The US' greatest gift to Canada?

[Machjo]

With all the anti-Americanism lately, I'd decided to create this thread to look at what the US has given Canada.

What would you say is the US' greatest gift to Canada?

Personally, I'd say, at least on the legal front, the US Bill of Rights along with President Franklin Roosevelt's 'Four Freedoms' speech. Sure the US Bill of Rights does not have any legal standing in Canada. However, it, along with other national bills of rights, did influence the drafting of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which in turn influenced the drafting of multiple national bills of rights, including our own Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

President Franklin Roosevel, (especially through his 'four Freedoms' speech) and his wife Eleanor Roosevelt were also instrumental in promoting the development of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We can also take pride in the fact that a Canadian, John Peters Humphry, was the Declaration's principle drafter. Sure it's also had influences from the Bill of Rights 1689, the Declaration des droits de l'homme et du citoyen, and the Code Napoleon among others, but there is no denying that the US Bill of Rights was also among them, and that roosevelt's Four Freedoms' speech was instrumental in the promotion of such a declaration. Had it not been for these two gifts from the US, our own Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms could very well have looked different today.

What would you say is the US' greatest gift to Canada?

 

[gerryh]

What would you say is the US' greatest gift to Canada?

hasn't happened yet...... it would be if they all just fcuked off and died.

 

[Icarus27k]

Well, President Bill Clinton's 1995 speech before Parliament was actually pretty entertaining.


William J. Clinton: Remarks to the Canadian Parliament in Ottawa

 

[Machjo]

hasn't happened yet...... it would be if they all just fcuked off and died.

They gave us absolutely nothing? What about Martin Luther King Jr.? Robert Hayden? Oh, Robert Hayden! I forgot about him. He's another one I could include as among the greatest gifts for his contirbutions to poetry. Look at this poem of his:


Those Winter Sundays

Sundays too my father got up early
And put his clothes on in the blueback cold,
then with cracked hands that ached
from labor in the weekday weather made
banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.

I'd wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking.
When the rooms were warm, he'd call,
and slowly I would rise and dress,
fearing the chronic angers of that house,

Speaking indifferently to him,
who had driven out the cold
and polished my good shoes as well.
What did I know, what did I know
of love's austere and lonely offices?

Robert Hayden

And then we have Emily Dickinson among many others.

So there is absolutely nothing that the US ever gave us?

 

[gerryh]

what the fcuk did king jr. do for Canada? Nothin.

 

[Icarus27k]

Canada's greatest gift to the US?

"You Can't Do That on Television"

 

[Machjo]

what the fcuk did king jr. do for Canada? Nothin.

Not even inspire us one little bit? Sure the US was having more racial issues than Canada at the time, but Canada still suffered from racism too just as it still does. I'm sure many Canadians suffering from injustice can admire him.

As for Robert Hayden, he's also given us a different perspective on racial relations. He may be American, but he wrote in English, and most Canadians can read English too.

Canada's greatest gift to the US?

"You Can't Do That on Television"

Blue berrets, resources, plenty of Canadian writers of our own, the Underground Railroad, John Peters Humphrey, the Canadarm, and our friendship (for the most part, Gerryh) just to name a few.

Seeing that Canada had abolished slavery prior to the US, we can also say that we'd set ourselves as an example to the US. And seeing that the Queen Victoria herself played a major role in abolition, we can say that our constitutional monarchy was a gift too since without it slavery in Canada would likely have lasted longer than it did.

 

[damngrumpy]

Well one great gift I got from America is a whole clan of dysfunctional relations.
Their attempts to take over this country is actually a gift, it set the Canadian
perspective which has become our personality trait.
I think we sometimes get carried away with our anti Americanism, even though
we all engage in it at one time or another.
we view the happenings south of the boarder with amusement as they postulate
on religion, culture and their fascination with all things of limited importance.
They are still debating Medicare for Gods sake, and most of the world moved on
decades ago. We see the abortion debate still going on while the world moved on.
They talk about the land of the free and then bring in the Patriot Act.
They believe the government should not be involved with business and the free
enterprise system is free enterprise. This is a core belief even though most of the
technological advancement has come from huge investment by the US defence
department since world war two, until about the last fifteen years. Perhaps that is
why they have dropped from first to sixth in science and innovation.
The majority of the things they enjoy, the Internet, and electronic games and a
host of other advances all come from government investment in other things, investment
they are opposed to. What does this have to do with the topic? Everything.
They provide us with entertainment. Imagine all this time they thought we were strange.
Its somewhat like how the Scott's ended up with the bagpipes. The Irish gave them to the
Scott's as a joke and they never caught on.
What would Canadians do without our American neighbours? We would have to be anti
something else causing cultural harm. It would put a serious wedge into our political
correctness, and give us an inferiority complex, wait we already have that, its our greatest
gift from America.

 

[YukonJack]

"Seeing that Canada had abolished slavery prior to the US, we can also say that we'd set ourselves as an example to the US. And seeing that the Queen Victoria herself played a major role in abolition, we can say that our constitutional monarchy was a gift too since without it slavery in Canada would likely have lasted longer than it did."

Some fat slob, past or present, male or female who demands to be called and referred to as Majesty, who have absolutely no redeeming human quality and value, but the shallow claim of superiority based on the vaginal opening through which they got to see the world, those whose ancestry is sullied with the blood of their victims throughout history, are no better than any slave owner, American or otherwise.

 

[Icarus27k]

Don't worry. "You Can't Do That on Television" was a joke.


Without those imports from Canada, we'd be f*cked.

 

[damngrumpy]

Some folks
on here are merely having some fun with a topic or two.
Just think of what Canada would be like if the United States had not given us
McDonald's.

 

[Machjo]

"Seeing that Canada had abolished slavery prior to the US, we can also say that we'd set ourselves as an example to the US. And seeing that the Queen Victoria herself played a major role in abolition, we can say that our constitutional monarchy was a gift too since without it slavery in Canada would likely have lasted longer than it did."

Some fat slob, past or present, male or female who demands to be called and referred to as Majesty, who have absolutely no redeeming human quality and value, but the shallow claim of superiority based on the vaginal opening through which they got to see the world, those whose ancestry is sullied with the blood of their victims throughout history, are no better than any slave owner, American or otherwise.

You still can't deny that if it weren't for Queen Victoria, slavery would have lasted longer than it had in Canada.

 

[Machjo]

Some folks
on here are merely having some fun with a topic or two.
Just think of what Canada would be like if the United States had not given us
McDonald's.

Mcdonald's?! Taht wasn't a gift, but a curse. About the only healthy food at McDonad's is their juice and salad, I think, based on what I remember the last time I'd gone there years and years an years ago.

This thread is about the US' gifts to Canada, not on how it tries to poison our bloodstream with McDonald's, KFC, and don't even let me start on the Double Down.

 

[Icarus27k]

Blasphemy. The Double Down is a national treasure.

 

[Machjo]

Blasphemy. The Double Down is a national treasure.

And you can keep it down there. There are plenty of good things Canada can take from the US, but the Double Down certainly isn't among them.

 

[DaSleeper]

Just think of what Canada would be like if the United States had not given us
McDonald's.

They sure can can keep their Starbuck for all I care......

 

[damngrumpy]

Personally I hate McDonald's it was a joke, its the only other thing I thought they might
have given us, but I suppose you are right, it like giving us a social desease eh?

 

[YukonJack]

America's gift to Canada?

How about movies? Novels? Music? Television? Automobiles and Trucks? Light and heavy appliances?

How about careers for talented scientists, singers, actors who would have been on a quick trip to obscurity in Canada?

How about the standard of living we enjoy?

How about worry-free security that American military might provided? If Canada had had to spend on military on an equal per capita bases, could we have our "free" medical system?

 

[Retired_Can_Soldier]

Spam! Not that crap you get in your email. The real stuff. Fried on toast, Mmmm mmmmm mmmmmm!

 

[Machjo]

America's gift to Canada?

How about movies? Novels? Music? Television? Automobiles and Trucks? Light and heavy appliances?

How about careers for talented scientists, singers, actors who would have been on a quick trip to obscurity in Canada?

How about the standard of living we enjoy?

How about worry-free security that American military might provided? If Canada had had to spend on military on an equal per capita bases, could we have our "free" medical system?

I agree with most of what you said there overall, except for US military spending. If anything, US military spending, at least at the rate it's been for the last few decades, has weakened the US economy considerably, which in turn is now hurting the Canadian economy. So I'd say that last part is more of a curse than a gift. If the US could reduce its military spending a little and pay off its debts, it would have a stronger economy, which in turn woudl benefit the Canadian economy.

By extension we could say that Canada's comparably more conservative fiscal management is a gift to the US both as an example to follow (though even we could learn to be more fically conservative ourselves and so this comment is stricly relative) and as crutch for the US to lean on when it's suffering economic downturn owing to more Canadians buying US goods when Americans can't afford to purchase anything themselves.

Spam! Not that crap you get in your email. The real stuff. Fried on toast, Mmmm mmmmm mmmmmm!

That's the best you can come up with? I'm not sure which is worse between Spam and McDonald's.

Man, we all sure have different ideas about what good things the US gave us and when we should have held back at the gate. Spam is among the latter in my book.

Spam! Not that crap you get in your email. The real stuff. Fried on toast, Mmmm mmmmm mmmmmm!

That's the best you can come up with? I'm not sure which is worse between Spam and McDonald's.

Man, we all sure have different ideas about what good things the US gave us and when we should have held back at the gate. Spam is among the latter in my book.