This was sent to me by a friend,I am posting iton the listserv
because we have many Canadians on the list.
BUTE TO THE UNITED STATES
This is from a Canadian
newspaper, it's worth sharing.
America: The Good
Neighbor.
Widespread but only partial news coverage was given recently to
a
remarkable editorial broadcast from Toronto, Canada 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 the franc 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
10? 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, Americans
Lanier Maddux Chattanooga
Tn