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It鈥檚 unclear what the average Liberal voter thought would be the outcome here. Some of this is doubtless the fault of our media, which have often published stories about the economic harm of Canadian boycotts to Americans. It鈥檚 not that we can鈥檛 cause pain to liquor wholesalers or realtors in Florida; it鈥檚 that there鈥檚 never been convincing evidence any such pain would translate into U.S. federal policy changes. Besides, Trump is immune to electoral pressure at this point, and that Canadians are prepared to boycott the U.S. in meaningful numbers.

In principle, there鈥檚 nothing wrong with imposing retaliatory tariffs, but as with most economic policies, this one lives or dies by consequentialist logic. That is, if retaliatory tariffs get Trump to back down, then they鈥檝e worked; if they don鈥檛, then Ottawa has simply imposed further costs on Canadian consumers to no particular national advantage. Sure, you could argue that tariffs also hurt American consumers, but unless they hurt Americans worse, then they鈥檙e reminiscent of that old business joke: we鈥檙e losing money on every unit, but we鈥檒l make it up in volume. If you can鈥檛 cause sufficient economic pain to incentivize changes to U.S. trade policy, then there鈥檚 no win to be had.

The complaint now is that Canada will have made concessions on border security, defence spending and service taxes in return for very little. But the Trump administration鈥檚 position seems to be that Canada and other countries that have hitched a free ride on the U.S. global-alliance structure already get quite a lot. In this respect, Trump is shifting the U.S. toward a more nakedly transactional and extractive posture vis-脿-vis its allies.

Canadians understandably might not care for this new approach, but聽 either militarily or economically to push back 鈥� for the strongest source of leverage in this or future negotiations with the U.S. (or any other country) is the sturdiness and dynamism of Canada鈥檚 economy.

More specifically, Canada鈥檚 real leverage lies not with our consumer market (our population is approximately that of California, but we have a vastly lower per capita GDP); it lies with our natural resources and raw materials, although as yet we鈥檙e not in a position to exploit them sufficiently. Indeed, the only hope that Carney鈥檚 retaliatory tariffs might have had would鈥檝e been their operating in concert with other U.S. trade partners. But to overcome that problem of collective action, . Meanwhile, we can鈥檛 even sell LNG to Europe without using the U.S. as an intermediary.

It鈥檚 natural that the imposition of tariffs by a neighbouring power would raise the ire of ordinary Canadians more than would the failures of their own government to prepare for such a moment 鈥� . But the tariff question is secondary to the of the recent lost decade that left Canada so unprepared in the first place.

But ultimately, I鈥檇 just like to be able to buy real bourbon whiskey again. As a certain U.S. president might say: thank you for your attention to this matter.