@tracydaniel17.bsky.social:
I won’t buy any US goods. Especially produce. The US no longer has any control systems in place to inspect any foods for diseases. So who in the hell would buy anything out of the US unless you like diarrhea and puking
@dkmunro.bsky.social:
Five decades of watching Hollywood movies did not at all prepare me for the pervasiveness of cowardice in the face of tyranny in America.
To be fair, it did prepare me for the stupidity.
@lizrenzetti.bsky.social:
I had a little bit of fun with the trade war, asking why Americans don’t understand us at all. A column featuring Seth Rogen, Marilyn Bell, and Odysseus
What do Americans think of Canada? They don’t — and now they’re facing the consequences by Elizabeth Renzetti, Aug 27, 2026, Toronto Star
Elizabeth Renzetti is a Toronto-based contributing columnist for the Star and author of “What She Said: Conversations About Equality.”
In the first episode of the hit show ”Sterling Point,” a worldly Brooklyn teenager is told he and his sister may be inheriting land in Muskoka, in a far-off place called Canada. “I have a wolf phobia,” he mumbles. “The accent’s too thick. Don’t understand it.” His sister, a driven brainiac, is astonished that the flight to Toronto is so short that she shouldn’t have taken a sleeping pill.
I watched the show with a Canadian friend who’s lived in the States for decades. “They’re American dumb,” she said, describing a brain fog that affects otherwise smart people when they’re forced to think about life north of the border.
“They don’t understand Canada, because they don’t ever think about us.”
I noticed this when I lived in the U.S., and grew accustomed to people asking if “we ever have summer” and who the president of Canada was.
I am always stunned how little, if anything, Americans know about Canada, compared to other countries much further away. “Sterling Point”’s Canadian creator, Megan Park, uses the trope cleverly: We are wolves in beavers’ clothing. Call us cute if you must, but don’t be surprised when we bare our teeth in a snarl.
This latest round of trade lacrosse seems to be teaching Americans some valuable lessons. The world’s most powerful nation and its negotiators were shocked that we might want to protect French-language cultural rights and the ability to trade with other partners.
This may be the greatest psyop in the history of cultural relations. We convinced them that we are as sweet and harmless as Justin Bieber’s falsetto. That we are the Drake to their Kendrick Lamar. If they think about us (they do not), it’s only when they’re grateful that they can camouflage themselves in our national costume — fleece and a maple-leaf pin — to wander around Europe undisturbed.
It’s like a Greek myth, and we are wily Odysseus. I have a theory that our Trojan horse was the smash hit musical ”Come from Away,” about the hospitality shown to foreigners after the US was attacked on Sept. 11. We trundled the musical down to Broadway, and out poured colourful Newfoundland locals, all a-jig and bearing bottles of screech. No wonder Americans were lulled into a false sense of security.Too Funny! Howling laughter here!
We gave them Seth Rogan, and now they think our whole country takes a bong break at noon. “Due South” taught them that all Mounties were polite, handsome and chivalrous despite real-world evidence that points, let me put it gently, to the contrary. Ryan Gosling went on “Saturday Night Live” and called Canada “America’s hat” and the audience laughed so hard that nobody noticed he was the general leading the Canuck takeover of Hollywood.
The stealth operation is working. When Donald Trump proposes renaming Lake Ontario to Lake America, do you think he knows anything about 16-year-old Marilyn Bell swimming across its cold waters in the dark, fighting lampreys the whole way? Or that she subsisted on Pablum, which was developed at SickKids hospital?
I’m pretty sure most of the Americans who saw “Come from Away” did not realize that Newfoundland sent soldiers to fight alongside them in a series of wars. Or that Canadian forces distinguished themselves with their toughness in conflicts from First World War to Afghanistan. We could add that bit of history to an information pack and send it to a certain US Transportation Secretary, who believes we don’t have a military. Here’s a wild idea for the Transportation Secretary: Maybe get out more!
The niceness campaign was so successful that Americans were genuinely shocked to find steel under smiling exteriors. They couldn’t have imagined that travel to the U.S. would drop by a quarter, and that we would spend billions of dollars fewer visiting their country. They didn’t foresee that we would sift through grocery stores like Hercule Poirot, searching for oranges grown outside Florida. That we would, collectively, show the grim determination of a goalie facing a power play.
Maybe we primed them to believe we were good at taking jokes, by sending them Catherine O’Hara, Jim Carrey and John Candy. Here’s the thing about being good at humour: You can tell what’s funny and what’s not. The president saying he wants to annex Canada? Not funny. In the end, the joke’s not on us. They’ve learned that the hard way.
@LatuffCartoons:
US double standard, as usual.
@MintPressNews:
The US Definition Of Terrorism Is One Who Seeks To Prevent Genocide
Palestine Action are added to the US Terrorist list, the IDF are granted billions to commit a live streamed genocide.
I quit google years ago, from day one, I never missed it. I use Firefox, Duck Duck Go, Sasktel and Proton (their VPN is excellent, Firefox also gives VPN). I will teach myself soon to get off all American everything tech. I use Adblocker and Ghostery. Fabulous helpers. My route planning uses good old print maps/map books, flood and construction searches, and my own brain; I love maps. Best way to travel. Every time I’ve travelled with someone using GPS, they got terribly lost for hours. Not a nice way to travel. Besides, what when Musk fucks up satellites with his insane ego and greed? People ought to use their brains to plan routes and travel.
@hezzer19.bsky.social:
Duck Duck Go lets you turn off AI! I’m sold!I’ve been using Duck Duck Go for years, long before this Nazi AI invasion. I love that they allow users to turn off fucking AI. It’s fabulous. Nothing AI comes my way. I’ve always hated Safari.
@yellowdaffodils56.bsky.social:
Have used Duck Duck Go for several years. It’s just fine. And it’s great that they prevent tracking.
@nailyard.bsky.social:
I moved to the Duck years ago. Google is not to be trusted.
@balaquina.bsky.social:
I have degoogled my entire life as of about a year ago. No regrets. There are viable alternatives for everything. You don’t need any software from the whole of the US, much less Google. Get off it now. Not only are you giving money to fascists, but it is a literally national security risk as well.
@ktrina88.bsky.social:
Yes ! The Duck rules !
@jsw2jz.bsky.social:
Its been a yr since I started using duck duck go. Still amazed at how many trackers it blocks.
@passivestein.bsky.social:
Have used @firefox.com @duckduckgo.com for years. Also @zotero.org which is IMO the best reference manager around.Indeed! I use it too.
@muddermary.bsky.social:
There are settings in duckduckgo that turn off ai. Being able to opt out of ai is my favourite part.
@marxistunity.bsky.social:
I really like Brave. It has an automatic ad-blocker, it let’s you play YouTube videos ad free and you can close the screen while playing YouTube videos so listening to music on YouTube is much better.
@wgyow.bsky.social:
Yup. Happily using Brave!!
@bellriots30.bsky.social:
I switched to Protonmail- Switzerland. And, Qwant (France) or Vivaldi (Norway) for search engine.
@rainartchik.bsky.social:
I’ve been using the no AI version of DuckDuckGo search engine and Vivaldi browser for months now. Google sucks!
@canucktunes.bsky.social:
I had uninstalled this clunky browser years back.
@abunchofmalarkey.bsky.social:
Fuck the oligarchs!
Google & Brin
Meta & ZuckerbergNo one ought to be still on Facebook, FFS, but many are addicted.
Amazon & Bezos
Disney & D’Amato
Palantir & Theil
Twitter & Musk
@toolew.bsky.social:
Bu-bye google. You really screwed the pooch this time
@sheridanshores.bsky.social:
Try Ecosia, I think it’s better.
@pelicandocker.bsky.social:
yep… and the EU went to Qwant back in June.
@rachelbulatovich.ca:
If you’re in Canada, I just signed up with Typewire who is one of the few companies to have all their servers in Canada
@achickinthewoods.bsky.social:
Another one is Northmail, and they also have Northcloud to replace Google Drive.
Ha ha ha ha, best news ever (until Trump keels over). Musk so deserves this slap.
@strangenewwords.bsky.social:
NO ONE should use American tech products, including Americans.
@aphclarkson.bsky.social:
It’s fascinating to watch so many centrist and conservative American commentators still struggle to come to terms with how their President is clearly insane
@chappatte.bsky.social:
Canada’s response – © Chappatte in @nzz.ch am Sonntag, Zürich – chappatte.com
Canadian sovereignty is an American trade irritant by The National Interest, Aug 28, 2026
U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer sat down with CBC’s Rosemary Barton on Wednesday for a long conversation about the state of Canada-U.S. trade. It’s worth a listen.
When Barton raised the discoverability of Canadian content on streaming platforms and French-language requirements, Greer downplayed the cultural side and pointed to the money instead: the Americans, he said, are focused on the tax element. “We understand why you’d want to have discoverability for francophone material.”
It’s a generous framing — and a much softer one than what his own office put in writing five months ago.
On March 31, 2026, the Office of the United States Trade Representative submitted the 2026 National Trade Estimate to President Trump and Congress.
It’s 534 pages of “Foreign Trade Barriers.” Basically, stuff the U.S. does not like. And there’s an entire Canada section (it starts on page 60).
The usual suspects, like supply management and alcohol, are there loud and clear.
The Americans also flagged that they don’t dig our “zero plastic waste agenda.” Deal with it.
They also raised opposition to the Buy Canadian Policy that was published in December, outlining concerns regarding new obligations when competing for contracts. (Ahem. They have two.)
But then things get gnarly, because the United States increasingly treats other countries’ attempts to exercise jurisdiction over the digital economy as an impediment to U.S. commerce. And because American firms dominate so much of the digital stack, ordinary Canadian policymaking — like taxing platforms, regulating streaming, supporting domestic culture, and protecting government data — gets creatively reframed as ‘discrimination’ against American companies.
We note that they ALSO flagged that Shared Services Canada published a Request for Information for government purchase of cloud services, which would require that all data be processed, transmitted, and stored exclusively in Canada. The sovereign cloud proposal would require that all data be “under the control of cloud service providers, up to and including their ultimate parent corporations, that are not subject to foreign laws that permit foreign governments to obtain access to Canada’s data without Canada’s prior written consent.”
Other longstanding Canadian policy frameworks are recast as “services barriers.” Here, the Online Streaming Act, the discoverability of French-language cultural content, digital services taxation and the Online News Act are all flagged.
These initiatives represent our ability to govern our digital economy according to our values.
None of this was a secret!
The sovereign-cloud example is particularly jarring. Canada isn’t proposing to ban U.S. cloud companies; it’s just working to keep government data beyond the unilateral reach of U.S. laws.
And granted, some Canadian measures genuinely are preferences for Canadian suppliers and can be fairly debated as protectionism. But some of their other beefs are more about who gets to set the rules inside Canada.USA in my view is like the abusive husband who beats his wife every day, and says it’s all always and only her fault.
The same logic is now creeping into labour policy. Keith Sonderling, currently Acting U.S. Secretary of Labor (no U) and Trump’s nominee for the permanent job, has argued that international rules governing platform work threaten American gig-economy companies. Questions such as worker classification, algorithmic management and pay transparency are normally understood as labour (with a U) regulation. But when the largest digital platforms are American, another country regulating them can quickly become an American “trade concern.”
That is the asymmetry of digital dependence: the more indispensable another country’s firms become to your economy, the harder it becomes to regulate them without creating an international economic “dispute” (or war).
And of course, this is bigger than just Canada. In July, the USTR attacked the EU’s enforcement against Google as targeting “the most competitive U.S. companies.” In my experience, view, Google is a piece of shit company And this summer it actually imposed tariffs on Brazil after finding, among other things, that Brazilian digital-trade and electronic-payment policies “burdened” U.S. commerce. So the U.S. is also retaliating against any countries that attempt to introduce regulations that enforce sovereignty when it comes to the digital realm.That’s why the Nazi fuckers are forcing AI, which most do not want, on us with traitors Smith and Carney eagerly assisting the fucking take over of Canada by the tech billionaire Nazis.
This is more than a quirky little bilateral dispute, Canada is part of a broader U.S. posture towards foreign digital regulation.The USA is a rape and pedophile country, it wants fucking women and kid abusing AI to do as it pleases, kill as it pleases, mass murder as it please and torture as it pleases. And stupid Canada welcomed in the greatest monster of them all, Palantir. It must be kicked out, and all American AI, including fucking Meta’s in Alberta need to be kicked out too.
It’s amazing that the Americans foreshadow these complaints every year. It’s almost like the definition of trade is changing from whether American goods can enter our market to how freely American tech firms can operate once they are already inside it.
Very little of this is new. More than ten years ago, Washington was already calling Canada’s decision to locate government email data in Canada a trade barrier, and 2017 was the first year that the National Trade Estimates created a “Digital Trade Barriers” section.
So let’s not act surprised.I am not at all surprised, USA is a Nazi bully. It always has been. In my view, it’s the most hideous country in the world, the most mass murdering country in the world, and with Trump as leader, the most thieving and most disgusting.
This is why it’s essential for us to ensure we have the ability to regulate foreign activities in the digital space in Canada. We demand this governance role in other industries, but we are content to let it slide when it comes to arguably the most important industry for the future. We’ve been offered continued economic integration on the condition that we exercise less jurisdiction over the economy happening inside our borders.
Sovereignty is the right to make rules that reflect the values of our country. While another country (or more likely the powerful companies in that country) may not like them, this is the fundamental basis of sovereignty. Canada is controlling its own destiny.
Part of the problem may be that we still don’t intuitively appreciate the scale of the digital economy in the same way we understand traditional sectors like cars, steel or aluminum.
Yet we talk endlessly about sovereignty in autos, steel, aluminum, energy and agriculture while treating digital dependence as something almost weightless, or invisible.
It isn’t. It’s annoying the Americans that we want to hold their firms accountable and build our own sovereign cloud. We should pay just as much attention to the new economy in this trade war as we do to cars.
Towards the end of the CBC interview, Barton raised an issue that Prime Minister Carney brought up:
“….that is that Canada says the United States wanted a say in new trade deals that it would be pursuing — particularly that you wanted to review and, even in certain instances, dictate terms for future deals, which the Prime Minister viewed as sort of [an] attack on Canada’s sovereignty.”
Greer protested that the Americans didn’t have language about what Canada “shall” do, but that they think we should do more to protect the North American market. Our market is not an extension of theirs.
Canada has every right to make the rules for how markets operate in Canada — including digital markets.
That’s sovereignty.
***
@chappatte.bsky.social:
#Canada stands its ground – © Chappatte in The @bostonglobe.com via @globeopinion.bsky.social
@ivanivanovichrenko.bsky.social:
Anyone who believes Canadians won’t fight has never watched an NHL game.
They will drop gloves and throw hands.
They absolutely will NOT roll over for that malevolent marigold MF.
@papayafools.bsky.social:
Based on the time I spent in Canada, I know
-they are decent and courteous people for the most part
-proud of their heritage but also try to improve moving forward
-absolutely will fight like a cornered wolverine if forced to
The fact that we have got them fighting shows how disgraceful we are.
But, beware our fingers: