(AP Photo/Frank Augstein, File)
President Donald Trump’s bizarre obsession with insisting that Canada become the “51st State” has pivoted from trollish trash talk to something in which he seems to believe.
Trump is known for his unique form of political kayfabe, perhaps learned from his days on the WWF circuit, knowing that controlling conflict is the easiest way to control the media and, therefore, the narrative. And he’s done it incredibly successfully, as nearly every media outlet — including ours — has not been able to resist taking the bait of outrage he tosses out on the regular.
Much has been made about Trump’s shifting tariff policy towards our biggest trade allies and longest-running allies, Mexico and Canada, which was explained by many as a negotiating tactic to get better border security and help stem the flow of fentanyl into the United States. While one might criticize the ethical nature of this approach, or the on-again-off-again tariff policy has cratered the investment markets, there is no arguing that Trump effectively bullied Mexico and Canada into taking action, even if much of what they agreed to had already long been planned.
But the 51st state thing is a different rhetorical beast altogether. And Trump has said it so repeatedly that it now seems clear as day that it’s no longer a troll but rather something he fully believes in, which is absolutely INSANE given the lack of reason, logic, or even an operational plan for how that would unfold, short of a military invasion.
Yes, I’m actually positing the previously considered unthinkable — the next step for a sitting president to make good on his international foreign policy desire is to draw up military plans for invading our neighbor to the north with whom we share a border. It would not be the first time in his second term in office that he would have military plans drawn up for such an invasion.
During a Thursday press availability with reporters in the Oval Office while meeting with the head of NATO, Trump centubled on his argument that Canada must join the United States, insisting that Canada “only works as a state.” Trump said:
But it comes a point when you just can’t do that. You have to run your own country. And to be honest with you, Canada only works as a state. It doesn’t. We don’t need anything. They have as a state. It would be one of the great states anywhere. This would be the most incredible country visually. If you look at a map, they drew an artificial line right through it between Canada and the U.S. just a straight artificial line. Somebody did it a long time ago, many, many decades ago. And it makes no sense.
It’s so perfect as a great and cherished state. Keeping, ‘Oh, Canada,’ the national anthem, I love it. I think it’s great. Keep it. But it’ll be for the state. One of our greatest states, maybe our greatest state. But why should we subsidize another country for 200 billion, costs us $200 billion a year? And again, we don’t need their lumber. We don’t need their energy.
We have more than they do. We don’t need anything. We don’t need their cars. I’d much rather make the cars here. And there’s not a thing that we need. Now there’ll be a little disruption, but it won’t be very long. But they need us. We really don’t need them. And we have to do this. I’m sorry. We have to do this.
Again, this makes no sense. Yet, he’s said it so many times, one can only take his needlessly expansionist rhetoric at face value. There is no other explanation behind his desire to annex our neighbors other than he truly believes it’s in America’s best interest.
And if that’s true, there are only two reasons for it: he sees himself as another strong leader willing to just take whatever territory he wants from a sovereign country — like Russian President Vladimir Putin did with Ukraine. OR… he’s officially lost his mind.
Some have suggested that Trump is simply following a Nietzschean model of “will to power” — envisioning or bringing desired things into existence. Or maybe he’s acting like an egocentric toddler who cannot comprehend not getting a toy he wants to play with or just having his way.
I think there is much more apparent reasoning to this weird position — it started as a joke of sorts, but Trump repeated it so often that he now believes it himself. More importantly, he lives in such a bubble of sycophancy that no close advisor is willing to risk their standing to just flat out tell him, “Mr. President? The 51st state stuff makes you look and sound crazy.”
The parable of the Emperor’s new clothes comes to mind, but instead of magical see through threads, Trump is nakedly acting like a strongman expansionist — the very sort that Americans used to risk their lives, and sometimes make the greatest sacrifice, to protect our allies from.
Oh how times have changed.
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.
