Last week at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney gave what is likely to be remembered as an historic speech in which he declared “there has been a rupture in the world order, the end of a pleasant fiction and the beginning of a harsh reality, where geopolitics, where the large, main power, geopolitics, is submitted to no limits, no constraints.” He made it clear that America’s allies finally understood that the reelection of Donald Trump had ushered in a new era in which the rule book that had, for better or worse, guided the world for over 80 years has just been thrown out the window. Carney urged what he called the “middle powers” to stand up for their principles and self-interest.
One couldn’t help but think of that call to arms just a couple of days later when former special prosecutor Jack Smith appeared before the House Judiciary Committee to testify for the first time in public. While his opening statement will not have the historic significance of Carney’s speech, the sentiment was very much the same: There has been a rupture and something important is at stake.
