Comment by zjsushsb
4 days ago
I’m assuming this is downstream of trumps move in Venezuela? Canada suffers the most from US access to Venezuelan oil. On top of all the prior rhetoric and moves by his admin.
What concerns me is why does the west think China is trustworthy? Why are we all fighting one another? Culture is important. China knows this, and is unequivocally Chinese relative to the Europeans.
It has nothing to do with Venezuela, and the move has been long time coming. It's not 'on top of all the prior' rhetoric, it is _ALL_ the rhetoric.
Let me be clear: here in Canada, the idea we are ever going to have anything like the same relationship with the United States again is held by a small and shrinking minority. And with every day, with the shit show that's happening down south, this becomes more true. The old adage is true, trust takes years to build and seconds to break.
As for China, I doubt anyone among the Canadian leadership, and most people here, "trusts" China, but it has nothing to do with trust but with cold hard calculus of who we can sell our stuff to. China is a big market, and speaking of trust, China has not threatened us with annexation. Words matter, as do deeds.
Culture is important, but has relatively little to do with geopolitics. Europe had thousands of years of shared history and values, and 2 world wars.
> Why are we all fighting one another?
well, the president of the united states of america and the human slimeball he sent as an ambassador to Canada have been threatening our sovereignty for a year. Hope this helps.
Pete Hoekstra? Canadians adore him! https://youtu.be/k6-KK1hfyU8
IP issues aside, China is a fairly reliable trading partner. That's all most people care about.
Up until a while ago, I'm pretty sure that the consensus was that China not trustworthy. And then, Trump plays his cards and the consensus is now that the US are even less trustworthy. So here you go.
> Up until a while ago, I'm pretty sure that the consensus was that China not trustworthy. And then, Trump plays his cards and the consensus is now that the US are even less trustworthy. So here you go.
But that doesn't make China trustworthy, which this move implies.
It seems like there's some "narcissism of small differences" kind of thing going on here. Trump may not share Canada/Europe's values to the same degree of prior US presidents, but China does not share those values at all and never has. It's really questionable judgement to throw your lot in with China if you're not happy with the leadership of the US.
We do trade with plenty of people who we don't think are trustworthy (Trump's US, for instance). I don't see that this move implies that China is trustworthy at all.
Why would this move imply anything about China's trustworthiness? Canada has forever been USA's lap dog. They say "jump" we say "how high?". Those tariffs we had were mostly to be in solidarity of the US.
Yes, it was also to protect car manufacturing in Ontario, but Trump has sent a clear signal that as long as Canada isn't a US state, this industry is going to die. So, why bother with a tariff at all?
This has nothing to do with China's trustworthiness.
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> Why are we all fighting one another?
Because of the Chinese/Russian asset that got into the highest leadership position of the western world, and is now using that position to create and inflame fighting amongst ourselves. We had it too good, for too long, people got too entitled, became out of touch with what actually made our society great, and our adversaries took advantage of that.
As an American, I am truly sorry to all of our allies and friends who didn't even get to vote on the matter.
While we (Canadians) certainly aren't happy with Trump's attack on Venezuela, Trump's threats against Canada, reneging on deals with Canada, threats against Greenland, and attacks on the US's domestic rule of law probably all carry more weight in this decision than that.
Despite the issues that Trump has caused Canada still does more trade with the US, on more favourable terms, than China...
What is Canada's issue with the "attack" on Venezuela (I wrap it in quotes because the actual operation was the capture of Maduro)
We're generally against warmongering. We're definitely against invading another country with the purpose being to steal it's resources, and that's what explicitly what the attack was. We're weary of the military of our neighbor violating their own constitution, and their own laws, to invade another country without authorization from the appropriate civilian authorities because that sort of lawlessness doesn't tend to turn out well. We are concerned by the blatant murders and violation of the rules of the sea, and the rules of war that lead up to the invasion including the sinking of ships nowhere near the US posing no threat to the US and the murder of shipwrecked people. I'm sure the list goes on, but those are some headline concerns that come to mind quickly.
The actual operation was a military invasion of another country resulting in 3 figures worth of deaths - not merely a "capture" of someone - though the capture itself is concerning for the aforementioned reasons.
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I don't want to be overly dismissive, but where do you actually see the cultural threat scenario?
Do you want the west to stick together mainly to preserve disneyified European fables in cinema as opposed to Chinese three-kingdoms drama?