Sorry

Last month a wonderful Canadian-style protest erupted over the Harper government’s plan to allow just about any cop to monitor just about anything anyone does in Canada online just about any time on just about any excuse.  Without a warrant.

Canadians used Twitter to mock Vic Toews, the Minister of Public Safety who introduced Bill C-30 in the House of Commons and defended it to various media outlets for the next few days.  The #TellVicEverything hashtag started out funny, clever, and awesome, swerved a little toward rants, and then back to funny, clever and awesome.

Early on, someone began tweeting as VickiLeaks30, publishing some very unsavory elements of Toews’ divorce, all a matter of public record but deeply personal.  Accusations flew, and the Conservative Harperites claimed that the NDP was behind the account, tweeting from inside Parliament.

Turns out it wasn’t the NDP at all, but a staffer for the Liberals.  He resigned, and the most Canadian of rituals ensued: Apologies all around.

Rae reveals Vickleaks - CBC.CA http://www.cbc.ca/video/watch/News/Politics/ID=2202713007

This video from the CBC begins with Vic Toews complaining about the Vickileaks30 twitter account connection to the House of Commons, and asking for an investigation.

After almost five minutes of this, the Liberal leader is recognized by the Chair and begins his apology, first in English and then in French.

At 8:28 minutes, an NDP member is recognized, and mentions that the Conservatives had accused the NDP of being behind all this, and demands an apology.

And, he gets it.

The Bloc Québécois leader then speaks in French.

Just when I thought this couldn’t get any more Canadian, Vic Toews gets up and accepts Bob Rae’s apology, but only after critiquing it for it’s sincerity and worthiness.

Bob Rae now takes his place alongside other notable Canadians who have apologized to people for things.

Apologizing is part of Canadian culture.  Canadians apologize when YOU bump into THEM. They apologize for running up the score. I once saw a musician say “Sorry” to a microphone stand he had banged into.  It takes some getting used to
.
Search Google for “canadian apologies” and you will get 12,900,000 results.



Search Google for “american apologies” and you will get 47,000,000 results, admittedly a much higher number, but most of the results appear to be links to articles complaining that Americans have apologized for something.

We just don’t like to do that.

But there is a theory that “Canadians say ‘sorry’ a lot, but they rarely apologize.  See this excerpt from How to be a Canadian (Even If You Already Are One). 

A Canadian Protest

Last January 18 saw the largest online protest in history when Americans (and many Canadians) staged the Stop SOPA event.  The "Stop Online Piracy Act" before the US Congress would have censored websites and impeded creativity. 

In Canada, people were horrified that the United States government would infringe on the rights of its citizens that way.  They were still clucking their tongues about the Patriot Act and complaining about the added border security and fees.  There was no shortage of Canadians ready to offer advice on how to better run a country.

On January 20, both houses of Congress backed down.

Meanwhile in Canada the Conservatives had finally formed a majority government, and were ready to prove that they could do whatever they wanted now that they didn't have to worry about offending members of the other parties.  It takes some getting used to.

So what they did was they cooked up Bill C-30, which sounds a lot like the Patriot Act, except they call it the "Protecting Children from Internet Predators Act."  The CBC sums it up:

The bill includes no mention of children or predators except in the title, which appears to have been changed after it was sent to the printers.

Like similar legislation introduced in the past by both Conservative and Liberal governments, the new bill includes provisions that would:

• Require telecommunications and internet providers to give subscriber data to police, national security agencies and the Competition Bureau without a warrant, including names, phone numbers and IP addresses.
• Force internet providers and other makers of technology to provide a "back door" to make communications accessible to police.
• Allow police to get warrants to obtain information transmitted over the internet and data related to its transmission, including locations of individuals and transactions.
• Allow courts to compel other parties to preserve electronic evidence.

However, unlike the most recent previous version of the bill, the new legislation:

• Requires telecommunications providers to disclose, without a warrant, just six types of identifiers from subscriber data instead of 11.
• Provides for an internal audit of warrantless requests that will go to a government minister and oversight review body.
• Includes a provision for a review after five years.
• Allows telecommunications service providers to take 18 months instead of 12 months to buy equipment that would allow police to intercept communications.
• Changes the definition of hate propaganda to include communication targeting sex, age and gender.

This really got under people's skin, and the Harper government is already beginning to backpedal, stating that they're willing to "entertain amendments."  It might not be enough.  Canada's Public Safely Minster, Vic Toews (pronounced "Taves") stood up in the House of Commons and said, "He can either stand with us or with the child pornographers."




It was too George W. Bushian for many Canadians, especially users of Social Media.  A uniquely Canadian protest has broken out on Twitter.  Using the hashtag #TellVicEverything, people are flooding the @ToewsVic account with the minutia of their lives.


It's absolutely wonderful.

The Stanley Cup

It’s the end of April, and time for baseball.  At least for me it is.  But here in Canada, people are paying far more attention to hockey, as the Stanley Cup Playoffs are underway.  It takes some getting used to.

When I was a little girl, I listened to the NY Rangers on the radio late at night. I'd never seen a hockey game, but I loved the rhythm of the game, and the French names of the players. My favorite team was the Toronto Make Believes, and I hoped to stand one day in Make Believe Garden. It was a pretty big disappointment when I saw my first (televised) game, and finally understood the name of the team.

When I lived in the Bay Area, the San Jose Sharks came into being, and I paid attention to hockey once again.  The standing joke then was that there were really only 17,442 Sharks fans. That was the capacity of the San Jose Arena configured for hockey, and the most likely explanation for a team with one of the worst records in the NHL selling out every home game.

Now, the Vancouver Canucks are in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, but even more thrilling, the Stanley Cup was in Kelowna last night.  I'll never stand in Make Believe Garden, but I got to touch the Stanley Cup.



No Falcons baseball until June.  So it’s root, root, root for the Canucks.

Canadian elections and Solfeggio

Canadian elections are confusing.  Elections here are different than back home.  In the United States, everyone knows when the next election will be.  Here, at the federal level, there’s no set date.  It takes some getting used to.

Canadians seem so proud of their Parliamentary system.  (Proud in a Canadian way, that is.)  I haven’t quite figured it out.  If Democracy were a religion, an election would be a sacrament --- an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace.  But as soon as there is a hint of an election, pretty much everyone complains.

This time around, the political pundits are trying to get Canadians fired up about the “In-and-out-affair” which is not what you probably think.  It’s about creative campaign funding, and the Conservative Party just trying to gain its fair advantage, a concept so foreign to Canadians I don't know how I could possibly explain it.

The chief political pundits are on the national news broadcast, called “The National,” are  Chantal Hébert, Andrew Coyne, and Allan Gregg.

At Issue Panel - Andrew Coyne, Allan Gregg, Chantal Hébert

Most Thursdays, they debate the issues of the day, each taking a different side.  Yes.  There are three sides to everything here.  At least.  They remind me of The Nairobi Trio.

Ernie Kovacs - The Nairobi Trio “Solfeggio”

If we have an election in May, I’ll probably hear “Solfeggio” in my head the whole time.

Canadian Frugality

Yesterday it came to light that President Obama’s proposed budget includes an item which would charge Canadians a $5.50 "”inspection fee” when entering the United States by plane or boat.  This is the same fee that the US charges people from other countries, and from which Canada was exempted in 1997.  No fee will be assessed to the Canadians who stream over the border by car or bus to buy food, clothing, gas, and alcohol at decent prices.  And Canadians are really conflicted about cross-border shopping.

Should we not expect a National Debate on cross-border shopping?

You would think something important had just happened, judging from the reactions of many Canadians.  Who knew?  Canadians are apparently just entitled to visit the United States whenever they please without being subject to the same fees as, say, people from England, Germany or Finland, just because they are Canadians.

It takes some getting used to.

The CBC kicked things off with a story slugged Obama proposed travel tax for Canadians, with a link to a poll question.  The question is:  Border fee:  Do you think the passenger inspection fee is reasonable?  Not surprisingly, the results look like this:

CBC non-scientific poll results

Many Canadians would rather complain about a proposed $5.50 (US) fee than about a $42M (CAD) glass dome which will house Canada’s Parliament…temporarily.  That $42M figure is courtesy of Public Works.  Other sources estimate the cost of Stephen Harper’s Cone of Silence as closer to $100M.

"One Hundred Million"

Canadian cross-border frugality is widely recognized by residents of Michigan and Ohio, who can't find anywhere to park at Wal-Mart in the winter because the parking lots are full of $70,000 motor homes with Ontario license plates.

Last month during the World Junior Hockey tournament Canadians flooded across the border to Buffalo, NY  to cheer for any country playing against the United States.  (It's a shame, really, that Canadians' Gold Medal hopes were dashed by arch-rival Russia.)  Apparently Americans can overlook fans fighting in the stands and general rude behavio(u)r, although some are still surprised and disillusioned when they witness it in their own country.  Donn Esmonde of Buffalo.com wrote about it here.  What sticks with them, however, is Canadian frugality:

Make no mistake, we were more than happy the past couple of weeks to have Canadians sleep in our hotel rooms, eat in our restaurants, drink in our bars and shop in our malls. We love the uncommon smell of outside dollars. All we ask is that you do not be obnoxious about it.

In some cases, it was too much to ask. I talked to workers at a downtown bar/restaurant that will remain nameless, to protect the place’s cross-border business. By tournament’s end, they had disdain for all things emblazoned with a Maple Leaf. The main complaint, and this is not new, is a lot of Canadian hockey fans are awful tippers.

“They would have a few beers and leave like a quarter or 50 cents,” said one bartender, who for job security reasons asked that his name not be used. “Servers said they were getting two-dollar tips on a $25 check.”

No report on the generosity of the Russian fans, but a two-dollar tip on a $25 dollar bar tab in the middle of an event is heroically frugal.

Hey, guess what, Canadians.  It's not your country.  You're don't get to come and go as you please simply because you're Canadian.  Run out of things to do in Canada?  Feel like making your way to the United States by air or sea?  Just pony up the $5.50.  You can always stiff your waiter later on.  You're entitled.

Stop the Presses

Former Prime Minister of Canada Jean Chrétien is quoted as having said, “Canada is like a big canoe…”.
 
Canadian Voyageurs, Walking a Canoe Up a Rapid - Currier & Ives, c1860
I have come to realize that in fact Canada is like a small town.
Canadians make fun of Americans who say things like, “You’re from Canada!  Do you know my friend George?  He’s from Canada!”  Yet more than once I’ve sat in the curling club and heard someone discover that the guy she lived next door to in some tiny town in northern Ontario 35 years ago has a son who is married to her best friend’s niece in Vancouver.

It takes some getting used to.

Canada is really like a small town when it comes to the CBC, the national subsidized English-language broadcast network.  (My French is not good enough to know if that is also true for the French-language network.)

It must have been a slow news day indeed when someone at the CBC in Saskatchewan decided to put a story about a Saskatoon man stuck for five hours in a hole into the Canada-wide RSS feed for the CBC news website.
 
A rescue crew carries a man out on a stretcher after extricating him from a hole at a
construction site. (CBC)
In some of the laziest reporting I have ever seen, two stories on the website and a video do not give the man’s name, do not say how he got into the hole in the first place, and do not press the local police on what they mean when they say it was "not believed to be accidental."

As is often true of stories on the CBC website, the best part is the Comments.  Although we don’t often see Godwin’s Law demonstrated by the posters on CBC forums, sarcasm abounds.  One comment reads:

My condolences go out to the family and friends of the hole in these difficult times.

Another:

So close.. after digging all that way from China, to get stuck at the end..

In that apocryphal story about the canoe, when everyone concentrates on doing his own job to the best of his ability, the canoe glides swiftly on the water --- no matter how troubled.  So thanks, CBC, for a job well done.  You’ve provided valuable insight into the Canadian Identity, if not into the identity of this man in particular.

Take Me Out To the Ball Game

The Kelowna Falcons play ball here.  The team is part of the West Coast League. 

Most of the players are American kids who play for NCAA schools during the school year.  Some of these kids go on to sign with MLB Teams.

I love going to the Falcons home games.  It’s the only place I can hear the National Anthem in public.   

This is minor league ball.  I refer not only to the standard of play, but to the atmosphere as well.  The Falcons owners have done an outstanding job of securing sponsors for little events that go on during the games.  The PizzaWay pizza eating contest is always a hoot. So it the TD tire roll-off. There are base races and cup-of-water races.  The bat spin is sometimes more exciting than the game itself.  It takes some getting used to.

All the home games are broadcast by an enthusiastic and knowledgeable guy called Ryan Watters.  The games are live on the Falcons home page and on AM1150.  Because I’m 57, it makes more sense to me to take a transistor radio to the ball park than an iPhone to listen to the game.  But people here don’t seem to get that part of the experience of the ballgame is listening to the home team announcer, so I also bring an earphone.

Of course, the games are on an AM station, the radio is mono, and plugging in a “regular” set of ear buds means sound in just the left ear.  I got tired of the right ear bud dangling and getting in my beer, so I went into The Source looking for a cheap mono ear bud.

The Source used to be RadioShack in Canada, and then it was known as The Source by Circuit City.  Now it’s not even that, it’s just The Source.  To give you an idea, one of my customers went to The Source to get a replacement CMOS battery for his computer.  The battery cost $6.99 CAD and they offered him an extended warranty for an additional $1.07 CAD.

I only go there for things that I need and can’t get anyplace else, like a really cheap mono ear bud.  I found one in there for $4.99 and took it to the counter.

The young lady at the register (or “till” as they say here), picked up the item, looked it over and said, “What are you going to do with this?”

I tried to explain to this maybe-20-year-old that I need to plug it in to my mono transistor radio so I can listen to an AM station while I am at the ballgame.

Blank stare.

She didn’t get “mono” or “transistor” or “AM station” and I am pretty sure she didn’t get “ballgame” either.  (She did, of course, want to sell me an extended warranty.)

The entire baseball experience is underappreciated by most people in Kelowna, it seems to me.  If your only knowledge of baseball comes from watching a couple of ex-Blue Jays do the commentary on Canadian cable TV, maybe it’s hard to relate to watching minor league baseball live while listening to a decent play-by-play man.  Maybe trying to bring baseball to Kelowna, in Canada, is like trying to bring hockey to San Jose, in California… Hang on a minute.

An evening at the ball park is a great evening, win or lose.  Thank you to the Nonis family for bringing quality baseball to Kelowna, and keeping it here, against all odds, for ten years.

I feel like a real Canadian now!

I was working my way through my first cup of coffee and my RSS feeds this morning when I came upon this article:

And I thought to myself, "How did the Inuit manage to hold off Microsoft?"

In fairness to me, I HAD just finished reading a curling feed that mentioned Paul Gross, and "Due South" is one of my favo(u)rite shows. But wow. "Inuit" instead of "Intuit" --- It takes some getting used to.

What Was He Thinking?

An article on the CBC website informs us that Canada hired two public relations guys to represent Canada's interests to the United States.

"While this isn't the first time Canada has hired lobbyists to launch an American media campaign, it's the first time the government is being open and transparent about it, [PMO spokesperson, Kory] Teneycke said, though he refused to discuss how much the lobbyists will be paid or how long they will be retained."

This is what passes for openness and transparency in Stephen Harper's Conservative government. It takes some getting used to.

The story actually gets better.

It turns out that the publicity flaks the Canadians hired are Mike McCurry, former White House Press Secretary for President Clinton, and, of all people, Ari Fleischer, who played the same part for President George W. Bush. Fleisher, apparently, "helped organize interviews" during Prime Minister Harper's visit to the US last month. I guess two of those were his own and McCurry's job interviews.

The vitriolic comments following the story are about what you'd expect:

• Harper and the Conservatives are in bed with the Americans, and Canada is about to become the 51st (and 52nd, and 53rd, and 54th, and 55th, and 56th, and 57th and 58th, and 59th, and 60th) state(s). (Personally, I think you have to be either an American living in Canada or a Canadian living in the US to understand why that's so funny.)
• Ari Fleisher is a big, fat liar
• Mike McCurry is a big, fat idiot for believing that Bill Clinton "...did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinski."
• Americans are big, fat idiots, period.

Well, Canadians, who would you rather have representing Canada to Americans? Maybe Rick Mercer? Be careful what you wish for.

It's the economy, stupid.

The local community internet site had this report today:

This is the thing about Canada.  You just don't have people running around with handguns like at home, so now that times are really getting tough, we have people holding up Subways with a screwdriver.  It takes some getting used to.

And no, we don't have an underground train here in Kelowna.  They mean the Subway sandwich shop.

The local reaction to this is to compose Letters to the Editor, complaining about people who are not just exactly like the letter-writers, and complaining that the RCMP is too busy using radar on the side of the road to stop robberies in shops.

Tell you what.  If I was working alone in a Subway, a gas station, a convenience store, or anyplace that had cash on hand, the next guy that came in with a screw driver better rob me before I can get to the cordless drill I would keep stashed under the counter.

A screwdriver, for crying out loud.

Another bunch of bleeding hearts

It seems that Canada is an attractive destination for former Guantanamo Bay detainees. According to this story:

Many Guantanamo Bay detainees cleared of terrorist charges and slated for release have expressed a desire to live in Canada, and refugee organizations are calling for sponsors.

Canadians think of themselves as tolerant, and they think Canada is racism-free, especially in contrast to the United States. I hear this often. I also heard a guy yell, "Run like you're carrying a watermelon!" while watching a football game on tv in the curling club lounge. It takes some getting used to.

When I started this post a few minutes ago, there were 244 comments on this story. Now there are 255. And despite the popularity of the CBC Television show Little Mosque on the Prairie ("Small town Canada with a little Muslim twist"), many of those commenting do not like the idea. The entertaining part is watching them complain about "terrorists" AND about Americans. Here's one:

Another bunch of bleeding hearts coming to the rescue of "presumed terrorists at some time anyhow". Of course people they are not going to say they are possibly still terrorists simply because they want to get rid of them!!! Especially, the Americans who have been critized to high heavens about that place, what a nice gesture from them to let them come to Canada with all our social programs. Probably they will land in Toronto and help our deficit get even higher? Only a few you say? Dream on, they will get all their families with the great great grand-parents and the 90 or so relatives from each family come here, go on welfare, get Medicare, some will be sick, etc, and you are saying you still want to sponsor them? Get your heads examined, now.

Well the radio call in shows should be pretty interesting for the next little while.

One

You can go along here for days on end and not feel like you're living in a foreign country.  Then, something happens to remind you that you are.  Maybe someone says, "Civic elections aren't until November.  It's too early to announce whether the Mayor will run for reelection," and here it is July already.  Or, maybe you go to a minor league baseball game and they play both songs but you realize you're the only one singing The National Anthem and everyone sings "O Canada."  It takes some getting used to.

I listen to a CBC Radio program called "The Vinyl Cafe."  The host, Stuart McLean, reads stories and plays music.  It all feels very Canadian.  Stuart McLean is a proud Canadian in the way that so many Canadians are.  They don't capitalize "proud" in the phrase, for one thing, and you have the feeling that they only capitalize "Canadian" because it's a rule.  Otherwise, it would be bragging.

I almost never hear the entire program, because even though it's on twice each weekend, I am almost always in the car when that happens.  I hear part of it, I get where I'm going, and that's it.  So for me, it's kind of a glimpse of Canadian life, because everything in the stories assumes a past that I simply don't have, not having grown up here.  It's wonderful.

Today, the music was all covers.  McLean played a really strange cover of the Rolling Stones' "Satisfaction" by someone called Cat Power.  She never sings the chorus.

He played a cover of Joni Mitchell's "Both Sides Now" by Joni Mitchell.  Yeah, it's better because she has looked at life from both sides now, and she sings with a voice influenced by 30 years of good whiskey and American cigarettes.

The very best cover was Johnny Cash's cover of U2's "One."  It was chilling.  I started crying.  I had to pull over to the side of the road and listen.

Cash just stripped out everything not absolutely necessary, and accompanied himself on the guitar.  In the key of C.  There's not a lot else going on, just that voice and those lyrics.  Stunning.  Interpret those lyrics any way you like.  Bono gave an interview once in which he said:

"It is a song about coming together, but it's not the old hippie idea of 'Let's all live together.' It is, in fact, the opposite. It's saying, We are one, but we're not the same. It's not saying we even want to get along, but that we have to get along together in this world if it is to survive. It's a reminder that we have no choice."

If Bono were Canadian, I'd swear he was talking about "America."

Curling, Lobsters, and Joan McCusker's Email

This is an old joke:

A man watches a lobster fisher throw three lobsters into a bucket. Concerned, the man approaches the fisher and asks if he isn't worried that the lobsters will climb out because the bucket has no cover.

"No worries," replied the fisher. "These are Canadian lobsters. If one starts to climb out, the others will pull him back in."

And that's how it is in Canada. In the US, we learn to recognize and celebrate success. In Canada, that would be bragging. It takes some getting used to.

Last week the Scotties Tournament of Hearts was held in Regina, Saskatchewan. That's the Canadian Women's Curling championships. The winner goes on to represent Canada at the Worlds next month. The opening of the week-long championships marked the ten year anniversary of the Team Canada gold medal win at the 1998 Olympics in Japan. The winning team hailed from Regina. They became national icons ("heroes" would, of course, be bragging) over night.


The team was skipped by Sandra Schmirler, who died just two years later at the age of 36, of cancer. The Sandra Schmirler Foundation keeps her memory alive. The remaining members of that team, Marcia Gudereit, Joan McCusker, and Jan Betker, continued to curl at a high level, but were not able to win another national or international title.

Joan McCusker is now a commentator for CBC's curling coverage. I wish I had Joan McCusker's email, because I think she could help me understand something about Canadians.

Colleen Jones, certainly one of the best Canadian women curlers, won six Canadian championships, two World championships, and a couple of mixed Canadian championships. She is bright, articulate, and gracious. (At least she was gracious to me when I met her, and I'm pretty much nobody.) She was a tremendous representative for the sport and for Canada, and yet Canadians belittle her accomplishments because she chews gum while she curls. I kid you not.

Kelly Scott curls at the same curling club I do. She began this year's Scotties as two-time Canadian champion, and was looking for a third consecutive title. She is a lovely person; polite, generous with her time, gracious, and kind of funny. She doesn't show much emotion on the ice. Still, there were posts on curling forums, articles in newspapers, and general talk among curlers that Kelly and her team "didn't deserve" another championship. Why? Because she has a squeaky, annoying voice when she calls a game.

Help me out, Joan! We all know that Sandra Schmirler is now practically revered for her curling success (Oops! There's that word again!) and for her good nature.

What was it really like out there after 1998? Did the general public say things like, "They don't deserve another win because Sandra did..." whatever Sandra did? Did people complain about her glasses? Did they criticize her style of play?

Well, there's a new Team Canada now, this one led by Jennifer Jones. She doesn't chew gum. Her style of play is more aggressive than Kelly Scott's and Colleen Jones'. She's tall and thin and blond. Let the snarkiness begin.

Is a Canadian spell checker a spell chequer?

There are a lot of extra U's, and unexpected double consonants ("jewellery," for crying out loud) in Canadian English. And then, the really odd spelling of seemingly familiar things. I wonder if a Canadian spell checker is a spell chequer? It takes some getting used to.

Many emails, both business and personal, go to Canadians. But I also correspond with friends and family who are Americans, and I want to use American English. I like Thunderbird for my email for lots of reasons. One of them is that I can check my spelling in either Canadian or American English, and it's easy to do. I just have to select "English/Canada" or "English/United States."

But today, I was confused. I was replying to an email from a Canadian about a party scheduled at the home of an American here in town. But the American started the thread. So which way to go on the spell check?



I decided to go with both: "neighbo(u)rhood" and both spell checkers choked on it. Maybe I'll add it to both dictionaries!

Gonna Need A Bigger Basement

Hello fellow AtomicSuburbia.com listeners. Like you, I'm enjoying Daryl's search for Canadian Identity. Unlike you, perhaps, I am not Canadian. Even though I live here now, it takes some getting used to. And like Daryl, I am searching for what it means to be Canadian.

If you've stumbled in here without coming from the AtomicSurbia.com podcast, and you're in search of the essence of Canadian Identity, quick go right now and check out the podcast. (And hurry back here.)

If you've ended up here because your search engine suggested that this is a good place to convert Fahrenheit to Celsius, check the sidebar for the Scheherazade numbers, or check here for more.

Canada Day Is Not Like The Fourth of July

On the same day Howard Zinn of "The Progressive" exhorts Americans to "...renounce nationalism and all its symbols: its flags, its pledges of allegiance, its anthems, its insistence in song that God must single out America to be blessed." an Ipsos Reid survey informs us that 39% of Canadians believe that Canadians should not be able to hold dual citizenship.

Zinn confuses nationalism and patriotism. Last Fourth of July, Christopher Dickey wrote a piece called "U.S. Nationalism Run Amok" for Newsweek in which he discussed Orwell's "Notes on Nationalism." Patriotism, Orwell wrote, is “devotion to a particular place and a particular way of life, which one believes to be the best in the world but has no wish to force upon other people.”

Dickey elaborates, quoting Orwell:

Nationalism is the habit of identifying oneself with a single nation or an idea, “placing it beyond good and evil and recognizing no other duty than that of advancing its interests.” Patriotism is essentially about ideas and pride. Nationalism is about emotion and blood. The nationalist’s thoughts “always turn on victories, defeats, triumphs and humiliations. … Nationalism is power-hunger tempered by self-deception.”

Flags, pledges of allegiance, anthems, and all that singing, then, are patriotic symbols. Americans believe the United States is the best country in the world and celebrate that on the Fourth of July. We do need to curb the nationalistic behavior, but not necessarily the patriotic celebrations. Americans need something to celebrate.

Here in Canada, it's harder to find people celebrating flags, pledges of allegiance, and Canadian identity. If you're ever going to find it, it's on Canada Day, when Canadians are issued flags at government expense, and encouraged to celebrate...not being Americans. Perhaps I've confused quiet patriotism with noisy nationalism. It takes some getting used to.

When polled by Ipsos Reid, 69% of Canadians said common history, heroes and symbols make Canada a successful society. Just what are those symbols?

Maple Leaf 87%
Beaver 74%
Hockey 73%
Mountie 72%
Canoe 39%
Timbit 31%

(For any non-Canadians who may have stumbled in here, "Maple Leaf" refers to the Canadian flag. "Timbit" is what American call a "donut hole." You get them at Tim Hortons.)

Surprisingly, duct tape didn't make the list. I see cars here held together with duct tape. And they've got a canoe, but no beer. What's up with beer not making the list?

We will celebrate the Fourth of July in this household, at least I will celebrate it. I have some cheap red, white, and blue decorations and banners which arrived in a CARE package several years ago. I have "Stan Freberg Presents The United States of America" on the CD player. I have a Weber grill. And I absolutely have beer. It's Belgian.