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Is US President Joe Biden good or bad for Canada? This question sets a simple binary answer. But if forced to make a choice, the Canadians’ answer is clear: Biden is good for Canada. Let us explain.

First of all, as De Gaulle said, the country has no friends; they are interested. These benefits can be economic, geo-strategic or based on values; but they often do not change much, despite the political marketing, no matter who is responsible. Strategy and tactics will be different, but the core national interests of a country are eternal.

Canadians have a complicated relationship with the United States. We worry about being ignored or being overshadowed. Moreover, although there are no friends between countries, we are still proud of our "friendship" with the United States. Former Prime Minister Jean Chretien described it this way: "Our friendship has no limits."

But now is 2021, and a lot has changed since the Chretien era. Geopolitical changes are accelerating. The United States has interests. The same goes for Canada. Sometimes these interests converge; other times, they don't. Regardless of the circumstances, the trick is always to maximize Canada’s sovereign policy freedom.

People in the “Biden is not good for Canada” camp pointed out that he cancelled the Keystone XL pipeline on the first day of his presidency, apparently having little or no consideration for Canada’s concerns.

They will notice that Canada is excluded from the new security agreement between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States, known as the "AUKUS" group.

There is no doubt that they would say that the government's protectionist "Buy America" ​​strategy echoes Trump's protectionism, and it hurts Canada the most.

But that's the point: whatever impact the Biden administration may have on bilateral relations, it must be compared with what Trump's second administration has done in its place.

Canada’s pursuit of its national interests requires a rules-based international order and well-functioning international institutions. The Trump era is deeply disturbing; protectionist attacks on Canadian steel and aluminum are just the most compelling examples. The rules-based international order and its supporting institutions, whether it is the World Trade Organization, the World Health Organization, the Paris Agreement, or various free trade institutions including the North American Free Trade Agreement and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, have all been positively affected. Repel. After the 2018 G7 summit in Charlevoix, Quebec, Trump made a notorious tirade against Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who described Trudeau as “very dishonest and weak".

Although Biden may not be the free trader that Canadians hope for, he is a friend of international institutions. He returned the United States to the Paris Agreement, the Human Rights Council, and the World Health Organization. Gone are the threats of withdrawing the United States from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, withdrawing American forces from Europe, or withdrawing military support to the Pacific Rim allies. Biden is hosting an international democracy summit whose purpose is to defend democracy, human rights and the rule of law.

In short, Biden has brought much-needed stability to international relations and bilateral affairs. Canada needs this.

However, beyond the duality argument, there is a bigger truth. In other words, Canadians’ traditional perspective on Canada-US relations and geopolitics is outdated. In the pursuit of American interests, the United States now regards the Pacific Ocean, and mainly Australia, as a bastion against a rising China; it focuses on Europe and sees the concentration of Russian military threats. Under such circumstances, is it no wonder that government officials have almost no time to satisfy Canada’s request for free trade in electric vehicles?

This is why we have been working on a multi-pronged effort for several months at the International Governance Innovation Center to revitalize Canada’s thinking about national security. We brought together more than 250 experts to participate in this work, and one message evoked repercussions: In a world that is more dangerous, increasingly digital, and no longer unipolar, Canadians must put aside post-war concerns about geography, natural wealth, and proximity to the world. The confidence of leading democracies. Will keep us safe. Greater investment in resources and political energy is no longer optional: it is necessary.

Like most politicians, the president of the United States is more interested in his legacy than doing the right thing for his own people, let alone foreign people, and Joe Biden is no exception.

Because the threshold for the last person is too low, it is easy for people to regard Biden as an excellent president and think that his policies are better just because he often speaks coherently.

But don’t be fooled: regardless of comparison with his predecessor, Biden’s policies in two key areas — pandemics and climate emergencies — clearly show that he is not a friend of Canada.

As far as the pandemic is concerned, Biden is the entire obstacle to the vaccine patent exemption, and the vaccine patent exemption is the entire obstacle to defeating this unfortunate virus. At least, abandoning patents will flood the world with cheap vaccines, reduce the mortality rate of the virus, and suspend its spread and variability.

Within a few years, the virus may be eradicated. More importantly, the lives of tens of thousands or even hundreds of people will be saved, and the pressure on our healthcare system, not to mention the global economy, will be relieved. Normality, or something close to it, will appear logically.

Although Biden issued a statement earlier this year that he supports this idea, his government has not taken any action to achieve this goal, and tens of thousands of people have died unnecessarily due to this inaction.

According to reports, not only did the US delegation to the World Trade Organization’s Trade-Related Intellectual Property Council not take any action to advance Biden’s position on this matter, Sarah Lazar reported in these times that they have not yet published Any statement or position. The specific vaccine exemption proposal, but proposed by India and South Africa, dates back to October 2020.

In other words, it is not that Biden does nothing, but that he does less than anything.

Biden’s inaction will affect us, because as long as people are not vaccinated, the virus will continue to mutate and the pandemic will continue. This will ultimately endanger our population, weaken our economy and destroy our lives. quality.

The South of the world has not been vaccinated because they are anti-vaccination people (a kind of social abnormality, mainly a disease of the so-called "first" world). This is because the most powerful people in the world have not insisted on giving up vaccine patents at all. Something that ostensibly supports.

Biden also failed Canada in its incoherent approach to the climate emergency. Here, the US President also said one thing, but did the opposite. For example, he claimed to deal with climate change while auctioning off new drilling permits in the Gulf of Mexico. Just as Biden is the only obstacle to abandoning vaccine patents, he is also the main obstacle to taking meaningful action to avoid climate catastrophe.

Not only will other countries in the world follow the example of the United States to radically reduce or even eliminate the consumption of fossil fuels, but the United States is, to a considerable extent, the world's largest oil and oil consumer. gas.

Even before inspiring other countries to take similar actions, the United States is actively working to eliminate the use of these toxic energy sources, which will have global significance.

Given that the United States is the largest single importer of Canadian oil (which happens to be the most ecologically destructive oil in the world), such a promise will force Canada to immediately follow suit. Given that Justin Trudeau’s climate policy is completely incoherent (if not incompetent), we are basically at the mercy of the American leadership, and under Biden’s leadership, the American leadership is equally incompetent and incompetent. coherent.

Joe Biden is not a rude arrogant like his predecessor, this is all he has done for him. In terms of policy, he continued the downward trend of the self-centered, short-sighted, generally reckless, and often illegal "America First" geopolitical strategy that has been characteristic of the presidential administration for the past four years.

The President of the United States is rarely a true friend of Canada, and we better remember this. Don't ask whether the President of the United States is good for you, but what better example we can set for Americans.

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