Letters to the Editor
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@Xeynon
I'm not going to do a point by point rebuttal, as a lot of your post comes off as flame-bait, but...
1.)Canada hasn't historically treated its aboriginals any better than the U.S. has treated its minorities.
Well... we didn't enslave them. But I'm willing to bet our reservation system and all the free money coming from the federal government has contributed to the situation we have today, which is hella worse than you guys treat your minorities now. Not that the Indians aren't in part complicit in the matter. For something scary, Google "Davis Inlet". How the fuck did that happen in Canada?
Now this is the part that actually bugs me:
Furthermore, a great deal of your economic prosperity you owe to trade with the U.S., your best students all study here, far more of your citizens move here than the reverse, you import huge quantities of consumer goods and raw materials from the U.S., the reason you haven't historically needed a large military to defend the world's second largest amount of territory is that you always had the luxury of knowing that no one would dare f**k with you for fear of pissing off your rather formidable ally to the south, CAN-CON regulations aside much of your culture is derivative of American culture, etc. Canada wouldn't be nearly as successful as it is without the U.S., and you know it.
We're each other's largest trading partners. Even now. More stuff (money and goods) comes from to the US from Canada than China, and still by a big margin. And sure, a lot of our brightest people do go to the States, and our musicians and movie stars go down there to make big names for themselves. Can you blame them? But either country wouldn't be nearly successful without the other.
And by the way, I apologize for any Canadians with that "smug, self-righteous attitude". It is a huge problem in Canada. I suspect it's a side-effect from being a small power (only 30 million people, after all) next to the world's only superpower, and perhaps a little subconscious worrying that we really are Americans. We're not, but I don't think "Canadians know how to make love in a canoe" really helps out the country anymore.