At one point during last night's opening ceremonies the camera lingered briefly on Stephen Harper.
And he looked so uncomfortable I thought he was going to come flying out of the rafters shouting "Hey hey don't forget it's all about ME !!!
He looked so jealous the Governor General got to do EVERYTHING, while he just stood there, for one horrible moment I thought he was going to prorogue her.
And although I thought the show was AWESOME.
The snowboarder barreling down the mountain and into the stadium. Our beautiful First Nations in all their glory. The gorgeous colours, and the amazing special effects. The gay bad boy Ashley McIsaac fiddling away wildly, the orca under the floor, the flying farm boy soaring over the golden prairies. And of course the lesbian queen K.D. Lang singing like only she can.
It was so wonderfully Canadian, gentle, different and creative, I loved every minute of it.
And so did a lot of Americans.
Indeed, the most memorable moments of the opening ceremonies came when Canada felt perhaps most unfamiliar. Fiddlers dressed like Hells Angels? Weary white-clad travelers walking across the snowy tundra? The aurora borealis come to earth?
No one will be mistaking that for America. It was, in the spirit of the national anthem, “the true north strong and free.”
On Friday night, however, Canada gave the world a sneak peek of a world with a lot more Canada.
And it was quite pleasant.
But I bet Great Ugly Leader must have HATED it because those are not his kind of Canadian values.
He was no doubt hoping the show would celebrate his ugly Con ones. Canada as a Warrior Nation. With a pig on a tank. And an oil rig on wheels.
No doubt hoping that it would be his Nuremberg moment that would help him get the majority he craves soooooo much.
But sadly for him the reviews of his Please Love Me Tour of B.C. have been brutal.
When reporters are kept at arm's length from the PM, you get quotes like these, from the PMO:
Harper said: "The Year of the Tiger holds great promise for Canada."
"My wife Laureen and I look forward to seeing Canada's vibrant Chinese community marking the Lunar New Year with colourful festivities across the country."
You get the picture.
Yup. We do. The monster is desperate.
And a dictator, is a dictator, is a dictator.
So all I can say is buzz off you flying
Vancouver you were BRILLIANT.
And play it again K.D....
My husband said the same thing. Funny post. Thanks for the chuckle.
ReplyDeleteFriday night was Canada's night, not Harper's night. That's the way it should have been.
ReplyDelete(come to think of it, that's the way it should ALWAYS be) :)
Aw, come on. He's there to support "a variety" of our Canadian athletes too...
ReplyDeleteNot all, just "a variety"...
I just did a Google search of the pair of words Harper and failure.
ReplyDeleteWhat came up was Stephen Harper failures.
There are 315,000 citations. Most of them are legitimate sources and not far left blogs.
What does that say?
I am with Pale: I have boycotted the games.
ReplyDeleteI am one who hopes Canada gets no gold medals and that we lose the hockey final.
I also like that the weather has been much too mild for many events. Gives the protesters more air time.
No, of course I don't condone the acts of violence or the busting of the windows of the BAy or any acts of Agents provocateurs, but I certainly understand why many started protesting to begin with.
Apparently, since Vancouver won the bid for them games, cuts had been made at the expense of Vancouver's most vulnerable. They legislated homelessness without a solution for them.
I guess they never learned from Montrealers who only recently finished paying off the 76 summer games---30 years later.
Vancouver has of course, gone over budget. Tax payers are going to continue paying that off for Lord knows how many years.
It seems that almost every city or town that hosts Olympic games, they end up with serious debt. With all the poverty in the world, perhaps it's time to think about putting an end to the games.
As for these overpaid athletes (I think we have the blinders off; most are not amateurs but pros), well, perhaps it's time for them to leave their training bubble and join the ranks of the real world and get a real job.
Nobody should be earning millions, particularly for sports and entertainment.
What ck, said.
ReplyDeleteWord Verification: orkpath
lol. Yep, that's right where this country is heading down.
Hi Emily...you're welcome. I was happy to see how he was practically ignored. And he must have HATED it... :)
ReplyDeletehi Sassy...yes I'm glad it worked out the way it did. I had horrible visions of Harpo hogging the show. On the other hand I was also hoping that he would be greeted by a deafening chorus of boos, and would be so bothered he'd stumble and fall flat on his face. But I guess you can't have EVERYTHING... :)
ReplyDeletehi prin...yes I'm sure he just LOVED all that variety. I was hoping that just the sight of K.D. Lang...the lesbian AND vegetarian from Alberta...would make him EXPLODE. But sadly that didn't happen... :)
ReplyDeletehi Torontonian...OMG. Only 315-thousand citations of Harper and FAILURE?
ReplyDeleteWho has been deleting them all?
I suspect Dimitri Soudas, that PMO monkey, and I demand a public inquiry !!!!! :)
hi CK...I'm not a big fan of the Olympis either. They're too big and too expensive. I'd rather see more money going to build playgrounds for ordinary kids rather than elite athletes. Especially since a recent study showed that thanks to obesity this generation of Canadian children may be the first to live less than their parents.
ReplyDeleteBut now that the Olympics are here, and the money has been spent, I don't see much point in protesting against them.
I figure we should just use the occasion to welcome the world, show off Beautiful British Columbia, and then hopefully learn from our mistakes.
As for gold medals...I hate the whole fixation on them, but I wouldn't mind if our athletes won a few...especially if they're from Quebec... ;)
hi Omar...ORKPATH? OMG. I know what you mean. But with Harper at the controls of the runaway pickup truck shouldn't that be DORKPATH? ;)
ReplyDelete