Nobody likes a bully, and at his recent World Economic Forum speech in Davos, Switzerland, Prime Minister Mark Carney garnered international kudos by calling for middle powers to stand up to would-be super powers.

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Carney deliberately refrained from naming the United States in his brief address, but President Donald J. Trump was astute enough to know Carney’s words were aimed at him.

In his verbal backlash at the criticism, Trump made the crass remark that NATO allies such as Canada had stayed “a little off the front lines” during the decades-long conflict in Afghanistan. Naturally, such a statement drew rebukes from all the NATO countries whose soldiers had spilled blood fighting in that U.S.-led occupation.

Trump then singled out Canada and Carney for not being “grateful” enough for the protection the U.S. will provide with Trump’s proposed Golden Dome missile defence shield.

To revive all the old insults, Trump also referred to Carney as “governor” in a Truth Social post. This, of course, reflects Trump’s oft-repeated claim of submitting Canada into becoming the 51st state, either through economic pressure or military force.

Under normal circumstances, ambassadors would attempt to de-escalate inter-state tensions by making apologies or sane-splaining the rantings of the........

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