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There are degrees of advantage. The greatest simple economic advantage should lie with untrammeled trade. Almost no country (maybe actually no country?) occupies this position. If the utility of protecting selected domestic producers is sufficient, a situation of mostly free trade with some...

I doubt their premises (definitions/criteria) for political ideology assessment. The placements on the vertical axis are manifestly inverted; the more collectivist ideologies are not inherently more "libertarian" than the more individualist ones. It's not conservatives who most vocally demand...

The two streams run deep. The Liberals are the most effective federal political party at hanging together, but even they couldn't contain the damage when Chretien was manoeuvred out by Martin.

Sure, I can understand how one could read "left-leaning parties" and assume that I wasn't writing about NDP and Liberals in general but about Carney's government specifically. The Liberal party has had two major factions/traditions/streams going back at least five decades. Carney is in the...

A government fiscal crisis doesn't always have to be a broad economic crisis; revenues can shrink by a greater proportion than GDP contracts (if it contracts). A typical fiscal crisis is a drop in revenue and increase in spending. On the revenue side, government can still aim to spend its...

"Jobs in Canada" makes a sale easier. I doubt it makes it easy enough to sell a path to 5%. Also, we're likely to have another fiscal-impacting crisis before that much time elapses. The "old people" ad hominem again. I understand and accept the goal. I don't "believe in" it because I also...

That's the "seen" and "unseen" mistake. What are the costs? It might not be "good" for all of those nations; it's just what they're doing. Paying a premium for source security isn't wrong, provided the premium is affordable. What makes 70% a rational target, rather than some list of...

That probably isn't in the "files" either. Reality isn't always what people want it to be.

I was responding to another person's comment, not whatever is situated in your head. Canada is still in a number of defence and non-defence arrangements with the US. The US is objectively a friend and ally irrespective of Trump's irrational trade policies, which are directed at almost everyone.

Yes, we're talking. But after the dreams end and reality intrudes, all the fiscal capacity and more (borrowing amounts to pulling future revenues into the present) was already used up. I'm predicting that much of the happy-happy-joy-joy is going to go away. I predict that social spending...

Trump's trade policies are foolish. I've been saying that since before he was in a position to give them effect. The same reasons for declaring Trump's policies foolish apply to anyone else's policies. Given that the nightly news has been delivering stories about Americans lamenting the loss...

That's basically a path to weak productivity growth and stagnation - "creating jobs", especially "good-paying jobs". Eventually it takes everything we have and more (borrowing) just to stop slipping backward, and eventually the cost of borrowing drags us backward. We get a lift every decade or...

The US is an ally - we share several defence arrangements. What I see is people mischaracterizing the situation. I don't care if it's supposed to be political manoeuvring or just emotional strain.

I've characterized Trump as a misogynist before ("grab 'em by the pussy"). He seems to be able to attract women and solicit prostitution on his own, with no obvious penchant for dipping below age lines. None of that is novel, nor is it the goalpost for the scandal everyone wants to have. What...

Oh, yes, the Epstein connections. So far the bombs are going off everywhere but under Trump - including those four unfortunates who had the ill luck to be named in a document because they were part of a police lineup and a halfwit Congress member read their names out - and all the "files"...

"Made in Canada" is just as much an economic mistake as tariffs and "Made in America" (because it tends to increase costs). The mitigating factor is one of the two usual exceptions to protectionism - security - but that is mostly relevant either when you think you're going to end up fighting...

As soon as Canadians stop drinking their own anti-Trump bathwater, they can think rationally about the difference between "Trump administration" and "US".

Figuratively, they are. The insurgency is upon them already. Problem is, the insurgent faction is led by Trump. Relevant news of the moment: McConnell (definitely part of the old establishment) is preventing the SAVE Act (voter registration and identification) from getting to the Senate floor...

I just love all the open grifting.

Follow the money. PACs and foundations. Not hard; they're right out in the open.