SPECIAL CANADA EDITION
1. Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. Imagine if NBC did separate newscasts specially tailored to viewers in Maine, New York, Texas, Missouri, California, Alaska and Hawaii and operated multiple public-radio networks and 24-hour news channels in two languages and you start to get a sense of the reach of the CBC. As I discovered each time I turned on a TV or radio in my train trip across Canada, there is no equivalent to CBC's might and scope in the U.S. ... and that's a pity.
2. Canadian debates. Our neighbor to the north runs on the Parliamentary system, so five party candidates are invited to the TV debates. In two languages! Had Sarah Palin tried reading her non-sequitur talking points off a cheat sheet during one of these free-for-alls, she'd had been spun around so fast it would've undone even her perfectly-pinned pile of hair.
3. Rex Murphy. Canada's great political commentator also hosts an incredibly civil and stimulating call-in program on CBC Radio. In a recent TV editorial Murphy complained that the current federal campaign (Canadians go to the polls Oct. 14) has put style over substance. He has no idea.
... AND WHAT'S NOT
1. MLB playoff start times. Bad enough that baseball's night playoff games are starting at 9:35 p.m. in the Eastern Time Zone. Try watching in Nova Scotia, like I did, where the Atlantic Time Zone is an hour ahead of Eastern and games rarely end before 2 a.m. No wonder they follow hockey up here.
2. Dollar bills. Canadians have replaced all currency below $5 with coins. The loonie ($1) and toonie ($2) were forced on the people by their government 20 years ago ... and given no choice, they embraced the coins with characteristic good cheer. If the Federal Reserve tried that, Fox News would go berserk.
3. No "Real Time." Odd that the distributor of Bill Maher's movie "Religulous" is promoting it so heavily in Canada since his HBO talk show isn't carried there. Happily, the channels that carry HBO's programs just announced a new service that will air "Real Time" and all the other shows currently not seen in Canada.
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