The US-Canada "Special Relationship" (Some Sunday Context)

This Day in Esoteric Political History

Jody Avirgan & Radiotopia

History

4.6 • 982 Ratings

🗓️ 9 March 2025

⏱️ 16 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Today, an episode from the archives that may provide some context for the news playing out today. We'll be doing more Sunday episodes -- from the archives and fresh conversations -- during the first year of the second Trump administration.

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Happy St. Patrick’s Day! It’s March 16th. This day in 1985, U.S. President Ronald Reagan and Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney met for what came to be known as “The Shamrock Summit,” which started to repair frayed relations between the two countries.

Jody, NIki, and Kellie discuss why a shared Irish heritage became the focal point for the meeting, and how a little singing and drinking probably helped as well.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi everyone. I'm Nicole Hemmer, and this is This Day, a history show from Radiotopia.
0:08.8	As regular listeners know, each week during the first year of the second Trump administration,
0:13.8	we are offering up some Sunday context. Today, we're revisiting a frosty moment in U.S.-Canada relations
0:20.4	and how some beer-based diplomacy helped accelerate a thaw.
0:24.6	We've talked about Canada a lot in the show, not just because it's America's northern neighbor, but because the two countries share a special relationship.
0:32.3	At times, tensions have run high. There have been border disputes as both nations expanded, conflicts over freedom and emancipation,
0:40.7	tense negotiations over resources and trade policy. But I don't think there's ever been a moment as tense as this one, at least not since the late 19th century or possibly even the war of 1812. Because while trade tensions have often
0:56.2	cooled the relationship, those negotiations have always remained centered on economics. Under the
1:02.6	new Trump administration, economic warfare has been combined with the threat of annexation.
1:07.4	New reporting suggests that this is not an idle threat. It's not random provocation.
1:12.6	Donald Trump himself has threatened to break border treaties and use economic devastation to violate Canadian sovereignty.
1:20.6	Bellicosity and territorial expansion have become a key part of the new Trump administration.
1:25.6	In less than two months, the administration has
1:28.3	shredded some of the most significant international relationships that the U.S. has developed over
1:33.1	more than a century. It signals a new era of U.S. foreign policy, one in which the U.S. is a powerful
1:39.7	pariah state, and where alienated allies look to forge new coalitions apart from and even against
1:46.0	the United States. For all the twists and turns of U.S. foreign policy over the centuries,
1:51.4	this marks something entirely new for the country, and something even our closest allies now
1:57.0	must guard against. With all that in mind, let's turn to this episode from last year about U.S. Canadian relations,
2:04.4	with a bit of Irish charm thrown in just for fun.
2:08.0	Enjoy.
2:12.1	Hello and welcome to This Day from Radiotopia.
	...

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