One Red Hot Country Mama!

I am blogging from New York City right now. My boyfriend and I drove down from Toronto this morning through beautiful New York State. The contrast between New York State and New York City is strong – while the state seems relatively rural, reminding me of the eastern Quebec near where I grew up, the city, which essentially invented urban planning, is the second-largest in North America. The city and state don’t seem to go together. They seem to have nothing to do with each other.

I have heard the same thing said about London – as a financial and cultural center, and which was long considered to be the most powerful city in the world… compared to the rest of England, which does not share those traits. Toronto is similar. Toronto compared to other Ontario towns, such as Ottawa, Kitchener or Barrie sticks out like a sore thumb, with its variety of cultures and the general chaos of so many worlds colliding. I was thinking, as cities are becoming more and more powerful, maybe we should rethink how we are governed. It seems impossible to believe that the citizens of the major cities and the citizens of the rest of the provinces/states/countries have the same needs. So, let’s start by creating the island of Toronto .

  A lot of Canadians are American-haters, but I am definitely not that way. My Grandmother was American and my Grandparents met while taking biology degrees at Stanford University. In fact, this summer my geneology-loving uncle who lives in California showed me my Daughters of the American Revolution number, saying that that network was open to me if I wanted. I still have an aunt and uncle in the US, along with some cousins, all of whom I love. There was even a period in my mid-twenties when I could only date Americans, since they just seemed so much more interesting and outspoken and less wishy-washy than Canadian men. So yes, I am definitely not a hater .

I have been working for American companies for most of my career. I have had respect for my colleagues south of the border – for their straightforward manner and their ability to face facts and make tough decisions. They also are not people to be messed with, and any time that I have tried to circumvent that I met with a quick, definitive and sometimes harsh response.

So – I really don’t understand what is going on in the US lately. Here are some of the inexplicable things I see, that are so out of what I think is the norm for Americans:

• Putting up with an unprecedented level of surveillance including phone and e-mail and allowing police to conduct a search without their knowledge, with a warrant obtained from a non-public court.
• Not holding Bush responsible for the problems in Iraq and not somehow harshly punishing him for misleading them by making them believe that Iraq was involved in the 9/11 attacks.
• Not taking Bush to task on his close relationship to special interest groups, including the oil and gas industry and his abuse of signing statements.

It is very confusing for me to see this going on – from the people who are so outspoken and not to be messed with. It is surprising to see this in them being so passive (a trait I have often talked about Canadians having, compared to Americans) in the face of what is going on.

There does seem to finally be some real dissent about the Iraq situation. Retired Lt. General Ricardo Sanchez, who was the commander of the coalition forces in Iraq, recently came out saying that the politicians should be held responsible for the lives lost in Iraq.

"Too often, our politicians have been distracted and they have
chosen loyalty to their political parties above loyalty to the
Constitution because of their lust for power," he said.

Congress, he said, has failed its job of oversight.

"Who will demand accountability for the failure of our national
political leadership involved in the management of this war," he said.
"They have unquestionably been derelict in in the performance of their
duty. In my profession, these types of leaders would be immediately
relieved or court-martialed."

Now… that is more like the Americans I know. Let’s hope for more like this.

PS. You can see a great story and some beautiful pictures of my boyfriend Matt’s summer road trip across the US here.

A friend of mine sent me this follow-up to Dove’s Evolution campaign. It is scary that a lot of people still think of their TVs as babysitters.

Greg Brophy, the Founder and CEO of Securit and Shred-it, died in a plane accident in Alaska on Sunday, September 30th. I worked for Greg for two years and found him to be an inspirational entrepreneur. He built his paper shredding services business from one truck, which he himself drove, to a multinational information management phenomenon – with 140 branches in 13 countries.

So few Canadian entrepreneurs are brave enough to do business state-side, let alone around the globe, and I think that Greg should be credited for his boldness to take risks. He also kept his business private and kept the head office in Canada, giving a lot of us rare opportunities to work on international business. Much of Canadian marketing is simply implementing programs designed by the head office, either in the US or elsewhere. With Securit and Shred-it, my colleagues and I had the chance to strategize, build and execute international programs from scratch.

I put his logo on my post because in my time in his Marketing department, he was always critiquing every design, whether it be a truck or a website, for having the logo be too small. The result of course was huge logos everywhere. I also remember standing out in a cold February parking lot debating over truck designs – people shouting out their opinions over the wind.

My thoughts are with the Brophy family on this sad week.