EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'
bbc.com
bbc.com
> Signal, Windscribe, and NordVPN say they'll pull out of Canada before building surveillance infrastructure. The biggest threat to encrypted communications in a Western democracy since Australia's 2018 law.
https://stateofsurveillance.org/news/canada-bill-c22-lawful-...
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> European Commission Revives Push for Encryption Backdoors in ProtectEU Strategy, Framing Mass Surveillance as “Lawful Access”
> The EU’s ProtectEU strategy quietly sketches the blueprint for a backdoor.
https://reclaimthenet.org/eu-protecteu-strategy-encryption-b...
the PATRIOT act, Stellar Wind, PRISM & Section 702 (FAA), Upstream Collection & AT&T Splitter Rooms (Room 641A), Bulk Telephony Metadata (Section 215, the Post-9/11 NYPD Demographics Unit, the Data Broker Loophole (Commercial Surveillance Purchase). Oh god, I could go on all day.
Or did/does things like extraordinary rendition to Guantanamo, or the illegal rendition of Canadian citizen Maher Arar to a Syrian torture facility while he was traveling through the US, or even just taking tourists phones and looking at the anti-Trump memes they've shared and detaining them.
Any "libertarian" American pointing fingers at Europe and Canada as somehow more repressive is living in an ideological echo chamber. The targets are (sometimes) different but every "western democracy" set up oppressive regimes post-9/11 that should outrage anybody.
Both "left" and "right" in the US are living in a delusional world if they think their constitution is worth jack shit as any kind of protection in the 21st century.
Near as I can tell we are, in fact, the baddies.
Truly this feels like it must be the dumbest timeline.
It's just a matter of degrees I guess.
We need to deal with the power hungry and the continued ramifications of them ruling over the rest of us.
I’m not sure where to even begin.
I think one of the best examples of propaganda in recent times is political figures pinning left vs right, when its really citizens vs govt. But if they can keep the common folks distracted by the outrage of the day maybe they'll forget that the government is surveillant everyone, all while billionaires line their pockets with money made from our data.
A few years ago I may have met a statement like that with a raised eyebrow and a tinfoil hat, but I guess sometimes those guys are right.
I disagree with this, but it's still somehow not an aspect uniquely horrible about EU or Canadian policy making, so not sure why this would be relevant here.
There is a strand of US politics which has tried to characterize Canada as uniquely authoritarian ever since the Ottawa protests. And it's been used increasingly as justification for external partisan "interventions"
So outright membership is likely not the route for overseas friends, but it seems we are inexorably moving towards a closer cooperation between a group of democratic countries outside the sphere of non-democratic China and ever more erratic US. Hopefully this will be an association which is less dependent on one single member than the western world has been under US lead.
It seems very likely the EU, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the UK would be part of this. Japan and Korea are still very US-dependent but given the lack of enthusiasm the US is showing its former allies, this may change quickly. I also expect growing cooperation with some of the south-American countries.
The world is definitely under realignment politically.
Our constant in/out wasn't great for the EU as a whole and it's now very hard to argue that pissing off your largest trading partner (by nearly a factor of 4 over the next one which is the US) was a catastrophic mistake.
Still that's democracy, even when it doesn't go the way you wanted.
Was/is the EU perfect, nope - it has all kinds of problems that are going to need addressing but was the UK in totality better off in the EU, yep.
The EU is one of the primary tools all these authoritarians use to push their agenda. In which functional democracy do parliaments have to vote AGAINST a bill? Which sane democracy establishes a literal ministry of truth? Which non-dystopian government introduces highly destructive laws (forcing every small online store to hire a legal representative in every single memberstate they want to ship to) and then telling desparate small business owners not to worry, because surely their countries wont enforce those laws?
And all of those happened AFTER the British people saw the writing on the wall and forced their rulers to downgrade their rank in the new aristocracy.
The decline is entirely by design.
The 'inorexably' part was rather referring to the fact that we are in a phase of realignment post US leadership, where other democratic nations by necessity must find new ways to partner. Exactly how this will look is still uncertain.
Anyway, I think you missed this reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-Aligned_Movement
As of today, with current affairs and the unpredictable element in chief, you may never know how long.
[1] https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/trump-adm...
If they changed that they'd perhaps become world powers themselves.
No, that's just the 2010s propaganda fed to you by people who assert that not letting them do whatever they want is "bureaucratic". These very same people are completely fine lobbying legislature for more moat when they benefit from it.
The difference between "middle democracies" or whatever that means and the US is just that politics aren't corrupted enough yet that they can buy whatever they want.
World Bank’s broad “Regulatory Quality” measure supports that direction: Sweden scored 95.28/100 and the US 90.57/100 in its latest comparable 2023 data. I couldn't find EU wide score.
I wanted to help someone to get work visa and I thought it is like Sweden and you just fill a small form, oh boy! We hired a lawyer for just filling the US side application.
But yes, Americans are told they have the freest speech and the freest markets, and don't seem to question either.
Yeah, an organized and powerful administration is the basis of rule-of-law system. The opposite isn't entrepreneurship, it's a state of widespread corruption where laws are toothless.
It doesn't benefit upstarts who want a fair environment to start a business, it benefits megacorps with their own militia of lawyers to bend the rules, and pockets deep enough to lobby for the removal of rules that can't be bent.
Think of AI copyright infringement. You know why the AI labs are in the USA and China and not in Europe.
Do you want your house blocked of by someone elses' wall. Do you want to be kept up all night by load industrial noises next to you?
Canada is corrupt as hell, just no one cares so it doesn't make international news.
Edit:
Oh yeah, forgot about the SNC-Lavalin debacle, where the ruling government tried to make the legal problems of their corporate buddies go away[4] by sneaking a new "slap on the wrist" law into an annual budget bill and then pressuring the prosecutor to apply it.
[1] https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/mckinsey-immigration-consul...
[2] https://thewalrus.ca/shadow-government/
[3] https://www.pm.gc.ca/en/news/news-releases/2026/08/31/prime-...
So is Europe. It's just not at the point the US reached, yet.
When your examples of Canada being "corrupt as hell" are such chickenshit nonsense, it betrays that you're just a partisan zealot that has literally zero sense of scale or reason.
McKinsey, a massive consulting firm, had a whole $32M in business with the government? Holy shit, basically the deep state! Sounds like the globalist infiltrated the government!
The SNC thing was embarrassing, but it was over its behaviour overseas (Libya, to be precise, where a dictator's family got wined and dined), and the government was concerned about a massive, major Canadian firm being crippled by domestic hand wringing.
When that is what you have to offer up for Canada being "corrupt as hell", in comparison to criminal shitholes like the US (which you think is much better, as you've explained elsewhere), wow. Back to shitty subreddits where your tiny group of laughable farces have your discussions about how dire things are.
I say it with absolute conviction that I desperately want every "Canada is broken" jackal like you to pack up and move South of the border.
That's unfettered capitalism at work—"free" implies no bounds. Multinational corporations have never been more powerful now than at anytime in history.
No bounds for whom?
Your implied premise is that private companies cannot impede others' freedom, which isn't true. In unfettered capitalism, only the largest corporations have the power and money to be free.
It is odious to start a company in the EU. There are many accounts of this on HN itself.
This is false.
> There are many accounts of this on HN itself.
Yes, I saw one just recently where the poster made obviously false statements about starting a company in Germany.
(Before you downvote this comment, please note that I have started multiple companies in the EU. I'm speaking from personal experience, not from something I've read on Hacker News.)
If they were to change some within the citizenry would stand to gain at the expense of others. Inequality would increase.
Seems—for now—middle democracies aren't prepared to pay the high price of social upheaval such a policy would create.
When people go on about a Golden Age, I'm the awkward one who asks "Golden for who exactly?"
European sentiment is totally out of touch with European reality. They'll post gleefully online about how much better their life is and then go back to their sardine flat where they can't afford to pay for heating, and it never ever occurs to them to reconsider any priors. They'll huff copium on Reddit about how bad American healthcare is, while waiting for years for desperately needed surgeries, paying far more for healthcare by way of taxes than any American does.
Are their ideas out of touch? No, it's reality that's wrong.
This is blatantly false. Americans spend 18% of GDP on healthcare, while most European countries are around 10%.
The US has depleted their missile stockpile and can no longer defend anybody. Countries in the Middle East are moving away from the US and forming their own alliances. Taiwan knows that the US cannot do anything to help them. South Korea also knows. The US has weaponized the US Dollar, forcing countries out of the SWIFT system if they don't do what they are told. As a result, the CHIPS system has become the alternative. China understands better how the economy works, with the Belt and Road Initiative. The US government doesn't understand how the economy works, and is run by a bunch of complete m orons.
As a joint us/uk citizen, even I would prefer to deal with China than the USA these days. Predictability is really useful in business, and narcissistic man child presidents aren’t predictable.
There is no path for victory for the US, where it remains the world's reserve currency. China will become the world's reserve currency by 2032.
You are simply in denial. Everything that I wrote points to China winning.
China doesn’t want this for the same reason that some Americans currently in power don’t want the USD to be the world’s reserve currency - it comes with an export and trade cost.
There are also many structural and political reasons why the Yuan can’t play this role not least of which are transparency, the peg and monetary supply independence.
China's military and soft influence are improving but until they get that good, USD will remain the reserve.
Because, imagine the scenario where the US simply counterfeits the renminbi. What is China's recourse? Spicy statements by Wang Yi in toothless international forums?
The momentum China already gained, and gaining more every day is well beyond anything in the west. Plus if you consider the position they are rising from, its properly meteoric. Nobody knows future, but its rather easy to continue projection with current, or even a bit slower pace and within 1 or 2 decades, situation will be pretty clear from any objective perspective.
Above is purely technological/process progress. Add US making enemy of whole world in one brilliant move, something that is practically irreversible in upcoming decades, and situation is clear. Military (without ammo) alone won't give you much negotiating power. LLMs can be replicated elsewhere with rather little cost, and soon some small bleeding edge advantage will be largely meaningless for most practical tasks.
It doesn't even matter what near future brings, this is settled and no amount of denial from US or self-patting is changing that.
Many people avoid Chinese stocks like the plague because the system is still half communist and as a foreign investor you get some paper in a company on Cayman Island instead of real direct ownership. That keeps me from buying their stocks and I'm not the only one.
I think we are closer to seeing the Chinese Hindenburg than Arpanet or Moon voyage or some other bewildering humanity joining initiative.
Its inarguable that the industrial revolution brought tons of wealth quickly to the UK. But one, having past it all, has to wonder if the child work force, insanely cramped victorian houses, constant deaths due to smog, polluted water etc could not have been entirely avoided by reducing "innovation" speed.
Is the existing suffering of the Chinese system worth the economic growth? For its own middle class, the answer is probably yes. But systemic conditions like limiting the universities places to top 30% students, means you have a permanent underclass that cannot join the white collar jobs.
Is that required to have a cheap, hardworking manufacturing and construction industries? Maybe. But reinventing a class system that has a few steps removed from slavery as an "economic miracle" and "neck breaking speed innovation" feels a bit icky when they could take 5 years longer and treat people better.
We are arguably close to post scarcity, and instead of building post-capitalism instruments (like libraries could be imagined as), we are just perfecting the economic conditions of capitalism which require an inordinate amount of cheap labour and state violence.
Billionaires are building bunkers instead of museums, they can see the end game of this system they benefit from and its not a good one. Like I can't understand whats the point of winning "the economy" if we end up in a post nuclear hellscape of ecological collapse, but number must go up I have been told.
It is certainly not necessary for economic development now. You probably cannot give people in less developed economies the same pay and working conditions, but you can provide the basics and relatively decent treatment.
It used to be chinese made goods sold by local or western companies. Nowadays bar a few exceptions these are chinese goods sold directly by chinese brands/companies.
Your lament of "Oh no China is the best in the world and only getting better!!!" is long long out of date.
In ten years the downvoters will not only agree with this, but have moved on to "and that's a good thing".
The middle democracies will do better fighting together and not deal with US individually.
Churchil wanted to pressure Stalin to leave Poland (and at least parts of EE) independent and even considered "Operation Unthinkable".
At least that's what I think the guy above referenced.
"Bluff" because no one other than perhaps Stalin would have followed through—to essentially extend WWII (this time between former allies).
So pragmatism was the order of the day, thus Poland and EE were sacrificed.
Even if Canada doesn't join the EU, there is a lot of mutual benefit from an economic and military defense pact (beyond NATO, which is nearly dead).
The EU can’t add any more “trade bazooka” than it already has. Canada doesn’t change anything in that dynamic.
Sorry, my brain is fried by a cold :).
"We ran the numbers for an EV, and right now gas is still cheaper, so we are holding off on the switch until it makes financial sense"
Canadian oil would need to be shipped halfway around the world. It would be more expensive. Price is always the top factor for everyone.
But we’re in a drought right now. I think hydro is down at least 20%. Wyoming wind power alone totally makes up for that.
If in 10 years the ratio moves from 70/6 to 50/26, the situation will be vastly different.
The options are not black and white
Since Trump is hostile to trade with both parties there's an opportunity to replace lost US trade that's probably not coming back.
Trump has weakened himself and his allies where as mutual trade between Canada and the EU makes both stronger.
Polish export to EU is 74% of its total export and import is about 60% of its total import.
Economically - whatever's good for EU is good for Poland and US barely matters.
"Only services" covers a lot of critically important things. Clouds services and payment systems, for example. Even just one American company like AWS could turn off a huge chunk of European economies.
That is just tech. What about fuel? machinery. https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/infographics/eu-us-trade/
Companies use AWS because it is there and others used it, so they got ball rolling. It doesn't mean one couldn't replace it with another service, most probably more pricey one. If there would be some kind of war, then one doesn't need to have servers in US, and European ones are right there.
You can't easily replace e.g. lithium or other metals.
Fuel is problematic, but there are places that are closer that could sell them (middle east, if we ignore current Russian state of mind).
As for machinery, it is hard to guess what kind. Germany produces a lot of it, and I would guess China also.
Not sure about pharmaceuticals.
Generally US is not our greatest import partner, China is. And we have a big internal market also.
I think hardware is a bit complicated by the way. A lot of hardware is also not US controlled. For instance ARM Holdings is British, Japanese, or global depending on how you look at it and quite a lot of vendors rely on ARM's reference designs. Europe also has a lot of important chip designers, but they are more focused on embedded systems and support chips, like NXP and ST Microelectronics.
"Only services" covers a lot of critically important things. Clouds services and payment systems, for example. Even just one American company like AWS could turn off a huge chunk of European economies.
Why European governments and increasingly companies are trying to move away to European alternatives. It all starts small, but e.g. a bunch of governments are already disentangling from Office. The sale of the maintainer of the Dutch DigiD infrastructure to a US company has been blocked (would have happened without any blockers a few years ago). Countries are reducing US arms purchases in favor of European alternatives.
It's like turning a mammoth tanker, but it is slowly happening.
Let's just hope we have critical mass before the right-wing populists take over, big tech has been intensively lobbying them in recent years [1]. So much 'for the people', like they always proclaim.
[1] https://www.brusselstimes.com/1916422/us-tech-giants-allying...
> It's like turning a mammoth tanker, but it is slowly happening.
Is it really happening? As has been mentioned on HN multiple times the EU's age verification app will only run on American controlled devices. Some countries are moving some things away from US suppliers, buts its very much one step forward then two steps back.
> Let's just hope we have critical mass before the right-wing populists take over, big tech has been intensively lobbying them in recent years
Unfortunately, not only them. As the article says the existing European Commission is already going in the direction big tech want, just not as far. The current British government (a historically left wing party) has also been cosying up to big tech. One of the organisations mentioned in your link has a lot of info on EU lobbying in general: https://corporateeurope.org/index%2Ephp/en/lobbying-the-eu
ARM doesn't just do R&D, they design full CPU cores. Until recently, Qualcomm's cores were ARM's reference design with their own extensions on top. It's only since Oryon that their CPUs are more dependent (the tech was acquired through their Nuvia acquisition).
How is design not R & D? it is literally what the D in R & D stands for!
AWS will never willingly stop serving the EU, and oil corps will (unfortunately) never willingly stop selling oil. The US govt could force it, but that would be the end of US-EU relations, and probably cause a breakdown of internal us politics.
The US is pushing its hand as much as it can right now.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cnvnl0elz47o
On top of more than 10 already.
Or sanctioned Francesca Albanese, a UN Special Rapporteur, for her work related to human rights abuses in the Palestine.
She can't have bank account (or other financial product), own a property or work in many sectors in countries holding meaningful bilateral relationships with the USA.
So what services do you have in mind? :)
I’ve always been told don’t let perfect be the enemy of good, and the journey of 1000 miles starts with a single step.
The lesson here is that you can’t rely on the US anymore. Not for military protection, not for defence procurement, and not for trade or supply chain. That legacy has ended entirely by choice of the United States.
The problem has moved beyond monetary trade value and into existential risk.
US tech financing and promoting far-right parties doesn’t help their case either
Better remove the bandaid now then wait until you are screwed.
People now see China as the reliable partner. This will be a multigenerational change.
Being in a situation where 70% of your exports go to one country is arguably pretty unhealthy; that is something that Canada would do well to work towards reducing, even _if_ the US administration wasn't openly hostile.
It is 100% about Trump.
The other democracies can no longer count on the US as a stable ally the way we have in the past (whether that trust was misplaced is a matter of perspective).
Simply put, you did it twice, We can't rely on them not doing it again.
Americans voted for that clown regime twice.
They cannot and should not be trusted anymore.
So either you have a massive win, or a party will block the other forever out of spite, nothing can be accomplished and no mistake can be fixed. With more opposition groups the situation would change for good ("You don't want to make a deal with me, I will ask the third and fourth parties. The first team doing a reasonable move gets the prize").
Let people vote for who they like the most without fear of their vote bolstering a candidate they really don't like. We should start exposing kids to RCV in schools. Now. It needs to not be "weird" or "hard" or propagandized as "not fair." Not fair is not being able to vote for your favorite person.
Yes, after all and more, no future Hitler has yet emerged.
Unless you see these things happening soon, then not really a good comparison.
I don't think even the most hardened bsky communist seriously expects the outgoing administration to be literally taken out and shot.
We can look at Biden. He's not a trump like figure by any stretch. He decided to continue some of Trump's foreign policy.
Removing Trump doesn't remove fundamental issues with the US
Thats exactly the narrative the rest of the world doesnt take anymore.
The US is on the hook for its decisions. But Europe doesn’t get off the hook for its own.
He has an exceptionally poor hand of cards to play but is maximizing any opportunity. Very creditable leadership - even for those who don't agree with everything he does.
I do think this is a lesson for political parties all over the world. You can be pragmatic.
Article 238 of the original Treaty of Rome, which is now article 217 TFEU, provides for the EU (or its precursors) to enter into "association agreements" with non-member states, e.g. Turkey has one of them. Many current EU members (e.g. Greece) had them before becoming members.
A lot of 1970s/1980s sources referred to these states as "associate members of the EEC" – but it seems like everyone has forgotten that.
Nice symbolism, but this is merely being used as leverage in Canada's negotiation with the US. "See, we have other options!"
Worth adding that Europe is far more protectionist than the US, so this is economically farcical. Symbolism trumping reality. Sort of like when celebrities were saying they'd move from the US to Europe in the aftermath of the Dobbs ruling... only to find out abortion law is far, far more restrictive in almost all of Europe than California or New York.
Meanwhile the EU itself is about two years away from being run by the AfD + Le Pen freak show.
Provinces in Canada have strong powers and much of the same back and forth trade and regional politico-economic bickering as what happens between EU member states. Much more so than US states.
The vibe is familiar at least.
Wow. That's really pathetic. I'm ashamed as a Canadian. I don't want someone who can be reduced to tears by a negotiation negotiating on my behalf.
It actually was "near tears", and this was because one region of Belgium was holding up what seemed so close. Eh. It isn't about them tearing up or changing or anything, or a tyrannical rapist king having a tantrum about some stupid bullshit, it was a negotiator frustrated that everything seemed to be held up by one small agricultural region. I don't know what you think this demonstrates.
> the EU has never ratified the Canada FTA and everyone's just sort of pretending it did for convenience's sake.
Greater than 98% of the provisions of CETA are in place since the original ratification. Which is why everyone "sorts of pretends", because for all intents it is in force in every meaningful way.
You either seem misinformed or deliberately misleading, but CETA has two phases. By far the most important, which the EU ratified fully. There is a very small component about an investor's court system that impinges on country-level domains exclusively, so it requires a separate ratification. But on the whole it is a minuscule part of the agreement, and is basically wholly unnecessary.
> Worth adding that Europe is far more protectionist than the US, so this is economically farcical
Ignoring the thing I just said, this is comical given literally everything over the past two years. Like, are you authoring your comment from a time loop or something, because in the current situation it is cartoonishly stupid.
Oh wait, you're a freshly created troll account just to drop this sort of "wisdom". ROFL.
Not only abortion, some EU countries still have laws to discriminate people based on their sexuality. One recent example is that one of the prominent openly gay German politician (Jens Spahn) had to give up his position (although he had it coming because his other political scandals) because he used a surrogate mother in US to have a kid with his husband. I didn't know till then, but apparently surrogacy is still illegal in Germany and nobody was talking about making it legal and let women decide what they want to do with their bodies.
All those democrats and celebrities in US wants to move to European countries and I would love to see their faces when they realize that old world is still archaic in so many aspects.
That's misleading. The issue was hypocrisy. Spahn was a chief advocate against surrogacy. He publicly supported a motion keeping surrogacy illegal in Germany while simultaneously secretly using a surrogate mother in the US. That's not a great look.
Even if he was a supporter of surrogacy, he would still be forced to step back because surrogacy is illegal in Germany. Further, there was no debate or discussions on making surrogacy legal after that incident by the so called all other liberal progressives parties like Greens or the left that pretends to be all for women’s rights and equality
No, you're lying. His colleagues publicly asked Spahn to resign explicitly because of the hypocrisy: https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/spahn-ruecktrittsforderunge...
Over the last few weeks, I've noticed you sharing many such misinformed framings of current news in Germany. May I ask why?
> Even if he was a supporter of surrogacy, he would still be forced to step back because surrogacy is illegal in Germany. Further, there was no debate or discussions on making surrogacy legal after that incident by the so called all other liberal progressives parties like Greens or the left that pretends to be all for women’s rights and equality
Just like the last few times you claimed "there was no debate" on a topic in Germany: yes there was, it just doesn't follow your caricaturesque understanding of leftist politics.
If you were mildly familiar with the situation, you'd know that.
America's become erratic and untrustworthy. America's made a deliberate choice make its reputation worse.
Most of these attention grabbing statements by politicians are usually about scoring political points at home. The only thing worthy of judgement are hard facts, and excruciating details, which are yet to materialize on this topic.
40 years ago I probably would have agreed with this statement - these days, not at all.
Though to illustrate further, there are many examples one might find of US acting undemocratically even 40 years ago.
So, politicians will talk, governments will be in power, and the observers will discuss. My invitation was simply to discuss known facts not political rhetoric. And main facts are largely absent and unknown.
There are plenty of nations I feel my nation has friendships with - if they were bullied, we'd stand up for them on pure reaction.
Not everything is interests. People are people.
Interesting that you didn't feel the need to say what your "nation" is, or their nation BFFs. It would have allowed us to dig into real data, but no, let's just use feelz instead :)
People are people, and nation states are nation states. These are different entities.
You can of course be needlessly reductive and say that friendship is just two temporarily, mutually aligned self-interested parties, but… yeah. That’s pretty verbose. And not even correct.
The EU feels like an incomplete experiment. Not strong enough to actually be a single market. But still able to create additional annoying regulations on top of nation level ones.
The EU needs to be truly Federal to succeed economically. That might create uniform regulations with more uniform regulations and actually make Europe competitive.
Not because I think regulations are bad. But regulations need to be well designed with clears lines on what the Federal / State are allowed to do.
Canada has made it pretty clear that they do not want to be part of the big country south of it, so they will have to find a way to create large companies that stays. Doing this together with a market of 450 million people seems like a good idea.
They are working in it: https://www.eu-inc.org/
I have no clue whether that will be a success, but at least they have recognised that problem as well.
Been doing it for decades. Not a billionaire and not interested in becoming one; in the US I would've been one. But never had issues.
you don't get it, americans are shallow people with no culture or background whose biggest achievement is saying I am 1/8 irish or something, but countries over here have millennial of culture
What does this mean, concretely? What do the people not have? Who are those people? What would they have in the EU?
There is this odd fatalistic attitude about the US in this thread that seems divorced from the reality I’ve experienced in my travels.
work/life balance?
EU already has uniform regulations, what are you talking about? It's also the third largest economy in the world, as uncompetitive as it is.
But for whom, people or companies?
The EU however is in this weird spot where they are pushing for a more integrated global economy (thanks to all kinds of trade deals) with fewer barriers while at the same time making their own companies less competitive with all these regulations and internal hurdles: There are examples where a German exporter had an easier time sending his stuff to New Zealand than France.
In addition there are plenty of technical standards which are agreed in expert committees, and these too apply directly. I'd expect Canada would join at least those technical processes and the two sides align technical standards over time.
If going by GDP (which this claim usually does), the EU as a whole beats out China for second place by ~10%. When going by individual countries Germany alone is the third place behind China, though with a large gap between the two.
These sorts of refactorings take time, even more so if done by "committee". The good thing is that explicit interfaces have to be created thereby (hopefully) increasing adaptability and resilience over time.
I agree, but there are huge barriers to taking this step. You need a common identity to create a nation. Americans have one, so do other large nations. The EU does not.
It seems to me the EU is overburdened with trivial regulations (like regulating the maximum power consumption of domestic vacuum cleaners) rather than prioritizing core issues of its single market, manufacturing, trade, etc.
Trouble is small vested interests hold overly powerful sway over EU-wide policy. The example above is a case in point, individual member states should be able to set their own regulations independently if deemed warranted.
You're correct, annoying regulations are bloating the EU bureaucracy making it lethargic and uncompetitive.
People proclaim this with such confidence, especially in the UK before the Brexit years I must say, and yet there are so many arguments against it.
First, accepting this goes against a core tenet of the single market, since the single market for vacuum cleaners is now split into 27 little markets. We thus need 27 regulatory bodies to each investigate, and then make a political decision, on the maximum power setting of domestic vacuum cleaners. Then, producers in China will have to make (up to) 27 different models of vacuum cleaners. This is certainly not going to be cheaper, completely destroys the famous Brussels effect [0], all for some token amount of "sovereignty".
Nations states can sovereignly decide to delegate this process of rule making to Brussels, and domestic vacuum cleaners are a perfectly mundane "case in point" to showcase the benefits of this process. The EU is far from a perfect union, but throwing these frankly naive arguments around will not help it much.
Europe’s biggest problem, I think, is its lost mojo. There’s plenty of good ingredients, plenty of challenges too. It can still go either way. Hell, at this rate it might outperform simply because US and China blow up due to domestic problems.
The thing about mojo is that it’s super hard to predict. It might stay where it is and Europe’s share of global GDP might decline to nothing. Or it might rekindle out of nowhere due to some impulse.
Either way, middle democracies are a somewhat threatened species now, and from their individual PoV an imperfect union might be much better than efficiently staying on their own.
Europe's biggest problem is that every decision can be vetoed by one of the member states. Which in practice means that the EU has very little power.
While I do appreciate and even support the idea that the immense wealth available on planet earth should be more evenly distributed, and people should mostly be focused on raising families, deepening their philosophy, and perfecting their craft... (some societies in Europe are pretty laid back in terms of hyper-productivity culture)
Regulation is possible without paralyzing industry. Laws about the internet are possible without stifling freedom. Central planning is possible without crashing the economy so bad you end up with a regime change. It all comes down to execution and for the most part, it's been a series of failed experiments.
As much as I want a happy future for Canadians and Europeans, I just don't see the odds being super favourable.
We don’t look either at the successful parts, not at the world where it is wholesale gone. My gut feeling is that EU members are, on the whole, much better off for being in than out. One natural experiment is the UK - opinions differ, but the drastic accumulation of problems coincides with Brexit timings.
I’m all for improving the EU! And for sure there are bad bits. But when your car AC is doing badly, you don’t write off the car. You try to fix the AC…
I'm more aware of what Canadian government does with its tax dollars. And I'm just assuming that the EU is similarly quite expensive for what it achieves, and the budgets only change in one direction.
That’s very small compared to EU members states national budgets, which sit at around 35% of GDP, apparently. Canadian federal government apparently spends 18-20% of Canadas GDP, topped up by local governments.
This is all very apples-to-oranges but doesn’t support the thesis that EU budget is particularly bloated.
In the US I can start a company and instantly have a market of 350M. Start a company in an EU country, then try to expand to another country, it’s a nightmare. That company will have a lower upper bound on market size.
The EU might be a success in coordinating on regional issues, but I don’t think it’s yet an asset to the European economy.
Culture in Europe is more on sustainable business rather than hypergrowth, but you can expand to other countries too. You just have to have a business strategy catering to all the groups you want to cater to.
I think it's good the supermarket chains in France and in Germany are mostly disjoint sets, it keeps competition around. Pan-EU Supermarket Inc would be bad.
Without your own “hypergrowth” you’ll always be dominated by the hypergrowth of competitors like the US and China. You’ll be in orbit of other powers instead of creating your own gravity.
Where am I wrong?
Do you know what else focuses on hypergrowth, in biology?
I think the world is less and less interested in the concept of securing economic growth by copying the exact US economic and political model. Different parts of the world are going to figure this out in different ways.
Being a superpower doesn't mean much to the americans that live in a town that looks like Gummo. There's a lot of them.
This is not exclusive to the US, though. NordVPN is an example - it launched in Lithuania and now has global reach, and thousands of EU companies have went that path as well. I am not saying that it is on par with the US on this metric, but let's not pretend that such things don't happen in the EU
But also: > The European Union has a nominal GDP of roughly $20 trillion, placing it closely on par with or slightly ahead of China ($19 trillion), but smaller than the United States ($30–$31 trillion)
I don't know about you but the same GDP as China sounds economically successful... or not?
As an American, I continue to be sad and tired that our current president is somehow allowed to unilaterally destroy a very successful and thriving trade partner via arbitrary tariffs that have already been ruled illegal and while it doesn’t make a damned bit of difference I’m sorry about it.
Notably many member states (incl. France) have not fully ratified it. The majority of its benefits are in place but not all.
Which doesn't bode well for the actual on the ground reality of any "associate member status."
I expect it will be mostly symbolic/diplomatic. (Which is also fine)
Don't be. Trump is a necessary and welcome wake up call. We Canadians needed Trump's shock of reality.
The truth is that, for more than a century, the main trait of being Canadian was simply not being American and not trusting Americans.
In 1775 George Washington ordered the invasion of southern Quebec and we resisted. After the American revolution we received an huge influx of Loyalists, the Americans that didn't want to be part of the U.S.; we say the American Revolution created 2 countries: yours and ours. In 1812 Americans raised war against us, as a continuation of the Napoleonic wars. Although we were still a British colony, we fought back, invaded Washington DC and set the White House on fire. In 1890, the McKinley Tariffs were meant to subjugate us, the same way Trump wants to do now [1]. They backfired, made us stronger.
But in the 80's the Reagan-Mulroney trade agreement fooled us. We became too reliant, friendly and confident to the Americans. It was a dangerous illusion. The Comanche, Apache and Navajo have learned too late that you can't trust Americans. Luckily for us, Trump reminded us that lesson on time, before it would be too late.
[1] https://canadiangeographic.ca/articles/the-u-s-tariff-act-of...
The Haudenosaunee Confederacy probably learned this the strongest. And more even than the Loyalists help build this country. Or I'm more conscious of this as I live in a place where Joseph Brant's (Thayendanegea) name is all over the place.
But they -- and Britain's other indigenous "allies" in the US interior -- also learned the hard way that the British couldn't be trusted either. The Treaty of Ghent ended the war of 1812 but on terms that let the Americans commit genocide against the native populations to the west of them ; which the British were formerly allied with.
And while the Iroquois were granted all extensive lands along the Grand river as reward for helping fight the Americans in 1784 (Haldimand proclamation) -- they subsequently had that chipped away at for generations and it's just a tiny postage stamp of what it used to be.
No good guys.
The British tried to create a native "buffer" zone. The Americans refused, and the British were ultimately in no position to make this happen. Instead they implemented article IX that demanded that the US return all entitlements, possessions, lands, and so on to natives as they were in 1811. The US agreed.
And then ignored it. The British were in no position to "let" or "prohibit" anything within the US or its territories.
> they subsequently had that chipped away at for generations and it's just a tiny postage stamp of what it used to be.
They literally sold it off, for their own benefit, as a free peoples with agency. There is extraordinary little controversy about this. And FWIW, the British bought that land from another tribe, and then moved a tribe -- one that had slaves, btw, and Joseph Brant was a notorious slaver -- in basically as refugees.
There are tiny areas where there is a contention that whatever band leader was in charge was illegitimate, but the vast majority of the transactions are settled historic record that absolutely no one has under doubt. A group of people had a lot of land and not much to do with it, so when other groups made offers for it they were onboard.
"Chipped away" is quite a hilarious misrepresentation of this. It actually sounds comically racist, like you're the "good guy" who is here to tell them that what they did with their own stuff was wrong.
It's interesting how patronizing both your points are. The British were both responsible for American actions, and then in the future were responsible for Mohawk actions. All lesser peoples have no agency or self-control, and need to be limited and directed by the apparently superior, all-knowing British.
My ancestors here in Ontario owned large tracts of land. Over centuries they sold it off. "Chipped away". No good guys, right? Give me back my land. The British should have stopped them from selling, because surely hundreds of years later it might be worth more?
Of course there's plenty of ways around it. In the case of film production, if the script calls for the characters to be in a specific location - then it's now a cultural asset that the government can fund with rebates. The person writing the script is of course aware of this and the incentives available.
So neither of these are good sustainable examples.
A description that fits a lot of politicians!
Bonjour du Québec.
Au début des annonces des tarifs, plusieurs experts disaient que de se découpler des américains étaient impossible à court terme. Nos économies sont trop entrelacées pour changer de cap rapidement.
Je ne sais pas exactement ce que Carney a en tête , mais j’espère que ça va accélérer le découplage.
C'est une bonne interview:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1g0nLGZIzhc (Anglais, désolé)
Mais les cas les plus extrêmes en Amérique sont relativement récents...
Also it's a great test for the EU. If all the EU countries can still actually agree on anything so novel. If we couldn't all agree on obvious stuff like support for Ukraine (famously Hungary had issues).
Even if things are very positive on the surface there are often small groups that get affected negatively. We can see this on the recent example of the EU-Mercosur agreement. It was supposed to to "unite a free market of 700mln people", but for example farmers in my country (Poland) protested it an I think they got a lot of concessions. (We have to remain food-self sufficient in case of war, so I'm not against their ideas per se). The deal is supposedly done, but I'm still not seeing bananas from South America in our supermarkets (don't laugh, this was one of the main points anti EU people raised back in 2005).
Ideally I'd like to see free market eventually expanded to free movement of people between EU/Canada but I have no idea how difficult aligning the legal systems might be.
As to contributions, it's not membership so things can maybe be worked out. As to the UK being able to get similar deal. I don't really get the idea to "punish the UK for exiting" they shot themselves in the foot sufficiently anyway (as well as us), but Canada has way more natural resources which may be a great benefit to our common market. So they have better "cards" to quote a certain Donald.
For example the whole farce that is EUs green initiative could actually make sense if we had a place to procure resources from in a more ecologically sound way. As opposed to what we do with China, we basically killed 90% of local industry, but we still get finished goods from countries that burn huge amounts of coal and manufacture those things in ways that would be never allowed here.
Of course that we E immensely expensive to set up, but we have 2 trillion $ in investment looking for a new home and there is a good argument to make this should be invested in a place that honours rule of law, democracy, human rights (inclusive of right to healthcare) and so on.
Canada needs a new perspective in how we produce and sell food here. I’d love to see us move away from a food system dominated by crappy US-style highly engineered, ultra-processed products and toward a much greater variety of fresh and minimally processed foods, stronger regional production, and a richer everyday food culture.
I would welcome EU grocery chains and food producers to shake things up here and bring some sanity back to Canadian food culture.
We get better cheeses, wines and other fine food.
They get maple syrup, Atlantic lobster and Manitoba flour.
Win, win.
The UK should continue to be embarrassed and ashamed to leave such an incredible institution, although at this point we can say that they clearly don’t deserve the EU anyway.
I might as well say that people in the Netherlands can’t keep up riding their bicycles much longer because they’ll get tired of it.
In a world in which the other great powers revive the Monroe Doctrine or threaten their magnitude smaller neighbors with annexation we're not doing so badly. There is an inherent pettiness, weakness and fake strength in autocracy and force and it's often why I think the EU receives so much disproportionate hate.
The EU does not have a military to annex any neighbours with. Individual states do, but non are really great powers any more.
Yes, you can read all about how that came about, and how it's going.
> The EU does not have a military to annex any neighbours with. Individual states do, but non are really great powers any more.
You're projecting an American ideal. Not all nations are--nor want to be--America, and we're thankful for that.
Yes, it seems to have made no difference. economically - economy performing much the same as France and Germany. Lots of lives saved by the faster covid vaccine rollout which is a plus IMO.
> You're projecting an American ideal. Not all nations are--nor want to be--America, and we're thankful for that.
You are missing my point. Not annexing anyone when its not an option because you cannot does not prove anything.
I have never even been to America - why would I project an American ideal?
No, of course not. I really do not understand how you interpreted what I said as saying taht.
Can people please read what I said in the context of the comment i replied to!
It isn't an unreasonable fear, especially given their dependance on that food source. Their "No" was perfectly reasonnable from what I can see.
Britain's "Leave" campain was drowning in lies, exageration, and british-empire nostalgia.
Those two situations are very different.
I don't know if you even made it to the end of the first sentence I wrote, but the fact that the UK could leave and is treated with respect, the fact that Iceland, a country of four hundred thousand people, which we could but will never threaten either economically or militarily, can decide their own future is a strength of the union.
We do not coerce our neighbors, no matter how small.
Really? Because there's this organisation called CUSMA that nations can voluntarily leave (the US) and some want to stay in (Canada).
It's economy is larger than the EU btw.
If we're doing a trade deal measuring contest, I will just point out that the EU has the world's largest free trade network, including Canada (already), South Korea, most of Latin America, India etc etc.
Funny that the opposite approach is now considered with Canada. I can see it though.
It seems you do not know anything about Puerto Rico and its history of shameful US meddling.
So when there's "meddling" it is about rules that the Dutch government has itself agreed should apply.
Norway is a prime example for a country that is exactly that, isn't it?
They used to have an excellent relationship with Canada, the UK, with the EU and with other civilized and democratic parts of the world. Until Trump started to undermine everything. And have selfish and unfair demands against everyone.
Now the US has a "comradeship" with Venezuela, Russia and North Korea.
I know that the above is perhaps an exaggeration. But the fact that the US now has worse relationships with almost all the civilized, democratic parts of the world and is bowing down to dictators and authoritarians does not come from external factors. It is all self-inflicted. Including the Iran war and its consequences.
> Usa is the best of the three surprisingly
As a US citizen, I'd rather our regulators copied Europe's consumer protections. American businesses do not respect privacy or free market economics, and it is destroying the tech sector.
She's also done plenty of bad things on the political theatre, but it's not like everything she does is destined to be a failure.
The same EU that still hasn't ratified CETA; 10 members still blocking it.
I don't hate the idea
Scotland is already a separate country, technically speaking, so I don't think it's comparable with the Basque situation. Furthermore, with the UK leaving the EU, they've opened doors that non-EU members can't use to work around such issues.
I don't think it'll happen soon, but the desire for independence does seem to be there to a significant extent already: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2026/09/13/irish-scots-...
The largest problem for an independent Scotland trying to join the EU would probably be that the EU doesn't just let anyone join. You need to have a strong enough economy and a grip on national debt to join.
From independence 1922 to 1979 (when we joined the EMS) Ireland just used a currency pegged to Sterling. An independent Scotland would presumably use a newly-created currency pegged to either Sterling or the Euro, on at least a temporary basis.
Spain have dropped their threats to veto Scottish accession: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/apr/02/spain-drops...
It was known that there was likely to be a Brexit referendum at the time of the Scottish referendum: Cameron had promised one if the Conservatives won the 2015 election.
Let's be serious. If the US supported Russia in its war against Ukraine, there would be no Ukraine now.
All it took was Trump & Republicans
The USA did plenty of offensive stuff before that (like a full campaign labeling the French as cowards for not supporting their baseless war in the middle east), but it took until Trump and his unhinged behaviour for the world to see how bad the situation really was.
The pivot away from Germany / France is starting and will not stop.
All it took was Merkel and sucking up to Russia.
EU has such a bad name in these circles. As a EU citizen, I cherish these same regimes.
Some regulations would have to be normalized and agreed upon between the countries for trade open up. Can't have different quality standards and ways of evaluating and declaring them.
Are you defending PPWR? Not in spirit but actual implementation?
It will never get so-far as the judge because the EU has already admitted the law cant be followed and arent going to be taking people to court over it.
Regardless of the intent, it's an abject failure.
Canadian provinces have a harder time trading with each other than countries in the EU, although thanks to the sales tax and package transit changes the EU is becoming competitive in this area.
I also think GDPR is too strict for small businesses and non-profits and not strict enough to deal with big businesses that trade data.
Its would have been trivial for a big business, but it was not for small businesses.
Maybe just calibrated poorly. Small enough and IMO the only important rule is no sharing with others. That should always be strictly enforced. But why worry about how some small timer handles my personal data or if I can make various requests of him? The stakes are too small to matter.
Mostly just wouldn't really work because Ottawa would have to somehow represent the provinces to the EU and the provinces and Ottawa don't work together in a way that would be compatible, I don't think anyone in Canada would want to change how Ottawa works with them. We may also end up in the same position again as we have with the Americans, nobody but us likes our supply management system[1]. GDPR is also something I think Canadians would struggle to get behind, our PIPEDA framework is quite good and I think most folks approve of it (except Quebec, who have their own framework). Taking the Euro would be a problem, etc etc, I think I could probably build quite a big list. btw, I respect the EU regulation, and that Europeans quite like it, I was just saying I don't think it would be practical for us to re-work the whole country to accommodate them, that's all.
[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dairy_and_poultry_supply_manag...
Also re: OP, yes if you want to sell stuff in the EU, you will need to adhere to the same rules as EU companies.
It's all bad faith from the US trying to run over any market they don't control so they can weaponize control over food supply of another nation later.
On the other hand, the US is the only country I've been to where I have purchased milk in a completely sealed plastic container, and it was rancid when I opened it. Upstate New York is proud of their local and organic produce, but they are selling rancid milk in stores like that's a normal thing. That was a shock as a visiting Australian.
I've lived in the U.S. for 40 years in 8 different states and twice as many cities. Never once have I experienced this.
The reality is that the US better if you have money (like white collar salary man level) and (much) worse if you are an odds-and-ends gig economy type worker (like an influencer).
From the vantage point of a ~75% income bracket home, moving to Europe is almost purely downsides (conventionally, some people give up everything for their dream to live in a cold dank cave), whereas being in a <50% income bracket home, Europe seems like a utopia.
I agree about social media distorting things. When I visited US, I was surprised that it's not GTA-like violence everywhere, haha. I feel silly sharing that. But, the biggest surprise was how friendly and warm strangers were. Memes didn't hint at that at all.
The only reason the trade is easy in EU (and with it non-EU partners) is these regulations. Countries that choose to stay outside but wanted access to our market (like Norway, Switzerland, etc.) - had to accept the regulations. So I highly doubt you'll get your wish.
So, easier to sell stuff, easier to buy stuff, free to just travel to/from Canada/EU and work there with no extra paperwork, free to buy and sell service from Canada to EU and vice versa.
No Euro, no vote in EU, no ECJ, no payments into each others budget.
Tighter integration than UK, not as tight as Norway/Switzerland/Iceland.
Common defense was already agreed anyhow.
I can tell you this enjoys broad support in the EU public. Although, no joke, a lot of peoples first reaction is: "They need to compete in Eurovision first. Otherwise they should wait for Australia to join first."
If you've been around the ESC scene, you know there's a lot of embassy involvement (parties in embassies are a thing), the scene is catnip for those interested in politics, the politically active, and to some extent politicians. Eurovision is also one mechanism for discussions of economic development. Hosting the contest is usually an excuse for upgrades to public infrastructure.
And there's Eurovision Asia starting in November. South Korea is an Associate Member of the EBU, for example.
https://www.ebu.ch/news/2026/03/bangkok-to-host-first-ever-e...
This is a euphemism on par with attending parties in parts of the SFO AI community.
And that wasn't the year that Belarus sent "I Love Belarus" as their Eurovision song.
_Terrible_ naming.
But the concept has floated around for over a decade under several different project names - Asiavision, Our Sound, ABU Song Contest. Somehow "Eurovision Asia" is the one that got countries to sign on and participate. There's a stronger political statement in Asian countries participating in "Eurovision" than in "Our Sound". It surprises me, but 2026 has brought a lot of global cultural & political shifts.
The American version was "The American Song Contest", hosted by Snoop Dogg & Kelly Clarkson, with US states competing against each other. Most Americans don't even know it ever happened.
Russia has its own rival "Intervision Song Contest", which the US participates in. Something something global cultural shifts.
Does Canada's agricultural output follow EU's (quite strict) norms? Not sure if this falls under "legislative integration" but I'd say that it would be quite important to have settled. The same goes when it comes to Canada's work-related laws.
Which output specifically? To take one example, the Dijon mustard coming out of France is mostly from Canadian mustard seeds:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dijon_mustard#2022_shortage_in...
I bought a box 37 years ago, a tiny little box, and I've been using it to season soups, almost weekly that whole time.
There can't be more than one guy that grows those seeds, for the entire planet! So my questions are, first who is this guy, and second is the in the EU?
Also, has anybody else noticed this?
And if you think buying his celery seed farm, don't. It's a very limiting market.
It'll just take time to reach an agreement both sides can accept and it's in some ways simpler than something like the EU-Mercosur agreement since one "side" is a unified country rather that been two trading bloc's negotiating.
It's fascinating watching the world re-align so quickly (by diplomatic/negotiation standards).
It might not be as strict anymore, as the EU-Mercosur Agreement seemingly ended up relaxing a bit on the strict norms and regulations. Many farmers were/are protesting this agreement exactly because the farmers in South America would compete against local farmers who are more strictly regulated.
So, seems we're a bit flexible on that front, when push comes to shove :)
Working Time Directive may be more of a sticking point, though Canada doesn't seem _that_ far away from aligned with it anyway (big difference would be on paid time off, where Canada's way under the minimum).
Among other things, they mentioned „recognition of professional qualifications“ in their speeches today, which is the first step in freedom of movement, so the direction is there.
Also, visa free is a third thing, which already exists for Canada/EU. Neither needs a visa to travel to the other.
>>No Euro, no vote in EU, no ECJ, no payments into each others budget.
This version of EU integration is more popular than EU itself in significant part of EU right now.
That we'd still have to comply with EU rules if we wanted to trade with them, but we wouldn't have any vote in those rules
The whole political course of Ukraine in the last ~20 years is mostly about teaming up with EU and NATO, isn't it?
Not, on the NATO front at least, the part between NATO bending to Russian demands not to extend Membership Action Plans to Ukraine and Georgia in 2008 (followed immediately by the Russian invasion of Georgia)—when Ukraine abandoned pursuit of NATO membership—and the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2014, only after which did it resume pursuit of NATO membership.
The resumption is sometimes tied to the Revolution of Dignity preceding the Russian invasion, and even occasionally claimed to be a reason for the invasion, but the decision to abandon the neutrality position was well after and a response to the invasion rather than the other way around.
> no payments into each others budget.
Not going to happen!
To enable free movement of goods and services the EU insists that the goods and services are produced in an identical regulatory environment.
Even when the regimes are basically identical - eg the UK - then the EU doesn't permit it without budgetary contributions.
All depends on what an associate member is of course.
That's a bit of a stretch
Cameron was trying to reduce the scope of EU integration with the UK (esp freedom of movement), with the threat he didn't want to use of a referendum, the EU said no (as the other commenter explained partly to disincentivize others, but also because they thought he was bluffing and people would never vote to leave), so the referendum was held.
Restricting that is a tall ask, I wouldn't describe refusing that as being inflexible.
[1]: https://european-union.europa.eu/principles-countries-histor... "Freedom of movement gives citizens the right to move and reside freely within the Union."
Because you simply wouldn't be offered the option of just deescalating your full membership to an associate membership. If you want to leave, you leave fully, and then in time we can discuss what happens next. Also, obviously an associate membership shouldn't feel more desirable than full integration if you're eligible to both. Indeed from the UK's perspective it would be exactly the opposite to what they wanted: free labor and movement but no representation.
Almost like many of the EU states were misled into their current situations.
"Being misled" is obviously nonsense that deserves no further comment.
Which many people inside the EU would observe seems completely consistent with EU behaviour.
Edit to add: "Being misled" would refer to the way the EU was sold to many participants in earlier decades as an economic union, and not an all encompassing political one, with it simply ratcheting that way. Whenever objections occurred referenda would simply be repeated until the populations complied. It's far from the exercise in democracy that proponents promote. (This is distinct from saying it is _all bad_).
Human cooperation does not mean misleading your compatriots into deals that you then ratchet up ever further until it becomes completely intolerable.
There are reasons that in the long run flexibility wins.
Mostly, like, the right to have, say, your own standards on chemical safety, tho. That is generally not something that most people would _want_; it basically just means you lose your job because import/export becomes, if not impossible, at least bureaucratically expensive enough that people will just buy from elsewhere.
Of course the set of countries and level of integration depends on whom you ask
I am of the view the UK should never have joined as a full member, and it would have been better to establish the two speed membership way back then, allowing France and Germany particularly to engage in further integration without mutual interference involving the UK.
Presumably by "half of the EU" you mean (sometimes) euro-sceptic states like Hungary or Poland? Well, these are not in EU because some illuminati/lizard people tricked them into joining and now won't allow them to leave, like some of their politicians would like you to believe, but because they enjoy billions of subsidies per year.
This was even a joke in the UK at the time. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVYqB0uTKlE
The Brits have a habit of only telling you the precise truth when they think you think they're joking.
This wasn’t intentional of the people who started the cogs turning, it was meant to be an empty gesture to get elected, no one expected it to actually pass.
It was a deliberate choice by his successors to pursue a hard Brexit. A softer Brexit was always possible and likely would have been more acceptable to the EU, as it would have had less financial impact and disruption to trade.
The referendum was triggered by a failed negotiation between Cameron and the EU in the first place.
It has pissed off the EU (understandably), pissed off his own supporters, and pissed off his enemies.
The outcome of the negotiations may have affected the course of the Leave and Remain campaigns, but it was not the trigger for the referendum itself.
People don't exactly feel they agreed to the Boriswave either, and now when I am back visiting the UK it's noticeably the most racist it's ever been, by a very significant distance.
I'm in Canada now and Canada has the same dynamics going on.
It was neither. They wanted freedom of movement that was only one way. In fact they didn't know what they wanted because they were sold a bill of goods when it came to Brexit.
Especially if it was a reciprocal right.
One part of the answer is that some are more open to out of EU immigration than others. A while ago that was Germany who got 1 million plus of refugees and economic immigrants from Syria , Afghanistan and other non European countries.
Now it seems that Spain is that willing to take immigrants and of course also provide them citizenship after 3-5 years. So you may end up with a disproportionate amount of immigrants that come from Europe but are not really European in terms of looks and behaviour. I really fail to see how EU will continue unless far right wins all over Europe and a common restrictive immigration policy is agreed.
Yeah… well, then the fun really begins doesn’t it.
But you know that the EU has this basically leftish centrist ideology of equality mixed in with the neoliberal profit-motive of the soft right. That it’s overt rationalism is politically neutralising rather than centrist, that is to say extreme positions either side do not flourish and are ridiculed as irrational, shouted down, and discarded even if they represent the views of several million people across the bloc. That continued ignorance and attempt at rationalising by a minority of career politicians in the face of an increasingly irrational and polarised base is feeding the right and pushing it into more extreme positions, because at least the right will represent and say what the EU refuses to.
People were poor, wages had hardly grown after years of austerity following the 2008 crash. A huge campaign pointed the finger squarely at the EU: they are taking our money, they are the reason you’re poor, you would be richer without them.
People believed them.
One of the effects of Brexit is that EU popular solidarity has noticeably improved while the UK has gone in the opposite direction. That says a lot about Brexit.
The UK renegotiation was a net loss for the EU, this Canada deal is a deal where both parties gain something.
Also, the Brexit referendum was a campaign promise of David Cameron that was going to trigger if his conservative party won the 2015 general election. Sure, the relationship between EU and UK had strained over the years, but trying to pin this on the inflexibility of the EU feels a bit misdirected.
That is iff the renegotiations with Brussels failed, which they did.
> The UK renegotiation was a net loss for the EU, this Canada deal is a deal where both parties gain something.
V. hard to see what Canada gets out of it. All the roadblocks to Canadian trade with the EU today (especially around resources) are internal to Canada and have nothing at all to do with EU status.
Presumably under the proposed thing Canada would largely adopt EU regulations. This would make trade (particularly for small businesses) _far_ easier. See the UK for how difficult this can become if you're not in alignment; it's survivable for huge companies (though even some of them had trouble; for instance Marks and Spencers' stores in Ireland literally went empty for a while because they were insufficiently prepared), but if you're a small business importing a bunch of components from Europe and making a thing which is largely sold to Europe, there's a _massive_ difference in bureaucratic overhead between being in and out.
Even many Norwegian SMEs don't see direct sales to Europe as worth the overhead, and Norway's in the EEA, as close to the EU as you can get without actually being in it.
Canadian provinces do not agree with each other about trade regulations. They will not surrender this to the federal government, and they certainly won't to the EU.
Canada isn't actually a single market itself.
No. The Conservative party promised an EU membership referendum by 2017 in its 2015 manifesto. That was not conditional on a failure of renegotiations. Nor, indeed, did David Cameron even concede that the renegotiations had failed, so that can’t possibly have been his stated reason for calling the referendum.
You can check the summary of the manifesto at https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-32302062, or page 30 (printed page number) of the original document at https://www.barnetconservatives.co.uk/sites/www.barnetconser....
Another clear indicator can be found in this article: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jan/10/david-camer.... Here, Cameron is directly quoted as saying:
> My policy is to hold a renegotiation and then a referendum. That is what we promised in the manifesto and then to abide by what the British public say.
So you can see that there was never any suggestion that the referendum would be called or not called depending on the outcome of the renegotiations.
Both of which Canada is ok with.
It’s what the newspapers report:
https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/canada-alliance-eu-carney-2...
US publications as a whole, and especially those on the right consistently miss the mark on Canadian coverage.
Yes. Just the demographics has substantially thinned their numbers by now though.
> would likely be a different 17 million crazies voting No again.
Highly unlikely - and turnout on the other side would be dramatically improved. Had the vote been held again the following day, it's likely that the result would have been different. If it were held today, it would be a landslide towards rejoining with the original terms.
People actually know what they're voting for, instead of falling for make-believe horseshit about how much money could go into the NHS (but didn't) on the side of a bus, with a heavy dose of Russian propaganda on Facebook.
The ones that are persistent are "I'm going to vote for anarchy because politics does no good for me", "I'm racist and don't understand that this doesn't get rid of people I really want to get rid of but really want it to so whatever" and "I'm xenophobic and haven't accepted that there isn't a British Empire anymore".
There may be fringe cases around specific regulations, but those were the main three. People were voting for whatever they wanted Brexit to be, most of which is pure fantasy, not what it actually is, which is a clusterfuck of badness, and zero benefit to anyone.
I say this as someone _who was a member of the Conservative Party at the time_, though the fact that the candidate in my constituency since 2010 was Jacob Rees Mogg meant I have voted against them in every election since then.
This is ignorance or just plain bad faith. MEPs are not the main democratic mechanism of the EU, it's the national governments. This is on purpose, so that both national democracy and sovereignty can be maintained.
This is the typical of EU misinformation spouted by people who have a problem with the EU. Of course people can dislike the EU all they want, but people who constantly rail against it, with little or no basis in fact, I'll never know. It's not about the EU, it's some sort of bitter obsession or ideological idiocy. Somehow the EU means much more to them than they claim, otherwise they wouldn't spend so much energy complaining about it.
It’s not misinformation - it’s a very basic fact about the democratic mechanism we had for electing who represents us in the EU parliament which makes and votes on our laws. The opacity of this process and the general lack of enfranchisement in it is a major flaw but one that the EU was content with, because a simulation of a democratic process is good enough, better even, because it avoids the scrutiny and can be defended by people like you. It’s a basic fact that people did get off their arses and vote to leave in greater numbers than even bothered to be enfranchised in the elections for MEPs. You don’t have to bleat about it or invoke ignorance or bad faith because all you show up is your own bad faith to a fairly basic fact.
And it remains that people had never been given the chance to vote on whether they wanted to be governed by the EUs mechanisms. It got decided for people by politicians that it was in their interests that a trading block rapidly evolve into a super-national government. It was decided by those politicians how it operates and politicians the ones with the control over its integration, and what kicked off my comments in this thread, that it has a president who speaks for the whole of Europe who only they choose. When put to the actual people for the first and only time, they decided they weren’t into it for myriad of individual reasons that can’t be usefully modelled. And now as we’ve seen endless times in these threads, the response from Europe hasn’t been to go back to the drawing board, there is a general tone of traitorship and casting it as entirely British issue caused basically by racists and idiots, when it happened within the EU and was also an EU issue. Nowhere else in the EU would 17 million people making a very clear decision be called a gang of fuckn idiots.
"Negotiate" ... is that what you call it?
David Cameron (and team) were the most inept bunch of wankers this country has had the misfortune of being represented by in living memory (in terms of medium/long-term real impact).
We had better terms than anyone in the EU and we still fucked it up.
You are assigning too much responsibility to the EU here and none to the other actors responsible for Brexit. It borders on propaganda, but I do not want to assume ill intent.
And Cameron, didnt he say he would guide UK no matter the result and then resigned when Brexit won?
Now the UK has managed to ramp up the tension dramatically, but without some easy foreign political bogeyman to blame. It's not going to end well either, but it's not clear exactly what the endgame is. This is why the Greens, Reform and Restore are suddenly things.
Come off it. Neither the referendum nor the referendum result were inevitabilities.
B) If it did happen, the US would just say “give us the same deal or you get cut off” and Europe would capitulate immediately.
Technlogy? That would likely result in a US market crash the likes of which has never been seen before. Look at what percentage of the stock market is the magnificent 7. Now imagine what would happen to that if US tech giants were no longer allowed to sell their products/services in the EU. The market is fragile as it is with the AI bubble going on.
Trade? That cuts both ways, and the US economy and cost-of-living crisis doesn't give them lots of wriggle room.
Products? China will be all to happy to step into whatever market is thus competition-free, not to mention the impact this would have on US businesses.
Doesn't seem to be true anymore, at least in every case. See the EU-Mercosur agreement for one recent exception to this, the goods we're now importing from South America don't have the same regulatory environment by far, to many of our local farmers.
This trade matter is likely going to require a new type of agreement that has some special privileges not extended in any other case for both parties.
Also, to be able to sell stuff, you gotta comply with the CE rules one way or another, there is no free card here.
About competition in Eurovision: absolutely, would love for them to participate, even if just as guest state :D
LMAO just googled it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada_in_the_Eurovision_Song_...
The CE rules are relatively sane and followed commonly right? At least I see a lot of CE-stamped goods in Australia… so I always assumed that was the case.
There are expulsions and entry bans even under Schengen, but these are incredibly rare things to happen as the freedom of movement is considered to be a cornerstone of EU values.
The ECJ has consistently ruled that the freedom of movement is very broad.
I know this because it creates an interesting corner case where Swiss citizens don’t have quite the same broad freedom of movement since ECJ rulings don’t automatically apply to non-EU citizens. For example, an EU citizen can move to Greece for no reason at all and just sit on a beach. A Swiss citizen cannot, and has to find work in 3-6 months or leave.
Yes but there's a big difference between "only import electronics that aren't fire hazards" and "you have to pay custom & excise on anything you import".
Doesn't this mean that Canada is, in a certain degree, dependent of UK?
Which country would you say has a closer relationship with the King of England?
"Charles the Third, by the Grace of God King of Canada and His other Realms and Territories, Head of the Commonwealth"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_titles_and_honours_of_...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monarchy_of_Canada#Royal_prese...
The last King of England was William of Orange, who died in 1702 and was succeeded by Anne, who was the last Queen of England. The Act of Union 1707 merged the Kingdom of Scotland and Kingdom of England into a single successor state, the Kingdom of Great Britain. In 1801 that became the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and in 1922 became the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
It really shouldn't surprise you to learn this, but the ordinary name for the "United Kingdom" is "England".
Imagine standing in New York City and proclaiming to the locals how lovely California is and how much you like it here in California.
Now imagine standing in Glasgow and proclaiming to the locals how lovely England is and how much you like it here in England.
If corrected, just say that England is the "ordinary name" for where you are.
If you're not sure where you actually are, Miss South Carolina can help: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lj3iNxZ8Dww
Check sense 4, and the usage note.
You can insist that everyone else in the world is speaking their own language wrong as much as you want, but no one will care.
If you want to be seen as an idiot, use the word "England" to refer to a group of four nations of which only one has that name.
If you want to be seen as a raging dickhead, show that you know that and used the word anyway.
We avoid doing this (only a few silly old men and bigots do it, as a dog whistle in national politics).
You should not do this.
It is not, in any sense, the "ordinary name" of the UK. It was pure chauvinism even when it was in common use. Don't do it; it will inevitably and correctly annoy people.
ETA: Even "Britain" and "British" are pretty complex. "Britain" is not really a place in any meaningful or legal sense. The islands are "the British Isles" but only cartographers and mariners really say that (because Ireland is one of them). Great Britain is an island. No identifiable map region is called Britain. "British" is a citizenship and a passport; whether people say they are British is increasingly a personal decision and people have a really wide variety of reasons for their choice.
Safer to say "The UK" when you mean it, and England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland only when you specifically mean those.
Anything else is quite likely to get your drink spilled over you.
yes, i was just pointing out the inconsistency.
> Which country would you say has a closer relationship with the King of England?
Legally speaking they both have exactly the same relationship.
I do not think King of England is actually one of his titles.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_Nations
These countries choose voluntarily to hold ties with the UK, and each other, and some accept the UK's monarch as nominal head of state, but don't be mistaken; they are all fully independent countries. Some are republics, some are kingdoms with their own monarch. They value each other's friendship, shared values and heritage, but they're not beholden to the UK or each other.
The monarchy is 99% ceremonial in Canada but it's important to note that the Canadian Crown isn't the UK Crown... Canada is not a dependent of the UK in anyway, simply the person that wears the Crowns is the same person.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monarchy_of_Canada
>the Crown has had both a shared and a separate character: the sovereign's role as monarch of Canada has been distinct from their position as monarch of any other realm,[n 4][16][65][66][67] including the United Kingdom.[n 6][69][70][71][72] Only Canadian federal ministers of the Crown may advise the sovereign on any and all matters of the Canadian state,[n 7][70][73][74][75][76][77] of which the sovereign, when not in Canada, is kept abreast by weekly communications with the federal viceroy.[78] The monarchy thus ceased to be an exclusively British institution and, in Canada, became a Canadian,[40][79][80][81] or "domesticated",[82] establishment, though it is still often denoted as "British" in both legal and common language,[40] for reasons historical, political, and of convenience.
I'm sure that in that scenario Canada would quickly update their primogeniture laws to give Charlotte primacy over her younger brother, but at the moment the primogeniture laws of the two countries are different.
As an ex-Brit I was always pro-monarchy, enjoying the pageantry and historical continuity, although the current crop of royals don't have much going for them. Perhaps William will turn out OK.
"Associate member" actually sounds like TIGHTER integration than Norway/Switzerland/Iceland, which are not members at all. Switzerland is not even in the EEA. It is a very bad term, actually as Canada cannot be an EU member (it isn't in Europe) and if they don't want or can't join the EEA then that leaves a Switzerland-like deal, which is purely bilateral.
I think the construct of geographical location should not be that big of an issue in these times. Plenty of EU countries have overseas properties.
Canada very much is not “blustering” when it comes to Trump. A big majority of Canadians see sovereignty and less reliance on the US as a massive issue. Canada has embraced China in a way that was unthinkable 5 years ago in a deal intended to hedge against the US. The Canadian Conservative Party lost an election it was thought to have a guaranteed win from and has continued losing seats since then in large part due to their half hearted response to Trump.
Hence I think it is safe to say that this is a lot of bluster, or ar least hyperbole, considering what Canada and the EU might really want and the long and complicated treaty process to define and create an "associate member" status.
Canada has been making real moves, and doing it quietly. In the past year non-US exports have grown by a record 11%. New trade and defense deals have been signed with more than 20 countries.
Whatever is going on in Ottawa, bluster is not the word for it.
[1] https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-capitals-mark-carney-ursu...
No idea about the EU side rhetoric, but it may not be bluster considering that Canada has huge potash and oil/gas reserves that could replace Kremlin aligned sources in the EU (and the defense deal that Canada just announced with Ukr.).
However Article 49 of the European Union states: "Any European State which respects the values referred to in Article 2 and is committed to promoting them may apply to become a member of the Union".
So Middle Eastern and North African countries (and Canada) cannot apply in the first place.
I think Turkey is in the grey area that allows some wriggle room as it spans both Europe and Asia.
But also, yes, Canada probably does not want to be a full member, at least in the near-term; they want some sort of alignment not amounting to full membership. I wouldn't be totally amazed if we look back on this as the start of the (long-suggested) two speed EU system.
A possibility.
https://www.reuters.com/business/australia-on-same-page-cana...
If it gets a free trade and freedom of movement system in place, I don't think anyone is going to object in Canada much. Unless they try to open up fisheries, which would get them a bunch of Maritime (and Quebec?) objections...
Fisheries are obviously not going to happen. They didn't happen with Iceland, they are not going to happen with Canada either.
The funny thing is that we got this, instead of tangible and needed deregulation within Canada. Another announcement, instead of actual shovels in the ground and making life better for Canadians.
There’s a meeting scheduled in Ottawa next month for the actual deal writing.
Maybe Canada could just join EFTA, that would be easier.
Sounds like it could be a solution for the UK as well, which begs the question: why wasn’t a similar proposal worked out with the uk?
What? First time I hear of this. Honestly, Eurovision doesn't really have anything to do with the EU. We all know the main sponsor is from a non-EU country whose participation is much more controversial than Canada anyway.
And the EU treaties refuse to define what „European“ means, so using „watches Eurovision“ as a rule of thumb is surprisingly workable as a definition of where the borders of „Europe“ end.
That is the whole point. If you want to understand more, this song is genuinely a good explanation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cv6tgnx6jTQ
And I'm not even joking.
> Signal, Windscribe, and NordVPN say they'll pull out of Canada before building surveillance infrastructure. The biggest threat to encrypted communications in a Western democracy since Australia's 2018 law.
https://stateofsurveillance.org/news/canada-bill-c22-lawful-...
> Australia passes world’s first law authorizing encryption backdoors
> The law authorizes police to compel companies to create a security vulnerability, often called a backdoor, that would give investigators access to an individual’s communication without that person’s knowledge. It marks a major milestone in the so-called “crypto wars” over the public’s ability to “go dark” via the powerful encryption available on commercial devices.
https://cyberscoop.com/australia-encryption-backdoors-law-pa...
First only as far as a law known to the state's citizens.
I was working on a compression and encryption idea late 80s, very early 90s albeit with too higher a price on compute power which I was hoping to improve -- fortunately I bumped into a bloke though attending a module to improve design who also worked for a company developing software which used encryption, primarily targeting a particular market overseas which would also see sales flow into other countries eventually. On telling him what I was working on he took the time to have a long chat as he lay out the difficulties he and the company he worked for had to deal with especially in regard to this country; as to be able to market the product there, the programs would need a back door ... from what I heard, I'd assume that all sold there at that time had a back door. It was a significant moment for it changed the path I was on, being apparently more or less pointless, I reluctantly moved on as it wasn't worth any more time to provide a free open source program that got around the sale aspect.
Funny thing is, myself online I couldn't give a rats if whomever in those 3 and 4 letter organisations around the world could see my emails, mailing lists etc.
Edit: clarity
Benefits are more visible from the inside, and if you don't like it you can brexit.
Unfortunately no one can be forced out also.
You could make a good case that the EU is still trying to deal with issues from the 2004 expansion for example. Doesn't mean it was a bad idea, but it's not cost free
For the most part I am thankful that the EU regulates things strictly. As long as I am the consumer of what is regulated and not the maker. Because while the regulation is well meaning, it is not always effective or efficient. And sometimes it achieves absolutely no positive results.
And yet, I am generally for regulating a lot of things.
For instance the cookie-popup-horseshit is failed regulation that came about mainly because regulators were squeamish about real solutions that would have required constant judgement calls. Instead of posing an existential risk to companies that run roughshod over our privacy, they created impotent regulation that is a dual failure: it protects exactly nobody and it wastes everyone's time multiple times over.
Companies that do bad things should face existential risks. It is the only mechanism that works. Fines only work for small players. For large players it is surprisingly often a calculation where the numbers dictate you DO bad things because the downside risk is mostly quantifiable and financially acceptable.
Yes, sanctioning companies guilty of egregious violations of privacy would have been noisy, but it would have been the right thing to do. And it would have been cheaper and more effective than what we have today.
> [Canada would be] EU's first "associate member"
> …
> [Von der Leyen] did not give specific details on how any Canadian membership would work, but listed manufacturing, technology, AI, defence, energy, critical minerals and economic security as key areas for cooperation.
> …
> But "associate membership" of the EU does not currently exist and the process, if agreed, could take years.
>
Many people (including Carney himself) are presenting this as a fundamental and recent pivot.
But the opening moves of this happened a long time ago. CETA was negotiated by Chrystia Freeland and the now-often-maligned Trudeau gov't.
(also Trudeau also had a honeymoon phase for the first two to three years of his term...)
Carney just eviscerated all environmental laws and climate change initiatives -- which were already pathetically weak -- and cons back in my home province of Alberta are still apoplectic about how persecuted they are. It's all team sport theatre. Dangerously close to US style dysfunction.
Translation: I don't care if it was Harper or Trudeau who "initiated" CETA.
In 2024, if the Dems just had a normal primary they would have won. But they consistently lied to people about what they were seeing with their own eyes (Biden's obvious lack of mental acuity), which people find really insulting, and then forced in a weak candidate.
To clarify, since this is the Internet and people make lots of assumptions: I voted against Trump three times, plus I voted against him in my state's open GOP primary, which he lost.
Yes, if they'd run Bernie they probably would've won, but there was zero chance the Democrat party would ever run a far-left presidential candidate - it goes against all their interests. It's like saying the Republicans should've run Chuck Schumer.
Bernie has literally zero chance in a nationwide election. Read it again: ZERO.
What do you mean by this?
The left things he's literally Orange Hitler, and the right is fractured between "hasn't done enough, mostly performative cruelty"/"MIGA"/"woah he's going to far, I just didn't want 'commiela'" types.
The one thing nearly everyone agrees on, however, is he is a disappointment. This much is evident from his absolutely underwater support in the polls, and how multiple states are likely to swing blue in the midterms.
I used the word "endorsed", not "voted". The distinction does matter.
Only about 25% of the voting age public voted for Trump. Almost 25% of the voting age public weren't registered to vote, perhaps some of them wanted to vote but couldn't, so let's use the registered voters as the denominator. 75.8% of them voted; roughly one third for Trump, one third for Harris and one third didn't vote.
Choosing not to vote against a likely outcome is an endorsement of that outcome in my opinion.
> "There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again."
Like, if the US had just elected ol' minihands once, that would be one thing. But it did it _twice_. Ultimately, even if he's comprehensively put back in his box, there is an issue of long-term trust.
At this point, Pandora's Box has been opened; it has been established that the US president can just act like a crazy dictator and... none of the mechanisms which are supposed to prevent that actually really function. Even if the US elects the most normal, sensible, rule-of-law-focused president imaginable in 2028, Canada will still have to look to 2032. I'm not sure that anything short of constitutional change would really restore trust, and the US is set up such that changing the constitution is virtually impossible.
Eased travel and trade, but not full membership voting rights, etc. So basically, an extensive trade and economics agreement, with options to intensify relationships later on.
Good thing for both sides!
Canadians are right to be skeptical that the next presidency will be significantly better than the current one. A serious amount of goodwill has been burned and I think the average view up north is that it's time to build a very solid backup plan.
Caligula's horse can't be elected solely because horses don't live past 35.
If Canada wanted to facilitate trade, I would imagine they would figure it out internally. So my guess is that this is just giving up some political autonomy for some unknown reason, maybe to stick it to the US?
The second biggest trade barriers between Canada provinces are liquor regulations. The second biggest trade barriers between American states are likely car emission laws.
Fairly comparable, IMO.
I.e. Opt in vs Opt out but more complicated.
Of course it's more complicated -- the US's inter-state commerce clause has been broadly interpreted by the courts.
Doctors can move pretty much freely between 44 American states. Doctors can't do that in Canada, and here we need more specific kinds of doctors in rural populations and there is absolutely no reason to not have a harmonized licensing regime.
We also have non-uniform regulation on stuff like the manufacture of construction goods (for example door sizing) which can cause a big drag in trade. This might be harder to fix but it exists and is not comparable to the US market.
We say as Europeans while interacting daily with USA engineers and other people here on HN - a site ran by Silicon Valley investors - while we usually talk about USA-made software. I personally do not hold every American accountable for the actions of their government.
For what it’s worth, as an American, I agree with them. The USA is proving to be unreliable, if not outright malicious, to our long term allies.
At the same time, a lot of them voted in favor of foreign policies that I very strongly disagree with.
Both can be true at the same time, and the former doesn't make me forget the latter. Especially when their president continues to voice threats against the sovereignty of my country.
I'm not saying there is no way that America and Canada can't repair the trade and diplomatic relations, just that Canadians shouldn't expect generosity and friendship.
Trust has been broken. The US has lost its shine and hard-earned reputation. Most of the trust was that a person like Trump would never have been elected in the first place.
Can't unelect Trump. The damage has been done, and is ongoing.
Nobody knows; it’s all up for negotiation.
FWIW, a (¿the?) previous time this term was floated, it involved (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potential_re-accession_of_the_...):
“Also in September 2023, France and Germany proposed a restructuring of the membership of the EU to allow the UK to rejoin as an associate member, rather than a full member. Associate membership would include membership of the European single market but not the EU customs union, in exchange for participation in the European Court of Justice and making contributions to the EU budget.”
Salut ! I wouldn't say the Americans are no longer our friends, but trust is definitely gone.
Here are some guiding principles of EU integration:
1. To have a say in EU rules generally requires being a full member. To some extent you can negotiate your entry into whatever level you desire but this has to be mutual agreement and can be difficult to change later without essentially threatening to leave;
2. Conditions generally need to be reciprocal. If you want freedom of movement in the EU then you have freedom of movement from other European states. This was a real sticking point in the Brexit negotiations and the EU doesn't play with reciprocal freedoms; and
3. Any sort of free trade with the EU will mean adopting EU regulations to be within the EU customs union. I don't see this flying with Canada because despite current trade hostilities with the US, the US is and will remain the primary trading partner of Canada. Adopting EU regulations might make US trade more difficult;
Also, the US might have legitimate cause to object. If Canada and US have free trade and Canada and the EU has free trade then that's opting the US into EU regulation essentially.
In some ways this is similar to the strained situation invented for Northern Ireland.
Obviously, Canada won't be joining Schengen or the Euro. Canada already has visa-free travel to the EU.
Canada still has a housing crisis and increased migration from the EU is likely a political non-starter even though those things aren't really related and literally nobody is going to tackle the true cause of the housing crisis (just like in every developed country). As an aside, the true cause is hoarding combined with tax advantages and a political goal of raising house prices.
In short, I don't know that this means anything because I don't think anything can substantively change with the Canada-EU relationship.
[1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/1qbq43v/european_in...
I guess it's the white version of saying Gringo.
Canada's economy is propped up by Alberta's energy production, which you my loose because they're so disgusted with the liberal politics.
Anyway, good luck with revitalizing the economy by trading with a bloc of countries in economic decline.
Thank you for directing your hate at the specified target. /// Merci d'aiguiller votre haine à la cible sus mentionnée.
i have to think that many people would consider the current situation with the usa is already a sinking (sunk?) ship.
Siberia is likely better off independent.
This is about much more than that.
No one is taking anything here, but I think the american mind cannot comprehend complex things such as having allied and building agreements
This is exactly the problem.
But taking someone by force in on brand for Trump, so it might happen.
As far as an offer goes, polls find that almost third of the UK now regards the USA as a threat rather than an ally.
https://www.opinium.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Opinium-U...
If nothing else, I mean, see how Iran's going, now imagine that with aircraft carriers, submarines, nuclear-tipped SLBMs, and so forth.
Like you're pretty much talking about WW3.
Countries cannot put their economic and physical security in the hands of a few thousand mouthbreathers in Pennsylvania or Wisconsin every 4 years.
Europe is rearming and talking about a continental nuclear shield. China is selling US Treasuries.
Middle powers like Canada that do not wish to become a U.S. protectorate are looking hard at what is needed to secure their futures.
A President Newsom, though a welcome change, does nothing to reverse these vectors now that they have been started.
The times to stop this were Nov 5, 2024 and Nov 8, 2016.
This is true. A US president who has strong support from a majority of voters of his own party can act like a dictator. So if 51% of Republican voters (which may be just 25% of all voters) support him no matter what, then he can act like a dictator. This is because Republican members of Congress who are supposed to rein him in are worried that they will be voted out if they anger the 25% of voters who support the president.
The fact that 25% of voters can set the direction for the whole country is indeed a defect in the system that is not easily rectified.
But if Republicans are defeated by Democrats in the upcoming midterms then there is hope. That's how we are going to recover.
Where is the recovery?
Canada has poor inter-provincial trade, with some provinces having an easier time trading with other countries than other provinces.
Maybe it's time we focus on ourselves? :think:
Geopolitical games like this are how real wars eventually start.
This is all a big pain in the back.
Solar panels are even worse. Here in Poland they're covering entire fields in the countryside, I have no idea why they don't build them on parking lots or on factory roofs.
Solar panels are similarly lovely to see. I'd just as rather see them than a uniform field of corn or maize or somesuch thing. I can't understand the mindset that objects to such things? is it just a straight up childish nimby "I don't want ANYTHING to be built" or would you prefer natural gas+coal power plants ? or any other built structures for that matter (I think they are better than concrete buildings etc - they are white tree-like things, thin with smooth curved surfaces, or rows of curious purple and black panels swiveling to face the sun)
I would prefer nuclear
Compared to all the things that could be built, it seems like the aesthetic harm is so small (a six lane highway, an industrial plant, a train line, sewage processing plant, refuse pile, the list goes on and on) - all of these must be built in places too. I can't see how anyone can think themselves anything but lucky that they get wind turbines near them instead
Canadian provinces have a far bigger ability to screw things up for the whole than countries do inside the EU, and people remotely familiar with the EU will understand what a strong statement that is.
I'm in Quebec and very familiar with the exact territory this has applied to wrt getting resources out on the east coast, and unless someone was willing to rule by decree to bypass all those entrenched groups it's not happening, and we all know why such decrees would not happen as well.
LNG was at all time low prices at the time, and Canada has an integrated NG pipeline system with the US, and the US has enormous amounts of export capacity as they just repurposed import terminals into export terminals, whereas for Canada it would be a greenfield project. Trudeau and his government caused a lot of harm for Canada, and a lost decade to platitudes and feel good save-the-world nonsense, but his statement was absolutely correct, and it was only "notorious" among partisans who see wrong in everything the "other team" does or says.
I mean, much of that natural gas that the US exports to Europe came from Canada, through that integrated "we're friends and allies" network.
There wasn't a case for it, because the US wasn't a criminal idiocracy at the time and we had an integrated system.
I mean, now we're talking about just building our own pipeline system because it has come to that, but at the time Trudeau was absolutely correct. You don't build a tens of billions of dollars terminal just in case a country goes rogue.
The US is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. It has barely any friends in the world, and its economy is on perilously shaky grounds. Crybaby Bessent is desperately trying to scare the bond market, but a run for the exits and the US will be fucked.
Yeah, Trump is totally just going to cut them off, bro. The fossil fuel companies, that basically run your government, will totally be cool with that too, because they love not making money and accelerating the transition off of their wares.
American delusions are amazing stuff. As a Canadian it has been astonishing seeing Americans constantly think they have the upper hand in everything (if they sell you something, well then you have the upper hand, but also if you sell them something, well then you have the upper hand, and....) and then getting frantic and crazed when it turns out...other people have "hands" as well. Eventually it all turns over to "yeah well we'll invade you!" because that's all you really have: A third world life expectancy and a social idiocracy, but yay you have a trillion dollar military!
I can't imaging Canada would be looking to align its standards and laws with the EU. Don't get me wrong, the EU does a lot of things that make it both safer and better, but it makes things more expensive to make, and that only works when there isn't a wild-west next-door-neighbour. It's hard to compete when your biggest and nearest export market has looser labour and product regulations than you.
Of course Canada can do more trade with the EU without broad regulatory alignment, it just seems weird you'd need to announce it.
Please flood the timber market.
Not white enough for the EU. There is a lot of opposition to even Turkey, which is already in customs union, joining and talks are dead specifically because EU countries do not want immigration from Turkey.
So in 50 years Tukey will border authoritarian regime either way.
Either way, it's clear that UK migration levels have not been diminished by Brexit, and much of it is coming from outside the EU... So whatever one thinks of the issue it is bigger than Europe.
https://bylinetimes.com/2021/08/12/cummings-brexit-confessio...
The warnings before Brexit were that it would increase immigration - and look what happened!
Edit: The Turkey stuff was on Cummings blog - don't know if its still there.
* Nordics: Iceland and Norway which are ambivalent, despite repeated attempts to get them to join. (They are already in EFTA.) Greenland and the Faroe Islands fall more under the dependencies category below.
* Switzerland which can't because it wishes to be neutral, and also because of the finance sector. The Vatican has some similar issues.
* Microstates, dependencies and tax havens.
* Ex-USSR. The Baltics function well in the EU and are the exceptions, but Moldova, Belarus, the Ukraine and Russia each have massive issues. (Including how Moldova doesn't control much of its territory and much of Belarus is contaminated by Chernobyl.)
* The Balkans. Problematic recent history. I think Albania and North Macedonia may join in the near future. Serbia, Montenegro and Kosovo have ex-USSR style issues.
* Turkey.
* The UK, which is problematic since it is the only major state which has left.
Oh yeah, that's gonna be hella popular with the voters.
The other question is what its border control is like at the eastern end.
There are already large numbers of Turks in western Europe, particularly Germany, so presumably some of them would vote for it.
Define large numbers. It's around 5% or even less in Germany which hosts the biggest Turkish community to the best of my knowledge, and way less in other European countries. Bringing Turkey in imo might dissolve the Union, I don't see anyone trying it soon.
> Turkey refuses to address its past with the Armenians, Kurds and Greeks which is a major concern.
It's also a dictatorship and its population is probably not in favor of liberal democracy - most (all?) Muslim countries aren't.
- US goes after South America and Greenland
- EU goes after Canada and Georgia (country), which is just ridiculous in terms of geography
- Russia invades Ukraine and goes after Eastern Europe and Middle-East to some extent
- China does its expansion too
Even though some of these actions are just political nonsense, it still increases the overall level of escalation. This is not what the world needs right now
Trade agreements and unions — yes, please; yet another political or military union expansion — please, God, no. I understand that EU is a mix of both, but also do think that this is a purely political game against Trump
- EU goes after Canada and Georgia (country), which is just ridiculous in terms of geography
Absolute brain dead comparison
It makes sense to me that these countries would want to build new trade and security alliances with countries who have similar interests and who face similar threats.
The alternative to these defensive military pacts is that Russia or the US or whomever can literally invade and annex countries piecemeal to expand their power. If we can’t effectively ban that, then it doesn’t make sense to me to ban the only thing that deters it today.
The EU is offering enhanced trade relations with Canada and Georgia.
Those are completely different things.
You sound like Puting fan boys arguing about NATO expansion, NATO does not expand. countries voluntarily ask to join them, because the alternative is being destroyed
This can work if one country/alliance is doing it, but when everyone starts doing the same it becomes a zero sum game with the dead end. It’s pretty much the prisoner’s dilemma: “if we don’t expand, they will expand/invade” although it’s a common interest to not escalate
yes i get it, stick it to the USA. yay patriotism. suddenly thats cool and not problematic for some reason.
and im also all for less restrictive coordination between nations. it's all performative in the end.
but like, this feels basically like "stick it to trump" and not anything meaningful.
Almost a decade on and most Canadians don't seem to realize we already have CETA (free trade) with the EU. It's not fully fully ratified but it's there. It's why our grocery stores have been slowly filling with European products we never had before (Yay!)
For example: It's already cheaper for me -- as a consumer -- to import sporting goods (skis, etc) from the EU than it is from the US. (And often less shipping hassle too, oddly).
And yet distributor arrangements often still funnel everything through the US, first as "North American distributor" models. Incurring shipping and sometimes even tariff overhead. (Looking at you Scarpa, North America. You suck.)
Even if all of this is symbolic, it may at least shift perceptions on our side of the Atlantic so Canadian businesses at least start looking to Europe more seriously as both importers and exporters.
People often forget our country was built on an east west shipping and transport axis with the St Lawrence (and later the Pacific) as outflow, to supply Europe (mainly Britain). It was only later that north-south trade became more important economically.
Shipping manufactured goods across the Atlantic to European customers may end up cheaper for them than shipping from China in some circumstances.
I'm maybe also a bit biased, I currently work for a European employer.
best we can get is "european style"
id love to just move to somewhere in the eu and be able to freely work there. thats how it should be in every country btw. until then, it seems like more performance, which carney has seemingly mastered.
Exceptions were made for cheeses though. They've dropped significantly in (relative) price and varieties of imports have improved significantly in the last 10 years. Even the most white-bread grocery stores tend to stock a selection of decent European cheeses now.
it's funny because we had someone running for PM in 2017 who was the only person who said they'd fix it and he was branded a racist right-winger.
politics in canada is rworded
I have mixed feelings about the dairy cartel. I am in favour of reform of some kind to eliminate the quota system but I also don't want a flood of American milk into the Canadian market.
also 6% is something ive never seen. does it come in an extra large bag?
It took a while but most of the local grocery stores around me are now stocking it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morocco%E2%80%93European_Union...
A necessary move, because the US isnt acting like an ally anymore.
Hence the increased cooperation and agreements with the EU and China.
The US is a completely broken country, and simply switching governments will not change that. Without a complete and utter change in how that entire country operates -- including dissolution -- no country should ever normalize relations with it again.
The US is by far the world's most dangerous rogue nation. It is a terroristic nation. It is a bully. It not only elected a rapist self-dealing criminal imbecile to president, it elected him again, seeking a round two after the utter debacle the first term was, and the disastrous results are exactly what everyone could predict, but you know...this is who America is now.
And a big reason Canada is moving on is that it's pretty clear that the US is a country in spectacular decline, and it is China's century now. Which is maybe why the US is electing disgusting garbage like Trump -- and he's certainly not alone, and there are various garbage "football coach" type creeps filling the entire US political class -- lamenting the position they once held, now going down the Russian/Putin path where they'll accelerate the crash just to reminisce about a past that mostly never existed.
EDIT: I should add that agreements with the US are worthless, and this has been amply demonstrated. As Carney noted, the US' signature is written in pencil, and even agreements signed by this very president mean nothing, and will be dishonoured at the earliest convenience. In recent trade negotiations, where Canada almost made a horrible mistake of accepting ridiculous terms to maintain the status quo as much as possible (sidenote: Canada absolutely must withdraw from USMCA, a Trump-signed and negotiated agreement that the US is in utter defiance of), they asked "so when we sign this, you'll then honour it?", and the US side couldn't even commit to that. They knew that it could be days before the rapist toddler had a twitter tantrum after one of the kleptocrats whispered in his ear and imposed new barriers, tariffs, etc. Like, what is even the point of negotiating with such a farce? A lawless cabal led by just the absolute worst human trash.
Don't worry, America still has the cartoonishly pathetic "Board of Peace" (though the Arab despots might not be as eager now that the US got completely humiliated by some isolated rogue theocracy), and your close allies Argentina and El Salvador.
I agree that Trump is a p.o.s with bad intentions, but pretending that there is some beautiful and perfect alternative on the other side of the planet is just hilarious.
If you have to construct a strawman to declare "hilarious", maybe just delete it in your drafts?
There are zero "beautiful and perfect alternatives" on this planet. But right now China reveres science, medicine, training and education. The US has descended to being a fucking idiocracy where foolish clowns like Rogan and Charlie Kirk are the heroes of the people. Oh look, Sydney Sweeney showed her tits!
Where a barking clown pedophile conman bag of shit gets elected to highest office -- his addled, simpleton brain stuck in the 1980s, so it's like listening to some sort of bizarre, incredibly stupid version of a time capsule. It is quite literally an idiocracy. Where your secretary of "war" is a drunken foolish idiot who only ever made captain, and thinks germs are fake and brags about never washing his hands. I mean, the entire administration, from Epstein Grifter Greaseball Lutnick to crybaby "we're the house" Bessent...just garbage from top to bottom. The absolute worst people.
I'm Canadian, and I will say with 100%, utter certainty that Trump has asked your military for plans to takeover Canada. Because it is a lawless risk to humanity. China isn't a member of the International Criminal Court, but they have never impeded its work or attacked its existence, whereas the US -- as a warcriming menace -- is actively threatening it at this moment, largely to support their genocide/war crime master Israel.
There is one country that has bombed 10 nations over the past 12 months. That has a deranged lunatic constantly tweeting threats of nuclear armageddon or "wiping out civilizations". A foolish cretin that is putting his name on everything and demolishing everything that won't let him. Even putting his disgusting face on currency, matching only a couple of despotic crapholes in putting a living leader on currency. There is one country that is committing wanton terrorism around the globe. I mean, we know China does some destabilizing things in Western countries, but it is nothing compared to what the US is doing, trying to export its garbage culture and idiocracy traits abroad.
What a farce. And Americans are...fine with this. With becoming a worldwide joke. A dangerous menace joke, for sure, and I guarantee a lot of nuclear stockpiles, including among allies, have newly added targeting for US targets, rightly. And many more countries are going to emerge as nuclear powers. The US under this criminal garbage has taught a solid lesson that nuclear proliferation is where it's at, and everyone should get in on it.
China, in contrast, does a lot of shitty things, but they are absolute rational saints compared to the farce that the US is now. Predictable, reasonable, rational.
It's clear the paths these two countries are on. And the US is heading to Russia v2, where a pathetic has been endlessly tries to reclaim that glory while it circles the toilet.
And before you seethe some more repeatedly saying "your military! your secretary of war! your your your!", I'm Canadian.
Both sides demonstrate that the United States can be consistently relied upon to break every deal they make, be it relating to international relations and borders, economics and debt, trade, military protection, and supply of arms.
Bush Sr and Clinton both broke the assurances made to Gorbachev that made the relatively peaceful dismantling of the Soviet Union possible by marching NATO eastward and carving up fresh borders in the Balkans.
Clinton, Bush Jr, and even Biden were still talking about free trade agreements, less than a decade before we see an international tariff regime spring up, and the United States reserves subsidy carve-outs in every deal they make with other countries who they expect to open their markets.
US spending has been out of control for decades no matter who controls the White House or Congress, and is only getting worse. They're relying on the inertia of its massive economy to bear the inflationary burden by printing money. The biggest export of the US economy, Treasury Bonds - that is, debt - is now seen as unreliable, and other countries are dumping them like burning garbage. Indeed, the United States has already started defaulting on such loans to a growing number of nations, only they get to call it "sanctions" when they don't repay their loans. The rest of the world looks on in horror as they realise how much of their wealth is tied up in this make-believe that the United States can renege on or bully creditors into not divesting on a whim. This explains the skyrocketing price of gold.
Speaking of those creditors, a lot of them are gulf states. As in, Persian Gulf. They used to sell oil and buy Treasuries as investments. But since nearly every US base in the Persian Gulf has been effectively destroyed, every gulf state that participated in the war crimes against Iran has been punished into submission for that involvement. Resumption of hostilities like we saw in the opening month would see the infrastructure that those nations rely on to continue to function as countries destroyed within hours. Absent desalination and oil export facilities, those countries would just cease to exist as significant polities. The de facto government in Yemen (referred to perversely as the "rebels", while the legitimate government sits in Riyadh, capital of the country that has been bombing Yemen for 15 years or so) just delivered Saudi Arabia a major military defeat, while the President refused to help. Saudi Arabia, land of black gold, unable to export from either the Strait or the Red Sea, with one of the biggest oil pipelines in the world now burning, is being forced to borrow money! The United States, so called most powerful military the world has known, dares not send a large naval vessel within about 1000 km of the Strait of Hormuz, and two aircraft carriers have been forced to limp away. Meanwhile, trade through the Red Sea has also been strangled off. All of the US allies under the protection of Pax Americana have been humbled by a country that has been getting "strangled" in some form or another for the past 70 years by a superpower.
And after all that the US military is out of interceptor missiles. They can't spare any for West Asia or Ukraine, right when everyone wants them. They wasted thousands of million dollar missiles on thousand dollar drones, and cannot make more at a rate that matters.
If you think it's just tariffs and some hurt feelings, you haven't been paying attention.
While there are troubling developments in EU countries as well, there is also the converse (e.g. Hungary), and the EU parliamentary systems are significantly more resilient than the US two-party presidential system.
Mistakes happen but this same buffoon got elected twice. That's no fluke, deep down the american population likes him enough to give him two chances.
The US is on the path of Russia since the end of the iron curtain, moving to a kleptocracy ruled by (tech br)olichargs.
The electoral + two-party system makes it nearly impossible to break out of this.
When it's Hungary it's funny, because it doesn't matter, when it's the US it's not, because it fucks up the entire world's order. It really is not that hard to understand the problem
Until the USA fixes their broken political system, it would be unreasonable to seek to create major bonds with them.
They will remain a partner, but they should be a minority partner.
If there's an apt non-baseball metaphor, it's perhaps that USA is a circus we are compelled to pay attention to for now. We'd rather just not
Even if Democrats were to be back in power and devote their 4 years to restore things and apologize, that wouldn’t be enough.
Americans have shown they can vote TWICE for a fascist regime that is willing and eager to generate chaos.
Their political system is foobar.
This ignorance makes it very clear that the American voting populace does not take positive relations with erstwhile allies seriously. Increased trade integration may not be the ideal situation for Canada, but nothing about the situation is ideal. At least we won’t be subjugating ourselves to hostile hegemons like China and the USA.
The next phase of history is China's, and broadly Asia's. Everyone on the planet, but Americans, can see this. It is indisputable.
Everyone else is finding a place within that new reality, and no one else wants to play along with American delusions that they're going to hold onto their place and everyone else are their supplicants.
At this stage, the US should be begging every like-minded nation to be friends. Instead you elected a grotesque embarrassment farce that coddles up to two-bit clowns like Milei, while endlessly attacking allies. ROFL.
Enjoy the coming crash.
Yeah, we don't want to be under the "umbrella" of a terroristic idiocracy menace. You can become the worldwide pariah on your own, without our offering of legitimacy for your terrible behaviour.
The US government has repeatedly called for invasion of Canada. Canada would be insane not to find allies against the American threat.
The EU has built the world's largest trade zone, from Mercosur to South Korea, Japan and India to Canada.
I believe they are currently outmaneuvering the rest of the world by quietly binding everyone to themselves while the US, Russia and China are caught up in their saber rattling.
The US and China are fighting a 20th century contest of hard power. The EU is the only 21st century superpower of soft power.
Which of those agreements are fully ratified by the EU?