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You have to think that President Trump must have had a bad trip or unpleasant vacation in Canada, as I can't think of any other legitimate reason for why he keeps attacking the country.
This past week, he announced two major policy decisions/complaints relative to Canada:
– he announced a new 50% tariff on many of the goods Canada sells to the United States; and
– he blamed the Canadian government for the smoke-filled skies coming from forest and brush fires in that country.
It is always interesting to me that our President never seems to accept responsibility for much of anything ... unless it is good news. News that is not so good, like smoke in the air, he has to blame on someone else.
His decision to impose more tariffs on Canada may have stemmed from the Prime Minister of Canada quoting former President Reagan who was opposed to tariffs as being counter-productive and detrimental to the economy of the United States. and detrimental to the economy of the United States. Locally, the original imposition of tariffs on Canada was one of the contributing reasons given for the liquidation of the Canadian company that owned Bush Industries.
When these new tariffs go into effect, Americans can expect to pay more for many things, probably the most impacted being paper products and lumber. The price of plywood and other wood products used in construction will be going up as the additional cost of tariffs will be passed on to the American consumer.
The president's attack on Canada as to air quality caused by wildfires, I would characterize as just plain "weird." He obviously hasn’t looked at a map of Canada. Had he done so, he would have seen that about two-thirds of the country has no road access to it. There is no way to get heavy firefighting equipment there even if you wanted to.
Several years ago I, along with a couple of friends, had the opportunity to fly a single engine plane to Alaska. For three days (each way) we flew through northern Canada and often, for an hour or two, would never even see a road. The further north you go in Canada, the fewer roads there are. About 90% of the population of Canada lives within 300 miles of the U.S. border. At latitudes above that, you are in the bush ... nothing but trees, lakes, rivers and, finally, the barrenlands.
On that flight to and from Alaska, we also flew over (or around) about 20 forest fires that had been started by lightning ... most were in Canada but some were in Alaska. They burn until they hit a lake, river or the weather changes. If the President of the United States wants to stop forest fires in the north, he should appeal to God, our Creator, who gave us this earth – not take a political shot at the Canadians.
It is this kind of nonsensical behavior which is making Americans and the greater world sour on our President. He seems to think that by saying anything that is on his mind, whether true or false, that he should be listened to.
I love the United States, my home. I also love Canada ... a good ally and neighbor with whom we have always had good trade and diplomatic relations up until now.
We need to get back to working with other countries, instead of trashing them. This summer, we have been flying the Canadian flag as well as the American flag from the flagpole on our lawn. We need to remember the friendly relations that we have normally had with our good neighbor to the north.
Rolland Kidder is a Stow resident.