How to negotiate with Trump? Just buy Canadian
I once sat in on a negotiating class at a business school and learned about “ZOPA”— a bizspeak acronym for “zone of possible agreement.”
If you and the person you are negotiating with are in this zone, wheter it's your salary or a free-trade agreement, a deal is possible. If you’re not in the zone, you are negotiating in vain.
I have always thought knowing about ZOPA gave me extra negotiating smarts. The only trouble is, many people I ask do not have a clue what ZOPA means. Even a guy I know with an MBA thought it might be an Italian soup. Nevermind, most people reach for the ZOPA instinctively. Not Donald Trump. I thought if this last weekend, while doing my grocery shopping. We needed ketchup. Naturally I went not for the American brand name, but for the bottle with the generic label that screamed "100% Canadian tomatoes."
In light of failed negotiations over Canadian-US trade, I was sticking it to Trump, the most impossible negotiator Canada has ever dealt with.
Just buying a bottle of ketchup, I felt like I was standing up to a bully, or as entertainer Bette Midler mischievously tweeted, "#Canada is livid! They're …ouching us in our most vulnerable spots…our wallets!! Hell hath no fury like a Canadian dissed.!!”
I wish. But we have to start somewhere. The U.S. president has of course petulantly imposed tariffs on our steel and aluminum exports. He also vicious- ly l slagged Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as “very dishonest & weak” in a series of now-notorious post-G7 tweets after Trudeau dared to restate publicly that t we Canadians “will not be pushed around," and would be imposing retal- iatory tariffs.
Following Trump’s outburst, he famously went on to an historic but not too substantial summit in North Korea where he openly admired Kim Jongun, the dictator who has murdered family members and imprisoned and impoverished vast numbers of his people.
Then the U.S. president made sure to threaten us again, sneering that Trudeau rising to defend his country was “going to cost Canada a lot of money.”
Then Trump turned to another shocking domestic matter and lied publicly — claiming it was a Democrat law —in defense of his government’s cruel and outrageous action happening right now at the Mexico-U.S. border, where authorities are forcibly separating the children of illegal immigrants from their parents and placing them in makeshift wire holding stations. It is a sickening mess.
Even normally reticent former first lady Laura Bush denounced Trump’s actions as “immoral” in an op-ed piece in the Washington Post.
All of this non-stop drama continues to unfold at exhausting speed, week after week.
Trudeau’s trade stance has received support from all Canadian political parties . The most recent polls show most Canadians approve of his actions and want him to take a hard approach against the U.S. in trade negotiations.
Meanwhile, love letters to Canadians from Americans are pouring in, as well as profuse apologies for the actions of their erratic president.
The two most hopeful developments for me were a terrific speech Canada’s Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland made in Washington last week as she was receiving the “Diplomat of the Year” award from Foreign Policy magazine. Calm, measured, informative, her words offered both a history lesson on liberal democracies and just a smart way to behave.
“Facts matter. Truth matters. Compe- tence and honesty, among elected leaders and in our public service, matter,” Freeland said without naming Trump. She vowed: “Canada knows where it stands, and we will rise to this challenge.”
The second positive development came from journalists covering Trump, one of whom decided last week to ask the president directly in a press conference, regarding a government report that Trump falsely said “totally exonerates” him of collusion with Russia: “Why are you lying about it, sir?”
This opens a bold new chapter in the battle of facts-based journalism against a dishonest president, giving the office itself full respect — sir — and yet stating the obvious: Sir, you lie like a rug.
How can we negotiate with such a person? Donald Trump changes his mind constantly and capriciously. Trump is also very emotional, having failed to keep a lid on his id. He has no idea or doesn’t care what the norms are in dealing with people morally, fairly or calmly.
Trudeau can also be an emotional guy — remember in May 2016 when he rushed over and “manhandled” a male opposition whip and elbowed a female MP in the House of Commons?
But he is now exercising admirable self-restraint to stay firmly on message.
I have wondered whether Trudeau might have an edge dealing with Trump because he grew up with an erratic parent. Through no fault of her own, his mother, Margaret Trudeau, suffered from mental illness. She has since done much to try to lift the stigma around it with her bestselling books and speeches.
Around Trump, Justin Trudeau seems preternaturally watchful, as if making a concentrated effort to stay one step ahead of any irrational action.
There’s now a third emotional guy who will have a say in our destiny— Ontario’s newly elected Conservative Premier Doug Ford, who aims to defend Ontario’s economic interests.
As Ford gave his victory speech, his voice quavering, I was reminded of how emotion-ruled he and his brother the late Toronto Mayor Rob Ford were during their tempestuous tenure. They have always gone for simple slogans and simplistic solutions. Ford, too, has been accused of being a bully, and many bullies, when you scratch their surface, are ruled by emotion.
With all these complex personalities, what will happen next in our ongoing trade negotiations?
I haven’t a clue but I do foresee another bottle of “100% Canadian” ketchup” in my future.