This has a certain poetic beauty.
Fully understood and despite any hardship it would cause me personally, I would fully support any proportional retaliation on the part of Canadians, including all of the scenarios you propose except the crypto one. The only reason I oppose that is that unlike Bitcoin there is no mining involved in $TRUMP. Its value comes solely from his legions of idiots who think its a sound investment, and those influence seekers wanting an easy way to launder money to him. So there really isn’t a way to waste a lot of electricity to throw it off. So find something else more useful to do with the extra Amps. Maybe set up some AI bot farms to find new and interesting ways to insult him throughout social media.
Understood, and I don’t blame you. Until Americans are made to really feel the painful consequences of empowering this corrupt, mentally challenged ignoramus they elected and the henchmen who help him, nothing will change here. I hate that it has come to that – but it has.
I think the Orange Foolius is courting disaster with idiotic remarks like that. I despise him.
This Canadian has appreciated this thread so far and have nothing new to what’s been said, but wow all the nuke-talk.
Gosh, it must be said.
As a Canadian, ex naval officer (30 years) I have always deplored our government’s disregard for our own defence. As colleagues and I have discussed, we could never win a war by ourselves but we should at least be capable of making it hurt before an enemy wins. And we are well less than capable of that. As such, we have basically free-loaded since after WWII and, believe me, it’s been an embarrassment every time we talk to our NATO allies.
Having said that, it’s appalling and frightening to see what’s going on in the US and I can only hope that the following two things happen:
- Our government quickly starts taking national defence seriously; and
- The non-US NATO nations build an even stronger bond than currently exists.
The current situation is unimaginable. I apologize for this sort-of hijack, since the OP was asking about American thoughts.
I’m embarrased by them. They seem very much like the schoolyard bully picking on someone smaller than them, simply because they’re smaller and can’t fight back so well.
It’s not appropriate, seemly, or friendly in the least, and Canada’s pretty much our closest friend, with the possible exception of the UK.
I’m usually in favor of a muscular, no-bullshit foreign policy, and feel like there’s not much point in being very militarily and economically powerful, if you don’t let it be known that you can and will use it to further your national goals. But not advantageous bullying; rather just being the biggest dog and not being afraid to snap every now and then.
But Canada’s done nothing to warrant anything of the sort, and it makes us nationally like a huge asshole and an international bully.
As an American who has visited Canada multiple times, I hate what has happened with Trump and Canada. It’s disgusting on Trump’s part to bully Canada. And I think Canada should fight back if Trump launches a tariff war. I do hope someone can cool Trump off on this front, and maybe a few minor tweaks of the USMCA would calm him down. But he can’t be trusted.
I don’t believe for a second that Trump will invade Canada militarily. But if we don’t move away from fascism, some future administration might eventually turn against Canada militarily in order to take the attention off of something else that they’re doing that’s horrible.
Having said all that, most of my worry with Trump has been about what he’s going to do to us Americans, and the rights that he’ll trample within our country. It’s so bad that I’m thinking of leaving the US seriously for the first time ever. And I used to be a Republican in an earlier part of my life. This is not the America that I thought I used to live in. Trump wants to crush “the left”, and I’m afraid of violence that will come upon us. The current targets are immigrants, and lgbtq. But the target list will grow over time, as it always does with these types of regimes that never run out of people that they need to “set straight”.
The current targets also includes women.
I would like to see the Canadian government ban all energy exports (oil, gas, and electricity) to the US. Not only would that fix the trade deficit, it would do the most damage to the US (and also to Canada, but sometimes you have to such it up). It would also send Danielle Smith (premier of Alberta who went to Florida to suck Trump) into orbit, but as far as I am concerned, she can stay there.
As eloquently summed upthread, it is simply appalling. That said, Trump just unleashes a swarm of shit. One can be outraged by each transgression, but it’s hard to cover all the bases. I think we learned during the first round, that performative opposition is meaningless. The playbook is actually simple: win back the House, win back the Presidency, and fund lawsuits in the meantime.
And, personally, visit Canada and spend tourist dollars.
Just to add, I made a stupid 51st State joke last week, and was called on it. I apologize, and trying my best to not have a repeat. Canada is pretty great. Have been many many times, and may even move to Toronto (assuming at that point it is possible).
Jon Stewart, years ago on the subject of Canada. Apologies if it’s already been posted.
I feel just the same about it as I feel about every other piece of trump. Abyssal disgust. Nausea and bleeding ulcers.
I have started to wonder how popular American tourists will be, if Trump crashes our economy and continues to talk annexation.
I don’t see why you’d suggest this.
The elasticity of demand for such things is very, very, VERY low. The logical way to fight back is not to ban such exports, but to jack the prices up with export fees. The USA would have little option in the short and medium term but to pay the higher rates. Canadian suppliers would make more money. And we’ll need money flowing into the economy, believe me, as thousands of jobs vanish and government revenues crater.
I’d also point out that a total shutoff of energy might provoke invasion.
The Honourable Charlie Angus, New Democratic Party Member of Parliament for Timmins-James Bay since 2004, on the MeidasTouch with host Ben Meiselas. He expresses in a restrained manner the attitude of most Canadians towards Donald Trump’s posturing.
Have a watch - https://youtu.be/hf2Wy7lOSas?si=9UILi4QhFh_3c4vT
Quoted for truth.
I don’t have any of those.
I had a vote. I used it. Didn’t help.
Trump is in dementia. (He’s also evil; but he no longer has any sense of consequences that he may once have had.) What all those people are thinking who are aiding him, I have no idea.
You, and the rest of the world, will do what you gotta do.
Trump and the MAGAts have been running on the principle of ‘but what if we just do all these things that are supposed to be unthinkable?’ They’re all too likely to find out. Unfortunately, the rest of us are going to find out with them.
That also cannot be hidden and would result in immediate invasion before they could be deployed, which would take some time - all British and French nuclear weapons are submarine-launched.
Understand: Trump has taken over and the US government’s checks and balances are going away now. The threat of invasion is real and it has to be taken seriously. Certain acts WILL provoke war. Trying to cut cut off electricity and blacking out whole states? Don’t for one instant think Trump won’t call that a clear and present danger and order war, and no one will stop him or refuse to go along with it.
You’ll see. This year, they’re going to start working on the American public to convince them Canada is a threat, just like they did with Iraq in 2002-2003. And many Americans will be convinced. We are in the crosshairs.
I would really like to call this out as hyperbole, but…I can’t. For all those who subscribe to the “Madman Theory” of international diplomacy, Donald Trump is the ultimate ‘mad man’; bellicose, entitled, obtuse, and desperately clinging to power and needing to satisfy his base that he’s as much of a ‘strongman’ as they imagine him to be. I can fully see him making a threat as pure bluster, being repulsed, and then refusing to back down from a confrontation for fear of looking weak.
Stranger
I think I’ve posted this once before, on a different thread…
Politically, Trump is the textbook definition of an iconoclast – a person who attacks cherished beliefs or institutions. But I think it was journalist Megyn Kelly who said, “some of those things probably needed to be broken, but some of those things are very precious to us.”
Trump is the ultimate blunt instrument. He’s a grenade tossed into a crowded market. Many of you turned him loose on the rest of us and on the world. It’s difficult to imagine how, if, when, and at what cost his damage might be undone.
How do I feel about a guy who licks the boots of the Worst Authoritarian Leaders of our Time while simultaneously shitting on those with a long history of mutually beneficial alliances with the US?
Just … fucking Godawful. That’s how.
So sorry to our Canadian brothers and sisters. I wanted/had no part of this, and you truly are … precious to us.