Summary

In a virtual speech at the World Economic Forum, Trump suggested Canada could become a U.S. state to avoid his proposed tariffs on imports.

The remark elicited gasps from the audience.

Trump claimed the U.S. does not need Canadian lumber, energy, or vehicles, vastly overstating the trade deficit between the two nations.

He reiterated his intention to impose tariffs, potentially as high as 25%, on imports from Canada and Mexico starting February 1.

Economists warn such tariffs would raise prices for U.S. consumers.

  • skozzii@lemmy.ca
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    3 days ago

    I still don’t think he realizes the tariffs he keeps threatening us with hurt his people way more…

    • brucethemoose@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      By “his people,” you mean most voters, yeah.

      But for high millionaires/billionaires, this is effectively a regressive tax that will benefit them.

  • Gammelfisch@lemmy.world
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    4 days ago

    Putin’s Sock Puppet taking orders from Moscow to divide the NATO members. For starters, the Canadians should stop buying US made weapons, because the current US leadership is unhinged and unreliable. If anything, the Blue States should become Canadian Provinces.

    • ubergeek@lemmy.today
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      4 days ago

      They don’t want us. As soon as NYS joins, NYC would dominate the votes, due to wild population differences.

      • HellsBelle@sh.itjust.works
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        3 days ago

        Why wouldn’t Canada want any state to join our Confederation?

        Guaranteed if that were to happen we would be switching to a proportional representation federal vote to fix large population differences.

        • ubergeek@lemmy.today
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          3 days ago

          So, Canada would “fix” it, by employing a system like the US has, that ensures a tyranny of the minority?

  • r0ertel@lemmy.world
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    5 days ago

    I’m going to keep posting this every time I see a reference to US tariffs against Canada.

    https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/15/beauty-eh/

    The TL;DR is that tariffs would violate the NAFTA / USMCA treaty in which Canada agreed to respect US copyright law in exchange for free trade. No free trade? Canada doesn’t need to respect US copyright any longer and can become a flourishing economy of products to compete with US products that are massively overpriced. Think printer ink and other stuff.

      • NotSteve_@lemmy.ca
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        4 days ago

        Idk if it’s just for individuals, but our ISPs generally don’t care about pirating already. I use a VPN to pirate here but just set to another city in Canada. I only even do that because I run jellyfin and have terabytes of downloads a month.

        Worst case scenario is the ISP sends you a notice that the media companies are mad, but that’s the end of it. They won’t pursue anything further because they don’t care

        • ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca
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          4 days ago

          It’s not illegal to download something, it’s illegal to host something (seeding)

          ISPs are compelled to notify you of copyright notices but they can’t hand your information over so you can only get caught if you respond

          • lazylion_ca@lemmy.ca
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            4 days ago

            And even if you are dumb enough to respond to one of those emails, the liability is limited to something $50 per title. So it’s not worth the money to pay a lawyer to go after anyone. They will however try to trick you into a private settlement.

            • Doomsider@lemmy.world
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              4 days ago

              No no no, you must charge every user with willful commercial infringement and penalize them $250,000 per violation. It is the American way!

      • r0ertel@lemmy.world
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        4 days ago

        I was thinking to host pirate sites of US movies, software, etc. Get the US companies to tell the orange buffoon to behave or better yet, move the companies to Canada.

        I really like the article’s reference to manufacturing US DMCA-breaking technologies and forcing devices to host app stores in Canada where the government can declare the 30% Apple tax illegal.

    • runeko@programming.dev
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      4 days ago

      Yes, please, Canadian produced pharmaceuticals + 15% tariff = an order of magnitude cheaper than what we can buy in the States.

      • chiliedogg@lemmy.world
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        4 days ago

        That’s why buying drugs across the border is specifically illegal. Can’t have us buying our medicine at a fair value.

    • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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      4 days ago

      The TL;DR is that tariffs would violate the NAFTA / USMCA treat

      The treaty that Trump himself negotiated and agreed to.

      That’s the treaty he is calling a “bad deal” and threatening to violate.

    • dan1101@lemm.ee
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      4 days ago

      Yeah anyone mad at the US government right now should to take it out on the US corporations, not the citizens. Citizens can’t do much about this shitty administration until the next election but the corporations will have their feelings massively hurt every quarter if they don’t meet their profit expectations.

      trump will listen to corporations far more than citizens.

      • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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        4 days ago

        Citizens could have done something about it in November. And almost half of them chose to sit on their hands.

        Of the ones who actually voted, half of those actively voted for this shitshow.

        Sorry to the few who tried to stop it, but the idiots that surround you have brought this on you.

        We will try to aim most of our retaliation at the Redhatter morons, but some of you will likely get caught in the crossfire.

        Please do whatever you can to fix your country’s shit, so we can get back to being friendly neighbours.

        .

        Also, please try not to break any more of the firefighting equipment we loaned you (and sent even after agent orange started threatening us).

  • ExtremeDullard@lemmy.sdf.org
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    5 days ago

    The US consumers voted for Trump to lower the price of eggs.

    The price of eggs is soaring today. Why? Because bird flu is killing chicken.

    So what does Trump do? He cancels research on bird flu. Surely the irony won’t be missed on the magats who voted him in.

    And now this: aggression against allied nations that will result in more price hikes. More irony for the maga morons to enjoy.

    It’s only been 4 days. It’s gonna be a long 4 years…

    • marcos@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      Surely the irony won’t be missed on the magats who voted him in.

      Oh… You have some completely unrealistic faith on Humanity…

      Of course they will miss the irony. And in 4 years, they will claim the constant 4 years of inflation on Biden.

    • Kraven_the_Hunter@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      4 days ago

      The term ‘magat’ is just so on the nose, no matter how deep you go with the analogy.

      A maggot is a mindless sack of flesh that wriggles and writhes all over itself and its neighbors, feeding on a constant diet of rot and decay. And if it survives that stage? It becomes a fly, attracted to steaming piles of shit, regurgitating the same diet that it feeds on just to consume it again, and then buzzing off to distract, annoy, and generally piss off the regular folk who are just trying to get on with their day.

    • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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      4 days ago

      Surely the irony won’t be missed on the magats who voted him in.

      Someone would have to explain the concept of irony to them first.

  • studentofarkad@lemm.ee
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    4 days ago

    Did someone brainwash this dude to annex other countries or something? Its like he wants to leave a legacy behind of being the first president in the modern age to expand America.

  • Obinice@lemmy.world
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    4 days ago

    We must strengthen NATO’s defences against the aggressive USA and significantly improve border defences, lest they catch us with our pants down when the time comes.

  • Zier@fedia.io
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    5 days ago

    Here’s the plan. The Northern US states all join Canada. The Southern Half of US states join Mexico. The US is gone. Canada & Mexico join to become 1 huge nation. (putin shits himself!) And then we deport ALL the conservatives out of North America, and live happily ever after. Problem solved. You’re Welcome.

  • atzanteol@sh.itjust.works
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    5 days ago

    Why the fuck is this asshole fighting with fucking Canada? Goddamn I can’t wait until he dies.

    • xenomor@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      I want to piss on his grave. Seriously, they better have that shit locked down or at the top of a mausoleum or something. Otherwise, I want to try and make it a national pastime.

      • Skates@feddit.nl
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        5 days ago

        I actually thought about this a while ago. Surely there are many hated people in the world, but some world leaders take the cake. I would pay to piss on Putin’s grave for example. So… Why isn’t there a business opportunity here? Buy the graveyard holding them, sell tickets to piss on Putin/Trump/Kimjong/Xi/whoever. You can make it into a holiday - 1000 euro for a weekend in a Moscow hotel, you visit the Kremlin, you piss on Putin’s grave, you go home with a shirt that says “I literally pissed on Putin and all I got was this lousy Polonium-engraved t-shirt”. I almost bought pissonputinsgrave.com when I thought about this, but I lack the funds to actually buy their graveyards.

        Surely there’s something here for our society, right? We’re all tired of oppression at the hands of a few power-hungry old fucks and are just waiting for them to die so that we can finally release our common prostate. Or is it just me and you that would love the satisfaction of defiling the corpses of these cunt dictators?

        • werefreeatlast@lemmy.world
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          5 days ago

          If only Saddam and the other fuckface hadn’t been wasted like that! They just got removed, one sunk into the ocean, the other hung and buried. We…err…the world could have made millions, even to this very day. Like if you hung a drape and told people Saddam was on the other side, they would pay you good money to punch the drape for a chance to actually punch Saddam. But to make this more accessible and make more money efficiently, pee is the key! Its universally understood. It would be a huge 2 floor shrine. You create a transparent fishtanks musuleum on the first floor, and toss the evil in there. People park, pay the entrance fee (which includes a large drink), and they make a line to go see the assholes decomposing. In due time, they need to pee so they head upstairs where urinals and restrooms are all setup accordingly. Then all that flows down and pours over the evil before heading to the general drainage. Done? Head back down and you can pay extra for a remote controlled super soaker fed with pee that you can use to shoot the poop off with. You may pay extra for the 3rd floor which offers a direct line of sight opportunity for you to personally peen on the evil. Everyone would enjoy this! And we can keep tossing in more evil as they fuck up and find out. A few decades later we would have bones for sale by the piece at auction. All clearly marked so you know which evil you are peeing on. And all this would be perfectly sanitary and safe and good smelling. Good for the environment too if we treat the swage correctly.

      • Roflmasterbigpimp@lemmy.world
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        5 days ago

        I live in Germany but I’m more than willing to send a stool and urine Sample via overnight express to the USA as soon as this sack of human-goo and spray tan gets put in the ground.

  • pixxelkick@lemmy.world
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    5 days ago

    So many people are extremely missing the point here

    Trump is purposefully threatening Canada to give his canadian conservative buddy Poilievre something to “fight” against, to make him look good

    “Wow Poilievre is standing up against Trump, I’m gonna vote for him!”

    That’s the game plan, in reality the two dipshits are best buds and can collude together to fuck over both countries extra hard, after conservatives get a majority over here.

    It’s a stunt to get conservatives in charge over here “against” Trump, which is so fucking stupid and yet it’s probably gonna work cuz so many people are gonna fall for it.

    I don’t think the liberal party has a good play against it, other than if our new liberal leader challenges Trump and musk to a boxing match and literally bears the shit out of them on live television

    I unironically think the Lincoln “I’ll fight you let’s go right now” leader who seriously fucks up Musk or Zuckerberg or any of those dipshits on live television would actually win by a landslide here

    It’s fuckin stupid but that’s what works apparently…

    • ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca
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      5 days ago

      The Conservative Premier of Ontario, Doug Ford, is already doing that. I’ve heard his ads on the radio calling for Ontarioans to give him a majority government so he “can stand up to Trump”. The guy spent his time as Premier standing up to nurses and bike lanes. This new stand up against Trump shtick is just more faux populism.

        • corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca
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          5 days ago

          Sides. But try not to get caught up in the us vs them drama.

          The key point is that Mr Ford is using populism to promote populism, with no actual history where he stands up to bullies as much as he stands up to caregivers and citizens; and populism is the schtick of his party and the national cons, but isn’t a common thread in other parties as they campaign on rights and consolidated services instead.

        • NotSteve_@lemmy.ca
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          5 days ago

          The centre to left is against it as much if not more than the conservatives. If anything, PP has been awfully silent on the whole thing. And don’t even look up how Danielle Smith (conservative premier of Alberta) is responding

    • nova_ad_vitum@lemmy.ca
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      5 days ago

      Trump is purposefully threatening Canada to give his canadian conservative buddy Poilievre something to “fight” against, to make him look good

      This theory is predicated on 1) Trump remembering who PP is, 2) caring enough about who is running Canada to have it drive policy.

      I don’t think either of these things are true.

      • pixxelkick@lemmy.world
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        5 days ago

        They literally have meetings, and Trump obviously cares about conservatives willing to help him grift being in charge…

    • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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      4 days ago

      Trump is purposefully threatening Canada to give his canadian conservative buddy Poilievre something to “fight” against, to make him look good

      Except Polierve has been the slowest and the quietest to speak out against this bullshit that Trump is trying to pull.

    • Someone@lemmy.ca
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      4 days ago

      I don’t think the liberal party has a good play against it, other than if our new liberal leader challenges Trump and musk to a boxing match and literally bears the shit out of them on live television

      Ahh, well that’s not good. Love him or hate him, I think one thing everyone could agree on about Trudeau is that he’d do pretty well in a politician boxing league.

      • pixxelkick@lemmy.world
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        Trudeau is out, we are voting in a new leader shortly

        Hopefully they vote someone in who unironically would challenge dipshits to boxing matches

    • Revan343@lemmy.ca
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      4 days ago

      other than if our new liberal leader challenges Trump and musk to a boxing match and literally bears the shit out of them on live television

      That would probably get me to vote liberal for the first time in my life

    • UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.ml
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      4 days ago

      Is electoral reform still a policy of the liberal party. Will they Lucy football is away once the election is over again?

  • Queen HawlSera@lemm.ee
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    4 days ago

    How does this lower the price of my god damn eggs?

    Also he does know that Canada would be yet another blue state right?

    • Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca
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      4 days ago

      Each province/territory would insist on being its own state so Canada would at least probably become 10 blue states and 3 red states if not 11/2. Not sure how Manitoba would swing.

      • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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        Not sure how Manitoba would swing.

        Given that our current government is NDP after a disastrous period of the previous conservative government, I would expect Manitoba would generally vote to the left of most states.

  • HappySkullsplitter@lemmy.world
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    4 days ago

    So much political theater and me without my opera glasses

    Cutting off trade with Canada would devastate the US economy overnight