Trump backing down already? Unlikely.

The good news is, we understand the actual threat; the bad news is they know the weakness because she was on the balls and parties circuit.

BlueSky.

I’m a desk jockey — a certified (certifiable?) member of the laptop class. I watch, read, read some more, and then I opine. I have developed an incredibly dark and twisted sense of humour that allows me to laugh out loud when politicians say outlandish things, and I have an exceptional memory that gives me a bit of an edge in the field of political commentary because I remember what politicians say, and where I read, or heard, it if I need to show the receipts.

Political crises are fantastic in my line of work. I recently described it as “the desk jockey’s version of a war correspondent”. I’m also good at seeing where things are heading. Perhaps a little too good because being two or three months ahead of things is asking a lot from people who have hobbies or responsibilities that entail paying attention to something other than politics.

With that being said, I’m not the one being asked to pack away all the U.S.-made booze again.

I’m not the one who is working in an auto plant in Ontario wondering if my job is going to be there by the end of the week.

Neither am I a public servant being asked to do whatever it is they do to apply new tariffs on various goods in different industries.

And I’m not a politician having to dance around a lunatic who is clearly enjoying the fact that his actions keep everyone on edge as he plays this little game of acting tough and then “reasonable” and “fair” the next day.

Back off, Donald

The tariffs went into effect at 12:01 AM, Tuesday morning.

Canadian politicians shared their responses all day long, with the Prime Minister again addressing the fact that tariffs would hurt Americans immediately. He also took some liberty in his speech by referring to Mr. Trump by his given name, in reference to a Wall Street Journal article; “Donald, they point out that even though you are a very smart guy, this is a very dumb thing to do."

And it always was, economically-speaking, which Mr. Trump has demonstrated is not a problem for him.

That refusal to protect his own people, the ones who voted for him to ‘make life more affordable’, seems to be signaling to Canadians, even the ones who thought a slogan was the first step on the path to becoming reality, that Mr. Trump is actively trying to hurt Canadians.

The United States launched a trade war against Canada, its closest partner and ally, their closest friend. At the the same time they’re talking about working positively with Russia, appeasing Vladimir Putin; a lying, murderous dictator. Make it make sense.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau March 4, 2025

Newly re-elected Premier Doug Ford came out swinging hard on Tuesday, earning him a phone call from Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick, who apparently didn’t like that Canadians were telling the Trump administration to take a flying one.

Much like how your puppet-in-chief has carefully crafted an image of himself as a “successful business person”, Canadians have worked very hard to craft an image of themselves as “nice”. We are pretty nice, generally, but many of us also cheer while watching two guys drop their gloves and start beating on one another.

We don’t like bullies.

We don’t like being toyed with.

And we aren’t going to play Donald’s game anymore.

Strong and tariff-free

Finance Minister Dominic LeBlanc has said there is no plan to reduce stage one of Canada’s response to the Trump tariffs. It’s barely a blip in response to sweeping tariffs on all Canadian goods — why would we?

Mr. Lutnick said Tuesday on Bloomberg that Mr. Trump might be willing to “meet in the middle” by exempting certain imports that are in compliance with CUSMA, the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement.

Here’s a hot take: Trump tariffs are not in compliance with CUSMA, so why would we entertain a negotiation of Canadian imports the U.S. wants to exclude based on an agreement they’ve already broken?

We didn’t respond with dollar for dollar tariffs, and we shouldn’t move an inch if the Trump administration isn’t willing to follow the agreement their current leader made in his first term.

My expectation, however, is that since Alberta Premier Danielle Smith spent months trying to befriend Republicans, and since she is “trusting” of people she aligns with politically, she gave them everything they need to drive a wedge into Canadian unity with partisan-laced splitters.

After her trips began, Republican representatives began pointing to Alberta specifically and suggesting they could just “take” part of the country with the oil.

Despite her recent, and incredible, communications flip from being “disappointed” in Donald Trump’s tariff threats to calling them “foolish” and a “failure”, Ms. Smith is a partisan first, and an oil lobbyist second. Unfortunately, she’s also the Premier of a Canadian province where the largest minority of people are also partisan first and only grudgingly willing to accept their place in confederation if a conservative government is in Ottawa.

Ms. Smith convinced them she is not loyal Canada at the same time she convinced the rest of us.

In her desperation to be regarded as an “equal” to partisan interests of an administration that has become hostile to our country, she would have given them anything, and everything, for them to use against “the Liberals”, and as a consequence of their being in power at the time and her inability to assess the consequences of her actions, Canada.

Therefore, I expect that we shall see evidence of that in Donald’s “negotiations” later today.

And then we’ll fight amongst ourselves while they sit back and watch.

Just like Putin is doing with America.

Fancy that.

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