Monday, February 15, 2010
Flag Day: 45 years
Douglas Bell, Globe & Mail: Americans (progressives particularly) console themselves with the notion that we're a lot like them and that when 'the people' get out of hand, throwing up fundamentally irrational policy (isolationism, the death penalty, state sanctioned torture, 'welfare to work'), pointing at their dozy younger brother will help pull manifest destiny back into line. Well, actually it's a little more involved than that... Put simply, the United States is a radical experiment in libertarian individualism. Canada, er, isn't. Sorting similarities between Americans and Canadians is like fishing about dancing.