The American Nightmare

As of writing, the best projections show that the impossible has happened.  Billionnaire-populist Donald Trump has won the United States Presidency.  What was once a punchline now feels more like a punch in the gut.  No doubt pundits and experts will dissect the Clinton campaign’s failures and the Trump campaign’s successes for weeks and months to come.  The overall impact of the Trump election may not be fully understood for years.

What we can’t ignore is that this will have an important impact on our side of the border.  Already, Immigration Canada’s website crashed partway through the evening – three guesses as to where the traffic was coming from.  An old saying in the economics of Canada-US relations goes: when the US gets a cold, Canada catches pneumonia.  We’re all about to have some harsh medicine.

In a broader context, it might appear that Canada is increasingly isolated in the rise of populist, reactionary movements in the West.  Europe’s closed answer to the Syrian refugee crisis, Brexit, and now the Trump presidency make Trudeau’s sunny ways an increasingly dim light.

In a way, Canada’s hold-out status says a lot about who we are as a people.  The rise of anti-intellectual movements sprinkled with open xenophobia and protectionist tendencies we’re seeing all around the world is, in many ways, a reaction by the masses against an establishment that has failed them.  For better or worse, our continued faith in our establishment politics is a testament to the groundedness of our social, political, and economic leaders and policy-makers.  Where the West is increasingly expressing frustration against the political class, lashing out with their basest reactions, we can and must continue to be a beacon of a better way.

This will not be easy.  Our social and political culture is deeply influenced by what happens in Europe and south of the border.  No doubt many here will try to emulate the hateful rhetoric that has succeeded elsewhere.

I am not afraid.  So far, we have already succeeded at resisting and rejecting these movements.  Last year, we Canadians reacted with overwhelming compassion and hope in the face of a Conservative party’s campaign of xenophobia and fear.

No doubt harder times are coming.  Many voices will try to divide us and to blame those who are different from the majority.  These same voices will call for a sort of blind nostalgia for some “good old days” as a justification for harsh policies that will hurt those among us who are most vulnerable – poor people, minorities, immigrants.  They will call for walls where we need windows, for isolation where we need to allies.  Let’s do better.  Let’s keep Canada great for the world.