America: Full of

EL PASO, Texas — Radio
stations everywhere try to
be community-minded; to
construct a campaign that
will not only achieve a wor-
thy goal, but that will also
endear the station to an
ever-increasing audience.

In this Texas backwater, abut-
ting Mexico and New Mexico, the
leading broadcast outlet is cur-
rently promoting a charity.

It boldly asks listeners to send
in money to buy bullet-proof
vests for its police officers.

The campaign repeatedly booms
on the air with announcements
that the City of El Paso cannot
afford to buy these modern-day
shields, Citizens have to do it.
Send money now.

Across the Rio Grande from
Ciudad Juarez, Ei Paso officially
declares a population of 463,800,
but no one really knows.

it could be 750,000 (there may
be a million more on the Mexican
side). Vast stretches of barren
hillsides, usually downwind from
ugly, belching mining concerns,
are infested with squatters in
adobe shacks.

it has long since gone beyond
the United States Border Patrol's
ability to control. Instead, the
immigration perimeter has moved
inland from El Paso, where road-
blocks, aircraft and assorted other
technique are employed to catch
the wetbacks.

In the cocoon of El Paso, their
underground network is secure.

Among the many differences
between Canada and the United
States is an attitude of self-
reliance.

Americans are taught as a cul-
tural inheritance that they are

equal and they must fend for
themselves.

Their freedoms will be pro-
tected, but they will not necessari-
ly be fed or housed, nor can they
be too demanding about medical
or educational services.

If you can’t make your own
way in life, be grateful for
whatever alms come your way.

If you are equal, prove it. Go
become president. Go become
rich. But don’t ever beg.

In Canada, drummed into us
from birth, the attitude is that
none fail because of their own
mistakes. Failure is a circumstance
of discriminatiou, a lack of
educational opportunity, regional
disparity, and — mostly —
because we have a succession of
stupid governments,

In economic competition with
the Americans, we start off with
the disadvantages of a smal] mar-
ket, a vast lerritory and a cruel
climate.

On top of this we build a
welfare state that is the envy of
the world, pratecting the National
Inferiority Complex, and making
it impossible for anyone to mate-
rially suffer failure.

To pay for this, governments
cither borrow or tax, forcing our
industry into a hopeless com-
petitive position.

There is no solution for this

.
lawyers, university people, politi-
cians, bankers, doctors, teache
industrialists — Le. ev

Canada have the same suggestion:
pay them more.

Cut their arguments to the core
and you will find that they are all
trying ou get more government
money for themselves or more
protection front competition.

Every visit 10 the United States
leaves me invigorated, even the
quick sorties into the State of
Washington.

Bannerman

epee

OPEN LINES

We arrived in Phoenix this year
in time for New Year's Eve, join-
ing the crowds on the city’s Cen-
tral Avenue for one of the coun-
try’s greatest annual events: the
Fiesta Bowl Parad

Marching bands from
throughout the U.S., and expen-
sive floats promoting various
children’s themes, came by in
waves.

American brass bands, in their
rapid pace, short-stepping march,
have a unique style, as ng as
they have become cliched: they are
all the same.

There were many in this parade,
not the least of which were The
Blues, the 280-member band of
the Pennsylvania State Nittany
Lious, and th ilar-sized ag-
gregation representing the adver-
saries, the University of Tennessee
Volunteers, and the host Arizona
State University Sun Devi

AS a pre-game respite, w
drought in the new year with The
Phoenix Symphony followed by
dinner.

But New Year's Day, we moved
with the crowds to Sun Devil

Sunday, January 12, 1992 ~ North Shore News - 9

Stadium in Tempe, sitting on the
50-yard line for the annual Fiesta
Bowl]. There is nothing quite like
U.S. College Feotball.

There are many bow! games,
and all of them auract large
crowds. Some —- Rose, Orange,
Sugar, Fiesta — are international-
ly televised.

We sat with 73,000 people
overwhelmed by all of the
obligatory Americanisms: 500
musicians on the field; massive
hot air balloons (shaped like a
beer bottle, an athletic shoe and a
cactus); **Old Glory”’ (the Stars
and Stripes) rolled out to cover
the entire football field; a moment
of silence for the troops from
“Operation Desert Storm,”’ a
televised message from the presi-
dent over the scoreboard screen:
and paratroopers artfully landing
from upon high amid a marching
band.

We were quite surprised when
they played God Save the Queen,
until we heard our seatmates voice
the words: ‘America tis of thee,
sweet land of liberty..."

We are of course reminded that
when a Canadian football team
draws a crowd of 1,000 fans, it is
a big event.

We are too smart to pay to see
lousy football; thus ensuring that
it will be lousy forever,

We ask our impoverished
universities to subsidize the s
and this ultimately leads to further

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paradoxes, always exciting

requests or government help.

Arizona State University has
just signed a new footbail coach.
His salary is $600,000, about
$700,000 Canadian per year. Not
a penny will come from the uni-
versily treasury.

When we travel in this ex-
hilarating country it is like taking
a swan dive into schizophrenia, a
nation that relishes its paradoxes.

This is where you see children
in grocery stores browsing through
magazines advertising handguns.
Their fathers make sure the
shotgun is visible through the rear
window of the half-ton truck.

When you see a line-up on a ci-
ty sidewalk, it is just as likely to
be the state hospital as it is the
latest hit movie.

No country in the democratic
world is so cruel to its poor. Cen-
tral cities have become vast bat-
tlefields.

In the face of this, President
Bush is beginning his election year
with promises of tax cuts. He is
more worried about the political
impact caused by defence cutbacks
than the crisis in the streets

More Americana in th
Next week,

pace

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