These were three of my favorites.
Posted on 07/18/2004 9:20:54 PM PDT by quidnunc
Everywhere, Americans are called "cowboys." On foreign tongues, the reference to America's Western rural laborers is an insult. Cowboys, we are told, plundered the earth, arrogantly rode roughshod over neighbors, and were addicted to mindless violence. So some of us hang our heads in shame. We shouldn't. The cowboy is in fact our Homeric hero, an archetype that sticks because there's truth in it.
Cowboys were of course plainsmen — Midwesterners operating from Texas to Kansas to the Dakotas. But their ideas and ideals spread across the continent to our Mountain West as well, even as far as the Alaskan West.
A few years ago, a Canadian anthropologist explained to us how different her countrymen are from Americans. She had a perfect comparison to illustrate this. She suggested that we go to the extreme western edge of Canada and have a look at two small towns named Stewart and Hyder. Stewart is situated in British Columbia, Hyder at the southeastern tip of Alaska. Though just two miles apart, these towns are very different in their "habits of the heart." If we visited them, our anthropologist friend implied, we would immediately understand the superiority of Canadian culture.
We decided to take up her challenge.
First we called up the respective town authorities. Hyder, the American town, turned out to have no town authorities — and, technically, no town. The Hyderites chose not to incorporate as a municipality, creating instead a community association — a private nonprofit corporation. Stewart, the Canadian town, is a real municipality with a traditional government.
When we phoned Stewart, the government agent refused to answer any questions until they were submitted in writing. The Hyder community association representative said, sure, she'd tell us anything we wanted to know, right now, on the phone. But to make it a fair comparison, we faxed written questions to both parties, and got written answers back.
-snip-
(Excerpt) Read more at opinionjournal.com ...
Ironic, then, that the author is a judge on the 9th Circus Court of Appeals...
and they still are it seems.
prisoner6
I would bet that Judge Kleinfeld is not often in the majority of the 9th Circus...at least on the rulings that get slapped down regularly by the Supreme Court.
These were three of my favorites.
My wife and I were in Canada on vacation this weekend. I didn't think anything about it, but I wore my cowboy hat everywhere I went. One gal in Calgary complemented me on it. She said that she had looked into buying one, but they were too expensive.
I always knowed there was a reason I done come to live in Alaska...not for the trees, not the clean air and unpolluted water (we do have lots of that) ... but for the freedom to let my mind roam and to be able to speak my mind.
bttt
ping for reply tomorrow.
But he DOES have the time to go running off to small-town Alaska.
Even I don't get that much leave...
Stewart residents courteously joined in the fun, bringing new government trucks and a poodle.
A totally GREAT article. I have never seen a better descriptions of the differences between Americans and Canadians (or Europeans). The irony is that a guy like Moore would not prosper in Canada or Germany. The anti-American is just too damned American!
bttt
Canadians in the Western Provinces very often wear cowboy hats.
Great article. Really cuts out the BS and exemplifies the difference between us and our Socialist neighbors. Give me a handgun and a bottle of "something warming" over flower boxes and government officials aye?
We should get rid of our stupid Army beret softcover, and put cowboy hats on all of our troops. ...better, yet, make some new kevlar in the shape of cowboy hats. Put cowboy hats on our M-1s and A-10s. Put the hats on our nukes.
I detest cowboy hats (even though I'm rural), but we should all start wearing them and throwing rotten tomatoes (i.e., loose rhetoric) at Europe until Europeans change their tune. ...can't reason with 'em.
Indeed, "frontier", to Americans, simply means the beginning of the future.
In America, rugged individuals discovered and tamed the frontier through their own initiative. In Canada, the government imposed law and order on the frontier through the Royal Mounties and then brought people to settle the land. As a result, the contrast between Americans and Canadians is clear. Americans prefer freedom and resist government intrusion as much as they can. Canadians prefer order and look to the government to make sure nothing is out of place. If you want to live in a country where doing your own thing matters and to go as far as your abilities take you, then you gravitate towards America. If you want to live in a country where feeling you aren't out of place is your most important value and prize politeness in your character, then you'll feel at home in Canada. A portrait of two societies that may speak the same language but have markedly different ideas about the good life. And neither wishes to be the other. Perhaps that is the point: to give up who we are is the day we cease to be American.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.