Way to go, Canada!

[Son of Dave W]

"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves Orcs."

John Rogers

I saw where that was going about seven words in 

[Son of Dave W]

Now , I live way off , out on the coast in Nova Scotia. The edge of the planet. No major industry , low population density , no great mineral deposits ... we are not what he's apparently after. I doubt Trump will be sending troops out this way.
Unless he's adding lobsters to his list.
With Trudeau stepping down we have a new Liberal leader , the Conservative candidate is somewhat modelled on the MAGA ideal , I do not want to see that happen here. The new Liberal leader , Carney , is an economist , and seems to realize economic decisions affect people. He seems to have some compassion. I think he'll take the upcoming election. He will stand up to Trump. So I think he's about to become the right guy at the right time.

We'll see soon enough.

I generally completely abstain from discussing politics online whatsoever, but without going any further, this entire situation with Canada has me scratching my head. 

[Pilgrim]

I generally completely abstain from discussing politics online whatsoever, but without going any further, this entire situation with Canada has me scratching my head. 

Yep, I was reluctant to comment even as much as I did. This is the most dysfunctional situation I've ever seen for the US.

[doombass]

I have kept out also, but I will say something. Current management of the U.S is to run it like a business. A business managed by the means of fear.

[uwe]

Correction: Like a family business. Which never works in the long run with other businesses either.

When you have to answer to a powerful supervisory board or majority shareholders, you need a different skill set.

The higher the monkey climbs ...

[gearHed289]

If it weren't for the cold weather, I would have moved to Canada long before the orange sh*tgibbon got into politics. I played Canadian Music Week in Toronto in 95 and 97 and fell in love with the place. Vacationed there a couple of times as a result. Been a long time. I should head back up there some time.

[Pilgrim]

The thought that comes to mind for me is this:

If I owned a business with 20 people working in it, and I thought one of them was stealing money, would I fire all 20 and then decide what to do next?

Hell, no.

I'd research the situation, study the result and take action where I could do so without causing a major halt in the business process.

The current situation does not reflect businesslike behavior in ANY respect.

[Dave W]

The most colossaly stupid move of all is to start your term by deliberately attacking and alienating your allies.

[uwe]

Yes, that caught us somewhat by surprise, not to mention our Danish neighbors to the North. 

But we are where we are and I always wanted a nuclear bomb arsenal of our own just in case.



That "Roman Salute" has become all popular again, wie ich gehört habe. I wouldn't attach any greater meaning though, I'm sure there is nothing to it.

[Pilgrim]

The most colossally stupid move of all is to start your term by deliberately attacking and alienating your allies.

Absolutely! There is no possible benefit to doing that.

Today an article in the paper mentioned that the federal student loan site was down for hours, so kids couldn't get at the FAFSA financial aid forms. Those forms aren't used just for federal aid requests, they are used for ALL financial aid at ALL higher ed institutions.  Why is the site down? Because of firings at the Dept of Ed.  So we're starting to see the internal process of government fail. It won't be long before we see a lot more of this.

I will try and desist from sharing further thoughts about this. 

[uwe]

I honestly believe that - other than maybe Afghanistan regarding girls and women and Cambodia when trying to create their stone-age communism under Pol Pot in the 70s - the US is the only country in the world with an administration to brag about cutting down on education. It's friggin' dystopian.



My dad was a plant construction engineer for General Motors and often worked as an expat on their international sites, the battle against red tape was not alien to him and he would curse about it. But I'll always remember one piece of advice he gave me: "It's all too easy to rant about bureaucracy and government employees ... until you have to get things done in a country that doesn't have them. Then you are really stumped."

[Darrol]

Correction: Like a family business.

A family business in the mafia sense of things.

Pretty much everything that tangerine 47 does is based on ego, money/power, and pleasing his Russian handlers.

[Dave W]

And another thing: the whole concept and purpose of tariffs has always been strictly to exert economic pressure. I can't recall any government using tariffs as weapons of social policy. It's just astonishingly stupid.

Besides, US government's own statistics show that fewer than 1% of illegal immigration and fewer than 1% of fentanyl comes from Canada.

[morrow]

People are making a point of not buying anything from the US. The other day I noticed some things in the grocery store were turned upside down ... it was to alert people not to buy the item.

[Ken]

People are making a point of not buying anything from the US. The other day I noticed some things in the grocery store were turned upside down ... it was to alert people not to buy the item.

Can't blame them.  At this point we deserve to be pariahs.  It's sad and embarrassing.