HOW ARE AMERICANS AND CANADIANS DIFFERENT?
When your average American strides into a Fanny Farmer chocolate provider barks an order for the five pound box of premium assorted, all hard centers, he knows behind him stands four hundred years of authoritative history: Plymouth and Roanoke; a completely realized Revolution; highly successful police actions in Barbary, Cuba and Panama; conditional and unconditional victories in two world wars; a near miss in Viet Nam followed by the glorious attainments of Operations Provide Freedom and Iraqi Freedom, All of this backed by eight trillion kilotons of nuclear firepower, the mightiest mass of military muscle ever achieved, wielded by the highest most assertive civilization yet realized. When your average Canadian creeps into a Laura Secord candy store and meekly requests half a pound of discounted soft centers, hes pretty sure somewhere theres 400 years more or less of movement from colony towards nationhood, an ambiguous narrative centered around forgotten underdogs but articulated as elitist heroism: Lundys Lane, Saint Anne de Beaupre, The Durham Report; lukewarm rebellions against a tolerant imperial parent; creation of a federal police force made famous for canoe paddling and falling in love with their horses; years of dominion-provincial struggle culminating in the opting out and notwithstanding clauses; the Ben Johnson steroid scandal followed by the latest Booker prize winner pirating his plot from an unsuspecting Brazilian writer, All of this back-grounded by a society eighty percent American owned or operated, the highest level of outside economic penetration ever achieved in one of the most restrained cultures ever wishywashyed.Tokyo Sun 06/06/08