On this day of prayer and remembrance, I wanted to encourage
all of you with the following:
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 broadcast.
"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 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 one of the
best editorials that I have ever read regarding the United States. It is nice
that one man realizes it. I only wish that the rest of the world would realize
it. We are always blamed for everything, and never even get a thank you for the
things we do.
I would hope that each of you would send this to as many
people as you can and emphasize that they should send it to as many of their
friends until this letter is sent to every person on the web. I am just a single
American that has read this,
