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Current state of American - Canadian relations (lemmy.world)
submitted 4 months ago by to c/2northamerican4you@sh.itjust.works
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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/40691532

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[–] 49 points 4 months ago (6 children)

The morons in charge get voted in by Americans. From a Canadian's perspective, we don't believe the admin is pretending to have a problem with us anymore.

Claim to love us or not, a sufficiently large portion of the US population chose this. We judge America by its actions and right now, we're all pretty collectively pissed at your government, and the population for allowing it to get here.

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  • [–] 5 points 4 months ago (4 children)

    A majority of Americans (who voted) voted trump in, that's true. But the other branches of government which could check the president are undemocratic:

    Each state gets two two senators, meaning places like Wyoming and North Dakota each get two senators while they have fewer people than individual cities in other states (500k people in Wyoming vs 8.58 million in NYC, 800k in North Dakota vs 1.5 million in Philadelphia)

    Congress seats are gerrymandered so that the number of seats awarded is not proportional to the amount of votes to each party.

    The supreme court is appointed for life (bad enough to start) and then has one stolen seat (should have been appointed by Obama) and another semi-stolen seat which wouldn't have been appointed if we didn't have the electoral college (Trump first term).

    The supreme court has ruled that corporations can spend money promoting politicians just like a person can.

    One might argue these are the rules, but we didn't put these rules in place, and the people in power have worked together to prevent reform. Blaming all Americans for the current administration's stance on Canada is counterproductive.

    All that said, Canadians have a right to be freaked out, to be mad, to be concerned. I'm mostly saying it's a stretch to call the U.S. democratic.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago (2 children)

    Excuses excuses excuses. You have the tools for the solution now get on with it.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago

    Very aware of how the electoral and political system work there. It's broken here too, just differently. We all still manage to get by without threatening to annex our allies.

    While I appreciate the explanations, I'm not sure it's counterproductive to be angry right now. You all need to know that we're actually legitimately upset with America. Being our usual polite selves isn't appropriate for the kind of behaviour that's been directed this way, we feel pretty betrayed and hurt by our closest friend and ally.

    Consider it a signal for change. Maybe enough Americans are left that care enough about what your neighbours(and increasingly the world) think of them to make a difference, maybe not. But no free friend passes until this stops.

    Anyways, no one was calling the US democratic. It's more like... competitive authoritarianism at this point.

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