Today is not a good day for the Canadian trade team.
It started with Quebec’s new Premier in Washington DC meeting with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer {citation} in order to talk trade {SEE TIMELINE} saying on Twitter, “Quebec wants a renewal of the [USMCA] to ensure a stable and predictable framework for our economic exchanges.” However, Mrs. Christine Fréchette (pictured left) then bragged about having strategic discussions with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. {citation}
For those who might not know, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is a parasitic Wall Street and K-Street lobbying organization that has been locked out of trade influence since President Trump took office in 2017. It was the U.S. CoC who sold out our manufacturing base, paid-off prior administrations and wrote the actual trade language in almost every trade deal that destroyed U.S. manufacturing.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is a lobbying organization who focuses on the bottom-line profits of U.S. multinational corporations, and they don’t care what happens domestically to American jobs, American manufacturing and American wages. The CoC is the organization who created the rust belt and destroyed our manufacturing base under the guise of promoting a “service driven economy.”
If Canada want’s a successful trade negotiation with the USA, the Chamber of Commerce is the last organization they should be strategizing with.
Then comes Prime Minister Mark Carney who not only steps on a rake, but he also publicly insults President Trump and the entire U.S. trade team by saying every country in the world privately tells him they regret making a trade agreement with President Trump. ¹{Citation at 28:10 of Video}
I’m going to post the entire video of Prime Minister Mark Carney discussing USMCA (Canada calls CUSMA) trade negotiations because the tone deafness of it is off the charts. That includes the Canadian Prime Minister saying that Section 232 national security reviews are a violation of the U.S-Canada trade agreement. Carney believes any independent U.S. trade position that negates trade with any Canadian sector is a violation of trade rules, yet he is afraid to sue over Sec 232 because he doesn’t want to discover the flaw in his mindset.
Carney, like Trudeau before him, is highly upset about the U.S. tariffs on Steel, Aluminum and Softwood Lumber. Factually, those raw material sectors of the Canadian economy have been dumping product into the USA for decades despite the Canadian government simultaneously dismantling their industrial dirty jobs.
♦ This is how the Canadian system works:
Canada dumps raw materials into the USA market, then skips the manufacturing part (dirty jobs) because they are not climate friendly, then imports manufactured component parts from China and elsewhere, assembles the components and then tries to find markets for their finished goods, usually in the USA.
President Trump has worked to stop the “dumping part” by placing tariffs on the Canadian raw materials (Steel, Aluminum, Softwood Lumber), in order to generate our own industrial sectors of mining, logging, steel and aluminum works.
This tariff block creates a situation where Canada needs to find other outlets for their raw material dumping….. which them becomes funny because Europe has already rejected them (same reason as Trump) and China doesn’t need them.
As a consequence, Canada has no choice except to try and force the USA to accept the dumping by lobbying Democrats and various business interests like the Chamber of Commerce to put political pressure on President Donald Trump. So far, their approach not only isn’t working – but it’s also insulting.
If Prime Minister Mark Carney keeps promoting this type of ridiculous anti-Trump trade narrative for domestic consumption (orange man bad), the Canadian people are going to be blindsided when the backfire surfaces. It has already backfired; the Canadian people just don’t see it yet.
Video prompted to 18:51 where Carney discusses trade relations with the USA:
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¹We are drawing attention to this because we understand administration officials review these CTH research inputs. President Trump is not going to like this insult.
Canada (we) is going to get our clock cleaned if and when negotiations begin. Our lead negotiator is the former chief bureaucrat for Canada. Insert face palm emoji. Bureaucrats with pronouns against seasoned, experienced negotiators who have been doing many deals these last 16 months.
This is why he is stalling because it will be down right brutal. Imagine Blinken with the Chinese in Alaska bad. The sad part is Carney and our negotiating team they will run to the press to call the US bullies and Canadians will believe this because of “Orange Man Bad” Syndrome. We have no cards.
My concern is how much more selling out to China Carney is going to do. This will further worsen our position as it it will not only be economic but security issues. Then I fear the US will look at us as a growing threat.
Canada lobbying to put political pressure on President Trump is a fools errand.
You can’t put political pressure on him. PDJT makes decisions based what he believes is best for America and doesn’t care about the politics.
Which is why most Americans love him and he’s a very effective President, he’s not a politician.
Are Canadian raw materials (wood, copper mine concentrate, other resources, etc.) less costly than U.S. produced raw materials?
I recognize that Chinese-manufactured / assembled products are cheaper due to lower wages.
I consider watching this interview cruel and unusual punishment. My ears and eyes are bleeding, and I am frantically searching for a barf bag. The gibberish, word salad Carney was spewing, has to be a learned skill of talking without saying anything. I confess this high-level economics conversation was outside of my wheelhouse. But I did understand the remark Carney made about other countries not happy with their trade deals. Of course they are not happy, because they have been ripping off the United States for decades and now it is all over. They FAFO and they are not happy, so what. They are lucky they even have a trade deal; they could wind up like Spain.
The old thing goes when you’re enemy is digging a hole don’t stop and let them dig. Carney knows what’s happening. He’s aligned with China. He has all his investments in the United States and he does not care about Canada. I feel bad for the conservatives in Canada.