These are the things that I love about the U.S.A.

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Good day eh.
That phrase denotes my country of origin to anyone in North America. The subtle and not so subtle nuances of language keep the Canadian and American cultures just short of a hug away from each other.
So what the heck is a Canadian doing waving an American flag? Funny enough the inspiration for this short piece comes from a conversation last night at a bar in Canada with a man from Poland talking about America.
His question was this "Why is it that we love to hate the USA?"
His query related directly to my changing views on the behemoth to the South.
I have always had a black cold spot in my heart for my yankee cousins the bravado of the USA has always offended my Canadian Goodness and from there it is a slippery slope to HATE.
I want never to be a hater and it is an inner struggle that I am dealing with to keep that darkness out of my heart. So in the spirit of being unbiased and to the process of looking at the whole picture by looking at all the details that compose it I have decided to make a list of the "stuff" that makes America unique and as delightful as any other place on earth.

I am not a hardened "tree hugger" but I think that keeping corporate interests out of certain areas of this planet is important on so many levels and as a boy I came to love the idea of our National parks. I can see the grand mountain tops of Canada's first National park from where I live. So why am I including this in a tribute to the USA?

Banff National Park is the first such park in my country it's 2564 sq mi of mountains and forest was created in 1885 13 years after Yellowstone national park which was the first such place in the world! The USA has a vast system of natural monuments and parks which, from what I can see, rivals any other country on the planet in it's scope and depth. So a Canadianism that I grew up with that implied that the States was a wasteland nearly devoid of natural spaces was dismantled by an American.
Ken Burns the man who created the documentary "The National Parks: Americas best Idea" a film that goes through the history of the NPS in 6 parts showed two things to this naive Canadian.
One was that in fact this foreign country had set aside a lot of natural habitat as a public trust and it opened my mind to the fact that an awful lot of that trust was due to the intervention and guidance of the proverbial capitalist. My reality was being shattered and the conversation with the Polish fellow related to this dismantling in yet another of his comments. Here I will paraphrase, when we become educated completely we can have discussions when we aren't educated we have pointless arguments. Very true words my nameless friend.
So Ken Burns and his documentary take me to another place where the evil capitalist empire of the USA shines and that is the concept and implementation of the Public Broadcasting Service.
The service started back in 1952 funded by the Ford Foundation, there is the nasty capitalist again, with the name "Educational Television and Radio Center".
In 1963 the scope changed and the name changed to "National Educational Television". In 1970 because of criticism as to content all funding was going to be pulled unless NET merged with a Public TV station WDNT-TV, Monday October 5th 1970 WDNT changed its call letters to WNET-TV and that same day PBS made its first broadcast.
This system or service is not perfect but it has kept an apolitical voice for America and for some of Canada. It is to be noted that while PBS is not the most viewed news source in America it has held the title of the most trusted and reliable news source in America.
It's cousin is another American marvel and that is National Public Radio. NPR was started the same time as PBS and it has the same bragging rights as it visual counterpart. National is somewhat of a misnomer because it broadcasts World wide via satellite service. It has a consistent listnership of some 37 million people!
I have not listened to any NPR broadcasts but I do take in the PBS world news and Charlie Rose on a regular basis and agree with the American public as to being trusted and unbiased as possible.
One more comment on these two entities, they were brought into existence through the pen stroke of Lyndon B Johnston, the man we wanted to hate for the continuation of the Vietnam war! This was another topic which the Polish fellow and I hit on but it is another thread for later.

As for the other good things that come from the USA? Well I am sure there are many other things if we put our minds to it and try to remain unbiased and here I will mention a person who is somewhat of a national treasure or I feel should be seen as such to the US citizenry that being the "Daily Show". It is America's Rick Mercer or Mercer is Canada's Jon Stewart, a dream would be a program with the two of them hitting the facts in the way that they do about politics and society.

I have come to realize that our own national identity is made thin by simply pointing out the faults of other countries when our persona is said to be mainly of utter politness. Politness often times is just duplicity or in a common term being "Politically Correct" I would rather be known as a citizen of a place that is noted for it's unbiased view and not it's ability to smile then scowl. That is why I am compelled to start the process by thanking my American cousins and saying "These are the things that I love about the USA".