Cold Big Macs. When the Orange Peril had some championship sports team over to the White House in his first term, publicity photos showed a big table loaded with fast food burgers (I think it was Burger King). Think about it – you have access to one of the finest kitchens in the world that can produce almost anything imaginable, and you choose to feed your guests junk food that’s guaranteed to be cold and congealing in its own grease by the time anyone gets to it. Now that’s real class!
He had to do that because he had shut down the US government, so no White House catering. He had to arrange for it on short notice out of his own pocket.
I just received an email from the Liberal Party of Canada that I needed to verify my identity prior to the leadership vote. You can either go into a post office with your ID or use the Canada Post Identity+ app. The app took a live selfie, scans your ID, and GPS verifies that you are near your registered address. The entire process took less than two minutes.
Voting opens on Wednesday!
Perhaps we can add a verse based on Bruce Cockburn’s “If I Had a Rocket Launcher (and it points south)”
More seriously, since no one liked the idea of issuing every Canadian a rocket launcher, it may be a good time to study up on and start organizing groups for non-violent resistance.
Also: Canadopers, where do you think Indigenous peoples in Canada would line up re an American takeover?
“They were even worse than you guys!”
In other news, last day of advanced voting for Ontario. Just went and voted, there was a steady stream of people. Not huge numbers, but didn’t seem to be any gaps in the line as I wet through. Whole process took maybe 10 minutes, even without my voter card, which has yet to arrive. There were several people with the same problem there.
Maybe. I’m thinking Indian and Irish support for Germany against Britain may be a precedent, (and for that matter, working class support for Republicans) and wonder about the promise of financial reward for selling mineral and oil and other rights to US companies as an incentive.
At some point people can be tempted to go with the devil they don’t know.
Oh voter fraud! Voter fraud!
/s
Ms. Fins and I just got back from voting. It was busy with a line out the door, but less than 15 minutes for us. We didn’t receive voting cards either, but we’ve only lived here for 17 years so it’s possible Elections Ontario didn’t know. We were speaking with one of the poll workers and her guess was 50% of voters hadn’t gotten their cards.
I heard something about a lot of them were misprinted, and that screwed up the deliveries.
Well, a) I’m blushing - thank you very much for your support, @Spoons !
and b) I’m really embarrassed that this is the first time I’ve been in the café for a couple of weeks and I’m just seeing this!
Quite the opposite - the US negotiator of the original FTA wanted cultural industries on the table, and the Canadian negotiator refused. There were a couple of days when it almost scuttled the deal.
Going by memory for the moment - I’ll have to do a bit of research to find you some cites on that one. I remember that I was very much against the FTA, but found a glimmer of hope in the fact that the Canadian team was not going to give in to the US team’s assertion that ‘culture is a business like any other’.
Mailed my vote in on Wednesday - later than I would have liked, but I hope it’s in time for the election.
This is likely the last provincial election I get to vote in, at least until I get deported/move back.
No, stay where you are. You’re going to make a great fifth columnist. 
In what way does that address what we were talking about? The claim was that CANADIANS tried to “quash” our culture.
That would have been about 1988, if my memory is correct. And if it is, then it would have been about Canadian Content (“Cancon”) rules for radio and TV.
On a predominantly RWNJ/MAGA message board lately (i.e. now in 2025), I’ve seen complaints from Americans about Cancon regulations. Apparently, they prevent American artists from getting exposure in Canada. Which is bullshit, of course; Americans get plenty of exposure on our radio and TV. But these posters go on about “Canadian protectionism through Cancon,” and other such garbage. There should be no question that the United States would try to quash our culture—maybe not intentionally, but by flooding us with theirs to the point where ours would never be noticed.
Here’s an example from an American (posted January 22, 2025):
And here’s another, also from an American, on the same day:
Just putting this out there. @Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela , I’d like to hear your comments.
I assume these same posters are strongly criticizing Trump’s tariffs as protectionism for US industries, and are arguing that Trump should let the free market determine imports from Canada and Mexico?
It refutes the claim by demonstrating that the Canadian negotiators engaged by the Conservative government at the time stood up for Canadian culture.
I will not post it directly in case it gets taken by the SDMB mods as a call to action, but Charlie Angus has started a parliamentary petition to strip Elon Musk of his Canadian citizenship because
Elon Musk has engaged in activities that go against the national interest of Canada;
He has used his wealth and power to influence our elections;
He has now become a member of a foreign government that is attempting to erase Canadian sovereignty; and
The attempts of Elon Musk to attack Canadian sovereignty must be addressed.
Anyone interested in signing can probably search for the petition on their own steam.
But if we let him keep his citizenship, we could charge him with treason….
Just a thought experiment, no need to post black letter law, precedent, practical objections, etc. in response.
They didn’t? Were you in the room? Then… why do we still have CanCon rules?