The Great Canadian Story

Above is the current logo for the most popular show on Canadian TV, Hockey Night In Canada.The Saturday night series carries double-headers of hockey games, almost always involving one of the Canadian-based teams in the National Hockey League which, despite its name, actually has member teams in the US and Canada. As I write this, it's July 1st, Canada Day, which celebrates the anniversary of the establishment of the Canadian nation. Those two ideas, Hockey Night In Canada, and Canada's identity, came together in recent days over the most unlikely of focal points. Ronn Roxx, of Ronn's Minor League Hockey Mania, tells the story so well [in turn quoting from "Maclean's" magazine for his source material] that I'm just going to get the Hell out of the way [I'll be back after you read the entry at the following link]:

http://ronnsmlhm.blogspot.com/2008/06/dumb-da-dumb-da-dumb.html.

Pretty amazing, eh? By the way, none of this is meant as a jab at Canada. I don't know how people further South of here feel on the matter, but personally, I think that, like most humans, the borders that separate us are arbitrary and ultimately meaningless. Many Canadians near Niagara Falls and Buffalo live and die with the Bills and Sabres, just as I do. This region, on both sides of the border, depended on manufacturing. Some of those old-time factories still exist [most on the Canadian side; apparently, compulsory government-run health care really is an incentive for multi-national corporations to establish more plants in countries that have it. Congress, are you watching this?], and many of those who worked in them spend time in each other's countries, shopping, eating, sight-seeing [again, Canada has the edge here. Sometime, I'm going to throw a few thoughts out there about why it's so foolish for the American side of Niagara Falls to challenge Canada, as well as a few strategies that might even the odds a bit].

I guess what I'm trying to say to Canadians is, Happy Canada Day! Some of our politicians are idiots, but basically, I think the everyday citizens on both sides of the border are on the same page. And don't drink and drive, and we'll try to do the same on Friday...

-Mike Riley