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This, from a Canadian newspaper, is worth sharing.

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
technology, and you get radios. You talk about German
technology, and you get automobiles. You talk about
American technology, 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!

This is Leonard Pitts Jr.

http://www.miami.com/herald/content/features/digdocs/000565.htm
 
 
 

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We'll go forward from this moment
 

It's my job to have something to say.
 

They pay me to provide words that help make sense of that which troubles the

American soul. But in this moment of airless shock when hot tears sting

disbelieving eyes, the only thing I can find to say, the only words that

seem to fit, must be addressed to the unknown author of this suffering.
 

You monster. You beast. You unspeakable bastard.
 

What lesson did you hope to teach us by your coward's attack on our World

Trade Center, our Pentagon, us? What was it you hoped we would learn?

Whatever it was, please know that you failed.
 

Did you want us to respect your cause? You just damned your cause.
 

Did you want to make us fear? You just steeled our resolve.
 

Did you want to tear us apart? You just brought us together.
 

Let me tell you about my people. We are a vast and quarrelsome family, a

family rent by racial, social, political and class division, but a family

nonetheless. We're frivolous, yes, capable of expending tremendous emotional

energy on pop cultural minutiae -- a singer's revealing dress, a ball team's

misfortune, a cartoon mouse. We're wealthy, too, spoiled by the ready

availability of trinkets and material goods, and maybe because of that, we

walk through life with a certain sense of blithe entitlement. We are

fundamentally decent, though -- peace-loving and compassionate. We struggle

to know the right thing and to do it. And we are, the overwhelming majority

of us, people of faith, believers in a just and loving God.
 

Some people -- you, perhaps -- think that any or all of this makes us weak.

You're mistaken. We are not weak. Indeed, we are strong in ways that cannot

be measured by arsenals.
 
 

IN PAIN
 

Yes, we're in pain now. We are in mourning and we are in shock. We're still

grappling with the unreality of the awful thing you did, still working to

make ourselves understand that this isn't a special effect from some

Hollywood blockbuster, isn't the plot development from a Tom Clancy novel.

Both in terms of the awful scope of their ambition and the probable final

death toll, your attacks are likely to go down as the worst acts of

terrorism in the history of the United States and, probably, the history of

the world. You've bloodied us as we have never been bloodied before.
 

But there's a gulf of difference between making us bloody and making us

fall. This is the lesson Japan was taught to its bitter sorrow the last time

anyone hit us this hard, the last time anyone brought us such abrupt and

monumental pain. When roused, we are righteous in our outrage, terrible in

our force. When provoked by this level of barbarism, we will bear any

suffering, pay any cost, go to any length, in the pursuit of justice.
 

I tell you this without fear of contradiction. I know my people, as you, I

think, do not. What I know reassures me. It also causes me to tremble with

dread of the future.
 

In the days to come, there will be recrimination and accusation, fingers

pointing to determine whose failure allowed this to happen and what can be

done to prevent it from happening again. There will be heightened security,

misguided talk of revoking basic freedoms. We'll go forward from this moment

sobered, chastened, sad. But determined, too. Unimaginably determined.
 
 

THE STEEL IN US
 

You see, the steel in us is not always readily apparent. That aspect of our

character is seldom understood by people who don't know us well. On this

day, the family's bickering is put on hold.
 

As Americans we will weep, as Americans we will mourn, and as Americans, we

will rise in defense of all that we cherish.
 

So I ask again: What was it you hoped to teach us? It occurs to me that

maybe you just wanted us to know the depths of your hatred. If that's the

case, consider the message received. And take this message in exchange: You

don't know my people. You don't know what we're capable of. You don't know

what you just started.
 

But you're about to learn.
 

[The Miami Herald, Wednesday, September 12, 2001]