are you saying America has never stood up to bullies? and who are they bullying?
You can make a case for Canada. At least diplomatically bullying.
Take the softwood lumber dispute. Canadian mills could sell lumber and pulp and paper products to the United States cheaper than American mills and with better quality.
The United States subsidizes its foresty industry, which is against trading rules. As a result, the economy in my region (Northern Ontario) is absolute garbage as we relied on forestry and mining.
So Canada took the US to international courts to resolve the dispute. Time after time after time, the courts rules in Canada's favour and said the US had to pay back the sum of 50 billion (I forget the exact amount, but I think it was around there). The US says "Nah, we'll give you 10 billion."
Canadians, especially the ones in Northern Ontario who lost their jobs were livid. They demanded the Prime Minister not take the offer and keep pushing for the full amount. The PM caved because Canada is sometimes a spineless country.
So now, the US keeps subsidizing its forestry industry (despite its illegality) and Canada keeps looking for ways to reduce costs to almost nothing in order to get competitive again with the US. It's not really working out.
And now the problem is being exacerbated because now the Chinese mills can undersell the American mills. Minnesota used to get their paper from Northern Ontario. Makes sense, right? Now it's cheaper for them to ship a roll of newsprint from CHINA then to import one from across the border in Canada.
So our politicians have basically given up on Northern Ontario and most of them refuse to acknowledge it exists.
...At least that's how I understand it.
The story does have a positive note. My city, once dependent on forestry and mining jobs, is moving to the knowledge sector. Labs are opening left and right here and we have some of the top labs in the world, believe it or not.
