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EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'

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Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'

#761
post #509

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The current regime is due 2028. For most of their history Canada and USA had cordial relations. This looks like a reactionary measure rather than a long term strategic one. Europe is in decline and facing political irrelevance, not the type of partner you want to have particularly if your border neighbor is one of the two current global super powers. It’s yet to see if the UE’s economic reforms will pay off, even of…

Canadians who expect America to suddenly be friendly towards Canada in 2028 are ignorant of history and reality.

Yeah speaking of history. Let’s pretend that the US and Canada have never been in conflict before. We literally went to war, had multiple territorial disputes, plans of invasions, tariffs and trade wars, not to mention all the disagreements in foreign policy including Vietnam, Cuba and Iraq. None of this has prevented the two countries to have one of the most peaceful and cooperative relationships between two sovereign nations in modern history.

Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'

#762

> Canada's Bill C-22 Would Force Encryption Backdoors > Signal, Windscribe, and NordVPN say they'll pull out of Canada before building surveillance infrastructure. The biggest threat to encrypted communications in a Western democracy since Australia's 2018 law. https://stateofsurveillance.org/news/canada-bill-c22-lawful-... + > European Commission Revives Push for Encryption Backdoors in ProtectEU Strategy, Framing M…

It seems every country in the world has such regimes, either publicly or in the background. You can bet no Chinese or Russian system comes without backdoors, plenty of US systems have been revealed to have backdoors, etc. I disagree with this, but it's still somehow not an aspect uniquely horrible about EU or Canadian policy making, so not sure why this would be relevant here.

> not sure why this would be relevant here.

There is a strand of US politics which has tried to characterize Canada as uniquely authoritarian ever since the Ottawa protests. And it's been used increasingly as justification for external partisan "interventions"

Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'

#763

Soon, Canada might overtake Finland in having the longest NATO border with a hostile country…

But it will probably be a long time till Canada purposefully causes the death of a million civilians in the USA, like Finland did with Leningrad!

It’s not a pretty competition, but I’m pretty sure Russia "wins" vs Finland in number of deliberate civilian deaths over any time period.

Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'

#764

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could, but it might be difficult to hear yourself over the explosive laughter of everybody around you. Which country would you say has a closer relationship with the King of England?

Which country would you say has a closer relationship with the King of Canada?

England, which is why he's called the King of England and never called the King of Canada.

Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'

#765
post #516

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>we seem to be the only large institution that countries still want to voluntarily join, and can voluntarily leave. Really? Because there's this organisation called CUSMA that nations can voluntarily leave (the US) and some want to stay in (Canada). It's economy is larger than the EU btw.

CUSMA is just a trade deal, not a full-on organization like the EU. If we're doing a trade deal measuring contest, I will just point out that the EU has the world's largest free trade network, including Canada (already), South Korea, most of Latin America, India etc etc.

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Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'

#766
post #516

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CUSMA is just a trade deal, not a full-on organization like the EU. If we're doing a trade deal measuring contest, I will just point out that the EU has the world's largest free trade network, including Canada (already), South Korea, most of Latin America, India etc etc.

[flagged]

Apples, Oranges etc once again. Of course NATO is a completely different kind of organization from the EU.

The Catholic Church has more members than NATO, too, but it's a completely nonsensical comparison.

The EU doesn't have some mythical status that doesn't apply to any other organization, it just has a very specific status in political science that it's the most successful example of: Supranationalism.

Anyways, why are we doing this silly phallus size competition in the first place? Can't we just accept that the EU is a major player on the world stage and that people look up to it?

Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'

#767
post #32

The EU is running out of Europe. I thought Turkey or North Africa would be the next steps. Maybe Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan.

> I thought Turkey or North Africa would be the next steps. Maybe Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan. Not white enough for the EU. There is a lot of opposition to even Turkey, which is already in customs union, joining and talks are dead specifically because EU countries do not want immigration from Turkey.

Talks with Turkey are currently dead because the current government does not wish to continue them; realistically they won't resume until, at the earliest, Erdogan is gone.

Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'

#768

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and legislative integration Does Canada's agricultural output follow EU's (quite strict) norms? Not sure if this falls under "legislative integration" but I'd say that it would be quite important to have settled. The same goes when it comes to Canada's work-related laws.

"Single market (but food treated specially)" wouldn't be unprecedented; Switzerland was basically like this for a long time. Working Time Directive may be more of a sticking point, though Canada doesn't seem _that_ far away from aligned with it anyway (big difference would be on paid time off, where Canada's way under the minimum).

AFAICT many EU nations let stat holidays count towards the paid time off allowance. Ontario has 9 stat holidays. 10 paid days off guaranteed + 9 stat holidays is pretty close to the 20 required by Europe's paid time off guarantees.

Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'

#769

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I thought Turkey Oh yeah, that's gonna be hella popular with the voters.

Turkey has been floated as a serious EU candidate for decades now. Most of it is not in Europe of course, and it has a large population. Turkey refuses to address its past with the Armenians, Kurds and Greeks which is a major concern. The other question is what its border control is like at the eastern end. There are already large numbers of Turks in western Europe, particularly Germany, so presumably some of them wo…

It's not just been floated; Turkey was (and strictly speaking still is, though talks are suspended because Erdogan) an official candidate, in the accession process.

Re: EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'

#770

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which country would you say has a closer relationship with the King of Canada?

England, which is why he's called the King of England and never called the King of Canada.

His title is "His Majesty Charles the Third, by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and of His other Realms and Territories King, Head of the Commonwealth, Defender of the Faith" but he can claim many others. In Canada he is announced as King of Canada.
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