Canada

Most of us take for granted the ease of filling up a gas tank or flipping a light switch — whether in Michigan or Ontario. But in the tumultuous day-to-day relationship between the United States and Canada, energy has become the latest bone of contention.

The reality right now is that this trade means that the tone and tenor of a phone call between Doug Ford and Howard Lutnick could mean a lot for my state, Michigan, and your province — positive or negative — when it comes to the cost of a gallon or kilowatt.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford and federal officials left an hours-long meeting with U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick saying they feel more positive about the Canada-U.S. trading relationship after weeks of bad blood and heated rhetoric.

Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Ford said he feels like “the temperature is being lowered, the temperature’s coming down” after the bilateral talks.

Imagine you had a woke lunatic living in your attic.

Someone who contributed nothing to the household — beyond barking politically correct slogans — and yet expected full bed and board.

You might hear him or her (or “them”) stomping around late at night, yelling “Trans women are women!” or “Defund the police!”

And the next morning they’d be down with their hand out, expecting breakfast and pocket money.

President Trump’s simultaneous trade wars with Canada, Mexico, China and the European Union amount to a huge economic and political gamble: that Americans will endure months or years of economic pain in return for the distant hope of re-industrializing the American heartland.

It is enormously risky. In recent days, Mr. Trump has acknowledged, despite all his confident campaign predictions that “we are going to boom like we have never boomed before,” that the United States may be headed into a recession, fueled by his economic agenda. But in public and private he has been arguing that “a little disturbance” in the economy and the markets is a small price to pay for bringing manufacturing jobs back to America.

America is a very resilient nation making economic recovery a matter of sooner rather than later.

President Donald Trump spoke to reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday while meeting with the head of NATO and doubled down on his argument that Canada must join the United States.

“No I’m not,” Trump replied when asked if he would reconsider the latest tariffs.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford and federal Finance Minister Dominic LeBlanc are set to meet Thursday in Washington, D.C., with U.S. Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick, who invited Ford to put an end to an escalation of the trade war between Canada and the United States.

Ford said he hoped it would be a cordial meeting, but it will come after both Lutnick and U.S. President Donald Trump dismissed the premier and Canada in statements made to the press.

About one million Canadian “snowbirds,” who contribute billions to the U.S. tourism industry each year, will soon be required to register and be fingerprinted before heading south, thanks to an executive order from President Donald Trump aimed at curbing illegal immigration.

While most travellers are automatically registered with an electronic I-94 admission record upon entering the U.S., Trump’s “Protecting the American People Against Invasion” order now mandates that all visitors staying 30 days or longer must register with the U.S. government and obtain an admission record, if an I-94 wasn’t automatically issued.

h/t XC