Slamming Canada is foolish and will boomerang back on the U.S.
Living next door to Canada as I grew up didn’t make me an expert on Canada, but it enriched my understanding of a neighbor and partner.
Working side by side with Canadians on Great Lakes environmental policy for 40 years didn’t make me an expert on Canada, but it deepened my appreciation for its parallel, yet distinctively different culture.
And that’s enough to tell me that any American who thinks Canadians are too nice to fight back when a U.S. President mocks their prime minister as governor of the 51st state, and then slaps punitive tariffs on Canadian imports, is dead wrong.
From this vantage point in Michigan, Ontario is just across the southernmost portion of Lake Huron.
Their current prime minister, Justin Trudeau, is deeply unpopular after nearly a decade in that office, but most of Canada stood behind him last night as he announced Canada’s response. It’s a muscular one.
His remarks were aimed not at Trump so much as Americans, and they were moving.
As President John F. Kennedy said many years ago, geography has made us neighbors. History has made us friends, economics has made us partners and necessity has made us allies.
That rang true for many decades prior to President Kennedy’s time in office, and in the decades since, from the beaches of Normandy to the mountains of the Korean Peninsula, from the fields of Flanders to the streets of Kandahar, we have fought and died alongside you during your darkest hours during the Iranian hostage crisis. Those 444 days, we worked around the clock from our embassy to get your innocent compatriots home.
During the summer of 2005, when Hurricane Katrina ravaged your great city of New Orleans, or mere weeks ago when we sent water bombers to tackle the wildfires in California. During the day, the world stood still, Sept. 11, 2001, when we provided refuge to stranded passengers and planes. We were always there, standing with you, grieving with you. The American people.
Together, we’ve built the most successful economic, military and security partnership the world has ever seen. A relationship that has been the envy of the world.
Yes, we’ve had our differences in the past, but we’ve always found a way to get past them. As I’ve said before, if President Trump wants to usher in a new golden age for the United States, the better path is to partner with Canada, not to punish us.
Most Americans rarely think of Canada. Maybe if we did, we’d refrain from policies that harm them — and in turn hurt the U.S.