Democrats introduced many amendments to stop tax cuts:
• First, stop tax cuts for those making over $10 million a year—Republicans voted no.
• Second, they tried to set the cutoff at $100 million—Republicans still said no.
• Third, they tried to set the cutoff at $500 million—Republicans still said no.
• Fourth, they tried to set the cutoff at $1 billion— Republicans said they were for giving billionaires a tax break on the backs of the poor and the elderly.
1) Republicans, 217 of them in the House, won’t even block tax cuts for people making $1 billion in a single year.
2) Republicans, 217 of them in the House, are more than happy to slash funding for kids with disabilities and seniors in nursing homes to give billionaires a financial break.
If you voted for one of these Republicans you are complicit in their actions.
It takes voting no on more than just some things, The Democrats have to become obstructionists, fight tooth and nail.
The Offal Office was the scene of a shit show today. Trump had Zelensky come to him, so he could bully and embarrass him. The other day Macron kissed his ass,Starmer and King Charles are doing the same.
Putins plan is to make America irrelevant so that he can take over Eurasia, leaving Trump with Oceania and there is a profound lack of backbone in Europe as in America.
I hope European leaders learn the lesson from the way Putin, I mean Trump, treated Zelenskyy, like a fly walking into a spiders trap, more like a fly falling into a Venus fly trap, lure it with sweets and then clamp down and devour it.
As a retired officer and a regular officer at that, I am still bound by my oath where I swore allegiance to the Constitution, but the Constitution has been shredded by the Supreme Courr, which has enabled and is enabling this treasonous, felon.
Are think tanks necessary for greed?! NO, they are not. Greed is a basic human trait. Reining in greed requires scholarship, thinking, and imagination. The billionaires have started “think tanks” to make selfishness and greed seem palatable. They promote greed under the guise of freedom. These “think tanks” do not look for both/and solutions. The billionaires have the what’s mine is mine, and what’s yours is mine also mentality. No sharing in their world.
There is a lot to be said for this, but given that the MAGA followers seem to be somehow confusing Marxism with vast plots to turn American children into transgender people or something, as well imagine they are fighting an evil "Deep State", I don't think they are going to listen. The funny thing is, they allowed an almost James Bond villain to take over the U.S. and voted an agent of Moscow into the White House, exactly the kind of evil characters they would cheer a GI Joe type hero destroying.
What might reach people in the middle is an understanding that the Libertarian ideas of small government have not worked. They may suddenly realize that "Washington" isn't a bunch of elite liberals out there but their hardworking neighbors who are keeping their food and medicine safe. I see that now farmers can't get climate data to plan what to plant and that graduate schools are canceling acceptances because the funding is so uncertain. This is the kind of thing that may make people turn on Trump and his Merry Musketeers. The Democrats just have to connect the dots, say that loudly and give viable alternatives.
Excellent. Your message, Dr. Weil, is unequivocal.
I am still asking why, not to blame nor denigrate the learned people who have for years written about the forces striving to undermine government programs for 'the people' as in the neocons-neoliberals and technocrat billionaires, their erudite works have not impacted the evil endeavors - exposed their intentions to destroy our democracy for the people and by the people- nor generated a movement to stop them.
I have read the writings of those who exposed the Turks, for example, the extermination and eradication of thousands of Armenians, and found there is no answer. Also, the writings of those who exposed the Hitler regime offer no answer for me.
Suddenly, those learned writers who expose such greedy people are turning on me for asking. I do not intend to mock writers like you, Thom, but I am without guile asking why voters were not awakened over the years to their sounding the alarm. I do not mean to step on the male egos of the writers of such books—I am just askin'. I don't appreciate the slander of me that my asking has generated by some of those learned people.
I don’t know Carol, in Greek myth Cassandra was cursed with being able to accurately foretell the future…and to never be believed. Perhaps it is like the experience my father-in-law had as a Jew in the Berlin of the 1930s. His friends all said that the new Chancellor was a semi-literate clown who would be gone in 6 months, then when things started getting bad they all said it couldn’t get worse. When it did he got out, but so many didn’t make it. Thom talks about this a lot in the book "They Thought They Were Free" which contains interviews of Germans who lived through the war. Most just went along with things and didn’t ask questions. Those who knew what the Nazis were and didn’t join them felt helpless and overwhelmed.
I really cannot feel more than sorry for those Americans who just don’t know better with MAGA. They have good reasons to feel hurt, marginalized, and angry about their futures and want somebody to blame. The issue is when they allow themselves to be directed against other groups as the ones who should be attacked. Then you have a mob fueled by hate, and the last century was littered with its victims. The real villains are those who know better but, even if they aren’t part of the group directing the movement, go along to profit from it. They make it possible for those at the top to unbind the hate. Most Republicans in Congress probably fall into this group, trading their souls for their seats, as it were. It must take a strong will to lie every day. (Trump can’t tell the difference, but most of those around him can.) Nothing is worth that.
"In today’s post-Reagan America, you’re only free if you’re rich."
This looks like a great bumper sticker, meme, and talking point. Let's get it out for everyone to see and hear. This should be the headline and the news topic from now until it sinks in and changes the conversation. There is enough info in this rant to drive it home and make it real if people will use it and proliferate it nationwide. This is what all our Senators and representatives need to hear today and every day. Bravo!
A lot of things are coming back to bite us in the ass. Slavery for one has set the tone for how the USA has progressed. A large percentage of our population has been relegated to live in poverty and denied access to a better life and are used as scapegoats for all of the problems of the poor whites. Well played oligarchs.
Our country has been constantly meddling in the affairs of other nations, many too small to have any recourse. Save Costa Rica every country in Central and most in South America have been subjected to the whims of their neighbor up north. The result has been the installation of right wing "governments" and the severe increase of poverty which leads to the mass exodus of people desperate to escape, ending up at our border.
The simple truth is that every time you do the wrong or greedy thing there will be consequences. Straighten up America.
Most Americans are clueless about the rest of the world and think they live better than anywhere else in the world. What little they know comes from the MSM, and for the wealthy, a few visits overseas in an American Bubble that insulates them from the places and the peoples they visit - mostly sites seen numerous times in movies and TV series. If my BFF in grad school had not been a German, I would be just as clueless about foreign countries as my neighbors. But that got me visiting at least once a year, then there would be the occasional international conference, making more EU friends, invitations to give lectures, invitations to provide consulting support to top government officials, making more friends, and more friends. Twenty-five years ago, I married a Foreigner.
I have never once been on a bubble-tour full of English-speaking Americans. Tourless travel forces one to use public transportation, learn how to communicate a little in various languages, and participate in foreign celebrations. That is how one learns that the average European has a higher standard of living than the average American. They have more diverse worldviews. Most, not all, are far less greedy than Americans. Doctors make way less than in America - but they do not need to own a business to practice. Teachers, not just professors, are held in high esteem and are paid like it. Kids readily appreciate that playing by the rules ensures a comfortable future. Those who do not, just like in the US, learn what jail is like.
Because greed is lower in Europe, climate change is less problematic. For centuries, they have built their houses mostly from stones and concrete with heavy tile roofs that do not blow off in storms or catch fire in wildfires. That is why many are centuries old. Most, surely not all, avoid building in floodplains. Those who do, typically live above the 1st floor and use the 1st floor for parking, storage, even livestock. In contrast, Americans still slap together houses out of wood and cover the roofs with flammable tar shingles. They are cheaper to build than concrete and thus have higher profit margins until the next storm, flood, or fire eradicates them. Europe is also moving faster to replace gas cars and buses than the US is.
Another cool thing is that, unlike the US, every state is a nation with a unique language and customs. Thus, Europeans experience foreign cultures from childhood. For $30, I can fly from Sofia to Rome in less than 2 hours. They learn to respect and learn from cultures different from their own, rather than to mock and disrespect them for not speaking English or wearing funny clothing, etc. They are more united, and free, than most Americans can understand.
The absolute savagery involved it pushing all out protection of the wealthiest and all out gutting of the rest of us is diabolical.
The fact that they are still pushing the “ Christian” card is preposterous. These republicans who refuse to consider taxing the very wealthiest in this country should be removed from Congress .They do nothing for the US but pursue evil and they have found it. They’ve found it by following having republicans in office who are happy to see the poorest and the once middle class die off from neglect.
I don’t mean figuratively, I mean they’d just as soon see us dead.
Then who’d pay their f’ in taxes?
Their friend Putin? Musk? Trump?
Congress needs to go . And this trio of perverse leaders of our country have to go .
Take every confirmed by MAGA heads of agencies Robert Kennedy ,who is now lying about vaccines while kids die from Measles. He says not uncommon .
That was before people listened to the bullshit of people like you , Bobby.
This is a murderous regime, with a gallery of lies for excuses. They need to be pushed back by the people.
We've been over this ground so many times, going back to Marx, Dickens, and Debs. Yet here we are again, trying to inject a soul into the capitalist system. If billionaires believed in democracy, they wouldn't be billionaires, or even millionaires. They and their businesses would own up to their social responsibilities, and government wouldn't need to have massive programs to attempt some degree of remuneration to those who actually do the work.
Now..how do we get rid of trump before it is 100 % authoritarian ??
I do not think we will have free and fair (anything ) elections in 2026..we will have Russian style elections ... putin keeps winning , what a guy ! We need a Leader, a think tank and the start of a PLAN maybe ????? hmmmmmm
Thanks Thom. You reminded me of my one and only trip to Europe. Two weeks in Paris October of '84 with my father who was visiting his well to do Aunt who owned a large manufacturer of light bulbs.
Paris was the cleanest major city I had ever seen. Street cleaners doing manual labor everywhere. My aunt shared that they make basic living wages, but all had full medical, and could go to college if they wanted. At the time the average tax rate including the VAT taxes for an average citizen was 45-50%. That was my first exposure to what you are talking about.
It's a standing "joke" that at anytime there is at least one major union on strike, assuring their wages stay in line. No strikes needed for benefits! As for my aunt the well to do business owner, she was making reasonable money "high' taxes notwithstanding.
At this point we just want to keep what we had and then discuss what we should have already had or could have. “Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got till it's gone”.
Outside of Thom, I don't often see mentions of what other countries have that we should have or at least could have. We have too many clueless people in this country, and therefore, here we are.
I do not mind cutting unnecessary administration bloated numbers especially academic. However, cutting grants to do things we know are beneficial is nonsense. That destroys jobs and the function of society especially medical research and aid worldwide. That is only possible when an AI system is already put in place to replace large bureaucracy. I am not for in any way phone answers to get people on or help them do what they need to do. These systems need to be automatic in registration, like voting, where as in EU the agency sends you the results and you get to dispute any info that is not right. All this takes investments first to let go of unneeded work force. Making an agency not able to perform its mandated tasks is only destruction like they did to the Post Office.
America ranks 17th on the World Freedom List, Canada ranks 10th. There are so many words Americans use that they have no concept of the meaning. Freedom being the main one, but closely followed by democracy, socialism, communism, Marxism. When the left use the term Nazism, they do know what it means. But Americans call Russia/Putin Communist. Russia has not been communist since 1992. It is full blown Fascist. Though as is often noted the ends of the horseshoe come close at the extremes. Did you look at the map of how Germany voted? The former East Germany went solid AfD. Not much different if any from the "Communism" they enjoyed uder the Stasi.
Any country that tried to treat its citizens fairly has been attacked by the USA. Central America in the 50s and 80s. Or Venezuela or Cuba or Chili. Like Putin attacking Ukraine, they fear a vibrant free country on the border would give their own people ideas and they would ask why not us.
Canada has to fear Trump right now with his tariffs. But good luck in forcing us to bend. We have a lot of friends and US has none now but Russia, North Korea and Iran and Venezuela. Also Canadian soldiers in WWI wrote the Geneva convention and we have not forgotten. Read Steinbeck's "The Moon is Down"
I know a lot of Canadians with dual citizenships. Lawyers, physicans, bankers, etc.
AI: Canada's investments in Florida contribute to the state's economy in many ways, including construction, transportation, and real estate. Canadian consulting firms also help Florida modernize its infrastructure.
How Canada contributes to Florida's economy:
Canada's exports to the Florida market have grown by 32.5% over the past five years and are valued at more than $5.8 billion in 2022.In 2022, Canada was Florida's third largest source of imports, with $408.7 million in repaired exports, $268.1 million of furniture, $230.1 million of bread, cakes and pastries, $201.4 million in refined petroleum and $197 million in turbojets and turbines, according to SelectFlorida.org.
Construction: Canadian firms help build roads, bridges, and public transit
Real estate: More than 500,000 Canadian homeowners in Florida pay state real estate taxes. Canadian firms help develop and manage real estate, including the Miami Dade County Civil and Probate Courthouse When a Canadian resident sells U.S. real property, whether it is in Florida or elsewhere, withholding tax of 15% of the sale price is payable.
Transportation: Canadian firms help develop and implement transportation projects, including ports and airports
Clean water: Canadian firms help develop and implement clean water projects
Jobs: Canadian-owned companies in Florida employ more than 54,000 people
Democrats introduced many amendments to stop tax cuts:
• First, stop tax cuts for those making over $10 million a year—Republicans voted no.
• Second, they tried to set the cutoff at $100 million—Republicans still said no.
• Third, they tried to set the cutoff at $500 million—Republicans still said no.
• Fourth, they tried to set the cutoff at $1 billion— Republicans said they were for giving billionaires a tax break on the backs of the poor and the elderly.
1) Republicans, 217 of them in the House, won’t even block tax cuts for people making $1 billion in a single year.
2) Republicans, 217 of them in the House, are more than happy to slash funding for kids with disabilities and seniors in nursing homes to give billionaires a financial break.
If you voted for one of these Republicans you are complicit in their actions.
https://bit.ly/4hUbbWU
It takes voting no on more than just some things, The Democrats have to become obstructionists, fight tooth and nail.
The Offal Office was the scene of a shit show today. Trump had Zelensky come to him, so he could bully and embarrass him. The other day Macron kissed his ass,Starmer and King Charles are doing the same.
Putins plan is to make America irrelevant so that he can take over Eurasia, leaving Trump with Oceania and there is a profound lack of backbone in Europe as in America.
I hope European leaders learn the lesson from the way Putin, I mean Trump, treated Zelenskyy, like a fly walking into a spiders trap, more like a fly falling into a Venus fly trap, lure it with sweets and then clamp down and devour it.
As a retired officer and a regular officer at that, I am still bound by my oath where I swore allegiance to the Constitution, but the Constitution has been shredded by the Supreme Courr, which has enabled and is enabling this treasonous, felon.
Post on Fox, MSM.
If they want to cut, cut all Congressional staff.
...and security for trump. How much do we have to pay for all his security?
Copy and repost anything I put out. By all means possible.
Are think tanks necessary for greed?! NO, they are not. Greed is a basic human trait. Reining in greed requires scholarship, thinking, and imagination. The billionaires have started “think tanks” to make selfishness and greed seem palatable. They promote greed under the guise of freedom. These “think tanks” do not look for both/and solutions. The billionaires have the what’s mine is mine, and what’s yours is mine also mentality. No sharing in their world.
Today, the main issue is the takeover of our govenment by resentful, revengeful, viscious foreigners. All Americans, rich and poor are prey.
Please enlist people like your senator, Tillis. https://www.carolinajournal.com/opinion/senator-tillis-speaks-truth-on-ukraine/
HAW HAW HAW! Say it in your native Russian, honey. Your English is pathetic.
I'm not a bot...subjec t to typos.... you must not follow this stuff. We have a small but poteltially great, window of opportunity to flip things.
We have a community of interest with all Americans to undo a foreign takeover.
There is a lot to be said for this, but given that the MAGA followers seem to be somehow confusing Marxism with vast plots to turn American children into transgender people or something, as well imagine they are fighting an evil "Deep State", I don't think they are going to listen. The funny thing is, they allowed an almost James Bond villain to take over the U.S. and voted an agent of Moscow into the White House, exactly the kind of evil characters they would cheer a GI Joe type hero destroying.
What might reach people in the middle is an understanding that the Libertarian ideas of small government have not worked. They may suddenly realize that "Washington" isn't a bunch of elite liberals out there but their hardworking neighbors who are keeping their food and medicine safe. I see that now farmers can't get climate data to plan what to plant and that graduate schools are canceling acceptances because the funding is so uncertain. This is the kind of thing that may make people turn on Trump and his Merry Musketeers. The Democrats just have to connect the dots, say that loudly and give viable alternatives.
Excellent. Your message, Dr. Weil, is unequivocal.
I am still asking why, not to blame nor denigrate the learned people who have for years written about the forces striving to undermine government programs for 'the people' as in the neocons-neoliberals and technocrat billionaires, their erudite works have not impacted the evil endeavors - exposed their intentions to destroy our democracy for the people and by the people- nor generated a movement to stop them.
I have read the writings of those who exposed the Turks, for example, the extermination and eradication of thousands of Armenians, and found there is no answer. Also, the writings of those who exposed the Hitler regime offer no answer for me.
Suddenly, those learned writers who expose such greedy people are turning on me for asking. I do not intend to mock writers like you, Thom, but I am without guile asking why voters were not awakened over the years to their sounding the alarm. I do not mean to step on the male egos of the writers of such books—I am just askin'. I don't appreciate the slander of me that my asking has generated by some of those learned people.
I don’t know Carol, in Greek myth Cassandra was cursed with being able to accurately foretell the future…and to never be believed. Perhaps it is like the experience my father-in-law had as a Jew in the Berlin of the 1930s. His friends all said that the new Chancellor was a semi-literate clown who would be gone in 6 months, then when things started getting bad they all said it couldn’t get worse. When it did he got out, but so many didn’t make it. Thom talks about this a lot in the book "They Thought They Were Free" which contains interviews of Germans who lived through the war. Most just went along with things and didn’t ask questions. Those who knew what the Nazis were and didn’t join them felt helpless and overwhelmed.
I really cannot feel more than sorry for those Americans who just don’t know better with MAGA. They have good reasons to feel hurt, marginalized, and angry about their futures and want somebody to blame. The issue is when they allow themselves to be directed against other groups as the ones who should be attacked. Then you have a mob fueled by hate, and the last century was littered with its victims. The real villains are those who know better but, even if they aren’t part of the group directing the movement, go along to profit from it. They make it possible for those at the top to unbind the hate. Most Republicans in Congress probably fall into this group, trading their souls for their seats, as it were. It must take a strong will to lie every day. (Trump can’t tell the difference, but most of those around him can.) Nothing is worth that.
"In today’s post-Reagan America, you’re only free if you’re rich."
This looks like a great bumper sticker, meme, and talking point. Let's get it out for everyone to see and hear. This should be the headline and the news topic from now until it sinks in and changes the conversation. There is enough info in this rant to drive it home and make it real if people will use it and proliferate it nationwide. This is what all our Senators and representatives need to hear today and every day. Bravo!
Got to pressure Republicans. https://jerryweiss.substack.com/p/remove-impeach-impeach
Picket. Sit in. Call. Write.
Boycott today!
A lot of things are coming back to bite us in the ass. Slavery for one has set the tone for how the USA has progressed. A large percentage of our population has been relegated to live in poverty and denied access to a better life and are used as scapegoats for all of the problems of the poor whites. Well played oligarchs.
Our country has been constantly meddling in the affairs of other nations, many too small to have any recourse. Save Costa Rica every country in Central and most in South America have been subjected to the whims of their neighbor up north. The result has been the installation of right wing "governments" and the severe increase of poverty which leads to the mass exodus of people desperate to escape, ending up at our border.
The simple truth is that every time you do the wrong or greedy thing there will be consequences. Straighten up America.
Thom, thank you. This post, which I’m about to share, is one of yours that has me thinking I need to find a way to put your stuff on “auto share”.
Most Americans are clueless about the rest of the world and think they live better than anywhere else in the world. What little they know comes from the MSM, and for the wealthy, a few visits overseas in an American Bubble that insulates them from the places and the peoples they visit - mostly sites seen numerous times in movies and TV series. If my BFF in grad school had not been a German, I would be just as clueless about foreign countries as my neighbors. But that got me visiting at least once a year, then there would be the occasional international conference, making more EU friends, invitations to give lectures, invitations to provide consulting support to top government officials, making more friends, and more friends. Twenty-five years ago, I married a Foreigner.
I have never once been on a bubble-tour full of English-speaking Americans. Tourless travel forces one to use public transportation, learn how to communicate a little in various languages, and participate in foreign celebrations. That is how one learns that the average European has a higher standard of living than the average American. They have more diverse worldviews. Most, not all, are far less greedy than Americans. Doctors make way less than in America - but they do not need to own a business to practice. Teachers, not just professors, are held in high esteem and are paid like it. Kids readily appreciate that playing by the rules ensures a comfortable future. Those who do not, just like in the US, learn what jail is like.
Because greed is lower in Europe, climate change is less problematic. For centuries, they have built their houses mostly from stones and concrete with heavy tile roofs that do not blow off in storms or catch fire in wildfires. That is why many are centuries old. Most, surely not all, avoid building in floodplains. Those who do, typically live above the 1st floor and use the 1st floor for parking, storage, even livestock. In contrast, Americans still slap together houses out of wood and cover the roofs with flammable tar shingles. They are cheaper to build than concrete and thus have higher profit margins until the next storm, flood, or fire eradicates them. Europe is also moving faster to replace gas cars and buses than the US is.
Another cool thing is that, unlike the US, every state is a nation with a unique language and customs. Thus, Europeans experience foreign cultures from childhood. For $30, I can fly from Sofia to Rome in less than 2 hours. They learn to respect and learn from cultures different from their own, rather than to mock and disrespect them for not speaking English or wearing funny clothing, etc. They are more united, and free, than most Americans can understand.
The absolute savagery involved it pushing all out protection of the wealthiest and all out gutting of the rest of us is diabolical.
The fact that they are still pushing the “ Christian” card is preposterous. These republicans who refuse to consider taxing the very wealthiest in this country should be removed from Congress .They do nothing for the US but pursue evil and they have found it. They’ve found it by following having republicans in office who are happy to see the poorest and the once middle class die off from neglect.
I don’t mean figuratively, I mean they’d just as soon see us dead.
Then who’d pay their f’ in taxes?
Their friend Putin? Musk? Trump?
Congress needs to go . And this trio of perverse leaders of our country have to go .
Take every confirmed by MAGA heads of agencies Robert Kennedy ,who is now lying about vaccines while kids die from Measles. He says not uncommon .
That was before people listened to the bullshit of people like you , Bobby.
This is a murderous regime, with a gallery of lies for excuses. They need to be pushed back by the people.
We've been over this ground so many times, going back to Marx, Dickens, and Debs. Yet here we are again, trying to inject a soul into the capitalist system. If billionaires believed in democracy, they wouldn't be billionaires, or even millionaires. They and their businesses would own up to their social responsibilities, and government wouldn't need to have massive programs to attempt some degree of remuneration to those who actually do the work.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Gospel
Excellent article.
Now..how do we get rid of trump before it is 100 % authoritarian ??
I do not think we will have free and fair (anything ) elections in 2026..we will have Russian style elections ... putin keeps winning , what a guy ! We need a Leader, a think tank and the start of a PLAN maybe ????? hmmmmmm
Thanks Thom. You reminded me of my one and only trip to Europe. Two weeks in Paris October of '84 with my father who was visiting his well to do Aunt who owned a large manufacturer of light bulbs.
Paris was the cleanest major city I had ever seen. Street cleaners doing manual labor everywhere. My aunt shared that they make basic living wages, but all had full medical, and could go to college if they wanted. At the time the average tax rate including the VAT taxes for an average citizen was 45-50%. That was my first exposure to what you are talking about.
It's a standing "joke" that at anytime there is at least one major union on strike, assuring their wages stay in line. No strikes needed for benefits! As for my aunt the well to do business owner, she was making reasonable money "high' taxes notwithstanding.
At this point we just want to keep what we had and then discuss what we should have already had or could have. “Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got till it's gone”.
Outside of Thom, I don't often see mentions of what other countries have that we should have or at least could have. We have too many clueless people in this country, and therefore, here we are.
Right on, Thom! 👍
Another something worth pondering along these lines is:
Question: What is the sign of a healthy society?
Answer: The way it treats its weakest members.
I do not mind cutting unnecessary administration bloated numbers especially academic. However, cutting grants to do things we know are beneficial is nonsense. That destroys jobs and the function of society especially medical research and aid worldwide. That is only possible when an AI system is already put in place to replace large bureaucracy. I am not for in any way phone answers to get people on or help them do what they need to do. These systems need to be automatic in registration, like voting, where as in EU the agency sends you the results and you get to dispute any info that is not right. All this takes investments first to let go of unneeded work force. Making an agency not able to perform its mandated tasks is only destruction like they did to the Post Office.
America ranks 17th on the World Freedom List, Canada ranks 10th. There are so many words Americans use that they have no concept of the meaning. Freedom being the main one, but closely followed by democracy, socialism, communism, Marxism. When the left use the term Nazism, they do know what it means. But Americans call Russia/Putin Communist. Russia has not been communist since 1992. It is full blown Fascist. Though as is often noted the ends of the horseshoe come close at the extremes. Did you look at the map of how Germany voted? The former East Germany went solid AfD. Not much different if any from the "Communism" they enjoyed uder the Stasi.
Any country that tried to treat its citizens fairly has been attacked by the USA. Central America in the 50s and 80s. Or Venezuela or Cuba or Chili. Like Putin attacking Ukraine, they fear a vibrant free country on the border would give their own people ideas and they would ask why not us.
Canada has to fear Trump right now with his tariffs. But good luck in forcing us to bend. We have a lot of friends and US has none now but Russia, North Korea and Iran and Venezuela. Also Canadian soldiers in WWI wrote the Geneva convention and we have not forgotten. Read Steinbeck's "The Moon is Down"
Like I said yesterday, we have more Canadians in Baghdad By the Sea than some Canadian provinces. They seem to be extermely prosperous. https://www.international.gc.ca/country-pays/us-eu/miami.aspx?lang=eng
I know a lot of Canadians with dual citizenships. Lawyers, physicans, bankers, etc.
AI: Canada's investments in Florida contribute to the state's economy in many ways, including construction, transportation, and real estate. Canadian consulting firms also help Florida modernize its infrastructure.
How Canada contributes to Florida's economy:
Canada's exports to the Florida market have grown by 32.5% over the past five years and are valued at more than $5.8 billion in 2022.In 2022, Canada was Florida's third largest source of imports, with $408.7 million in repaired exports, $268.1 million of furniture, $230.1 million of bread, cakes and pastries, $201.4 million in refined petroleum and $197 million in turbojets and turbines, according to SelectFlorida.org.
Construction: Canadian firms help build roads, bridges, and public transit
Real estate: More than 500,000 Canadian homeowners in Florida pay state real estate taxes. Canadian firms help develop and manage real estate, including the Miami Dade County Civil and Probate Courthouse When a Canadian resident sells U.S. real property, whether it is in Florida or elsewhere, withholding tax of 15% of the sale price is payable.
Transportation: Canadian firms help develop and implement transportation projects, including ports and airports
Clean water: Canadian firms help develop and implement clean water projects
Jobs: Canadian-owned companies in Florida employ more than 54,000 people