Andrew MacDougall: Maybe we should just bribe Trump
It might be dirty and degrading, but you have to admit it would work.
By: Andrew MacDougall
Guys, what if we just straight-up bribed the President of the United States of America?
That’s where my mind keeps going when reading the rumours, speculation, and partisan back and forth over Mark Carney’s negotiation/not-negotiation with the Trump Administration. Just pay the man.
Not the administration. The man. Or his family.
What? You don’t think it’ll work? Well, Qatar gave Trump a $400-million plane. A Dubai-based former hardwood-floor seller turned crypto tycoon facing a money laundering investigation in the United Kingdom has just given the Trump family’s World Liberty Financial another $100 million. Oh, and two Belgian diamond firms just gifted Trump an 18-karat gold ring encrusted with 321 diamonds to avoid tariffs. And it worked! Indeed, you don’t see Trump hassling any of these people, places, or things.
So pay the man. Take the amount the Canadian economy stands to lose out from a protracted trade fight, slice a percentage off, and stick it straight into the Trump empire. And don’t be shy about it; the President doesn’t mind the publicity over his naked corruption. The man is charging people for access to his market moving “truths,” for fuck’s sake. It’s brazen and admirably clear. Deals don’t matter to Trump — or stick — unless he gets his cut. So cut him in.
Now, Mark Carney doesn’t seem like the kind of man who enjoys paying a bribe. Au contraire, he’s the man who’s used to being in command and having the smoke blown up his proverbial. But nor does he seem like the type who enjoys being put over a barrel. And right now our national backside is raw following the Gordie Howe bridge debacle and other Trump ignomies. So send the grease in the direction of Trump’s palm, and move it away from the vicinity of Canada’s collective rump.
Sure it’s dirty. And degrading. So let’s make it academic, and call it an update to Thomas Freidman’s famous “Golden Arches Theory of Conflict,” which held that two nations with McDonald’s had never gone to war. The new “Bribing Trump Theory of Conflict” says that people who pay Trump don’t get bombed. Or tariffed. Forget the The Davos Speech™, the BTTOC can be Carney’s legacy to world affairs.
What’s the alternative, signing a “deal?” Signing a piece of paper with Trump is meaningless and worthless, as NAFTA into CUSMA into clusterfuck proves. When it comes to Trump, logic and consistency will only break your heart. How many times has Trump waffled, wavered or TACO’d? But he never welshes or flips once you make him richer. Personally richer.
There are a number of ways to go about this. Trump loves golf? Take St. George’s, Crowbush, Cabot Cliffs, Ancaster, Banff National Springs, and Capilano, and add them into the Trump Golf collection. Trump wouldn’t dare tariff us then, not when he has skin in the game. Trump also loves and wants Greenland. So why not give him the Queen Elizabeth Islands instead? He bloody loved the Queen and now he’ll love Canada.
We could also play to Trump’s vanity. The president wants his face on a piece of rock? We have the damn Rockies, so chisel him in somewhere between Banff and Jasper and then dynamite him off once he leaves office. Put him on the damn $100 bill for all I care.
Or, if that’s all too embarrassing and complicated, we can simply stroke a big check and become Trump crypto players. Or buy a whole building’s worth of his shitty condos in whatever Godforsaken hellscape the Trump Organization is now building them. Or become major investors in Trump Media & Technology Group. Just make sure it hits the bottom line.
Canada, it’s time to swallow our pride. This is the most effective way to get those elbows up. Who knows, it could end up being the best investment we’ve ever made. So call Dominic Leblanc and Janice Charette back home and pay the man.
Andrew MacDougall is a director at Trafalgar Strategy and former head of communications to Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
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Or maybe we could just give him the CBC? That way we could get 2 birds stoned at once.
He's always wanted a football team, and I bet Rogers would be willing to give up the Argonauts.
It would probably work out for their fans too, since the new ownership would just ignore the salary cap.