Seven reasons Ford's anti-tariff ad was beneficial
National Post, 2 November 2025
The ad featuring Ronald Reagan mightily annoyed Trump because it was pushing on an open door with the American people
President Ronald Reagan’s winsome voice was widely heard again this week, a most welcome consequence of the Ontario tariff ad and the subsequent tantrum by President Donald Trump. The benefits were manifold. I count at least seven.
First, while Trump likes to be photographed in front of Reagan’s portrait in his gilded-over Oval Office, and has borrowed Reagan’s slogans — “Make America Great Again” and “Peace Through Strength” — he does not engage, let alone reprise, Reagan’s political or economic philosophy. For 16 years before his election as president — from his “Time for Choosing” speech in support of Barry Goldwater in 1964, through his two terms as governor of California, to his presidential campaigns in 1976 and 1980 — Reagan articulated, argued, proposed and persuaded both Americans and those abroad of his vision.
The radio address quoted in Ontario’s tariff ad was Reagan, reasonable and genial, making his case and explaining his policies. There were no histrionics, no outlandish claims, no personal attacks. The Reagan ad was a pleasant reminder that, not so long ago, a bold, history-changing presidency could be conducted in a largely gentlemanly fashion.
Second, Reagan was making an argument — in this case, explaining why he was imposing tariffs contrary to his preferred trade policy. He was doing something unusual and thought he should explain why. Reagan’s Saturday radio addresses, a tradition he revived after the fashion of FDR’s fireside chats, were a mark of respect for the voters, a tending to the health of a democratic culture.
Reagan excelled at rallies, staged photo-ops and images shaped for television, but the radio addresses were none of that. It was a president, making his case, with logic, facts and good writing, to the people, paying them the implied compliment that they were intelligent enough to engage his argument. Reagan knew that being good at the theatrics of the presidency did not preclude being thoughtful.
Radio was a medium that Reagan had mastered decades before as a young baseball announcer, and his successors kept the tradition. Trump initially did, but abandoned it early in his first term.
Third, the ad hit home — and mightily annoyed Trump — because it was pushing on an open door with the American people. Trump is a not a popular president, consistently underwater in his approval ratings. Reagan was popular at the end of his two terms and remains popular nearly 40 years later. Tariffs are not a popular policy and, while Americans may be open to being taxed when they buy Chinese goods, they remain bewildered that their president is waging a trade war on Canada. Reagan is posthumously popular, Canada is perennially popular. Trump, his anti-Canadian rhetoric and his tax increases are not.
Fourth, the (threatened) 10 per cent tariff increase on goods from Canada exposed Trump’s trade policy arbitrariness and recklessness at its most bizarre. So bizarre that it is not clear when, or even whether, it will be implemented.
Ontario made a commercial praising a former Republican president. The current Republican president feels, justifiably so, inadequate by comparison. Thus he raises taxes on American consumers of Canadian goods, and American manufacturers who need Canadian steel, aluminum and copper. Critiquing a policy as foolish can be effective, but not nearly as devastating as the proponent of the policy acting foolishly himself.
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