Should Canada join America?

0, 1, 2, 3, 7, 10 state solutions

President Trump insists he is serious about acquiring Canada as a whole. Let us call this the 1-state solution. It will have to take its place in line with Gaza, Greenland, and the Panama Canal as priorities.

Many of us in the MAGA movement were not anticipating the expansion of America as a priority for the second Trump administration. You could argue that this would help make America great again. Personally, I lean towards splitting America, China, India, and Russia each into two parts simultaneously. I don’t think we benefit from living in the same country as ANTIFA, DEI, LGBTQ, Hamas and company. And though President Trump can no doubt accomplish positive things for our country, a Democrat successor can issue executive orders repealing all of Trump’s actions. A larger empire could put dissenters (like vaccine skeptics or DEI-LGBTQ skeptics) in danger.

The question before us right now is: would a merger of Canada with America be good for our two countries, especially with Canada being significantly to the left of America? As someone who respects national boundaries, I don’t think they should be erased casually unless there is an extremely good fit between the parties. For example, a good argument could be made for the merger of Romania with Moldova.

Are America and Canada equally similar? I don’t think so. Americans and Canadians hold certain features of the others’ society in disdain. Each country would be eager to fix what it perceives as the flaws in the other. I do not want to have Canada’s socialized medicine, and end up waiting months to see a specialist. Canada complains about America’s crime rate. So the best solution is a 0-state solution, wherein the two countries remain independent, and focus on their own priorities.

This column will focus on the political preferences of Canada’s provinces and territories, as reflected in recent federal elections. I computed a weighted average of the percentage of the vote in each province and territory for conservative parties: the Conservative party, founded in 2003, and the more recent People’s party. Each election was weighted twice as much as the previous election. The map below uses the traditional international coloring where red signifies the left.

With Ontario and Quebec as the most populous provinces, containing more than 60% of Canada’s population between them, it is clear that admitting Canada as a single state simply adds two Democrat senators guaranteed. If each province were admitted as a state, there would be 14 Democrat senators guaranteed. Thus the 1-state and 10-state solutions should not be considered.

The four provinces of eastern Canada have relatively low population, with Prince Edward Island at less than 200 thousand. If the four eastern provinces merged into a single province, call it Atlantica, we would have a 7-state solution. Then there would be a bit more balance, with only 8 Democrat senators guaranteed, but still only 4 Republican senators guaranteed from the prairies. This too is not desirable.

Alberta and Saskatchewan have been stoutly, reliably conservative for decades. If provinces could go their own way, America should welcome these two provinces with open arms. Manitoba would be welcome to join the first two, coming in as a swing state. These are the 2-state and 3-state solutions.

EDIT: I edited the data labels on the map to make them more legible.