For Sale: Greenland, Canada, the Panama Canal, U.S. Dignity

POTUS is on a buying spree!

By Ed Goldman

Since President Trump has been suggesting the U.S. take over Greenland, Canada and the Panama Canal, I’d like to suggest a closer-to-home, easier target for his empire building: my condo. More on that in a moment.

First, let’s talk about Greenland and Canada, which are intertwined in this equation (provided you have a very large ball of very imaginative twine). One of my concerns about the U.S. annexing Canada emanates from a fear that Trump will re-instate the Selective Service Administration and declare me eligible to be drafted into the military. Well, if Canada became part of my country, I wouldn’t be able to flee there.

Everything must go!

It’d also take some of the exotica out of the fact that some of our favorite show-biz celebrities—including Ryan Gosling, Justin Bieber, Rachel McAdams, Drake, and Jim Carrey—were born in Canada. If Canada’s part of the U.S., it’ll be the equivalent of marveling that your favorite star hails from Evanston (Illinois), Omaha (Nebraska) or Newark (Mars).

As CBS-News reports, “Greenland is located to the northeast of Canada and is largely covered by the Greenland Ice Sheet. The largest island in the world, but home to only around 60,000 people…(i)ts location between the U.S., Russia and Europe makes it strategic for both economic and defense purposes—especially as melting sea ice has opened up new shipping routes through the Arctic.

“It is also,” the report adds, “the location of the northernmost U.S. military base.”

Okay. As soon as I was reminded that Greenland’s the largest island on our planet, Trump’s need to have it was understandable. As we’ve learned, he likes to attach his name to things that are oversized, like his resorts, hotels, neckties, bibles, steaks, waistbands, ego and Happy Meal add-ons.

For him, it’s all about the branding. “America now owns the largest island on earth,” I can hear him saying at his first 2025 State of the Union address. “It’s huuuge.”

On a side note, when I first heard he also wanted to rename the Gulf of Mexico, I was surprised he wasn’t urging it to be called The Trump of Mexico. “¡Ay, caramba!” went through my head. But no. It was the much more modest Gulf of America he has in mind, which I’m sure will go over really well with people living in the Country of Mexico.

Back to my condo’s suitability for federal inhaling. Let me advance some strategic advantages for the U.S. to do this, though they’ll probably sound even more specious than gobbling up Greenland and Canada.

1. My condo’s near a decommissioned air base, now known as Mather Business Park and Bird Flu Colony: As of last month, more than 30 dead swans were found there. This means in case of war, the base could deploy, on a moment’s notice, decommissioned fighter jets flown by retired pilots and strafe the enemy with bombs containing bird flu.

2. My place is also 10 miles from Sacramento International Airport and Automobile Graveyard: The second half of that title stems from the facility’s eternal parking-lot expansion project. Meanwhile, if you’re looking for nonstop flights to faraway lands, that “international” part is one of the airport’s little inside jokes.

In case of war, once again, the enemy could be lured to fly into our airport and told if they can find their cars within five hours, we’d give them the keys to the country.

3. But best of all for our salad-adverse Chief Executive, there’s a McDonald’s just a few blocks away from my front door. I’d say, “within walking distance,” but when it comes to our POTUS, we know better. The dead swans are more likely to walk there.

Ed Goldman's column appears almost every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. A former daily columnist for the Sacramento Business Journal, as well as monthly columnist for Sacramento Magazine and Comstock’s Business Magazine, he’s the author of five books, two plays and one musical (so far).