Classic Beauty and the Beast scenario…
Can’t say that the Beast harbors much love for the beauty in this case though…
You forget that NAFTA is the basis of trade between Canada and Mexico. Trump is about to trash NAFTA and Trudeau needs to know if Trump can be trusted not to interfere with Canada/Mexico trade.
Trudeau is playing this brilliantly. You don’t understand the difficulty of his situation up here - the left is ripping into him, because he refuses to basically shit on Trump publicly (potentially dooming us to a devastating trade war). The right is ripping into him because the man dares to prepare Canada for a post-carbon (we recently imposed a nationwide carbon pricing scheme), highly-automated (he’s also passed a universal childcare benefit, which currently provides my middle-class, 2 kid family with 800$ per month, among other efforts) economy with an aging workforce (for which he’s beefed up immigration) and a massive infrastructure deficit (for which he’s dramatically increased infrastructure spending).
So in short - Trudeau is attempting to deal with arguably our four greatest national challenges, simultaneously, while trying his damndest not to piss off Trump by, say, being good-looking or being nice to foreign children on camera. The man is quite possibly walking the shittiest tightrope of all-time. We (mostly) love him for it.
Trudeau’s close cooperation with Trump and the first daughter could ease some worries among Canadians that the U.S. president will enact protectionist measures that could hurt the Canadian economy. It could also alleviate some fears that Trump will be as combative with Trudeau…
Everybody knows the people to our north are white and the people to our south are brown, so our Canadian friends have nothing to worry about from the bigot-in-chief.
He didn’t know that Shinzo Abe’s last name was Abe and not Mr. Shinzo. I wonder if he will call Trudeau Mr. Pierre? What a fucked up WH
I would so love it if Mr. Trudeau ditched at the last minute.
Watch out for that handshake Justin. If you are half the man I think you are, do not sibmit to arm pulling and hand patting.
I wonder if Trump will bring up how Canada has destroyed American families by stealing the entertainment industry with absurd subsidies. I’m not holding my breath…
…are you really going to complain about our arts and culture subsidies? You guys subsidize farms to the tune of billions, basically guaranteeing that Africa never has a viable agriculture industry, and you want to get mad at us for protecting arts and culture?
Get bent.
I’m slowly beginning to think that Drumpf meeting with foreign leaders is having the curious effect of highlighting how unqualified he really is. They come and immediately people start saying “that’s how a head of state is supposed to act, what a head of state is supposed to be like.”
I think it’s one of the most painfully embarrassing things for the GOP.
Everybody has seen the video of Mr. Abe’s face after that handshake.
Gotta feel sorry for Trudeau. For him a hand shake with Trump is like unclogging a toilet with your bare hands.
“It’s a smart thing if Canada proposed this,” said Nelson Wiseman, a professor at the University of Toronto. “It takes attention off of NAFTA. And from Trump’s point of view, it contributes to softening Trump’s image, and he’s got a problem with women.”
Cough on your hand right before the shake.
Protecting arts and culture? If that’s the goal of those subsidies, then you should be furious about how it’s being squandered away so that already successful Hollywood studios can make even more money.
I’m happy to have this discussion in good faith, but if you’re going to claim that the subsidies are protecting arts and culture, or put up straw men about other things that the US does, there’s no point.
I’ve seen my own lively hood depleted and many friends and families harshly effected by those subsidies, so yes, they make me mad. Do I hate Canada? No, quite the opposite. Do I support everything we do in the US? Of course not. I do have every right to be upset by those subsidies.
The subsidies are about protecting arts and culture. I’m not sure why you find that concept difficult. That point about your own subsidies is not exactly a strawman either - Americans sometimes have very US-centric view of the world, and I’d assumed maybe, in the course of lecturing about our country’s subsidies, you’d considered the fact that your country (with bi-partisan support) crushes entire continent’s economies with subsidies of their own. Considering the topic at hand, I fail to see why that’s a strawman…
But no matter. Yes, we subsidize studios large and small - and yes, it is to protect arts and culture. You are not the only people with a film industry - and while you may not like that “big business” receives the subsidies, and you may not consider that “art”, the actors, artists, and other talented people they employ, in Canada, would beg to differ. In fact, as most Canadians would (let’s debunk an American myth here - we are not all nice) they’d probably utter something along the lines of “get bent”. We are a small country on the doorstep of the most culturally dominant nation in the history of civilization. We don’t want to lose our unique culture - even if it is so easily dismissed south of the border.
And by the way - you and your friends are more than welcome here. Anyone is. However, I won’t apologize for our government protecting our artistic industries - and I won’t accept any blame because yours will not.
I know we’re more than welcome there (and that’s fantastic, really, you guys have every right to look down your noses at our politics/policies). I got offered a raise to move there when they shut down my company (to move to the same company in Vancouver), along with most of the hundreds of people I worked with, and this happened at most of the VFX studios in Los Angeles. You act like it’s no small thing to pick up and move to another country. People have homes, people have children, people have ailing parents and all kinds of other reasons they are not to able to leave home, even if they wanted to.
Within a couple of years the industry here collapsed over it. There were literally hundreds if not thousands of Americans moved up there to work since there weren’t enough Canadians with the skill to get the work done (not that Canadians weren’t capable of getting skilled, LA just had most of the experienced people since that’s where the industry was created).
People who couldn’t hold onto the small bit of industry left here either moved their families, moved away from their families or switched careers. It had a huge negative effect on lots of progressive middle class families. I refuse to agree that that’s some sort of justice because of other bad American policies.
So if you want to say, “We wanted your industry so we bought it and you got screwed, deal with it.” I can’t really disagree.
You haven’t convinced me at all that it’s main effect is to “protect” Canadian arts and culture, or even Canadian film makers. Right now it’s main beneficiaries are large US studios, and not the middle class people who work for those studios.
I will concede that I can’t be mad that Trump doesn’t bring it up with Trudeau. It’s certainly not the worst thing either of our countries does, and it’s only a pressing issue for a few thousand people. That said, as one of those people, I have every right to be mad about the subsidies.
For the record, the way things are going now, I’m beginning to wonder if I shouldn’t have taken that raise and moved. I really do love it up there. I just have kids, ailing parents (are they welcome too?) and frankly, this is my home.
Man - let’s put the policy stuff aside for a moment. When it comes to global economic interests screwing you over individually, I want you to know I really do emphasize. I come from Cape Breton Island on the east coast of Canada - we were a coal and steel boomtown until NAFTA. This brought our beautiful little Island from 250000 people to the current 130000 - half the community has left. I get not wanting to leave - I struggle with the same problem.
That being said… we made our industry more competitive. We have a much stronger tax base than the US, and we are willing to spend the money. Its not something I feel we need to apologize for.
You have every right to be mad - but being angry at international economic policies isn’t very productive. We can’t control these things. We need to adapt - unfortunately. I don’t intend to be harsh - but with real-life economics, that’s just the way it is.