I've always been proud of being born in the U.S.A., even after five decades as a Canadian citizen.

Having access to dual citizenship in a country that gave so much to the world economically, militarily and democratically was a bonus branch from our family tree.

Not any more.

The events of the last two weeks, starting with Canada becoming the U.S. president's trumped-up trading nemesis, has turned America into a global embarrassment bordering on a pariah.

It is suddenly a country whose moral compass has gone haywire, its place in the world has turned isolationist and its relationship with Canada has needlessly soured.

The final nail in America the Great's coffin was Donald Trump’s infamous zero-tolerance anti-immigration policy, which caged thousands of children pending the resolution of their parents' asylum claims.

It’s a barbaric policy which hasn’t entirely been resolved by Trump's flip flop, which continues separating 2,000-plus children from their parents.

Of course, Canada’s history is not without sin in ripping apart Indigenous families during the residential school and Sixties Scoop tragedies.

But this is 2018 and that makes the stories of very young children having their shoelaces removed and told not to hug their siblings so viscerally appalling, even Trump's three-sizes-too-small heart softened slightly under intense political pressure.

The concern is that Trump's backtrack has all the symptoms of a political cancer that’s in tentative remission, not likely for elimination.

His brutal truth-defying argument that he must shield America from asylum seekers will undoubtedly manifest itself in new and disturbing ways.

To his credit, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau went as far as he could or should go to express dismay at Trump's policy by calling it unacceptable.

The economic price of further cranking up a Trump trash-talking would be just too high for the self-satisfaction of registering Canada's concern on volatile White House ears.

But object Trudeau must. And object he did, albeit rather slowly.

As for this born-in-the-USA Canadian, there’s always been a temptation to take advantage of expedited access to U.S. passports, green cards and emigration.

But until politics in America gets a complete makeover under new management, that birthright is worthless for a country that's gone so terribly wrong.

That's the Last Word…