Canada

It really must be tough times up there in our Great Northern Neighbor – what with the massacre currently in progress in Vancouver. The Canadians haven’t beaten us in anything since 1812 (and they got A LOT of help from England in that one). No doubt they expected to use the home nation advantage to finally put Defence Scheme No. 1 into (metaphorical) action but it really shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that we’re whooping international butt in the these Games. But here’s what I say to you, forlorn Canucks, it’s not that you’re losing; it’s that you’re looking at this whole thing the wrong way.

See, we obviously have the home advantage at these games because Canada is actually part of the United States – they just don’t want to admit it. Formal annexation would be simple as Canada is already neatly divided into states (which they apparently call “territories”). They already speak the same language as we do complete with a cute and easily identifiable regional dialect. Canadians also play roughly the same sports as Americans and multiple professional sporting leagues locate teams in both nations. (If French-Canada wants to either go independent or join France that would be fine by me – I don’t blame your Anglican Canadian if he doesn’t want to be associated with the French.)

As it is I’m sure most people abroad barely dissociate Canada with America and who do the Canadians really want to be associated with anyway? Canucks aren’t effeminate like the French and they aren’t arrogant like the Brits. Apparently both European nations influence Canadian culture but you’d never know it by doing anything other than visiting Quebec or listening to their national anthem. Canadian cuisine isn’t exquisite like the French’s or even crappy like the Brit’s… they don’t have “cuisine”… just like us. (You want to know about this great Canadian restaurant downtown? I didn’t think so.)

And then there’s the whole Mexico situation. You know Canadians can’t be happy about the fact that the US/Mexico border is virtually nonexistent (where it’s probably necessary) and they have to wait in a customs line just to see a Tigers game. Would it really be that bad to move all the resources spent defending our northern border down to the southern one? A lot more marijuana would probably be trafficked up north but at least when the Canadians deal pot they stop short of building armaments capable of terrorizing local governments. This leads to a major problem in American society today – we can’t get rid of the 2^nd Amendment but we can’t let Mexicans legally buy a lot of guns (because they love forming unusually large cartels). We could easily solve this by outlawing guns in Mexico, keeping them kind of legal in the US, and letting anyone and everyone own them in Canada.

Ok, but Mexico aside, American absorption of the country it shares the longest border in the world with would bring a number of positive attributes to the new and expanded US of A. We’d be a lot better at international basketball with Steve Nash at point guard and we’d be A LOT better at hockey. Our roster of native comedians (who are actually funny) would almost double when we added a number of hilarious comedians like: Dan Akroyd, John Candy, Michael Cera, Brendan Fraser, Tom Green, Phil Hartman, Norm Macdonald, Mike Myers, Matthew Perry, Van Wilder, Seth Rogen, Martin Short, and Keanu Reeves. I know you’re probably wondering how the CFL fits into all of this but I think it would make an excellent feeder league for the NFL (which means they could finally end NFL Europe – if it still even exists).

Canadians – look at it this way. This is going to happen eventually so why not get it over with and start on a new rich legacy of state history rather than clinging to your own forgettable Canadian past. Then you wouldn’t be all upset about this Olympic debacle and, rather, you’d be celebrating total and complete domination of these Winter Olymipcs (and we wouldn't be worrying about the Germans breathing down our necks.)

Clothes

I got a job as a consultant and my father asked me what it was like at the office. I described it plainly, “I sit in a cubicle like most other people. Some guys sit in offices and they wear ties.” My father, aware of my penchant to disregard appearance as unnecessary, replied, “If you wear a sharp pair of pressed pants, a nice shirt, and a great tie, people will notice you.” While I knew I could never live up to those expectations if I tried, I took simple comfort in the fact that the other day I had consciously not worn my new white sneakers in the rain in order to save their appearance for the new office. It might seem like a fairly minor thing in the grand scheme of “dressing the part”, I am proud of it… it’s progress.

Don’t get me wrong, I realized wearing nice clothes will get you ahead in life but so will lying constantly. And given my outlook on outward appearances, it really feels like lying for me. Some jobs (and situations within many more jobs) occasionally require dressing the part. If your job is selling insurance to people in a region and you notice most of them wearing fancy clothing, you’d be foolish to not dress the part for the sake of increased sales. That said, most jobs shouldn’t require such attention to your looks but they sadly do. People, apparently, equate productivity, efficiency, and professionalism with nice clothes.

Not only does this equation strike me as retarded and deliberately wasteful, but it seems out of line with a lot of other messages American society is sending our way. For example, some black dude (back when it wasn’t cool to be black) said something about judging people on the content of their character, rather than how they looked. Oh, I get it, while you can’t control your skin color, you can control how you configure your apparel, right?

Cutting to the point – I’ve always believed in function over form and substance over style. My personal philosophy with regards to clothes is strictly about utility over aesthetics. Therefore, here are some fashion trends which I think are silly.

Scarves – As I understand it, these things are about keeping people’s necks warm… and making the wearer looking like an adult. I prefer to wear hooded-sweatshirts, which serve the same purpose and are a lot harder to lose. Unfortunately, many people in society look at those who wear hooded-sweatshirts as “sketchy”, at best, and “a prospective rapist”, at worst. Another layer to protect against the cold… and a hood to fend off the wind… what’s not to love? I’m not asking that people come to their senses and replace their scarves with hoodies, I’m just asking for people not to judge me when I walk down the street.

High heels – Granted I don’t have to wear them so perhaps I shouldn’t comment but this one goes out to the ladies. High heels are absolutely ridiculous and should be banned. How is this not exactly like foot-binding (besides the fact that it’s not forced on children)? It reduces maneuverability, puts unnecessary stress on the foot, and, I honestly can’t believe it’s more comfortable than flat shoes.

Ties – I don’t think I need to explain how pointless these are…

Anything lacking an adequate amount of pockets – Pockets are so useful. Why aren’t cargo pants the norm in the business world? Because suit pants are more practical? Hell, why aren’t cargo pants the new jeans? They’re like jeans only with the added practicality of more pockets.

I dream of a world where my children wear cargo pants to business meetings and hoodies to formal dinners. I dream of a world where people are judged more on what they say and they do than by what they wear. Is it too much to ask that prospective employers consider interviewees’ words before dismissing them for wearing clothes that don’t match? It might be a pipedream but I’m sure MLK once thought a black guy being president was one too.

Politics

It’s really a shame that we’re often instructed to not talk about religion or politics in public because these are two of the most interesting topics known to man. Of course this rule, like so many others, was designed to protect idiots from other idiots. Given that so many people today believe that anyone in the opposite part is a complete moron, it’s easy to envision harmless political discourse mushrooming into physical assault – especially in the more violent past. Of course if you believe that the other person is utterly and completely wrong in every way, it’s hard see anything productive coming from it (rendering religious discourse all but impossible between “We’re right and you’re going to hell” religions). I guess it’s kind of ironic that I think mostly everyone else is totally wrong and yet I think it’s productive to yell about how politics is messed up… but we’re moving past that.

This cut-and-dry, “I’m right, you’re wrong” philosophy – which prevents productive political discourse – is nurtured by our two party system. Given the sheer size of the population and the polarity of the respective parties’ views, it seems implausible that two parties can describe the views of most of the population. In reality, people fall in line behind party lines because it’s easy and because third parties are mostly a social joke. Many will tell you that a vote for a third party candidate is wasting your vote… and they’re so sadly wrong that I want to publicly vilify them for the disservice they are doing the youth of this nation. If you believe that your voice isn’t accurately represented, isn’t a vote for a third party a voice saying “I want more choices”? Ironically, the only time a third party vote is bad, is when there is a viable third party. In some cases it’s possible that a third party candidate will split like-minded voters and leave the candidate farthest from their own views as the frontrunner.

How do we only have three debates? Are we living in the 19^th century where transportation and distribution costs are so high that candidates are limited to three not completely scripted orations? Everyone who ever complained about George Bush’s stupidity should be screaming at their senator to propose a bill mandating more debates. But can we really complain about GW slipping past our incredible collective ability to sense idiocy? We don’t even require candidates to answer the actual questions posed to them. Remember that question that Obama answered well during the first three questions of the second debate? No? That’s because neither him nor that ol’ maverick McCain answered a single question during the first three rounds of the debate. (I can’t speak for the rest of it because I turned if off but I hope they actually gave an answer eventually.) This technique is most effective in high school history – where you have no clue what the answer is so you write a lot about something you do know – but it shouldn’t be acceptable during a debate. Yet most commentators the next day had more to say about who they thought won (which apparently means “who appealed the most to completely retarded people”) than about the fact that the debate was an insult to our collective national intelligence.

Not that we don’t deserve the insult. When the candidates did get around to actual answers (again, I’m just guessing they did since I never saw it) they took the most absurdly simplistic views on the subject. Obviously the issue of financial regulation is more complex than “regulations are good” and “no more regulations”. I was sure,”Cancer: Bad or Good?” was somewhere on the docket.

So we only have two candidates, we only require three debates, and we don’t actually mandate that anyone actually answers a question. And we’re surprised when a moron sneaks in the Whitehouse? So here’s my plan for fixing up this process. First off, end the conventions. It’s a tremendous waste of money, not to mention paper, and yet Democratic who claim to care about the environment love throwing their paper around at the DNC convention (I’d be amazed if liberals weren’t so consistently hypocritical). Ok, so this isn’t really a critical step to my process but I just want the pathetic cheerleaders that travel across the country to have to find something else to do every four years.

But seriously… do away with the two party system on a national level. Pick a dozen or so candidates from a number of different pools – major political parties, branches of government, the private sector – and have them square off in a rigorous process which emphasizes more evaluation and less public appearances designed to fire up people who already know who they are going to vote for. Instead of a trio of PR stunts, replace the “debates” with a dozen or so forums broadcast live and posted on the internet for public viewing. Hell, maybe it’s going too far but I’m all in favor of doing rounds of trivia questions and possibly a poker tournament. Isn’t seeing how someone responds under a little pressure better than watching them recite memorized talking points? Political parties can still exist but they’d operate only at the sub-presidential levels (with the hope that this method might be successful enough to be expanded down the branches of the electoral tree. I know this would require people to “think” but couldn’t be just try it out?