It has recently come to me that I literally have no choice but to start blogging again as the dysfunction in our governance, politics, courts et al has proven itself so resoundingly stupid that I’m left feeling that if I don’t say something no-one ever will.
I’m 77 years old this July and have never been involved in anything other than what I was involved in as, lacking in formal (academic) education I was left with no choice but to become an entrepreneur back when the word entrepreneur was a bad word. Then in the seventies or so being an entrepreneur came into vogue and gained respectability.
Prior to our last federal election I had never voted and never belonged to any Party.let alone a political one. I built my successful career around identifying problems for businesses and selling those businesses solutions to problems that in the majority of cases they had no idea that they had. I became well known as a sales trainer and hustled a respectable living despite no university background at all. Thankfully reputation still worked and I had a reputation as someone that could get the job, any job done,
My business portfolio offers a full spectrum of visionary project ranges from introducing residential condos to Canada, to syndicating two self produced television series, with my major success culminating in simplycondos.com introducing the first Toronto condo web site and “buyer agency” connecting global condo investors to Toronto condominiums.
So, since retiring a few years back I’ve had the time and luxury of learning what really is going on in society and I would be remiss if I didn’t say how shockingly disappointing the reality has proven to be.
I’ve been so blessed in my life that I’ve never involved in anything other than enjoying my wife (and business partner of three and a half decades) and my very well earned retirements. But simplycharles.com is not about me. It is about our seriously flawed Canadian political situation.
I’ve long held the view that my never having attended university might have been the magic that forced the creativity that was required to achieve the successes that we achieved which is something that I literally could not have done myself. The only “Partnership” that ever delivered (and there were many that did not) was when the stars aligned and we met. We struggled for almost a decade and then finally the internet caught up to our vision that I’ve been told was the literal prototype for realtor.ca.
But simplycondos/simplycharles is no longer about trading residential condominiums. I sold the domain simplycondos.com after almost two decades of being the only digital game in town which lead me to happily retire.
So I am left with no choice but to go to work at least making available an honest perspective of developments as I see them unfold before me and I don’t want to get side tracked with the small stuff.
Donald Trump has already officially declared war against us but has relied on perpetrating an economic war. But I do not feel that he is the sole problem as America has a civilized understanding historically about how a democracy is supposed to work. The indictment rests with the collective of the American people, who could stand up and put enough heat on their political representatives to get them to stand up to the bullying that has taken over the country.
I actually think that America is beyond saving but that is not my concern. My concern is with Canada with what I’ve complained about for half a century now which is how Canadians have been copying and literally emulating Americans. We have copied their television and movies all my life and these days we can see our key political players literally copying American style politics and using their corrupt tactics as though they are acceptable. They are not!
And this is where Prime Minister Mark Carney comes in and I want to make a point that it seems everyone in the media misses repetitively, simply using only his surname. He is the Prime Minister and should be addressed as so by all at all times. That’s called civil respect and it is as it should be. These are the uniquely Canadian characteristics that we’ve forfeited over the years of copying American media.
When I was growing up here in Canada, Americans were openly but respectfully seen as “snake oil salesmen” and yes, we Canadians were seen as “boring non-resk takers“. And oh, how the facts have proven those historic adjectives accurate.
Well, that all changed materially when Prime Minister Carney brought his experience and unique hands-on expertise home to Canada. If anyone is uncertain of this man’s credentials ard/or credibility, you really can Google it and I assure you that you will be impressed. He earned a Phd from Oxford, big corporate background, Governor of the Bank of Canada handling the crash of 2008, Governor of the Bank of England handling Brexit, and a list of accomplishments far to long to state again here (but all characteristics that are unique to the challenges introduced by America attempting to take over our nation!
I mentioned that this was the first time in my life that I ever voted for anyone in any election anywhere. I actually see our “Party System approach to democracy” here in Canada as seriously and materially flawed as America’s flawed concept of democracy (and why not when we’ve been socially conditioned to act like them for my lifetime).
My logical foundational question is: “when did lying become socially acceptable“? For the record, lying is not even close to Canadian standards of integrity however I’ve learned that it is gaining prominence here in Canada based on conduct of the Conservative Party of Canada and its Leader.
It literally makes me feel sad to read comments by so-called Canadians on various social media sites like Facebook (I spend a maximum of 15 minutes daily (which is about all I can take) just to be sure that my condemnation of these people is valid) and on Youtube (which appears to carry upwards of 85% AI generated material, which is good news as well as bad news rapped up in one).
I understand that many comments are actually not people at all but rather, are bots programmed to challenge any legitimate commentary and that carries itself forward throughout the conventional press.
simplycharles.com is simply a published record on the reality that I see unfolding. So, as of today I’m going to publish my analysis using AI on YouTube (I spend hours daily sifting through the garbage to find verifiable facts so you don’t have to). If I were you I would rely on simplycharles.com over trying to navigate through the AI jungle that is YouTube. You will find everything and anything on YouTube with contradictory news readily available on pretty much every topic imaginable. It can actually be more confusing that not reading anything!
So, today I want to address the latest developments in the low budget reality tv series known as America Today and specifically how our provably brilliant Prime Minister has amazed me with skills that I’m confident most Canadians are not even aware of.
Amidst all the lunacy that the entire world has observed over the past year and a half or so there has been one steady hand by the most prolific negotiator that I’ve ever seen in my life. I’ve always felt and my business successes supports that I am an above average negotiator (my career has been negotiating) but I can tell you that I would suggest that Prime Minister Carney is way above my pay grade. This guy is world class!
America prepared a 47 page document ahead of a scheduled Summit that was to be held in Ottawa between Canadian and American Trade Negotiators entitled: “A Framework For Bilateral Trade Normalization Restoring The Foundation of North American Partnership“.
The America negotiators had sculpted the document over six weeks and it had been studied by four Federal Departments and signed off by the White House Chief of Staff. It resembled more of a snake oil salesman’s sales brochure but as with most things introduced by the Americans in this fight the substance proved to be based solely on lies.
Prime Minister Carney is reported to have read the document in just fourteen minutes, paused for about ten seconds, adjusted his tie, closed his folder, stood up without saying a word, and walked out of the meeting.
I employed exactly the same tactic when negotiating with the developer of the Churchill Park Condo in Toronto’s prestigious Forest Hill area. I had been invited in to meet the developer by his agent Pat Baker and following some short introductions the developer threw out that “he really didn’t need my help” and my rear end barley touched the chair and I packed up and walked out without saying another word. When he caught up to me at the elevator I simply told him that if he had no need for my services we were wasting both of our time. I earned my living by identifying developments that I felt would not meet their sales requirements to get their funding and for his agent to call me it was clear that he did need my investors.
In the end my investor group bought almost half of the suites required to give him his financing and save face and millions of dollars with a failed site! And as usual the developer proved untrustworthy and delivered a flawed building. What about protection under the Condo Act. My honest answer is that you have virtually no protection under the Act. But this exercise proves that in real world negotiations it is not the person making the noise that is in control.
So let’s take a look at the American demands but first it is important to realize that the negotiations did not start when Prime Minister Carney shut his folder. The negotiations actually had started seven weeks earlier when America called for a Summit and Prime Minister Carney agreed to host it in the Chateau Laurier Hotel in Ottawa. America had asked for the Summit seven times and each time Canada had required it to be held in Ottawa on Prime Minister Carney’s timetable.. Why? It’s called negotiating tactics and observably Prime Minister Carney is quite talented and skilled at it.
Nineteen senior American Trade officials had flown into Ottawa and just before the Summit started, the Americans delivered their “Framework For Bilateral Trade Normalization Restoring The Foundation of North American Partnership“. Prime Minister Carney quietly read it for just fourteen minutes while all delegates on both sides sat quietly.
Their “Framework For Bilateral Trade Normalization Restoring The Foundation of North American Partnership” was a joke (a bad one but a joke just the same) as it was a total dismantlement of everything Canada had just built over the past eighteen months and offered absolutely nothing of benefit to Canada. Prime Minister Carney remained stoic, calm and emotionless. He then calmly stood up and walked out without saying a word. When he reached the door his Trade Minister and Finance Minister stood followed by his Foreign Affairs Minister followed by the remaining Canadian delegation. In a total of 17 seconds they were all exiting the door.
The head American trade official uttered the Prime Minister’s name as the door was closing. The Americans sat for 6 minutes literally dumbfounded without saying a word.. Prime Minister Carney was heard saying only two words to his Ministers and walked away.
Forty minutes later Prime Minister Carney was a a lecture in the Parliament Buildings where he laid out each point in the Framework For Bilateral Trade Normalization Restoring The Foundation of North American Partnership and then he delivered one of the shortest statement of his entire tenure as Prime Minister, just 10 words . . . “Canada does not negotiate the terms of its own existence“.
The document consisted of 47 pages formatted in the language of a partnership and offered in exchange for nothing (so very American).
Let’s have a look at America’s so-called: Framework For Bilateral Trade Normalization Restoring The Foundation of North American Partnership:
- Suspend its bilateral trade framework with the European Union for 24 months pending a joint review process (in other words “stop trading with Europe on your terms until we decide if we agree with those terms“);
- Restore pre-2024 Energy protocols for American buyers (despite Canada enjoying a 23% premium in Europe);
- It demanded dismantlement of Canada’s Commodities Settlement infrastructure (the parallel financial architecture Prime Minister Carney had built to process trade outside dollar denominated frameworks that had already settled $340 Billion in non dollar trade)
- It demanded that Canada issue a public joint statement affirming the bilateral relationship as the cornerstone of Canadian international economic engagement (which would have directly contradicted every trade diversification announcement Prime Minister Carney had made in the previous 14 months);
- It demanded compliance verification mechanisms with a joint oversight commission, American appointed chair, American veto authority over Canadian implementation time lines ;
- It demanded Canada formally retract three (3) specific public statements made by Prime Minister Carney in the preceding 6 months, statements in which he had described the bilateral relationship as a “a dependency Canada has outgrown”, retract those words and sign a statement saying “‘the relationship is the cornerstone of Canadian economic life“, freeze your European trade deals, “accept below market energy prices”, dismantle your non-dollar settlement infrastructure, submit your trade policy to America veto authority and do all of this in exchange for a conditional partial phased reduction of tariffs.
It literally offered Canada nothing! So very American! I’m sure you can see why our Prime Minister walked out with commenting. Had he shown being offended or hostile it would not have had comparable impact as having our entire trade delegation, without saying a word simply stand up and politely walk out.
So this is my message to the Conservative Party of Canada who’s leader has been lying and disparaging our Prime Minister who, in this one example (tune in frequently as I’m got a whole lot more proof on what is going on in our trade negotiations that you will not find anywhere in conventional media.
That’s all for now . . . . I’m Charles
