What isn’t mentioned is that there’s a kind of tit for tat norm in politics. If you damage the soft negotiation power that comes from co-operation retaliation is normal. Forcing a group to do something completely against their interests because you took advantage of the size of your resources (hard power) isn’t actually difficult… It’s just that you destroy goodwill and open the door to future “screw you” style retaliation.
“Stomping our head of State” isn’t exactly difficult when there as many Canadians in the world as there are Californians. He basically tanked steel trade because it would cause outsized harm to a smaller country the costs of which which ended up being borne by the US industries to force milk onto a market where it generally isn’t wanted. American milk contains artificial growth hormone which domestic milk doesn’t and threatening to tank our domestic food security because Canadian milk isn’t Government subsidized like American milk is means that we can’t compete on price is a dick move.
Since then that coercive deal has been taken apart by the courts and that Milk deal has all but been rescinded as of November last year. The Biden admin did their best to make it stick but Trumps abysmal understanding of the law extends to international trade law and the flaws were there from the beginning.
Trump damaged a lot of America’s good diplomatic standing for temporary victories and there was a lot of America’s long standing dirty laundry that other nations were already overlooking due to soft goodwill policy. The only advantage Trump had was that people were banking on him being a temporary nuisance. If he returns to power he does invite a lot of opportunities for international retaliation. Canada is a notorious soft diplomacy country. A future Trump lead US might not like what closed door handshakes may be in it’s future.
What isn’t mentioned is that there’s a kind of tit for tat norm in politics. If you damage the soft negotiation power that comes from co-operation retaliation is normal. Forcing a group to do something completely against their interests because you took advantage of the size of your resources (hard power) isn’t actually difficult… It’s just that you destroy goodwill and open the door to future “screw you” style retaliation.
“Stomping our head of State” isn’t exactly difficult when there as many Canadians in the world as there are Californians. He basically tanked steel trade because it would cause outsized harm to a smaller country the costs of which which ended up being borne by the US industries to force milk onto a market where it generally isn’t wanted. American milk contains artificial growth hormone which domestic milk doesn’t and threatening to tank our domestic food security because Canadian milk isn’t Government subsidized like American milk is means that we can’t compete on price is a dick move.
Since then that coercive deal has been taken apart by the courts and that Milk deal has all but been rescinded as of November last year. The Biden admin did their best to make it stick but Trumps abysmal understanding of the law extends to international trade law and the flaws were there from the beginning.
Trump damaged a lot of America’s good diplomatic standing for temporary victories and there was a lot of America’s long standing dirty laundry that other nations were already overlooking due to soft goodwill policy. The only advantage Trump had was that people were banking on him being a temporary nuisance. If he returns to power he does invite a lot of opportunities for international retaliation. Canada is a notorious soft diplomacy country. A future Trump lead US might not like what closed door handshakes may be in it’s future.