Canada, and the shaming of pride

And so, on the 150th anniversary of the birth of a pretty splendid country, did it come to this.

Canada Day was indistinguishable from the CBC itself, the state celebrating the state broadcaster with hours of bloviating self-congratulation, cloying interviews with hapless children and adults terrifyingly well-schooled in correct answering (Reporter: “What do you love about Canada?” Child: “I just love Canada!”, or, Adult: “The diversity!”), and reporters, equally wellschooled, each thanking the retiring Peter Mansbridge for, as one put it without a trace of irony, “all your years of service.”

Service? Was the host of The National not paid, perhaps even well-paid? Was he not, er, doing his job? All these years, did I miss him wearing a uniform of some sort and risking his neck?

And there was Mansbridge, finally signing off the July 1 broadcast and saying, also without a shred of selfawareness, “I’m not a fan of long goodbyes.”

The reader will make up her own mind, of course, but for God’s sakes, he announced his retirement last September. Eight months is a short goodbye, it appears.

Let us be grateful for small mercies.

Before the day dawned dreary and rainy, there were confident reports in virtually every major news outlet in the land that 500,000 people would descend on Parliament Hill.

About 25,000 made it onto the lawns, as many again stuck in lines that went nowhere, and if you imagine it was all because of the grisly weather, think again.

Police in New Mexico are investigating after a Canadian woman was found dead with her husband inside a pickup truck on the shoulder of an interstate highway. The bodies of Ursula Tammy Kokotkiewicz, 32, and Jacob Kokotkiewicz, 31, were discovered Thursday morning in a blue Dodge truck. New Mexico State Police say the woman, who was found in the passenger seat, and her husband, who was in the driver’s seat, both sustained gunshot wounds to the head. Police say a handgun was also found in the man’s lap.