“In Canada, he doesn’t sound like a troll. He sounds like a threat.” Adam Gopnik writes about how the 2025 Canadian federal election was won and lost on Trumpism and its perils.
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It was significantly closer than even those numbers show.
Only 0.15% (zero point one five percent, less than 1/5th of one percent) of the votes cast is how much Trump won by. Less than one fifth of one percent was his margin of victory.
🇨🇦 From paying way too much attention to US news I do think it wasn't only his supporters who thought he was trolling.
Example: Tariffs -- where there was a fairly widespread belief he wasn't serious & it was merely a negotiating tactic. Maybe during Trump 1.0, but not in unleashed Trump 2.0.
Sure. But is the idea here then that if only Jimmy Kimmel and John Oliver had not made jokes about him, we wouldn’t have the tariffs?
I mean - what are you guys expecting from those of us in the US who are just as upset and worried as you guys? Even 42% of the Canadian vote went conservative still…
You’re not listening.
Everyone laughed, joked and dismissed/ignored his threats from comedians to pundits to commentators and beyond. Shameful. We get that voters did not vote for this, but they don’t have the cards.
Resisting to and preventing the corruption and rotting of nazi love, fascism and anti-laicism to turn into a medieval engisitionist terror dictatorship in the end like medieval Spanish Kingdom is a duty for every human being!
It is insane how you White people will tar and feather a Black man and hang him from a tree, bomb a nation for human rights, destroy sovereign nations for terrorism. But idly sit by as another white man dismantle your government and you do nothing. Please help the world make sense of your hypocrisy
Because too many older Americans have been brainwashed by Fox News. And too many younger ones either know nothing of news or get their information from the manosphere.
Not all Americans like Trump and do see him as a threat to our democracy. Approximately 3 years and 10 months until he is out. That is if our country is still here 😢😢
Another Liberal
landslide election
in Australia,
like in Canada,
Trump is the finest gift
to the world's liberals
in a lifetime.
A political honey-pot,
a global boogey-man
who just keeps giving.
People have to stop treating him like he's funny. There's nothing funny about him for us who are outside the U.S. He's just a mean ignorant bully who happens to have a nuclear arsenal.
Accurate analysis of the Canadian reality.
It is important for all Americans to remember that when anyone threatens our sovereignty we scrappy Canucks respond with our ELBOWS UP.
He is a threat. He’s a sweaty, shabby-looking semiliterate mobster who doesn’t care about right and wrong. He’s a threat to you guys down there too. He’s not trolling, he’s making threats. He’s made his whole living threatening people. It’s not negotiating, it’s not deals, it’s just fucking threats.
We, the American people, hear the threat; however, the ignorant population. Who knows nothing about the economy, they feel threatened by the hard-working Latinos, by the wealth of the Blacks and the smarts of the Oriental population. They hate their own women. Elon and starlink stole the votes.
Finally, a US publication that doesn’t talk about tariffs being the reason behind our fury, and admits the shameful behaviour that the administration is promoting upon US foreign policy.
Are there Americans still treating the orange clown like a troll? He's a flipping nuclear explosive device waiting for a meltdown! The aftermath is going to be pretty dang ugly.
Donald Trump said he wasn't cutting Medicare or Medicaid! Well he just cut my medicare. They're now taking 182 out a month to pay what Medicaid was paying before! That's both cutting Medicare and Medicaid! I didn't vote for this!!! So they're taking from me to pay for tax cuts for the rich!!!🤬
I do wonder if trolling right back would serve Canada better.
"If we were even to consider this, we'd insist on the whole union having proper gun control, universal publicly-funded healthcare, English, French and Spanish as official languages..."
That’s the first thought I had except not as a troll…Trump’s family owes Carney, and Trump respects Carney, who might be able to help do a Fortress America type thing.
This is an excellent article; you did a great job at capturing the nuances that make up this very complex situation. Thank you for taking real journalism seriously.
All we can hope for is growing strength and cooperation within the liberal democracy coalition (EU/UK/Canada/Japan/South Korea/Australia/NZ/etc.), and a future where the USA petitions to rejoin it after learning a hard lesson in the perils of bullying and isolationism.
Australia votes tomorrow. Our conservative opposition party chose to align themselves with the mango moron. It went down like a cup full of vomit with Aussie voters. Looks like a landslide win for our leftish progressive government. Thanks Trumpty dumpty!!
Comments
Canada realized that he's serious. He may float an idea as a joke to test the response, but he's always serious.
Trump didn’t even win a majority of vote.
Trump did receive more votes than _other candidates_ but he did not win a majority:
In 2024 Trump received 77,303,568 votes.
49.7% of the votes cast for president.
31.59% of the voter eligible population.
22.73% of the US population.
cont ->
Only 0.15% (zero point one five percent, less than 1/5th of one percent) of the votes cast is how much Trump won by. Less than one fifth of one percent was his margin of victory.
Example: Tariffs -- where there was a fairly widespread belief he wasn't serious & it was merely a negotiating tactic. Maybe during Trump 1.0, but not in unleashed Trump 2.0.
I mean - what are you guys expecting from those of us in the US who are just as upset and worried as you guys? Even 42% of the Canadian vote went conservative still…
Your status quo is abusive and violent. It's your American norms that are the issue, which Trump is a symptom of.
I have spent time in 9 provinces, and I love CA, well - except maybe SK.
Saying “Everyone” in the USA didn’t take this serious is just as bad as Americans attacking _all_ CAians in some way.
Everyone laughed, joked and dismissed/ignored his threats from comedians to pundits to commentators and beyond. Shameful. We get that voters did not vote for this, but they don’t have the cards.
I contend that “Everyone” was not “laughing”. Most of us were actually crying.
Comedy & Tragedy.
The GOP & rich pukes enabling them bring multitasking to a whole new level
Trump did not win
He got himself elected
Big difference
(Huge)
MAGAmerica is seen as a dangerous and inhospitable country by Canadians & Europeans.
We are going to have to take some lumps, and I hope we earn their friendship back in my children's lifetime.
From a Canadian. 🇨🇦
landslide election
in Australia,
like in Canada,
Trump is the finest gift
to the world's liberals
in a lifetime.
A political honey-pot,
a global boogey-man
who just keeps giving.
It is important for all Americans to remember that when anyone threatens our sovereignty we scrappy Canucks respond with our ELBOWS UP.
https://bsky.app/profile/volts.wtf/post/3lo57j2plis2j
Thank you
I wouldn’t be surprised if Honey Boo-boo was given an ambassador role.
Tell your fellow citizens to find a basic standard of human decency, okay?
Now we've seen what a disaster trump is, we wanna go the other way
Elbows up.
"If we were even to consider this, we'd insist on the whole union having proper gun control, universal publicly-funded healthcare, English, French and Spanish as official languages..."
Anyway: Carney may have done Jared Kushner a huge favour; note how Trump doesn’t shit-talk him. https://www.junonews.com/p/carneys-ex-company-brookfield-has
Carney also surely considers the prospect of a “Fortress North America”.
https://www.policymagazine.ca/elbows-up-carneys-first-face-off-with-trump/