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EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'

693 points · 905 comments · hackernj

  1. neom · · focus · HN ↗
    No idea what this actually means, if it means easier trade, I'm all for anything that reduces our dependency on the yanks, as long as we don't need to be involved in their regulatory or legal regimes. The Americans are no longer our friends, Salut, mes amis Européens. :)
    1. method_capital · · focus · HN ↗
      I'm afraid you're mistaking our lunatic leader with "us". Understandable, but this step will be wholly unnecessary as soon as December when his power will be checked (largely). I lean right, more libertarian small government type, so you're not hearing this from a blowhard on the American left. His foreign policy, the way he's treated friends has been wanton and immensely damaging, and a whole lot of us want this corrected.
      1. neom · · focus · HN ↗
        You're right, I am confused. It was clear what was going on under his first term... You guys voted him back in!!
        1. enoint · · focus · HN ↗
          The system elected him without a majority.
          1. bryanlarsen · · focus · HN ↗
            It was 49.9% vs 48.3%. The 1.8% of people voting for a 3rd party candidate and those who didn't vote were implicitly endorsing Trump.
            1. enoint · · focus · HN ↗
              That’s a weird way to say 50.1% of votes were against Trump.
              1. bryanlarsen · · focus · HN ↗
                Agreed, it is a weird way of saying that. But it is basically what I'm saying.

                I used the word "endorsed", not "voted". The distinction does matter.

                Only about 25% of the voting age public voted for Trump. Almost 25% of the voting age public weren't registered to vote, perhaps some of them wanted to vote but couldn't, so let's use the registered voters as the denominator. 75.8% of them voted; roughly one third for Trump, one third for Harris and one third didn't vote.

                Choosing not to vote against a likely outcome is an endorsement of that outcome in my opinion.

                1. enoint · · focus · HN ↗
                  We usually rely on polling for those answers. When you encounter a randomly-selected American on the street, do you find it 50/50? I’m in Wyoming, perhaps the reddest state, and it’s close to 50/50.
                  1. bryanlarsen · · focus · HN ↗
                    The third of the people who didn't vote are culpable.
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