So Long; Farewell

A Year to Remember, or Perhaps to Forget

What a year 2025 has been! We Canadians were caught off guard when a newly-elected Trump began his initial fusillade of grim, humourless insults at our Prime Minister, stunned when he brought in crushing tariffs that endangered his own economy as well as ours, and then enraged when he threatened Canadian sovereignty for our resources.

I can remember thinking, “What the hell? We’re your easy-going neighbours who always have your backs. We’re always there, quietly lending a hand, backing you up.“

It was a slap in the face.

And what were our American compatriots doing? Those ‘land of the free, home of the brave’ folks were running around in a frantic display of hand-wringing, crying “It’s not us! It’s him! It’s Trump! We love you!”

Yeah, well.

We waited, sure that Americans would do the right thing, would stop their buffoon-bully from trampling over everyone near and far. We were sure they would stop him from shovelling up fortunes despicably extorted from friends and allies. But no. The mighty nation that created a mythology centred on standing up for the little guy and doing the right thing in the face of implacable odds collapsed into dust.

Trump was left to his avaricious rampages.

And here in Canada, we quiet Canadians from coast to coast to coast said, “Enough with this shit.”

We dropped the gloves and together stepped forward to do battle.

We may be a small nation in comparison to the US behemoth, but, if I may say so, we’re quietly formidable as others have learned in the past. While Trump gloated and let his rheumy eyes wander greedily over our resources, we discovered a collective Canadian resolve. We elected a formidable dragonslayer to lead us. He stepped up, calm nimble, and wily. He has faced down the blundering, grievence-driven Trump again and again and not flinched. In the face of Trump’s wrath, he muttered, “Who cares?” and pivoted toward sanity and rule of law. And we everyday Canadians? We punched back where it we know it can hurt, the American pocketbook. In particular, Trump’s MAGA followers’ economies.

We spontaneously started a boycott of American products, in particular liquor, and our governments followed our lead pulling American booze off our shelves.

We changed our travel destinations from New York, Orlando, Palm Springs to London, Montreal, Puerto Vallarta, and the Azores.

And now? Kentucky bourbon is a collapsing industry. The sale of American wine has plummetted. Las Vegas is a ghost town, and house sales by snowbirds in Florida and Arizona are on the rise. Bordertowns are reeling at the massive drop in Canadian cross-border shoppers.

We hate that it has come to this, but we are exhilerated that we Canadians have stood together to face down Trump’s aggression, and are firm in our determination and resolve.

So, hopefully in 2026, Americans will get their shit together and rein in the most egregious of the Trump shitshow. We look forward to a day of reckoning.

Until that day, Elbows Up my friends. Elbows Up.

And may 2026 bring all of us everywhere peace and goodwill.