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Carney at Davos
21/01/26
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Jan. 20, 2026
Where does one even begin to pick up the gaslighting load of horse manure that Carney laid down at Davos today? The loss of the global order he mourns – the so-called rupture – is that of North American and European white people's stability and relative distance from the organized violence that this nation, among others, contributes to and profits from. We are scared, Carney and the global elite agree at Davos, that some of the chickens may be coming home to roost. That is the brutal reality, and to make a market correction, one bathed in the usual gobbled gluck of human rights and Canadian values, we need to find different exploitation partners because Big Daddy is not as reliable as he once was.
What I heard today was a warmed over rehash of the 1948 basis for the world order for which a rupture has been named: PPS 23, written by American mandarin George Kennan, that laid out the "pragmatic" (a term Carney loves) rationale behind the global system of violence that has murdered tens of millions of people since 1945 in the name of democracy, human rights, and a stable investment climate. "We have about 50% of the world's wealth but only 6.3% of its population... In this connection, we cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national security….We should cease to talk about vague and unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better."
This world order was fine as long as we white people were not the ones being genocided in Sudan or Gaza or Vietnam or East Timor or Guatemala or Rwanda or Turtle Island, among many others, as along as our Muslim loved ones were not being interned in Chinese or Syrian concentration camps, as long as our loved ones did not have to spend decades on boil water alerts in a land occupied by a genocidal state that kidnapped and tortured and mass-incarcerated our children, and still does.
Carney’s pretence that the past 80 years of Canadian-supported, funded and armed state terror (with its big brother the USA in the lead) was somehow an OK norm that has suddenly been ruptured because supply chains for massive corporations are at risk, along with bottom lines. It's the ultimate pulling of the wool over our eyes and throwing out the bleak history in which we have played such a nefarious role.
Canada as a "middle power" has done significant damage to the global ecosystem and human rights infrastructure. I will have more to write on this, but if we take a breath, appreciate the fine words, and THEN look at who is saying them and why, I think it will become clear why Bay Street and Wall Street (indeed, the Global elites who cause this massive violence and sustain the gross economic inequality and gave Carney a standing ovation) are applauding. Someone is going to save the most rapacious predatory system the world has ever known (notice how Carney used an example of communism, not capitalism, to talk about the illusions of false promises), and we will retire to our elite villa suites in the Swiss mountains to cogitate on it all.
It's because what Carney is proposing is predatory late-stage capitalism on a slightly different axis. We can continue to mine the earth, invade Indigenous territories, burn through fossil fuels, cook the planet, steal from the poor to give to the corporate warfare profiteers, and maintain a good return on investment for all you who can afford the ticket to Davos and reminisce about Vaclav Havel over sherry.
To the folks desperate for a warm space tonight on Canada’s freezing cold streets, there was nothing, absolutely nothing, in today’s speech for hope. To Indigenous people bearing the full frontal force of climate catastrophe, not a word. To those worried about the repressive new Carney legislation at home, that will strip whole classes of refugees of their status, that will ramp up the deportation machine, that will justify invasions of Indigenous territories, absolutely nothing. For folks in Gaza continuing to be blown up with Canadian weapons, or folks stateside fleeing ICE violence enhanced with Canadian-made armoured vehicles and drones, nothing.
Since he came to power, Carney has made Trudeau’s gaslighting look like child’s play. And while the wool is over our eyes, we will continue supporting the most dangerous economic system the world has ever known, one that threatens to drown or burn us to death on the road to a good day at the stock market.
Applause for a good show, King Carney.
PS: What is the alternative, you might be wondering. While I think there is lots of space for that discussion, let’s actually make sure what we are discussing IS an alternative, not a sequel. But the path to an alternative is being realistic in assessing who our greatest opponents are right now. And many of them are quite close here at home.
