Let’s Stop Donald Trump’s Ego and Power Trip All Together - Right Now!

This is an opinion piece written by external contributors. All views expressed are the authors' own.

I’m addressing this call for solidarity to all Québécois and Canadians, the peoples of the United Kingdom (Canada still being a British colony in a some subtil way; personally, I don’t think a country can exist and really be sovereign when its Chief of State is a foreign king).

Peoples whose country is a member of NATO, Latin Americans, Caribbeans and Arabic peoples from many countries who were insulted in many ways by the past by Donald Trump, people who support Ukraine against Russia’s invasion, the peoples of Greenland, Denmark and Panama whom Trump also disrespected and/or threatened publicly.

People all over the world who are fed-up with his threats and arrogance, childish nicknames and bullying, misogyny and other forms of despise towards others.

Soon to be president of the USA for a second time, Trump seems to be seriously - and publicly - considering the annexation of Canada, a sovereign and allied country.

As it is often the case when it comes to this man/politician’s public declarations, this idea seems close to delirium to most people around the world.

One day, he says he wants to annex Canada, the next day he says he doesn’t need it, while firefighting planes from Québec, Ontario and Alberta are sent to help fight massive and predictable (there will be more and more there and all over the planet) fires in California.

Sounds like a childish kid trying to manipulate his parents to obtain what he wants, whatever may be the cost and sacrifices for others. I thought about sending this SOS during his first presidency, but I decided not to.

I didn’t want to harm my neighboring country’s economy during the COVID pandemic. I can feel empathy for people I don’t know and who aren’t my compatriots. I know Canada’s economy and USA’s economy are linked, that we need each other for many excellent reasons.

Financial, industrial and commercial alliances help millions of people earn a salary, pay their bills, feed their kids, here and there. In the 19th Century, our ancestors even built canals, railroads, highways and bridges to be able to do so.

Since Trump has been boasting around with the idea of putting economic pressure on Canadians to force them into annexation, and since his soon to be co-leader of the Department of Government Efficiency, Elon Musk, began insulting the elected Prime Minister from an allied country - mine - calling a man a woman as an insult (by the way, who is he to decide of someone else’s gender?), I decided I had to reach out to all of you.

Let’s not panic. Consider this… There are First Nations, Inuits and Métis in Canada.

Their ancestral and fundamental rights have been recognized in the past by the British Crown, Canada’s (new) 1982 Constitution, provincial and federal courts, and international laws.

Considering USA’s policies towards Native Peoples throughout history, I can guess they would all be quite hard to convince into accepting annexation! Trump believes Canadians would be happy to become a 51st State.

Who in Canada (or anywhere else!) would really want to live in a country where mass shootings occur so often and have become a daily problem and concern? As a teacher, I would never work in a high school where people carry guns.

I wouldn’t either want to work for a Department of Education whose top head was the former president of a Wrestling association… «You believe in public education and science? Headlock! Still believe in public education and science? Sleeper hold!»

Enough of my personal opinions. Here are some other facts. If Canadians where to consider joining the USA as the 51st State, all 10 provinces would have to vote unanimously for it according to their Constitution.

And the Governor General of Canada, Charles the 2nd, King of the United Kingdom, would have to approve it. Such a conclusion seems very unlikely. There are two official languages in Canada, French and English. How many in the USA?

Would millions of French speaking Québécois, Acadians, Franco-Ontarians and Franco-Manitobans abandon their mother tongue and accept being served and supposedly protected by laws in a foreign language they don’t understand or speak?

Hence, the Province of Québec has its own Constitution and French is its official language.

Another major rebatement: «There were 109 public mass shootings in the United States (of America) and 35 public mass shootings in 35 other economically and politically comparative countries between 2000 and 2022.»

Not really appealing! In Canada, racism isn’t a global concern for immigrants and for peoples with African origins as it has always been the case in the USA. Yet I must admit Native Peoples still suffer from racism on a daily basis in Canada likewise in the USA and elsewhere.

Trump still has a lot to learn about world politics… and geography. America is a continent divided into two halves, not a single country. There is North America and South America. There are North Americans and South Americans.

I used to work in a restaurant in Vieux-Québec while completing my university studies. My colleagues came from Québec, but also from Latin America and Europe. We all thought it was funny when tourists from the USA answered «America» to our question «Where are you from?»

A colleague with Colombian origins would often ask in return: «Yes, but from what country exactly?»

Blame it on propaganda, the dream of a Manifest Destiny, political imperialism, low standards in the teaching of geography and ignorance, the difficulty of creating a noun with «united» or «states», facts are facts.

It was similar to Residente’s reply to Childish Gambino’s "This is America". This is not America! Peoples living in all Canadian provinces might not have the same history and identity, but at least we share a common sense of identity.

Like it or not, we are Canadians, and our society isn’t as polarized as that of the USA.

The people of the United States of America (Native Peoples excluded because each one has had its own name for centuries or millenniums) still hasn’t come up with a common name to identify itself since the American Revolution!

When we think about it, there aren’t many cases of peoples in the world who don’t have specific names to identify to. How «united» are they really?

French-speakers from Europe and Canada created a few decades ago the name «États-uniens» to name the people of the USA (États-Unis d’Amerique) and distinguish them from all the other peoples living in the Americas.

It would be a great legacy if President Trump were to create a new name for his own nation and build a common sense of belonging for his own people and within the frontiers of his own country.

Trump is also threatening to raise tariffs on Canadian exports to add pressure and force Canada into annexation. We can let our politicians do their job (special thanks to PM Doug Ford and former PM Jean Chrétien for standing up in the name of all Canadians).

This is what we, as civilians from Canada and all over the world, can do to stop his bullying and answer his threats. First, let’s boycott the USA as a travel destination for the duration of Trump’s second presidency. There are so many beautiful and more peaceful countries to visit.

We, Canadians, spend billions in their country each year.

Here are a powerful argument or way to reply and more facts. In 2023, Canadians spent some 26,5 billion CAN dollars in the USA as travel expenditures for hotels, restauration, leisure, etc., according to Statistics Canada’s National Travel Survey (all four quarters considered).

Multiply that times four and that could add up to more than 100 billion CAN dollars Canadians could spend elsewhere in the four upcoming years. Same goes for Mexicans and other Latin Americans, Europeans, Africans, Asians… Speaking of money;

The US dollar has been the world’s main reserve currency since World War II, but its prevalence has been declining since 2002 because of globalization and other reasons. If Trump were to declare a commercial war against Canada, it could harm USA’s economy in many ways.

Millions of people in Canada and billions of people all over the world keep US dollars at home or in a bank account for business or to spend on an upcoming trip.

We could all go to our Caisse Populaire or bank to sell back these US dollars as a way of sending a clear message to President Trump via the Federal Reserve Board of the United States of America:

We will not let you set the world economy on fire. We will not let you ruin the lives of millions - and billions - of people. I will not get into climate and environmental issues, another serious concern for humanity’s survival that he doesn’t take seriously.

Why not create a website where people could say how many US dollars they sold back and why? We can all sit here and there, reading our newspapers, listening to the radio, watching the news, scrolling feeds, worrying about what will come next.

In Canada, many already fear their salaries and jobs will be at stake once Trump’s second presidency starts. In Ukraine and in European countries, millions could die because of war if the USA stop supporting them.

There is only one matter on which I agree with him, it’s that Canada, as a NATO member, can do much better to contribute to our mutual security but also for international security.

My grandfather was a Hong Kong war veteran. He became a pacifist when he came back after being a POW for four years. In an interview, he said these words Trump should consider: «War? No one wins, there are no winners!»

Be it with guns or with threats aimed at allied countries. I don’t know if Donald Trump is a blues fan or not, but he should stop and think about these very profound and wise words Willie Dixon sang so beautifully:

«You can go to the Moon and come back home, but it don’t make sense, you can’t make peace.» (It don’t make sense/you can’t make peace). In these times of great political and environmental uncertainty and danger, we must all take action and stop this madness.

Let’s answer back: «Knowledge + Action = Power» (Shepard Fairey/Obey)