Pick your warrior

 The obsession of 2025 so far has been the endless back and forth on tariffs between the United States and Canada. It's been the most uniting thing to hit this country in the last couple of decades but despite that unity, Donald Trump continues to push his rhetoric and has even pushed so far as to say he's going to annex Canada - by force if necessary. 

So this led to a conversation this past weekend about what our wartime roles would be during the Canada/US of the 2020's

For my part, I'm excited to get into making propaganda. I'm too old for battlefield work and I doubt I could get past the physical. But that doesn't mean I don't have anything to offer the war effort. Dr Seuss famously put his talents to work making ads for war bonds and the like during World War II. Maybe I could get some work writing jingles about how to defeat the US. I've already written a protest song about the current situation. Maybe I can be put to work writing songs about arming your AI sub-machine gun or how to outrun an American. I dunno. But that's the role I think I'm best accustomed to. 

We've joked that Kayah's role is pretty easy. We'd just take her ADHD meds away, give her a Red Bull and just point her towards the border. They'd surrender in days. 

Rhonda has already been making plans with her co-workers on how they'd run their own M*A*S*H* camp. They'll be less sarcastic and far more judgie. I tried to extract what her nickname would be - Hot Lips Houlihan is already taken. Maybe she could be Randy Rhonda? Instead of a homemade gin-still in the doctor's tent, they'd have a weed grow-op in the nurse's tent. Modern times call for modern numbing agents. 

Jonas, as a young, white male would make excellent cannon fodder. But he hasn't spent his entire youth playing video games just to be sent out to the killing fields. I think someone is gonna have to fly the drones - and he'd be great for that. I could also use his video editing skills in my propaganda machine. He's far more useful with a mouse than he is in combat boots! 

I'm still undecided on The Navigator. I think overall he'd be one of those Army Engineers who can build a bridge out of hay and peanut-butter cups that's strong enough to support a phalanx of tanks. He would also be an excellent mentor to Jonas and the work he'd do running war drones. I don't know if the Navigator has ever actually piloted a drone, but he ran a sound console for a few years and I assume that the skillset is transferrable. 

Overall - who knows what would happen in a Canada/US war. I do hope that cooler heads prevail over the next few months. Frankly, I hope that the Republican-dominated Congress sees just how much Trump is concentrating power under one man, how much that one man is destabilizing the world and that someone starts to step up to stop him. Whether he's a Russian plant or not, he's doing exactly what the Russians want and any war between Canada and the US is going to pale in comparison to what the Russians will do once things erode enough. The relationship we had as countries up until a few months ago was intentional and had purpose. One can't help but think that the destruction of that relationship has a purpose too.