Canadians are with us still

Shortly after the terrorist assault of Sept. 11, a Canadian paean to America began circulating on the Internet and we received many calls suggesting that we reprint it. In checking it out, however, we found that it had been written by a prominent Canadian broadcaster, Gordon Sinclair, in June 1973, when many Americans were depressed by the defeat in the war in Vietnam.

To reprint it now would have been to take it out of context. Moreover, Sinclair died in 1984 and there was thus no way to determine whether he still felt as he expressed himself in 1973.

Instead, we print in our column of letters to the editor today two letters from Canada that say much the same thing that Sinclair did nearly three decades ago, and we are grateful for their generous words of goodwill and support.

Canadians and Americans have many cultural differences and do not always see eye to eye on the issues of the day. Beneath the skin, however, we are cousins and there's no one whom we would rather have as our neighbors north of the border.

Richard Halloran

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