this post was submitted on 06 Mar 2025
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Summary

Ontario Premier Doug Ford says the province will permanently cancel its $100 million contract with Elon Musk’s Starlink, even if U.S. tariffs are lifted.

The decision follows Trump’s 25% tariffs on Canadian imports, which prompted Ontario to ban U.S. firms from contracts.

Ford cited Musk’s ties to Trump as a factor and said he is willing to fight potential legal fallout.

Musk previously responded to cancellation threats with a dismissive “Oh well.”

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[–] [email protected] 170 points 1 month ago (3 children)

Fords an absolute asshole, and this is a stopped clock situation. But let’s take the win. This is a policy change in the right direction.

From a southern neighbor: sorry about the smell and the noise. We are busy shitting the bed, and we’re just getting started.

[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 month ago

Thanks bud. it's not our first rodeo, we're used to the smell of bullshit.
Still, you know, when it actually gets on you it stains things.

[–] lost_faith 15 points 1 month ago

Fords an absolute asshole,

and he is OUR asshole, for now (no telling if/when he will flip-flop, let's hope he sticks to it)

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[–] Daelsky 66 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Good. We Canadians should stop relying on the US. Time to focus on local industries.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Cross country trade scales the economy way better than doing things locally though

[–] [email protected] 34 points 1 month ago (4 children)

With a stable partner, I’d say you are correct.

However if your partner is willing to weaponize that interdependency then the calculation changes.

China weaponized trade and used wolf warrior diplomacy during Covid in an attempt to gain influence. Russia weaponized energy with Europe. Now Trump is having the US do the same for “reasons” with Canada.

You’d think we would learn there is more up side to cooperation than conflict but here we are again.

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[–] [email protected] 64 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Oooh Trump’s gonna get in a fight with Canadian Trump! Get some popcorn y’all!

[–] [email protected] 44 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Yeah, i was gonna say pp is canada trump, but on further reflection pp is more akin to mike Johnson. I guess marlaina Smith is a combo of mtg and bobo. Side note i forgot bobos name and looked it up.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago (3 children)

Lmao! I hate to admit this, but I bet "hot" would have worked as well.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 month ago (2 children)

I mean she is not unattractive, until she speaks.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 month ago

If you're into that kind of fake tit, dead in the eyes kinda thing...which I'm not.

Boebert is the shadow land version of AOC. My apologies to Naomi Klein.

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[–] [email protected] 49 points 1 month ago

This is the right thing to do. Make responses permanent, otherwise trump will just continue his idiotic game of bouncing back and forth.

[–] [email protected] 44 points 1 month ago (3 children)

Feel bad for the people at Starlink. I can imagine a few astro-nerds really enjoying their work there and then some moldy bigwig rich guy thinking the world is his sims 4 just fuckes you with tweeting.

[–] [email protected] 58 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Don't. The tech world has been aware that Musk is a piece of shit for more than a decade.

Anyone working for a Musk company approves of his craziness.

[–] [email protected] 44 points 1 month ago

Or is stranded there on a H1B visa. Musk likes them both fanatical and vulnerable.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 month ago

Eh, idk. I'm sure there's smart people doing cool things at Starlink, but the actual product itself is basically a brute force approach to Internet access with a ton of downsides

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[–] [email protected] 37 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Doug Ford is the world's biggest douche.

But this is how you get Musk to behave.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Doug Ford is the world’s biggest douche.

Interesting choice of words given this world has Trump and Musk, amongst others …

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago

It's true.

Lots of high-profile douchebags in the world today.

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[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 month ago

This is absolutely the right decision.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 month ago (2 children)

It's frustrating that $100 million is only about 0.028760% of Elon Musk's total wealth ($347.7 billion). Let's hope more people abandon his failing companies and that other governments and big clients follow Fords lead.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 month ago

I canceled my starlink after his nazi salutes, I hope a bunch more follow suit, then it could be a lot more lost reoccurring revenue for old Moscow musk

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[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 month ago

The name Ford making Elon cry again

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Yeah “Oh well.” But then he cries like a baby who didn’t get a piggy back ride, and starts to sue people who won’t do business with his companies.

Just like all these people he’s paying off and then two days later realizes he made a mistake and wants to hire them back. Just like all these tariffs they are so fast to impose and then AFTER THINKING ABOUT SHIT want to start rolling it all back. These people are legit dumb as fuck.

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 month ago

Good. Should cut ties with that asshole. He is constantly pitching ideas that are not that great on their own and can only be accomplished with subsidies.

And all this tariff threat should have repercussions. Can't keep going back and forth, back and forth without saying enough.

I say this as an American who is disgusted with how this administration is treating our closest friends and allies.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Why tf we doing starlink deals with that fucking idiot in the first place?

[–] GreatBlueHeron 14 points 1 month ago (2 children)

From a consumer perspective it's a good solution for internet in remote areas and Ontario has a lot of remote areas. I used it for a couple of years when my only other option was a local wireless provider with an expensive high speed plan with advertised downloads up to 10Mbps, but actually never got anywhere near that. I'm lucky that I now have fibre and my starlink hardware is collecting dust in the shed.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Ontario is a massive province and rural internet outside of a handful of areas is terrible. Satellite, esp. good, consistent satellite, is a godsend for those areas -- no one is running fiber out to a town of only 2000 bodies that's highly isolated.

It was a reasonable choice, assuming Musk was mostly sane and not onboard with MAGA.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 month ago (3 children)

EU citizen here, I see that Premier Doug Ford is doing good stuff, it is a good political figure in general?

[–] doxxx 37 points 1 month ago (6 children)

He’s a Conservative douchebag in general.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago (3 children)

Oh. Then it looks like he is trying to clean his image or something.

[–] doxxx 24 points 1 month ago (2 children)

He could actually be patriotic for all I know but he has tried to enrich himself and his buddies at the expense of the public before so I trust him about as far as I could throw him.

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[–] ahal 7 points 1 month ago

Not really, he was already insanely popular before this. Just won a third majority a week ago, which is unheard of in Ontario politics. It's more that he knows how to connect with people and the electorate is very gullible / willing to turn a blind eye.

With all this recent goodwill he'll probably end up being our prime minister at some point shudder

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago (4 children)

Hahahahaha no, this is one of the very few odd times that I agree with him.

That being said, I come from one of the orangest (NDP), most union-ey provinces, Manitoba, so I'm a bit biased.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago (4 children)

From what I've understood he's a conservative populist. So interpret that however you want.

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