LeT’s StArT a TrAdE wAr WiTh OuR AlLiEs -my fucking countrymen, apparently
I hate this fucking timeline
Here are some numbers to consider.
The US sold $441 billion worth of goods and services to Canada in 2024.
Canada sold $482 billion worth of goods and services to the US in 2024.
The US has a populating of 334.9 million people.
Canada has a population of 40.1 million people.
Per capita, every American man, woman, and child spent $1,316.81 on Canadian goods and services.
Candians spent $12,019. 95 on American good and services.
Who isn’t pulling their weight in this trading relationship?
This isn’t about illegal immigration and it isn’t about the 20 lbs of fentanyl that tried to cross the border from Canada.
This is about the billionaire class raising taxes on the poor and raising prices for Americans.
Who isn’t pulling their weight in this trading relationship?
Not how that works. Even with a “trade deficit”, a trade relationship must have an element of bilaterality. You’re exchanging something for something. The exception would be when one side militarily has their boot on the other side, i.e., sweatshop/imperialist relations. Which the U.S./Canada relationship is not exactly a poster child of.
Congrats Trump and his buddies, you managed to not only save Trudeau but made the nation rally behind him out of national pride and defense.
Congrats Putin
ftfy
Get ready, middle class, for our glorious new era of Trumpflation.
Except now it will be branded FreedomFlation ™. This is done to put our glorious Dear Leader and his pals like fElon on a pedestal! Don’t worry if you and your kids go to bed hungry and have no idea if you’ll keep your home tomorrow…donvict will bask in the glory of a brand new, gloriously golden 'merica.
And no complaining about it to anyone, because there will be donvict colluders to snitch on you for your thought crimes and redhatters hanging around with special uniforms to send you and your family off to glorious reeducation camps, er, centers, so you’ll be thinking properly again in no time!
Why does that sound like it should be on the side of a penis pump?
As a Canadian, I’ve already seen my nearest grocery store put up labels on shelves like “made in Canada” and aside from pricing it is gonna make it easier to avoid American products
Haha gotta love it
Well, that was fast.
I wonder how long Trump and his buddies are going to be able to ignore the mess they are making of the stock market now which hurts his businesses world supporters. It certainly is going to hurt US car companies hard.
This is all on purpose to tank the American economy and put the country in such chaos that Trump can call an emergency, suspend the constitution indefinitely and the GOP can stay in power. All the while there will be a mass redistribution of wealth so great to the already rich that everyone else will be destitute.
Don’t worry comrade! This is all for the promise of making 'merica great, again! Even if market indicators under Biden were all pointing in fantastic directions, this will be even better, at some unstated time in the future, and you won’t have any of that WOKEMINDVIRUS or brown people speaking funny languages or that one trans athlete to deal with no more.
Trump is so horrible he got Americans to side with the country putting retaliatory tariffs on them.
Also it should be pointed out that Trump essentially declared war on an ally because he wanted to seize Canadian land.
Any talk about drug trafficking is silly since the first thing Trump did was pardon one of the biggest drug traffickers in the world, Ross Ulbricht
All drugs should be legal
IMO they should be decriminalized for personal use, but having corporations selling hard drugs is a terrible idea
Wait, the Dread Pirate Roberts got pardoned? How does that fix anything???
Trump isn’t trying to fix things. He is trying to break it all and end up a dictator. He isn’t healthy so he wont live long enough to enjoy being a despot like putin. Trump honestly can’t see his own death. Few can. That narcissist will die with a surprised look on his face. His father lived a long time but he wasn’t a overweight coke head.
Fuck, I just looked it up. He lived to 93. If donvict lives that long, he has 15 more years…ack.
It makes Trump more money.
How did it fix anything for the rest? Ha
Isn’t it great that a narcissistic jackass with no understanding of economics is Duning-Krogering all to death?
We are actually seeing the us get destroyed by a mad king. Never let conservatives forget that they ushered in a man who intentionally tried to destroy their country.
You could argue that in 2016, some conservatives voted based on promises of economic growth, job creation, or an ‘outsider’ shaking up the system. But at this point, it’s clear that a significant portion of the movement isn’t just tolerating the consequences—they’re actively embracing them.
Right-wing media outlets like Fox News are already preparing their audience for economic hardship, not by criticizing the policies causing it, but by framing it as a necessary sacrifice to achieve ideological goals—like restricting immigration. That tells us this isn’t about economic prosperity or stability; it’s about prioritizing certain cultural and political victories, even if it means making life harder for everyone.
This isn’t just one politician’s recklessness; it’s a broader shift in conservative politics. There’s a growing acceptance of government dysfunction, economic decline, and even authoritarian tactics—as long as it’s seen as benefiting their side. That’s what makes this moment different from 2016. It’s not just that a ‘mad king’ is at the helm; it’s that a large segment of his supporters and media ecosystem are celebrating the chaos, rather than trying to stop it.
I plan to never let conservatives forget that the Trumpflation starting up was created by Traitorapist Trump.
Yes, yes, but “Daddy’s home, you guys! And he has his belt off! Yah-fucking-hoooooo! 'merica gunna be so gud noaw! Egg prices? What egg prices? Everything else is even more expensive, too, but we were for low prices before we were AGAINST them!”
This gives stupid people a real chubby, so we should all have to suffer for their stupid feels.
Not just the Conservatives; there’s always a cohort of Democrats willing to side with Republicans to make sure the worst ideas make it across the finish line.
Dema haven’t been “on our side” for decades. They’re too busy milking the corporate teat.
With absolutely no respect, quit whining about Democrats. The are not the ones doing tariffs. They are not the ones revoking trans people’s passports. They are not the ones tossing all mention of gender down the memory hole. They are not the ones trying to amend the Constitution illegally via executive order. They’re not the ones allowing unconfirmed, unelected, unvetted, private citizens to take total control of the Treasury.
Apparently, the Democratic party’s biggest sin was not being evil enough, since that’s apparently what Trump elected.
The Dems ain’t coming to save us. It’s astounding to me that even in a forum like Lemmy, I’m still having to piece a to b to c for the madding crowd, and being downvoted for my efforts. Just look at the last 30 years.
What have Democrats accomplished, really? Just look at the last four years. Biden could have come out of the blocks on his day/week/month one just like Trump- with a slew of executive orders and tasked decisions already hitting the ground running. But instead he dawdled and pithered about, while Republicans and the SCOTUS went about laying their plans to systematically dismantle America. And every time we needed a quorum of Democrats to actually affect anything, they all scattered like cockroaches in the light. But when Republicans put forth a bill, rest assured there will always be a few opportunistic Dems willing to cross the aisle.
They’re Controlled Opposition. Sure, they may be the best (or only) option we have, but that does not and should not preclude us from viewing their “leadership” with highly critical lenses. Because at this point, they deserve all the criticism coming their way. They have been categorical losers for far too long, and this last election cycle should be catastrophic for Dem leaders, because their actions (or lack thereof) have facilitated a catastrophe for the world. A catastrophe that President Biden ushered in with the utmost decorum. They ain’t comin to save us.
Oh, look, “both sides bad”, the reason we’re all here.
They are both bad and have a massive overlap. But yes one party is clearly better and at least tries to help however flawed it may be.
Still both Dems and Republicans are ruled by the elite and the interests of the oligarchy. That’s clear and part of the problem. Until we change how our elections work though it’s in everyone’s best interest to vote for the democratic party
Still both Dems and Republicans are ruled by the elite and the interests of the oligarchy.
Weird that the last 3 Dem presidents raised taxes on the wealthy and/or corporations. Didn’t know that the oligarchy was interested in that.
A lot of oligarchs are philanthropic or at least not sociopathic enough that they realize they should be paying more and they’re happy to do it. I think Warren Buffett is a popular example.
So, yes, I would say that some of the oligarchy is interested in that and making sure themselves and their peers are doing their fair share. At the very least, they are okay with it happening as there are other things the folks in their pockets can do for them in government.
It’s not black and white, like everything else there are shades of gray and we mustn’t make the mistake of believing the 1% who’ve captured (or maybe always have had …) the ear of our government are monolithic.
Actually, some are. Some of them are scared of pushing so much the pitchforks come out.
Not sure there is a change to elections that will help. Homo sapiens became the dominant species by a tendency toward small group loyalty. That will be exploitable as long after you and I are dead I figure. Our best hope is a benevolent AI takeover. How sad is that.
I think ranked choice voting would help a lot. Then we could vote 3rd party without doing the equivalent of lighting that vote on fire. Right now it just makes no sense to vote anything other than Dem or Repub when you’re voting. Just because enough voters are only voting one or the other regardless of policies and beliefs and we’re not convincing enough of those folks to change their vote.
I am sincerely on the robots side in the future robot war against humanity. May they take mercy on our souls and save us from ourselves.
I used to favor Ranked Choice voting, but someone on lemmy linked me this and I’m a STAR voting fan now.
Not that Ranked Choice voting isn’t a million times better then First-past-the-post voting.
Thank you for sharing, that’s some good info! Too bad in order to get voting reforms done the people who can do it would need to be okay with losing a more fair election.
All governments are ruled by those who stand out. They aren’t going to pay much heed to some guy who lives in a trailer or dirt farmer.
Jfc this is the fault of republicans. It’s not always both sides.
They should have made it 26%. Trump wouldn’t be able to resist upping it to 27%, and they could just spend a day reaching the logical, yet stupid, conclusion to this mess.
Infinite % tariffs?
I bought an impossible burger abroad and now I’m bankrupt… forever
That is amazing idea
I’m sure the Kamala timeline would have been Just As Bad ™.
Well you know, we have Trump to think for that ceasefire that Israel has already violated
If we had a more representative electoral system, people could be free to vote outside the two party system. Then people could vote how they want and their vote could still be counted against the republicans if their preference didn’t win.
You do support democracy right? Because democracy is not “vote for my preference or else”. That is a hostage situation and should be treated as the crisis it is. Your fellow Americans are not represented by their options in the voting booth. This is a crisis!
Yet the democratic party hasn’t done away with the FPTP voting system in most of the blue states they control. They wanted safe states and easy elections with no hard questions to answer. Even if it meant republicans winning it all and then some.
The United States of America is more important then the Democratic Party.
Videos on Electoral Reform
First Past The Post voting (What most states use now)
Videos on alternative electoral systems we can try out.
This shit has never been less relevant. Republicans will never go for this and Democrats can’t find their own asses let alone win an election. This isn’t happening.
Sigh. It’s not like most of us don’t already know all this. That’s a great plan, why don’t you work to make it happen? Get a third party that is not a joke and not a set of useful idiots for someone like Putin. Build from the ground up, too, not run once every four years. Start winning local elections and building a party that isn’t captured by corporations, and actually is out there fighting for labor and for the middle class and can tell owner-donors to get bent when they try to send in the lobbyists. Try to get ranked order voting passed, etc.
Many of us would LOVE that. However, I don’t see anyone seriously doing that. I’d love to see a million Bernies bloom, running as whatever party they unite under. That’d probably bring tears to my eyes.
All I tend to see is useless lectures on how it should be, and how voting for Democrats is “just as bad” as voting for monsters on the right, so we should all just stay home and pout and pontificate about a perfect system while the world burns under donvict. I also see a hell of a lot of single issue voters further splintering the Democratic Party on fringe identity politics stuff and demanding that others should follow them on the way out the door if the Democratic Party doesn’t capitulate on some rather fringe stuff.
We only had TWO viable choices last fall. That’s it. All the wishcasting in the world was not going to change that.
Removed by mod
Kamala would have been at best delaying the inevitable. The DNC is not capable of meaningfully changing fast enough to react to the growing threat of fascism.
Say what? So I guess the solution is to…install the people actually eager to implement fascism?
Make it make sense…
Delaying the inevitable seems like a much better option than, you know, the inevitable
"may as well commit suicide, because, well, you’re going to eventually die anyway "
“we’re all gonna die one day, why delay the inevitable”
If this escalates, wait until Canada decides to stop buying US made weapon systems. It will be expensive and time consuming to retrain, but the US is not a reliable defense partner under the neo-Nazi GOP. The US MIC must see the writing on the wall.
We really should have gone with the Gripen.
The Saab Gripen is one of the best deals available and there should have been more customers.
American here.
Don’t counter with tarrifs. Counter with embargoes. Trump loaded you a gun and handed it to you. Pull the fucking trigger already.
Counter by decriminalizing everything to do with violations of US intellectual property. Ignore all US patents. Let Canadian drug companies make pharmaceuticals without having to pay for a US license. Let repair shops disable the DRM systems that prevent HP printers from accepting any old generic ink. Let Canadian broadcasters show US movies and TV shows without kicking back money to Hollywood. Let Canadian farmers repair their tractors without first kicking back money to John Deere. Allow anybody who wants to to jailbreak iPhones, and sell kits that allow other people to do that. Free Canadians from having to kick 30% of every purchase back to Apple in California.
That was Cory Doctorow’s recent take on it too. Trump just threw out the trade agreement with Canada and Mexico he was so proud to say was his accomplishment, after renegotiating NAFTA. They really should say fine, stew in your own mess. Ignore patents, crank out cheap pharmaceuticals, forget about DRM. Nationalize US factories on their soil. Will hurt for a while until new trade is established, but there is the whole rest of the planet to trade with.
Nationalize US factories on their soil
This is extreme and could warrant an invasion from the US. Wars have been fought for less. Look at what happened to Guatemala when they wanted to take back some of the half off their farmland owned by Chiquita.
Canada is a mid-sized power but not really in a position to flaunt US power like that
Canada is part of Nato. Isn’t trump going to leave Nato? So that would mean all of Nato would be on Canada’s side. That is one hell of a leg to stand on.
Nato doesn’t have the navy to help Canada in a fight. Assuming America isn’t torn apart by a civil war as factions of the military defects and there’s a revolution in the streets. (60/40 at that point. Fighting a century old ally is a red line that would absolutley cause a civil war)
the US navy would chuckle as the french and british and other relevant navies lie at the bottom of the atlantic. And at that point, Russia moves in and Europe is in a land war while the US decides to partner with Russia.
Britain and France also have thermonuclear weapons. Britain has Vanguard-class ballistic missile submarines and France has Triomphant class ballistic missile submarines, and both have nuclear capable fighters and bombers. If Europe is to fall - let the whole world fall with it.
As an American, I will join the war on Canada’s side if my country decides to invade.
Canada should make nuclear weapons. Such is life in the shitter multiverse. I’d want my commune to have nukes to. Humans are psychotic hairless monkeys and are untrustworthy.
This is an insane hypothetical but the worst thing is I can totally see Trump declaring a “military intervention into the Canadian comunist takeover of US interests and property” or something like that
I know, it’s a nuclear option. Seriously shouldn’t put that card down right off. And yeah, hasn’t gone well for any central or south american government that the US has destabilized or overthrown due to some large corporation’s interests. But as all this garbage escalates, bringing up the possibility could make owners and shareholders squirm a bit. It hurts them financially, the only thing that would make them care. People who Trump might (might, small chance) listen to. But before that point? Those companies can produce all kinds of things. Doesn’t mean Canada or Mexico have to let those goods go out across their borders. Their trade agreement has been torn up by Trump again. And you know that bureaucracy is complicated, things get held up in customs sometimes, occasionally for very very long times. Paperwork gets lost… When companies here in the US are screaming about their supply lines breaking down again, now because of HIS stupid tariff war, there will be some negative political fallout. Trump’s ego and image are vulnerable things despite all the bluster. He won’t back down, but he could pivot to something else and let this nonsense drop.
the rest of the world is too chicken shit. there is no rest of the world to trade with as the us cries to everyone that they need to embargo nation X.
STOP!! I can only get so errect!!
Counter by giving Luigi Mangione diplomatic immunity.
Sounds like heaven to me
I wish this comment (merc’s comment) would get bumped to the top of every post related to the tariffs. Tit for tat tariffs is stupid with predictable results. Strategic tariffs and other targeted mean of retaliation are better. Why is there only a 10% tariff on oil? Because the US needs Canada’s oil. You fuck with our economy we fuck with the resources we give you at a discounted rate. Look at CUSMA (hehe. or NAFTA or whatever broken trade agreement that was) and target the industries that the (US) wanted to protect.
And for people using the tired fight analogies - just because someone tries to punch you in the face doesn’t mean you punch them back in the face. You have already been training to kick them in the fucking balls.
Tit for tat tariffs is just political posturing for weak leadership.
Also, this is a fight against a much bigger opponent. Not only is the US population 10x bigger and their economy more than 10x bigger, that size means they have a lot more trade partners, whereas Canada is pretty isolated and trades mostly with the US.
If you’re up against a much stronger opponent in a life-or-death fight, you don’t fight fair.
We’re doing both. Both BC and Ontario are cutting off American Booze. That’s gonna hurt American company’s hard.
My hope if Trump keeps it up we cut off the power, and better yet the gas. Although that might make him try to invade or something.
Up next will be him calling Canadians Nazis and trying to annex Quebec.
My hope if Trump keeps it up we cut off the power, and better yet the gas. Although that might make him try to invade or something.
I think US history is clear. Mess with the US oil supply and you get the smoke.
I think US history is clear. Invade Canada and your capital gets the smoke.
Touché. I concede on this point. Let the Americans fear Canada burning down the capital again.
Let them remember why the Geneva Convention exists.
And it burned burned burned. I’ll bet that made them mad!
I get what you’re saying, but the US being Canada’s biggest trading partner would absolutely destroy Canadian economy right together with the US economy
The Canadian economy will be ruined by any kind of half-measures.
Don’t negotiate with a fascist state. Cut them off, recall ambassadors, and cease all joint military operations.
Trump will never do anything to benefit Canada, so why give him an ounce of cooperation?
Our only reliable allies. Europeans and the Pacific Partners like Australia, NZ, Japan and South Korea… are all oceans away. The US has by overwhelming force, the largest navy in the world. Only China, who we don’t want to dive into the arms of and become a puppet of, even remotely stands a chance.
Our allies aren’t going to rush to our aid in a worst case scenario, because they can’t get across the atlantic. and they’re also preoccupied with more or less being de-facto at war with the Russian Federation right now. and they are still not taking it seriously that they may have to fight for real over there.
When you start doing things like you’re suggesting. That is absolutely going to be seen as a hostile act by the US, and they will manufacture consent for war.
Because we still need our own economy?
If Canada 100% stops trading with the US it will wreck havoc on the economy. Sure, it’ll hurt the US too, and yes, it’s a fascist state at this point, but you still gotta live, eat, etc…
Brother, your economy is getting gigafucked by Trump either way.
You can slow-roll it, with the impact lasting decades, or the world can sign up for one shitty month that will result in Trump being neutered by Congressional Republicans who are terrified of 2026.
the world has too many right wing govs currently to handle any fallout form such efforts. they no doubt don’t see benefits; they just have no idea how to actually govern and are just in it for the cash.
Brother, your economy is getting gigafucked by Trump either way.
If someone shoots at you, you don’t shoot yourself in the foot to spite them. Canada is reliant on US trade. Cutting it off entirely would cause a serious economic shockwave that’s hard to understate.
You know what’s frustrating in all that? Is that our leaders won’t do jack shit to diversify the economy.
Nothing has changed much during COVID and nothing will change now.
People will suffer and nothing will change.
Countries trade with the countries closest to them because the realities of logistics overpower politics or whatever ideals people might have. There are a few exceptions of course. Cuba doesn’t do a lot of trade with the countries closest to them. But they aren’t doing that well. The UK had an idea about diversifying their trade to be more about trade with non-european countries, but that didn’t go well either.
Geography is a bitch. You can’t physically move a country to another part of the globe, you have to deal with the countries near to you whether you like it or not.
So from the conservative viewpoint, what is the rationale for the tariffs? Are people really supposed to believe it has something to do with fentanyl? Like do conservatives actually believe that or is there some other narrative besides Donald Trump is looking to flex his power?
Yeah they do. Source: I know idiots.
or is there some other narrative
I believe a couple different things
a) he’s intentionally weakening the US economy to both weaken establishment institutions and spread mass discontent. he wants people nice and angry and fearful for the future. so when he takes more extreme actions later on, it doesn’t seem as bad. also he’s probably preparing for some sort of riot movement that includes political violence in the next couple years. as the establishment gets weaker, he’ll be in a better position to essentially ignore them. so for example Supreme Court says something unconstitutional? Maybe he just ignores it and enforces his will regardless
b) in the near future we may see a serious decoupling of the US economy from the world. maybe it’s due a planned war or some other circumstance and this is in preparation for that. tariffs tend to cut off the economy from the outside world. it’ll hurt less later on if we do some of it now
It’s not conservatism, it’s fascism. The strongman says jump and those loyal to him say “how high?” even when he’s being stupid. There is no analysis of Trump’s actions or why people go along with it beyond that.
He’s talking about Canada being 51st state. So not sure if he wants to just annex Canada.
For the most part it’s not getting the kind of attention you might expect, they are seeing this as all “part of the plan” and celebrating their great trade-warrior leader punishing the “bad guys” and the white house has deliberately withheld a LOT of the information about what’s going on. Most of the breaking stories we’ve gotten have been from foreign press. We didn’t even hear the tariff schedule until fucking France media issued stories.
There is not going to be the satisfaction we all hope for, not until there’s literally a new dust-bowl as we get ravaged by a new great depression, which as bad as it could be, might be our only hope for a more balanced political system going forward. I hate that these clowns have made me into an accelerationist but here are.
Back in 1890, there was no income tax. The federal government was funded through tariffs. With the upcoming rewrite of the tax code, the current administration needs new revenue, and trariffs are one of the few the president cab levy unilaterally.
Tariffs are essentially a shitty sales tax. I’ve read it described as a way to switch the US federal funding from I come tax to a hidden sales tax.
The revenues will also be much much lower, which is why they need to eliminate every federal bureau.
Yeah I’m confused because this is going to ruin American billionaires. Doesn’t maga worship billionaires?
If you have the money to ride it out you can buy the country for pennies on the dollar.
I had to chuckle about this comment. I said that same thing in a rant to family and friends last night including using the words “for pennies on the dollar”
Grow a spine and make it 100 percent. The quicker trumps masters learn it wont work the better.
I think the idea is to let trump continually be the one who escalates, with the hope that the American public notice it’s him and not those evil Canadians who are stealing America’s trade deficit.
That’s an emotional response. You don’t win with emotion, you win with a pragmatic strategy.
Don’t push your mental state on me.
Tariffs hurt the country imposing them the most
Go tell that to the idiots who think that the tariffs are paid by the companies exporting the goods.
Nah, keep shtum on that one until people in the US start to flip out
