Earlier quoted context omitted.
Errrrr...... this has nothing to do with the struggle between USA and China. It is 100% about Trump.
This has been brewing since George W Bush. Obama made a valiant attempt at normalising relations with Europe but I don't think any future US president has any hope of reversing this now.
EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'
471–480 of 878 posts
Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'
#472Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, I'm curious about which ones are a problem. I could see there being some incompatibility, and the details are more interesting than sweeping statements. Some regulations would have to be normalized and agreed upon between the countries for trade open up. Can't have different quality standards and ways of evaluating and declaring them.
Welcome to Canada where the regulations are in fact provincial. Canadian provinces have a harder time trading with each other than countries in the EU, although thanks to the sales tax and package transit changes the EU is becoming competitive in this area.
Provincial trade barriers basically only exist in two areas: liquor and labor licensing.
Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'
#473Earlier quoted context omitted.
The EU is an ongoing experiment as well. Europe’s biggest problem, I think, is its lost mojo. There’s plenty of good ingredients, plenty of challenges too. It can still go either way. Hell, at this rate it might outperform simply because US and China blow up due to domestic problems. The thing about mojo is that it’s super hard to predict. It might stay where it is and Europe’s share of global GDP might decline to no…
> Europe’s biggest problem, I think, is its lost mojo. Europe's biggest problem is that every decision can be vetoed by one of the member states. Which in practice means that the EU has very little power.
It’s effectively the same as what I mean - or a part of it. You fix this with either better "alignment” (ugh!) ie conviction of going in a particular direction, leading to a consensus. Or in turn, a conviction that the veto is bad and needs to be curbed for the overall benefit of everyone.
Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'
#474No idea what this actually means, if it means easier trade, I'm all for anything that reduces our dependency on the yanks, as long as we don't need to be involved in their regulatory or legal regimes. The Americans are no longer our friends, Salut, mes amis Européens. :)
Carney was asking for freedom of movement of goods, people and services, but without full monetary and legislative integration. So, easier to sell stuff, easier to buy stuff, free to just travel to/from Canada/EU and work there with no extra paperwork, free to buy and sell service from Canada to EU and vice versa. No Euro, no vote in EU, no ECJ, no payments into each others budget. Tighter integration than UK, not as…
When several EU countries are already struggling with large Indian Subcontinent communities that don't integrate (and dodge taxes and food-processing regs--Indians where I am have their own large underground cash-only food economy among themselves), opening up flow of people from Canada's mobile classes which has seen vast demographic change seems like it would only exacerbate the problem.
Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'
#475I have no idea how we do it, but I think we should somehow ban the expansion of all the existing unions (EU, CIS, NATO, whatever else we got). The overall worldwide tension is pretty high, but now - US goes after South America and Greenland - EU goes after Canada and Georgia (country), which is just ridiculous in terms of geography - Russia invades Ukraine and goes after Eastern Europe and Middle-East to some extent…
The US invaded South America and is treatening to invade Greenland, just like Russia is invading Ukraine.
The EU is offering enhanced trade relations with Canada and Georgia.
Those are completely different things.
Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'
#476Earlier quoted context omitted.
No - it means that Charles III is an independent monarch for two separate nations. The monarchy is 99% ceremonial in Canada but it's important to note that the Canadian Crown isn't the UK Crown... Canada is not a dependent of the UK in anyway, simply the person that wears the Crowns is the same person. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monarchy_of_Canada >the Crown has had both a shared and a separate character: the sove…
It's not just theoretical -- IIUC, if Charles, William and George get hit by the same bus, Charlotte would become Queen of the UK while Louis would become King of Canada. I'm sure that in that scenario Canada would quickly update their primogeniture laws to give Charlotte primacy over her younger brother, but at the moment the primogeniture laws of the two countries are different.
No, all the Commonwealth countries changed their succession laws at the same time precisely to avoid this scenario.
Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'
#477Earlier quoted context omitted.
Creativity, innovation, freedom? 10 guys in a room can't compete for long against hundreds of millions or billions pursuing their own separate interests. Sure, they can steal, but they can't create to the same degree if at all.
Why is all the newest and best technology from China, outside a few specific fields?
Why is there still demand for Chinese student visas at universities in the USA?
Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'
#478This would be Canada getting down leveled to the minor leagues. Yes there are a few issues with the US, but Canada is vastly better off playing on the world stage under the wings of the US than it would be as the EU’s “associate member.” The next phase of history is going the be China and the US and then everyone else scrambling for scraps.
You think the wings of the US are a larger league than the EU?
The EU has built the world's largest trade zone, from Mercosur to South Korea, Japan and India to Canada.
I believe they are currently outmaneuvering the rest of the world by quietly binding everyone to themselves while the US, Russia and China are caught up in their saber rattling.
The US and China are fighting a 20th century contest of hard power. The EU is the only 21st century superpower of soft power.
Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'
#479Nearly 60% of EU LNG imports come from the USA. If Trump doesn't like Canada to cuddle with the EU, then it won't happen. This is all a big pain in the back.
Good thing EU is investing heavily in renewables then.
Canada has a proven, safe reactor technology[1] and Uranium to spare. This is a good synergy.
Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'
#480Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's easier said than done when you are competing in a global economy. The US is actually getting more consistent here: It starts to become more isolationist (through the trade war and specifically tariffs) and as a result will have more leeway in choosing their own mix of workers rights, compensations, taxation, etc. Sidenote: Of course consumers will be worse off as a result. The EU however is in this weird spot…
Thanks for replying to a comment I didn't make. It is clear that your mind is full of American exceptionalism, I'm done in this comment thread. Thanks for your contribution.
FYI: I'm European and worried about our competitiveness. It appears you didn't get my point. You can have different values like you said but then you have to be consistent with this on all levels to make it work. And that means less EU integration into the global economy - the EU doesn't have a clear vision where it wants to go.