At midnight on a Saturday in August 2026, the long-standing economic partnership between the United States and Canada crossed into new and uncertain territory, as 50% tariffs on dozens of Canadian goods took effect after six days of negotiations collapsed into mutual recrimination. President Trump invoked a nearly century-old statute never before used in this way, while Canada promised to answer dollar for dollar — two neighbors, bound by geography and decades of shared commerce, now testing how much strain that bond can bear. The moment is not merely a trade dispute but a question about the a