Now get rid of First-past-the-post voting so there can be more then one chance to beat the conservatives.
You promised
Interesting way of framing it. As an American, I see it as a win. I think it’s poor journalism to perpetuate the idea that Trump represents Americans and not himself.
Whether or not he represents Americans, as head of state, he represents America
Sure but even the headline is manufacturing consent of Trump’s regime. It’s not the United States’ election to win or lose and the only person interested in Canada is Trump/Putin.
Maybe it’s this kind of language that acts as a soft-acceptance of what Trump is doing to global politics.
As a USian, I’d say we won. Donald Trump isn’t even approved by a majority. His desires certainly don’t equate to the United States in general.
Oh, it’s David Frum yearning for a better time when the guy he worked for also disappeared prisoners without due process, but didn’t do anything distressing like impede free trade.
Unfortunately you elected him twice. Knowing what a arsehole he is.
So now the rest of the world has absolutely no reason to trust any treaty you sign. It just time until you elect another nutter who will ignore the treaties when it suits them. Or the billionaire buggering them.
Heck you started a trade war with a nation he signed a free trade deal with last time you elected him.
You are not a nation to trust even though some of you may be sorta cool.
Your legal systems independence is proven false and party driven. And your constitution seems intentionally meaningless, as a form of government control.
While your second amendment seems to only increase the availability of death. With no ability to control the power of your government.
You are basically a member of a failed state.
Sorry babe I tried my best to be born in the right country and I guessed wrong is all
I didn’t nor did the vast majority of the country due to either voting blue or not living in a state where presidential votes even matter, but it’s perfectly reasonable for other nations to not trust that the United States’ broader system and political climate will be reliable in maintaining its policies and relationships.
But they also should have been more independent in the first place. We’ve been doing bad things for a while now while our Western allies just rode along because it was easier to demonstrate fealty than stand up for what was right.
The neoliberal system in the US has paved the road for something much more abhorrent, but the broader Western liberal world order is also in a rotten state. Germany, Canada, Australia, France, and the UK all have had (and generally still do have) serious risks of empowering their own fascists and few are reflecting on how to defend from and depower them. They just think that holding them off for an election means the problem is over and they can go back to the generic neoliberal policy that’s doing nothing for people and playing into right-wing talking points on debt and immigration.
Lots of Americans breathed a sigh of relief with Biden, went back to brunch, and then just accepted it as business as usual when the centrists immediately pivoted to obstruction to prevent any movement leftward. The return of The System and the status quo were our armor against Trumpism. Don’t make that same mistake.
But they also should have been more independent in the first place.
Sorta comes with actually following agreements. And the US ignoring it’s own past.
After ww2 the US forced European nations into following US fiscal leadership. In exchange for the fiscal support post war.
You ignored the war for 4 years building up your power while Hitler destroyed Europe. Then used that power to entrape Europe into your methods.
Add to that using your huge defence budget to overpower the spending of remaining world. And dependency on the US was not an option bot a act of force.
Throwing this on Frum is an odd take. I don’t agree with his policies, but a free press means an exchange of ideas. And in this piece, we see reasoned discourse, not some sort of batshit set of plans (but who needs that when you have Project 2025?).
Saying that a concept (or set of concepts) has no value because of who is saying it is an interesting intellectual choice. We all fuck up; we all change over the years. My dad, for example, was a die-hard Reagan supporter, and he didn’t drink, let alone use cocaine. Now, in his 80s, he won’t touch any GOP candidate, voting straight Dem regardless.
If my dad can realise in his golden years that the message is more important than the messenger, it’s not a stretch to think others can as well.
What are you going on about? I’m not saying he should be banned from printing his ideas, I’m saying his characterizing continued Liberal rule as an unfortunate consequence of needing to stop Trump insanity is indicative that he’s still his same neocon self and hasn’t reflected on the relationship of his political work and the current climate.
It’s ok to not pretend every op-ed is a fresh expression of ideas with no context stemming from their author’s history or world view, and it’s similarly ok not to treat all world views as just curious and value neutral opinions enriching a beautiful tapestry of ideas.
David Frum has been an instrumental and active shaper of the conservative-led degeneration of American values since the Bush administration. Trump is his limit, but everything in the whole rotten project before that was fine. No, we don’t need to divorce the message from the messenger. The message itself is bad, but the messenger’s role in the while situation deserves extra criticism.
We definitely won the election. Canadian authoritarianism would have just made things worse. And at least we still have somewhere to go north of the border.
