost without being substantially effected. Hydro power as an example, can easily eat a 10% increase and still be the cheapest source of electricity. Canada could probably slap export tariffs on oil, hydro electricity, and potash and the US will just have to eat it.

      Finally, Trump will probably continue tariffing the EU and other countries as well, further triggering retaliatory tariffs. This means Bosch, Samsung and LG will need to make more dishwashers to replace the Whirlpool and Maytag dishwashers that aren’t going to be sold outside the US (as an example). It’s going to suck, but Canada already has CETA and CPTPP to build on, and should be deepening CANZUK ties. The world is bigger than the US, and the US looks set to isolate themselves from everyone. Being on the outside in that case is better.


      no one wins trade wars, but the kid who never stands up for himself always loses and for a long time

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    Don’t you guys basically power a bunch of northern us states, and your crude is the biggest % of their oil.

    Slap big enough export tariffs on both that the yanks have to think if they can afford it before turning on the lights and their petrol is more expensive than it is in Europe.

    • HellsBelle@sh.itjust.works
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      Canadian crude oil makes up 60% of American oil imports, so yes they get a lot from us.

      The problem we have is Alberta’s premier (Danielle Smith) has her head so far up Trump’s ass she’s tickling his tonsils … so she’s stonewalling on adding tariffs to the oil. And her next door neighbour in Saskatchewan (Scott Moe) is following suit.

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    Honestly, if Canada and mexico team up, it’s easily possible to destroy what slim majority trump has. If the EU joined too, US is gonna have bigger problems.

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      The EU has it’s own rising fascism problem, with Canada not far behind. Hopefully the insanity in the US will drive things the other way, but threatening times are generally good for fascism.

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    We can pivot and re-orient our strategies. It’ll hurt short term but we’ll make it. We don’t have to win if we just decide to play a different game.

    • HellsBelle@sh.itjust.works
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      We don’t have to win if we just decide to play a different game.

      Exactly. We either change the rules of the game or we change the game, because we won’t “win” by fighting the orange asshole under the rules he’s currently not following anyway.

      Imo we need to get Danielle Smith to allow full CAN tariffs on all Alberta oil sales to the US.

      Within a week or two the orange asshole would crumble because his base would be freaking out at paying $7-$8 per gallon of gas.

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    Yup, seeing that Trudeau was unable to talk with trump for 2 weeks, it really shows that trump does not give a shit. It’s like when he said “I want Panama’s canal” and “I want Greenland”, it’s not a choice, nor a question, it’s a fact, and he said he will take them by force with the army. Seeing what he did with Canada/Mexico, you can be sure that he will invades Panama and Denmark.

    The only way to resist is a full world embargo on USA.