This year, like every other year, Americans will celebrate Independence Day with flag-waving, and parades, and fireworks. The political system the flag and the parades and fireworks are supposed to represent is in tatters, but everybody likes a party. It was 249 years ago, when the United States separated from the British Empire. Over the past year it has separated from the world order it built over those 249 years, and from basic sanity and decency as well. For Americans, the madness gripping their country is a catastrophe. For non-Americans, it is an accidental revolution. This Independence Day, the world is declaring its independence from the US.
As the United States retreats from the world, it is reshaping the lives of its former trading partners and allies, leaving huge holes in its wake. For Canada, where I live, the sudden absence of a responsible United States has been more shocking and more terrifying than for other countries. Americans are our friends and neighbours, often our family. We have been at peace with them for 200 years, integrating with their security apparatuses and markets. Now they are explicitly planning to weaken us economically in order to annex us.
