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Trump Is Eyeing Canada, Greenland, and Panama Canal to Ape Putin

Tuesday, January 7, 2025 at 8:25 PM
Written by Anthony L. Hall

For Trump power is a mirror where he kisses the rings of autocrats as billionaires kiss his

Trump: Everybody wants to be my friend

Suddenly, everyone is kissing ass to curry favor with MAGA America, thinking it will help them thrive. That explains billionaire Jeff Bezos greenlighting a propaganda biopic on Melania Trump, sports commentator Stephen A. Smith gushing to MAGA’s chief propagandist Sean Hannity about their friendship, and liberal comedian Bill Maher sounding more like right-wing podcaster Steve Bannon.

But nobody has dismayed me more than pundit Van Jones. You’ve probably heard about Trump taunting Canadians, suggesting they should give up their independence to become the 51st state. Frankly, the only responsible reaction is to dismiss this as absurd – like most of the idle bluster Trump spews. Instead, Jones belittled his reputation and sullied democratic politics by getting into the gutter with Trump:

‘I don’t understand why anybody is mad at Trump about this,’ the pundit said Monday on CNN’s NewsNight. ‘If Trump — I’m serious. If Trump wants for Canada to become the 51st [state], that would be a huge blue state,’ he told the panel.

Van Jones Misses the point of Greenland

But, if you’re going to dignify Trump’s blandishment with serious commentary, here’s the point Jones should have made:

  • Trump is aping Putin, his puppet master. With Project 2025, he wants to turn American democracy into a Russian-style autocracy. He wants dominion over Canada like Putin has over Belarus. He wants to annex Greenland like Putin annexed Crimea. And he wants to invade Panama like Putin invaded Ukraine.

 

Trump eyeing claims on Greenland, Canada, Panama Canal with images of Van Jones, Sean Hannity and Stephen A Smith inset

Ukraine, Panama, Greenland, Taiwan: Trump’s normalizing land grabs

Meanwhile, he’s daring Denmark to defend Greenland against America, the way Britain defended the Falkland Islands against Argentina. But here’s to Denmark calling his bluff. Because I suspect the US military would mount a coup before following Trump’s orders to invade Greenland.

He’s framing his Putin-style land grab as necessary for national security. But even this Supreme Court would be loath to grant him absolute immunity to invade Greenland on a pretext more trumped-up than Putin’s for Ukraine.

Trump’s providing democratic cover for his autocratic friends

Apropos of Putin, the prevailing story afoot is that Trump is providing cover for his authoritarian friends. By threatening to take Greenland — by force if necessary — he’s signaling support for Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and Xi’s for Taiwan.

Beyond this, Trump seems hell-bent on alienating US friends and embracing enemies. His mercenary ignorance is such that he probably thinks the more America seems at war with friends and neighbors, the easier it will be for him to heed his puppet master’s bidding to normalize relations with Russia.

Frankly, Putin and Xi can be forgiven for thinking Trump is doing more to advance their axis of autocracies than either of them. Alas, this is the autocratic, bullying, and brazenly un-American man the American people willfully reelected as president of the United States.

God help America!