Trump’s big lie is about election fraud. Canada’s big lie is about equalization.

Both are weapons aimed at harming democracy.

Claims of fraud in the 2020 US election are still widely promoted by US Republicans, actively seeding the minds of their followers with a dangerous lie. If the allegations were supported by evidence, even one of more than 60 different court cases on the topic wouldn’t have been lost so spectacularly. But the point isn’t to be able to prove anything. The point is to drive already belligerent partisans into feeling that actions like those of January 6th are justified. The goal is to undermine a democracy in which they cannot win honestly. Just as the USA has a concerted effort to destroy the unity of the country from within, Canada’s right wing keeps observing them, taking notes, and emulating. While American politics is being kicked over and set on fire by a big lie that any election the right loses must be illegitimate by definition, Canadian politics has a big lie as well, and the oil happy premier of Canada’s Texas is busily pumping fuel into it and ready to ignite. It all revolves around a program that perpetual grievance manufacturing has steadily turned into arguably the most radioactive single word in Canadian politics: Equalization.

How Canada’s Equalization payments work

Canada is the second largest country on Earth. Most of the population lives in dense urban areas near the US border, but some communities exist in incredibly remote locations. Some places wield huge economic clout which others could barely dream of. This means that some provincial governments simply cannot afford to provide for their citizens as opulently as others. Canada’s equalization program was enshrined in its constitution to ensure that all citizens, no matter where they live, will enjoy a minimum level of access to certain basic services. We call the central concept “patriotism.” It means that when I say that I care about my country, I also care about whether all the people that live in the country can get a decent education, or access to health care they need, instead of only thinking about myself.

The Equalization measure, which provides assistance to provinces with the smallest per capita budgets to help them fill in some of the…