Letters: Are we falling prisoner to Trumped-up falsehoods?

Re: U.S. hits Canada, 59 other countries with new tariffs just days after 50% levy on Canadian goods announced — Tracy Moran, July 23

Tracy Moran’s report on President Donald Trump’s tariff tantrums against Canada, forced-labour imports one day, wildfire smoke the next, reads like governance by make-believe: evidence optional, belief mandatory. Believe his reality or pay for doubting it. The world is becoming a prisoner to his lies.

Consequently, Trump’s strategy has created a global prisoner’s dilemma. He bets that no democracy can afford to break with America first, that each will quietly accommodate his fictions rather than risk standing alone. Individually, appeasement looks rational. Collectively, it is ruinous. Every government that swallows one falsehood to preserve the relationship makes the next falsehood easier to swallow. That is why this is no longer merely a dispute over tariffs or trade. It is an existential test of whether democracies can defend a shared reality without destroying themselves in the process.

When Trump tells prime-time America he has proof the 2020 election was stolen, the lie becomes a loyalty test: accept his reality or risk political exile. His apprentices — Musk, Vance, Rubio, Hegseth and Fox News — have learned the lesson. Lie fluently or become irrelevant.

The danger is not simply that Trump lies. It is that lying becomes cheaper than resisting him. A chain of command built on fiction eventually collapses because no one knows which orders, promises or treaties can be trusted. His lies are reducing the world order to chaos.

Charles Mackay, in “Extraordinary Popular Delusions and The Madness of Crowds” (1841), wrote that crowds lose their senses together and recover them one by one. One hopes he is right. Defections are how prisoner’s dilemmas are broken: not necessarily by everyone at once, but by enough people refusing to play along.

So how do we deal with a nominal world leader who treats lying as statecraft? One practical way is to boycott the fiction, not America. Not tariff for tariff, which merely escalates the game, but deliberate diversification. Mark Carney should show new-found independence. Negotiate where necessary, resist where essential, and do not import Trump’s unreality into a new CUSMA. Reinstate the digital sales tax. Urge Canadians to avoid travel to America. Keep American booze off Canadian shelves. Remain Canadian through your purchases. And if that means being anti-MAGA, so be it. Talk back; don’t go silent. Keep diplomatic channels open. Engage Trump’s MAGA. But quarantine the falsehoods.

The economic cost of resisting Trump is recoverable. The cost of surrendering our shared reality, of teaching democracies that truth is negotiable when power demands it, is not.

Tony D’Andrea, Toronto

Re: Doctors consider ‘death by organ donation’ for MAID patients — Sharon Kirkey, July 23

There exists a singular, agonizing irony in the current state of the Nova Scotia government’s administrative priorities — one that would be comical were it not so profoundly tragic.

We find ourselves navigating a bureaucratic landscape where the entry into this world is strictly rationed, while the exit is provided with the seamless efficiency of a drive-through window.

Consider the expectant mother in Baddeck, or Richmond, or Glace Bay. Should she wish to bring new life into this dominion, she is met with a stern ledger of logistical impossibilities. The local wards are often shuttered; the specialized teams are centralized; the resources are consolidated. For the miracle of birth, our system demands a pilgrimage — a stressful, calculated dash down the Trans-Canada Highway to a select few regional hubs. Life, it seems, must strictly adhere to the government’s centralized schedule.

Yet, turn your gaze to the final chapter of human existence, and the administrative sea parts with astonishing majesty. For Medical Assistance in Dying — or MAID, as the planners so clinically acronymize it — the geographic barriers miraculously dissolve. There are no select locations here. No rationing of care. The apparatus of the state becomes entirely mobile, willing and eager to accommodate you in virtually any hospital, any clinic, or any living room from Cape Breton to the South Shore.

One cannot help but marvel at the grim, linguistic dark comedy of it all. For decades, the old folks used to say that when a man finally achieved total comfort and freedom from worry, he “had it made.” How twisted a transformation that the modern state has provided a literal interpretation of the phrase: to finally have peace, you simply have it MAID.

We have built a system that makes it remarkably difficult to arrive, but infinitely convenient to leave. Surely, a society that prides itself on compassion must eventually look in the mirror and ask why the cradle is so heavily restricted, while the hearse is granted an unlimited, all-access pass.

Mark Macneill, Mabou, N.S.

Re: Anti-family propaganda has devastated a generation of women — Kate Marland, July 2

I cannot disagree more with Kate Marland’s opinion piece about why Canadian women are choosing to remain childless.

Women aren’t opting out of motherhood because of television shows that prioritize material success over having families. Women are choosing to remain childless because of the ridiculous costs for basic items like an apartment, and even milk and eggs. They’re choosing not to have kids because they have no choice but to work, and they know that in the majority of marriages/partnerships, it’s the woman who does all the work to take care of the kids.

The way our world has changed, it is almost impossible to live off of one income so that a father or mother can stay home with their child(ren). That’s a dream now, and it has absolutely nothing to do with Carrie Bradshaw or Hannah Horvath or any other character we watched in our late teens and early 20s.

The other issue that should have been addressed is that men need to step up and be more involved with their families and housework.

Vicky Welch, Montreal

Re: U.S. deal could have been ‘explained better’: PM — Jordan Gowling, July 25

Gordie Howe was more known for his hockey skills than his verbal skills but his style was honest. His name and reputation, however, have been besmirched by the political actors involved in his namesake bridge in Windsor.

Mark Carney’s Davos speech, his concern about spending by former governor generals through a secretive account, and his yet to be seen but apparent understanding that we need to develop our natural resources, are all promising indicators that he knows what the PM’s job is about. And, thankfully, he has yet to descend to the “I’m sorry for everything” mantra normalized by his predecessor.

None of the above, however, will balance the dismal display of leadership he has shown over “The Bridge.” His “I could have explained it better” was his apology for misleading us.

It wasn’t going to be hard for Carney to outshine Justin Trudeau’s flickering candle of “look-at-me” management. All he had to do was show up everyday. Now, though, no amount of Davos deception will get him a Mr. Hockey title, regardless of whether his elbows are up or down.

Larry Baswick, Stratford, Ont.

Re: The sex criminal in Canada illegally who got a work permit — Jamie Sarkonak, July 21

We Canadians tend to view ourselves as morally superior beings, especially in regard to our American neighbours.

Day after day the National Post, and sometimes even The Globe and Mail, publish articles like Jamie Sarkonak’s column that demonstrate our inability to govern ourselves effectively, as exemplified in this case by the lack of enforcement of removal orders and the endless ability of individuals to access our courts, all at the expense of taxpayers.

This inability is exacerbated by the lax sentencing imposed on criminals by soft-hearted, or more likely, soft-headed judges who fail to realize that going easy on individual offenders will likely mean hardship for the community at large.

While the U.S. certainly has its flaws, I’m not certain that theirs outweigh ours to an extent that would justify our smugness. President Donald Trump has a point that securing borders and enforcing laws are the basic things countries should be able to do. If we can’t do that, perhaps he is correct in calling the border just a line on a map.

John Harris, Toronto

Re: Hockey still rules in Canada despite heightened visibility of FIFA World Cup: survey — Stewart Lewis, July 19

Watching the final game of the World Cup, my inner — well, I should admit, not so inner — curmudgeon overtook my dutiful enjoyment of a sport I rarely watch. As one of the hosts, we Canadians felt the obligation to suddenly feign interest in a game unfamiliar to many — although I concede the familiarity is growing. But as I watched Spain and Argentina play for nearly two hours without scoring a goal, the thought suddenly popped into my head: I was actually watching 1990s NHL hockey.

Clutch and grab. Diving with faked injuries. No scoring. Blatant interference, almost always uncalled. Slow play, endless back and forth passing. The left-wing lock.

In the 1950s, Anatoli Tarasov, a Russian football coach, was asked to create a Russian hockey team, primarily for propaganda purposes. Famously, Tarasov didn’t watch any hockey. Instead, he read the rule book, over and over, until he felt he understood the game. Then he used his football background to devise a system of hockey that became well known to Canadians in the 1972 Summit Series against the Soviet Union.

It was all about possession. Five-player units who worked as one. Carry the puck up the ice, but if the opening was not there at the blue line, circle all five back into the defensive zone and try again. And again, and again, until the opponent made a mistake. Booooring.

Admittedly, it required a very high level of technical ability, skating and passing. But it was slow, robotic and mind-numbing. And that’s what international soccer is — Anatoli Tarasov hockey. Combined with Gary Bettman’s expansion-era holding, punching, elbowing and diving.

To his credit, Bettman allowed hockey to evolve. He had the referees crack down on clutch-and-grab, allowed speed and skill to take precedence. Possession remains an important metric, but stick handling, quick puck movement, and advancing play into the offensive area are the rule. International football could take a lesson

Tom Curran, Consecon, Ont.

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