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In light of what has gone on this is something everyone should read...

In light of what has gone on this is something everyone should read...

This, from a Canadian newspaper...
-------------------------------------
America: The Good Neighbor.

Widespread but only partial news coverage was given recently to a remarkable
editorial broadcast from Toronto by Gordon Sinclair, a Canadian television
commentator. What follows is the full text of his trenchant remarks as
printed in the Congressional Record:

"This Canadian thinks it is time to speak up for the Americans as the most
generous and possibly the least appreciated people on all the earth.

Germany, Japan and, to a lesser extent, Britain and Italy were lifted out of
the debris of war by the Americans who poured in billions of dollars and
forgave other billions in debts. None of these countries is today paying
even the interest on its remaining debts to the United States.

When France was in danger of collapsing in 1956, it was the Americans who
propped it up, and their reward was to be insulted and swindled on the
streets of Paris. I was there. I saw it.

When earthquakes hit distant cities, it is the United States that hurries in
to help. This spring, 59 American communities were flattened by tornadoes.
Nobody helped.
The Marshall Plan and the Truman Policy pumped billions of dollars into
discouraged countries. Now newspapers in those countries are writing about
the decadent, warmongering Americans.

I'd like to see just one of those countries that is gloating over the
erosion of the United States dollar build its own airplane. Does any other
country in the world have a plane to equal the Boeing Jumbo Jet, the
Lockheed Tri-Star, or the Douglas DC10? If so, why don't they fly them? Why
do all the International lines except Russia fly American Planes?

Why does no other land on earth even consider putting a man or woman on the
moon? You talk about Japanese technocracy, and you get radios. You talk
about German technocracy, and you get automobiles. You talk about American
technocracy, and you find men on the moon - not once, but several times and
safely home again.

You talk about scandals, and the Americans put theirs right in the store
window for everybody to look at. Even their draft-dodgers are not pursued
and hounded. They are here on our streets, and most of them, unless they
are breaking Canadian laws, are getting American dollars from ma and pa at
home to spend here.

When the railways of France, Germany and India were breaking down through
age, it was the Americans who rebuilt them. When the Pennsylvania Railroad
and the New York Central went broke, nobody loaned them an old caboose.
Both are still broke.

I can name you 5000 times when the Americans raced to the help of other
people in trouble. Can you name me even one time when someone else raced to
the Americans in trouble? I don't think there was outside help even during
the San Francisco earthquake.

Our neighbors have faced it alone, and I'm one Canadian who is damned tired
of hearing them get kicked around. They will come out of this thing with
their flag high. And when they do, they are entitled to thumb their nose at
the lands that are gloating over their present troubles. I hope Canada is
not one of those."

"Stand proud, America!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
****************************************
11,297 views 43 replies
Reply #26 Top
OK, educate me.
I have indeed read a lot about WW2, but not much about the American side of the story. Every country has his own stories. Tell us yours.
And BTW, I did know that WW2 was extremely profitable for the US; the the arms business is very lucrative.
Reply #27 Top
I am not giving the US's side. I am providing facts. The equipment and materials that the Western allies used is not a matter of opinion but historical fact. The US, UK, and USSR were the indespensible players of WW2. You remove any of these 3 then Germany would have probably won. But if you remove the US, there's no doubt, Germany and Japan would have won. And it would be a much darker world today.

I am not willing to discuss history with someone who would even jokingly imply that WW2 was just a means for the US arms business to get rich.

Do you ever have anything positive to say? Has anyone other than yourself ever done anything good or generous? I have family that died in Europe in World War II.
Reply #28 Top
Jafo, thank you for the response, however I fear that the damage has been done, so with a heavy heart, I type the following:

Of course I respect his right to an opinion, but in a time of strong emotions such as this, twisting something that was intended to help the healing process and further antagonizing those who are suffering is just what I said: disgusting. I also don't see where smarta$$, uninformed comments such as he posted fall into the realm of "adult, mature discussion", hence my not-so-mature response to his not-so-mature comments. craeonics and berzerka's attitude towards American pride have forever changed my view of them and this community. The sheer lack of sympathy for those who's lives have been so dramatically changed comes across very well in several comments that I have found here.

On my father's side, my grandfather's ship was heavily damaged in WWII and ended up going down in a matter of hours. This was not in Pearl Harbor but out in the open sea. My grandmother received a letter saying that he had been killed in the line of duty while serving our country. Little did anyone know at the time that he and several of his shipmates were able to use pieces of the ship as flotation devices and made it to an uncharted "island", where they lived for nearly five weeks until they were rescued. Upon returning to the States, he met with my grandmother to let her know that he was alive and ok, and then he returned to service to defend our country. He is still alive today, and still has the letter proclaiming him killed in action. To this day, he talks about all of the friends that he lost that day and cries.

crae and berzerka, if you think that the amount of American pride shown here "makes you hate Americans" and makes us look "arrogant", you'd have a field day with him.

So enjoy your freedom, enjoy your right to speak your mind, and enjoy your right to pervert what was meant to be a step in the healing process, and turn it into your own personal soapboxes, but keep in mind that without the good ol' U S of A, you'd more than likely be typing this in German, or some other language, if you were allowed to own a typewriter at all...

... my grandfather says you're welcome.

Frogboy (and the admins), you've done a good job here with Wincustomize, keep up the good work. My thoughts go out to all of you who have been affected by this tragedy.
Reply #29 Top
Another good bit of commentary...

Just for being Americans . . .
BY DAVE BARRY



No humor column today. I don't want to write it, and you don't want to read it.

No words of wisdom, either. I wish I were wise enough to say something that would help make sense of this horror, something that would help ease the unimaginable pain of the victims' loved ones, but I'm not that wise. I'm barely capable of thinking. Like many others, I've spent the hours since Tuesday morning staring at the television screen, sometimes crying, sometimes furious, but mostly just stunned.

What I can't get out of my mind is the fact that they used our own planes. I grew up in the Cold War, when we always pictured the threat as coming in the form of missiles -- sleek, efficient death machines, unmanned, hurtling over the North Pole from far away. But what came, instead, were our own commercial airliners, big friendly flying buses coming from Newark and Boston with innocent people on board. Red, white and blue planes, with ``United'' and ``American'' written on the side. The planes you've flown in and I've flown in. That's what they used to attack us. They were able to do it in part because our airport security is pathetic. But mainly they were able to do it because we are an open and trusting society that simply is not set up to cope with evil men, right here among us, who want to kill as many Americans as they can.

That's what's so hard to comprehend: They want us to die just for being Americans. They don't care which Americans die: military Americans, civilian Americans, young Americans, old Americans. Baby Americans. They don't care. To them, we're all mortal enemies. The truth is that most Americans, until Tuesday, were only dimly aware of their existence, and posed no threat to them. But that doesn't matter to them; all that matters is that we're Americans. And so they used our own planes to kill us.

And then their supporters celebrated in the streets.

I'm not naive about my country. My country is definitely not always right; my country has at times been terribly wrong. But I know this about Americans: We don't set out to kill innocent people. We don't cheer when innocent people die.


A DECENT PEOPLE

The people who did this to us are monsters; the people who cheered them have hate-sickened minds. One reason they can cheer is that they know we would never do to them what their heroes did to us, even though we could, a thousand times worse. They know that when we hunt down the monsters, we will try hard not to harm the innocent. Those are the handcuffs we willingly wear, because for all our flaws, we are a decent people.

And now we are a traumatized people. The TV commentators keep saying that the attacks have awakened a ``sleeping giant.'' And I guess we do look like a giant, to the rest of the world. But when I look around, I don't see a giant: I see millions of individuals -- the resilient and caring citizens of New York and Washington; the incredibly brave firefighters, police officers and rescue workers risking their lives in the dust and flames; the politicians standing on the steps of the Capitol and singing an off-key rendition of God Bless America that, corny as it was, had me weeping; the reporters and photographers who have not slept, and will not sleep, as long as there is news to report; the people in my community, and communities across America, lining up to give blood, wishing they could do more.


A GOOD COUNTRY

No, I don't see a giant. What I see is Americans. We may have the power of a giant, but we also have the heart of a good and generous people, and we will get through this. We will grieve for our dead, and tend to our wounded, and repair the damage, and tighten our security, and put our planes back in the air. Eventually most of us, the ones lucky enough not to have lost somebody, will resume our lives. Some day, our country will track down the rest of the monsters behind this, and make them pay, and I suppose that will make most of us feel a little better. But revenge and hatred won't be why we'll go on. We'll go on because we know this is a good country, a country worth keeping.

Those who would destroy it only make us see more clearly how precious it is.




Reply #30 Top
-And, right now...I must dutifully pledge my allegiance to the flag of the United States of America.

Frogboy, your INTELLIGENT insights are MUCH appreciated! Amen!

I'm DAMNED proud to be an American and when we are hit hardest...THAT is when we come out fighting back with all of our might!

Down but not out,

Victor G.H.
Reply #31 Top
Frogboy, history has sides. There are the facts, and there are the interpretation of those facts. I ahave many times witnessed it when talking about Canadian history to my english friends. They did not learn the same things we did in their classrooms. Or the indien side is yet another different one.
Talk about WW2 to an American, a German, a Russian and a Japanese, and you'll get 4 different stories.

And I didn't say the US went to war BECAUSE it was profitable, I only say the US came back richer that when they left. You said it yourself, a lot of the military equipment used by the allies was American.

And where did you get that what I said was negative? Since when is making a profit
considered negative? The USA entered WW2 as a relatively modest country, but came out of it as a giant, both economically and militarely.
Reply #32 Top
And by the way the comment "Do you ever have anything positive to say? Has anyone other than yourself ever done anything good or generous? I have family that died in Europe in World War II." was uncalled for.
Reply #33 Top
I see words being put in my mouth (never said I hated the US, just complained about one sided views) and I see I should've used more tact (this is not the time for fights). I'll bite my tongue to prevent this from happening again.

/me bites my tongue and swallows remarks about sufficient knowledge about WW2
Reply #34 Top
(disclaimer) I really do not want to offend anyone with this next post. I have made some good friends in the skinning community from all over the world and I really don't want to jeopardise this.

You speak about it being good to take pride in your country. But the way some of these things are said says to non US people 'You can't take care of your problems and we have to help you out all the time'. Maybe it's true and maybe it's not but this does go against our pride and (unintentionally) causes bad feelings. Please remember that Americans do not have a monopoly on being proud of their country. If someone feels something they are proud of is being slighted they will feel indignant and may respond in a different way than they would if they had time to calm down. This is a very sensitive subject and really is not worth losing friends over.

In my opinion the way many of these things were said is the problem not what is said. Yes Americans should be proud of their country and yes it has helped a lot of people. But so have other countries including my own.

end of transmission...
Reply #35 Top
"In my opinion the way many of these things were said is the problem not what is said.
Yes Americans should be proud of their country and yes it has helped a lot of people. But so have other countries including my own."

......well said pjpowell !
Reply #36 Top
Yes, indeed, and I would like to apology if I came out as pumpous (sp?) or disrespectful. I want it to be clear that I respect every citizen of this planet.
These are difficult times for everyone, and I am just very afraid at what the near future will bring us. I feel very deeply for my friends and family south of the border, only one hour drive away. Again, my apologies if I hurt anybody's feelings. America was attacked. Even if there are people of all nationalities among the victims, the target was American. In that aspect, it's perfectly normal to stand tall and be proud of what you are. American friends, I love you and I respect you. Be proud, be brave.
Reply #37 Top
'pompous', Patric....Spell checker
Reply #38 Top
And 'apologise/apologize'....Spell checker
Reply #39 Top
If this happened to another country, we could all feel free to praise them and talk about that country's great qualities and good people.

But this happened to America, so could all the jerks here (and you know who you are), please just let the Americans take their complement and move on?

No one should have to apologize for their nationality.
Reply #40 Top
I wasn't apologizing for being American, since I'm not. I was apologizing for seeming disrespectful to America, which was never my intention.
I don't know if any of my comments were perceived as such, but I just wanted to make sure.
Reply #41 Top
sorry i didn't read this sooner.. i think it's important to remember that 'america: the good neighbor' was written in the early seventies.
Reply #42 Top
I can tell you one thing that aggravates me that i constantly hear about. I am equally pissed off at hearing about hate crimes being put upon the arab-americans. For christ sakes. These people didnt have anything to do with this. Leave them the f**k alone. I feel for the arab-americans. I feel for them for being scared of being attacked in their own country (USA) and i fear for their children being scarred in school by hate words.

I wonder what it must be like now to be an arab-american and have to take a flight somewhere. It must be a terrible feeling. My heart goes out to them as well.

BTW my religion is judiasm. I had to deal with jewish slurs all my life. It always hurt. Even stupid things like hearing people when dealing with money saying things like "dont be jewish about it." I was bartending one night a long time ago and some guy asked for a vodlka on the rocks and he said "and dont be jewish about it". I was so angry i cannot begin to tell you. I refused to serve him. I just simply left and smoked a cig and didnt serve him. My manager had to serve him.

So please support all people you come in contact with that cant stick up for themselves. If i saw someone attacking an arab-american you better believe i would beat that attacker down the best i could. Its our jobs as Americans (and everyone else) to stnad up for the people that cant stand up for themselves. Its what it means to be American and now after what i've seen its what it means to be part of the a world that is coming closer together in light of this terrible deed. As angry as i am over the events that killed our people, i have never felt so much love for other countries as i do now.
Reply #43 Top
Yeah, there was some poor Muslim woman who had rocks thrown at her in Espoo (more or less a Helsinki suburb), and that is so not right. Yes there are plenty of Muslims from the middle-east here, there is even a Mosque within walking distance of our flat. But most of those people are refugees who wanted a better life for crying out loud.

Unlike those terrosts, I can't just hate blindly.