[Pokey78]

[JohnHuang2]

Mark Steyn MEGA PING!!

[GeronL]

jokes in Canada are not illegal. They're just federally regulated.

hahahaha

[Criminal Number 18F]

Every Tomovia, Dickania and Harristan is independent these days

Steyn cracks me up.

d.o.l.

Criminal Number 18F

[McGavin999]

I never really understood why the rest of Canada didn't just let Quebeq go.

[NorthOf45]

'So a dozen people objected to the "vicious hatemongering" and as a result the rest of us 30 million Canadians are now damned as humorless prigs.'

Laughable isn't it? Thank you Mark Steyn. A member of the media actually GETS IT.

[lainde]

bttt and thanks for an unexcerpted version..

[Drango]

Notice he didn't dare write this for a Canadian paper...

[Tamzee]

Just for the record, Canadians are not humorless. We're humourless, OK?

[dixiechick2000]

ROTFLOL BUMP!

Thank you, both, for the post and the ping!

"As for Francophones, nothing the dog puppet did is as devastating an indictment of their (and my) ramshackle backwater as the first half-hour of Denys Arcand's current film, "The Barbarian Invasions," partly financed by Telefilm Canada, Telefilm Quebec and all the rest. For Americans, the scenes set in a Montreal hospital are a fascinating preview of what U.S. health care would be like if the Democrats ever get to "reform" it."

Ooooh! Nice slam!

It's very nice to see you, JH2. I'm not babysitting tomorrow. It's too bad I don't have the energy to find some trouble to get into...;o)

[mylife]

Gags are one of the great pillars of a common culture, but they're one of the first things to get lost in translation--and if you can't share a joke, it's hard to have a shared culture.

Aint that the truth!!

that the problem with the moral high ground of the rue des Pussies is that it's a cul de sac.

Way to end on a high note Mark!!

[Ichneumon]

So when Conan O'Brien's sidekick, Triumph the Insult Comic Dog...

Triumph is great. He's like a cross between the best of Groucho Marx and Don Rickles.

[Tax-chick]

That's the way a mature, confident society deals with such provocations--with cheap jokes and extensive lists of "Famous French Poofs"--not the reflexive cringe that cries "racism" and calls for "hate crimes" investigations.

If everyone who's not as brilliant as Mark Steyn would just shut up, what a quiet world it would be! (Those who appreciate Steyn would be allowed to say "Oh, wow!" or the equivalent, and exchange favorite quotes.)

[TexasNative2000]

Just for the record, Canadians are not humorless. We're humourless, OK?

Whether commentary or humor, Steyn is genius.

[maica]

Instead of falling into po-faced whining like the Toronto Star, Britain's Sun ran a picture of two Frenchmen carrying those dinky little male purses they're partial to over there, under the headline: "They Don't Call It Gay Paree For Nothing." Instead of huffing and puffing about "racist filth" like Canadian Members of Parliament, one British MP attempted to introduce the following motion: "This House does not fancy elderly French women." That's the way a mature, confident society deals with such provocations--with cheap jokes and extensive lists of "Famous French Poofs"--not the reflexive cringe that cries "racism" and calls for "hate crimes" investigations.


*****

Steyn is the absolute champoin of putting ideas into words.

I suggest that ridicule is the way to beat the pompous Kerry and the smarmy (Brit word) Edwards.

GWB understands this extremely well.
Remember "The Look" at the final Bush/Gore debate.

[Gritty]

Thanks for beating Quidnunc to the article this morning, Pokey78, even if you did have to get up "early".

There's a lesson here, both for the European Union and an increasingly Hispanicized U.S.: Gags are one of the great pillars of a common culture, but they're one of the first things to get lost in translation--and if you can't share a joke, it's hard to have a shared culture.

Steyn sees things most of us sometimes do, but that we aren't perceptive enough to isolate. Here is one of them.

[manic4organic]

Bump for later reading

[irv]

Four prime ministers from Quebec have run Canada for 34 of the past 36 years ... at least Iraq's Shiites had the excuse that they were living in a dictatorship.

When you can't make a joke without the feds coming after you, it is a dictatorship, which is really hispoint, more or less.

[Warhammer]

Is this clip of Triumph on the web anywhere? Anyone got a link?

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

True story.

My wife and I were eating at the Colonel Barrie Inn, in Barrie MA a few years ago. Studying the luncheon specials, I see there’s a “French Canadian Meat Pie”. When the pretty young waitress arrives we have the following conversation:

PYW: What can I get for you?
LIM: How’s the French Canadian meat pie?
PYW: Very good…
LIM: Is it made with real French Canadians?
PYW: (Not missing a beat) Yup.
LIM: Are they fresh?
PYW: (Not missing a beat) Boss traps ‘em fresh every morning.
LIM: Guess I’m committed then, I’ll go with the French Canadian meat pie.

Oddly enough, my wife watched this entire exchange with growing amusement, didn’t kick me under the table or anything. After we finish PYW returns:

PYW: How was your French Canadian meat pie?
LIM: I distinctly tasted Anglophone.
PYW: Hugn?

If she’dda read this column, she’d would have understood.