Canada Should Not Be the 51st State
Alberta Should Be
Begun, the Tariff War has
What the Wall Street Journal has described as “The Dumbest Trade War in History” is now officially underway, for reasons that nobody can quite seem to figure out.
On the one hand, Trump has rattled off a grab-bag of casus bellis, ranging from fentanyl to migrants to deficits to defense spending, but on the other hand has said he is “not looking for concessions”, which would seem to call into question how much he actually cares about anything on his list of ostensible grievances. Trump’s primary offer to Canada at the moment still revolves around Canada becoming the 51st state.
It did not take long for his claims to get slapped with a Community Note:
The incipient trade war has thoroughly scrambled Canada’s domestic politics; Justin Trudeau has pivoted from calling Canada a “post-national state” with “no core identity” into now pursuing a lame duck attempt to rally around the flag, while Canadian conservatives who are otherwise sympathetic towards Trump’s populism now have to forcefully condemn him to preempt any Liberal attempts to turn tariff backlash into a wedge issue in the coming election.
The Canadian politician who is probably in the most awkward position is Alberta premier Danielle Smith, who after weeks of lobbying was left with a somewhat bitter consolation prize of ‘only’ 10% tariffs on the Albertan Oil & Gas sector (which coincidentally is the same rate Trump imposed on his chief economic and geopolitical rivals in CHY-na). On the one hand, a tariff rate of less than half the rest of the country is a meaningful difference, but on the other hand the lack of a full exemption is still a profoundly hostile action against the group of Canadians who would otherwise be most open to becoming Americans.
Who Really Subsidizes Canada
Talk of “subsidies” is a particularly sore spot for Albertans for two reasons.
First, most of what Trump refers to as “subsidies” to Canada is really American energy companies buying large volumes of Albertan heavy oil. Apart from that particular form of oil being what American companies have already optimized their refineries to process, Americans also benefit from it being traded at a steep discount because Trudeau’s Liberal government has cockblocked nearly every attempt to build a pipeline to someplace other than those American refineries. The same basic story applies as to Albertan natural gas as well.
Americans being more or less the only available customers for otherwise landlocked oil & gas means they can pretty much demand whatever discounts they want. Naturally, profit-seeking companies prefer to buy from those suppliers they can more easily pressure for bigger discounts. Now on top of the aforementioned cockblocking of pipelines by those Eastern Bastards/Laurentian Elites, which has forced Alberta to sell almost exclusively to those discount-demanding Americans, the President of the country benefiting from those discounts then turns around and twists the knife even further by imposing 10% tariffs on the oil Alberta has been cockblocked from selling to anybody else.
The second reason subsidies are a touchy subject is because Western Canadian provinces (especially but not exclusively Alberta), are already forced to subsidize those Laurentian Elites cockblocking Western Canada’s economy, thanks to Canada’s system of interprovincial “equalization transfers”. Every Western premier (even the socialist running BC) is giving voice to the regional outrage over this West➜East subsidy system:
Eastern Canada isn’t really being subsidized by the United States, but it is being subsidized by Western Canada. If Trump did manage to negotiate, say, an Alberta and/or Saskatchewan defection from Confederation in favour of the Union, the rest of Canada would likely have to follow sooner or later, because as
has noted, the rest of Canada is as broke as the poorest US states even after being bailed out by equalization transfers.Without those equalization subsidies from those Prairie economies (which even with all the cockblocking are still the economic engine propping up the rest of Canada), Trump is not wrong that the rest of Canada really would “ceace to exist as a viable country. Harsh but true!”
As I’ve written previously,
Alberta’s net contributions to the equalization system between 1968 and 2018 was roughly $630 billion, while electoral riding counts in Western provinces are routinely lowballed so Quebec’s riding count can be inflated, which makes it tougher for Albertans to fight Laurentian impositions like a production cap on the oilsands. It’s currently far too easy for Laurentian Elites to throw around prairie-province tax revenues at every wild virtue-signal and/or vote-buying scheme they can think of, while also attacking any economic foundation and utility grid that smells remotely of hydrocarbons. As Peter Zeihan put it: “if you think hamstringing a region’s economic growth while depending on its tax payments is a less-than-tenable long-term strategy, you’re not alone.” The equalization system is now so lopsided that economically speaking, Alberta and Saskatchewan would be better off separating from Canada than continuing a futile attempt to bankroll the rest of Confederation while also being pressganged into decarbonization-at-all-costs.
The ultimate reason disgruntled Westerners haven’t already separated from Canada over this “cockblock and loot whatever’s left” political system boils down to hesitation over the risks of going it alone as one or more separate countries. There certainly isn’t any kind of legal barrier to secession; Quebec has already successfully demanded a poison pill be inserted into the Canadian Constitution, allowing any province to separate via a simple referendum.
Trump’s election may yet breathe new life into the Wexit movement, as he seemingly introduces a third option between remaining perenially-exploited Canadians vs. trying to cobble together a new country from scratch; much depends however on how quickly Trump burns his bridges across the Prairies.
Alberta Up For Grabs?
If Donald Trump really wants a “51st State”, it would be trivially easy for him to pitch MAGA expansionism north of the 49th Parallel as an act of liberation rather than conquest.
As
recently put it:sees a similar risk of Alberta being poached by a savvy populist (or more accurately, driven towards an American reprieve by hostile Laurentian Elites):Trump might well say…“I could offer Albertans the American dollar; full access to our markets for their resources, at full international price; lower costs on almost all manufactured goods and on food; lower taxes, both corporate and personal; membership in a country that prides itself on being a country, and that does not plan to dissolve itself into an unstable multicultural mishmash; genuine admiration for your economic and industrial endeavours, along with a can-do, visionary and deeply entrepreneurial culture; immediate, reliable and guaranteed access to ports and pipelines, and full military defence. And, if that’s not enough…no transfer payments!”
If the federal government isn’t careful, it could inflame the “Wexit” movement, which, for the first time, would be feasible, because it could find a willing partner in Washington. Trump thinks it would be great if Canada became America’s 51st state. But what parts would he want? Downtown Toronto, with its core of NDP and Liberal voters? The province of Quebec, which speaks a different language?
Nope. The prize would be Alberta, with its oil and conservative mindset. And its border with the Northwest Territories. If Trump got Alberta, his next stop would be striking a deal with the N.W.T., then on to neighbouring Yukon, to increase the U.S.’s access to the Arctic and its undersea oil reserves.
And how would Albertans feel about joining the U.S.? In a December poll, 30 per cent said the province would benefit, the highest percentage in the country.
Alberta also doesn’t get enough credit for being the only part of Canada with any credibility when it comes to border security; any province that knows how to stop rats from crossing a border can certainly handle fentanyl and human smugglers.
Solving the Health Care Stumbling Block
One of the greatest longstanding boogeymen in Canadian politics is “American-Style Health Care”. While the American and Canadian health care systems both have their problems, a synthesis of the two would likely work better than either system in isolation.
Both systems primarily place the states/provinces in charge, with federal funding in exchange for compliance with an overall national approach. In the US, the federal government provides a range of funds to states for implementing health-care programs; in the case of any Canadian provinces becoming American states, those existing funding streams could simply be reallocated on a dollar-for-dollar approach from disparate systems like Medicaid towards something more closely resembling a public option. Canadian provinces are already accustomed to picking up the tab for public health care, which is only partially funded by federal support (and said federal support is a fraction of what Western provinces are forced to pay into the equalization scheme).
A public option in lieu of Medicaid et al would defuse the single biggest objection to becoming Americans; the loss of public health care. It would also be consistent with the “laboratories of democracy” approach inherent in the American federalist system, and would entice public-option-curious blue states to support expanding the American Experiment north of the 49th.
Which Way, Western Man?
One area I disagree with Kheiriddin is I think if Alberta ever took the plunge and separated from Canada, the logical next step would be Saskatchewan, with their similarly conservative politics and their strategic importance in global food production. Additionally, if Trump brought Alberta and Saskatchewan into the Union as separate states, he would get 2 more red states (and 4 more Republican Senators), rather than the likely blue state that Canada would present as a single voting bloc.
However, “Trump the Liberator” only works as a viable sales pitch if he seduces Albertans (and Saskatchewanians) with the many, many carrots at his disposal, rather than trying to beat his otherwise most sympathetic northern audience with the stick of “economic force”. Economic benefits of American statehood aside, Trump’s antagonistic approach is forcing his would-be allies on the right wing of Canadian politics to distance themselves from him as fast as possible, lest they be accused of lacking patriotism by the ever-present Canadian leftists desperately seeking a winning campaign issue.
Any Americans who want to see Trump’s expansionist ambitions succeed should pressure him to at least provide exemptions on Alberta & Saskatchewan’s key regional industries, from wheat to potash to oil & gas. The path to expanding America’s borders northward lies in seduction of Prairie populists, not via brute force, which risks Canadians of all stripes feeling not exactly “cherished” so much as like the next Ukrainians. Canadian small businesses are already bracing for the worst, as
reports.Subscribers may have noticed my publishing schedule somewhat fell off the face of the earth this past year; the simple reason being I started a new job that is considerably more demanding than my last one (in a good way for the most part). I’ve made no secret of my populist sympathies…
But I can’t bring myself to support what Trump is doing here. I would personally love to see Western Canada switch teams and become part of the US, from Coutts to the Alaska border, so if Orange Man is losing me on this issue, then I would take that as a sign that he really needs to dial back the vinegar and try some more honey on this one.
Even if this is all an elaborate ruse, it’s playing out at the worst possible time for a nation looking to move on from the Dark Ages of Justin Trudeau. As
has pointed out, “There’s a resounding multi-partisan consensus that Trump’s grievances with Canada are concocted and contrived. That’s almost where Canadian unity ends.”
Outstanding piece, Mcstylez! Am sharing this with the growing Freditorial phalanx. Canada is like a marriage in which one party has been enduring beatings for far too long. If we end up with Carney, as looks likely, beatings will continue and Alberta morale will not improve.
I hope somebody in the white house reads this