#nafta

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/12/03/clementsy/#can-tech

For a country obsessed with defining itself as "not America," Canada sure likes to copy US policies, especially the really, really terrible policies – especially the really, really, really terrible digital policies.

In Canada's defense: these terrible US policies are high priority for the US Trade Representative, who leans on Canadian lawmakers to ensure that any time America decides to collectively jump off the Empire State Building, Canadian politicians throw us all off the CN Tower. And to Canada's enduring shame, the USTR never has to look very hard to find a lickspittle who's happy to sell Canadians out.

Take anti-circumvention. In 1998, Bill Clinton signed the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, a gnarly hairball of copyright law whose Section 1201 bans reverse-engineering for any purpose. Under DMCA 1201, "access controls" for copyrighted works are elevated to sacred status, and it's a felony (punishable by a five-year prison sentence and a $500k fine) to help someone bypass these access controls.

That's pretty esoteric, even today, and in 1998, it was nearly incomprehensible, except to a small group of extremely alarmed experts who ran around trying to explain to lawmakers why they should not vote for this thing. But by the time Tony Clement and James Moore (Conservative ministers in the Harper regime) introduced a law to import America's stupidest tech idea and paste it into Canada's lawbooks in 2012, the evidence against anti-circumvention was plain for anyone to see.

Under America's anti-circumvention law, any company that added an "access control" to its products instantly felonised any modification to that product. For example, it's not illegal to refill an ink cartridge, but it is illegal to bypass the access control that gets the cartridge to recognise that it's full and start working again. It's not illegal for a Canadian software developer to sell a Canadian Iphone owner an app without cutting Apple in for a 30% of the sale, but it is illegal to mod that Iphone so that it can run apps without downloading them from the App Store first. It's not illegal for a Canadian mechanic to fix a Canadian's car, but it is illegal for that mechanic to bypass the access controls that prevent third-party mechanics from decrypting the error codes the car generates.

We told Clement and Moore about this, and they ignored us. Literally: when they consulted on their proposal in 2010, we filed 6,138 comments explaining why this was a bad idea, while only 53 parties wrote in to support it. Moore publicly announced that he was discarding the objections, on the grounds that they had come from "babyish" "radical extremists":

https://www.cbc.ca/news/science/copyright-debate-turns-ugly-1.898216

For more than a decade, we've had Clement and Moore's Made-in-America law tied to our ankles. Even when Canada copies some good ideas from the US (by passing a Right to Repair law), or even some very good ideas of its own (passing an interoperability law), Canadians can't use those new rights without risking prosecution under Clement and Moore's poisoned gift to the nation:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/11/15/radical-extremists/#sex-pest

"Not America" is a pretty thin basis for a political identity anyway. There's nothing wrong with copying America's good ideas (like Right to Repair). Indeed, when it comes to tech regulation, the US has had some bangers lately, like prosecuting US tech giants for violating competition law. Given that Canada overhauled its competition law this year, the country's well-poised to tackle America's tech giants.

David Badash at NCRM:

President Donald Trump spent years praising the trade deal he signed into law in 2020, the USMCA — United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement — which was his replacement for NAFTA — the North American Free Trade Agreement. “America’s great USMCA Trade Bill is looking good,” Trump wrote in 2019. “It will be the best and most important trade deal ever made by the USA.” Declaring it would be good for everybody, he cheered, “we will finally end our Country’s worst Trade Deal, NAFTA!” One year earlier, Trump said that his USMCA would serve as a means for Mexico to pay for his border wall: “Mexico is paying for the wall through the many billions of dollars a year that the U.S.A. is saving through the new Trade Deal, the USMCA, that will replace the horrendous NAFTA Trade Deal, which has so badly hurt our Country. Mexico & Canada will also thrive – good for all!” On Wednesday in Paris, the president gave reporters a different take on his deal, suggesting he would prefer to have no trade deal with America’s top trading partners, Canada and Mexico. “I think it’s better without it,” Trump said. “I mean, to be honest with you. I’m not a big fan of it.” He said the reason he had “liked it” was it helped get the U.S. out of NAFTA. “That is the thing I liked about it the most,” Trump insisted. “We do better without an agreement.” The president then offered two different scenarios. He said he would rather leave any USMCA extension “unsigned,” but then declared, “I’d rather have it terminated.”

"It's always easier whenever I talk to you."

Close ups that I liked under the cut:

So Donnie abrogated the USMCA Treaty between the US, Canada, and Mexico by imposing illegal tariffs on the latter two countries, citing bogus 'national security threats'. He did not identify or appeal any specific actions he deemed contrary to the Treaty, just willy-nilly saying it's over.

People sometimes forget that this Treaty was brokered at his request when he was previously president, replacing the NAFTA Treaty of 1994. He agreed to it, made a few adjustments unilaterally, to which Mexico and later Canada agreed, and signed it into law in 2020. It was HIS Treaty and he crowed mightily about it (although in reality it was just NAFTA 2.0).

This is nothing more than a cruel flex against smaller countries, the actions of a schoolyard bully. The sad part is it will cause widespread hardship in all three countries and permanently shatter the trust needed between partners.

I think USA have lost right to be casually named "America". That's the name of a whole continent, not some brawny imitation of a country. Especially since #trump destroyed NAFTA, threatens Mexico with military invasion, and Canada with occupation of their territory.

So my proposal is:

1. Refer to USA as "States". Because USA is in constant States of Decay, Mizery and Hyperpyrexia.

2. "Americans", those who live in USA will become "statoids" or some other form of this word.

Having country administratively divided into states isn't that unique, but USA makes such a huge deal out of it.

Misija opravljena 3.0: Je Venezuela postala nova ameriška bencinska črpalka? ⛽️🌎

Zgodovina se ponavlja, le da so tokratno kuliso za »dostavo demokracije« postavili v Južni Ameriki. Medtem ko svet opazuje aretacijo Madura, se v ozadju vrti stara dobra zgodba o težki nafti in strateških interesih.

Kje v tem naftnem šahu pa je Evropa? Na balkonu – opazuje sosedov pretep in se pretvarja, da jo kamin še greje, čeprav ji je že zdavnaj zmanjkalo kurjave. ❄️🇪🇺

Je to res konec krize ali le začetek novega poglavja odvisnosti?

👉 Celoten (sarkastičen) zapis si preberite na mojem blogu: