Carlo Dade
None of this is new. Yet Canada, writ large, walked into the stadium without studying the game film of the opponent. Had we done so, little of what just transpired would have come as the surprise it apparently is. We would have known that the Americans would slip in an amped-up no-trade-with-China poison pill. We would have been prepared for it to arrive at the last minute, and we’d be working on contingency plans. Businesses could have readied (stockpiling goods, for instance). The media would have known, and they’d be hyperventilating less. Instead of a shock, it would have been a known worst case. We wouldn’t feel singled out. Our reaction would be calmer—we got punched when we weren’t expecting it, and we’re upset.
Either "writ large" is doing a lot of work there, or that's just unfair. Anybody both not MAGA and following events was expecting this. Our negotiators definitely included.
The bit later on about communicating with the public suggests he did mean everyone else. To that, a whole lot has been written and said already about why it everything had to be secretive. Trump didn't make a deal, but he wouldn't even have gotten close if we'd been calling him out the whole time, and then you'd have the Conservatives saying Carney didn't even try.
The nationalist, hit-back response—“we’re at war”—is based on emotion, not reason, and that plays into the Americans’ hand.
The only examples I can't think of, where a nation at war downplays it, is where the war is a war of aggression they started. Spreadsheets and pie charts just don't stir up the same will to sacrifice and defend.
At the other extreme, Vass Bednar is totally speaking our language:
What’s been missing, so far, is a strategy for technology and digital goods.