Canadian radio commentator Gordon Sinclair decided he'd had enough
of the stream of criticism and negative press recently directed at
the United States of America by foreign journalists (primarily over
America's long military involvement in Vietnam, which had ended with
the signing of the Paris Peace Accords six months earlier). When he
arrived at radio station CFRB in Toronto that morning, he spent twenty
minutes dashing off a two-page editorial defending the USA against its
carping critics which he then delivered in a defiant, indignant tone
during his "Let's Be Personal" spot at 11:45 AM that day.

The unusualness of any foreign correspondent -- even one from a country
with such close ties to the USA as Canada -- delivering such a caustic
commentary about those who would dare to criticize the USA is best
demonstrated by the fact that even thirty years later, a generation of
Americans too young to remember Sinclair's broadcast doubt that this
piece (which has been circulating on the Internet in the slightly-
altered form quoted above as something "recently" printed in a Toronto
newspaper) is real. It is real, and it received a great deal of attention
in its day. After Sinclair's editorial was rebroadcast by a few American
radio stations, it spread like wildfire all over the country. It was
played again and again (often superimposed over a piece of inspirational
music such as "Battle Hymn of the Republic" or "Bridge Over Troubled
Waters"), read into the Congressional Record multiple times, and finally
released on a record (titled "The Americans"), with all royalties donated
to the American Red Cross. (A Windsor/Detroit radio broadcaster named
Byron MacGregor recorded and released an unauthorized version of the piece
which hit the record stores before Sinclair's official version; an
infringement suit was avoided when MacGregor agreed to donate his profits
to the Red Cross as well).

Sinclair passed away in 1984, but he will long be remembered on both sides
of the U.S.-Canadian border -- both for his contributions to journalism,
and for his loudly proclaiming a friendship that few at the time were
willing to embrace.


"LET'S BE PERSONAL"    CFRB, Toronto, Ontario

"The Americans"

The United States dollar took another pounding on German, French and British
exchanges this morning, hitting the lowest point ever known in West Germany.
It has declined there by 41% since 1971 and this Canadian thinks it is time
to speak up for the Americans as the most generous and possibly the least-
appreciated people in all the world.

As long as sixty years ago, when I first started to read newspapers, I read
of floods on the Yellow River and the Yangtse. Well, Who rushed in with men
and money to help? The Americans did, that's who.

They have helped control floods on the Nile, the Amazon, the Ganges and the
Niger. Today, the rich bottom land of the Mississippi is under water and no
foreign land has sent a dollar to help. Germany, Japan and, to a lesser extent,
Britain and Italy, were lifted out of the debris of war by the Americans who
poured in billions of dollars and forgave other billions in debts. None of
those countries is today paying even the interest on its remaining debts to
the United States.

When the franc was in danger of collapsing in 1956, it was the Americans who
propped it up and their reward was to be insulted and swindled on the streets
of Paris. And I was there. I saw that.

When distant cities are hit by earthquakes, it is the United States that hurries
into help... Managua Nicaragua is one of the most recent examples. So far this
spring, 59 American communities have been flattened by tornadoes. Nobody has
helped.

The Marshall Plan... the Truman Policy... all pumped billions upon billions of
dollars into discouraged countries. And now, newspapers in those countries are
writing about the decadent war-mongering Americans.

I'd like to see one of those countries that is gloating over the erosion of the
United States dollar build its own airplanes.

Come on... let's hear it! Does any other country in the world have a plane to
equal the Boeing Jumbo Jet, the Lockheed Tristar or the Douglas 10? If so, why
don't they fly them? Why do all international lines except Russia fly American
planes? Why does no other land on earth even consider putting a man or a women
on the moon?

You talk about Japanese technocracy and you get radios. You talk about German
technocracy and you get automobiles. You talk about American technocracy and
you find men on the moon, not once, but several times ... and safely home again.
You talk about scandals and the Americans put theirs right in the store window
for everybody to look at. Even the draft dodgers are not pursued and hounded.
They are right here on our streets in Toronto, most of them... unless they are
breaking Canadian laws... are getting American dollars from Ma and Pa at home
to spend here.

When the Americans get out of this bind... as they will... who could blame them
if they said 'the hell with the rest of the world'. Let someone else buy the
bonds, let someone else build or repair foreign dams or design foreign buildings
that won't shake apart in earthquakes.

When the railways of France, Germany and India were breaking down through age,
it was the Americans who rebuilt them. When the Pennsylvania Railroad and the
New York Central went broke, nobody loaned them an old caboose. Both of them
are still broke.

I can name to you 5,000 times when the Americans raced to the help of other
people in trouble. Can you name to me even one time when someone else raced to
the Americans in trouble? I don't think there was outside help even during the
San Francisco earthquake.

Our neighbours have faced it alone and I am one Canadian who is damned tired of
hearing them kicked around. They will come out of this thing with their flag high.
And when they do, they are entitled to thumb their noses at the lands that are
gloating over their present troubles.

I hope Canada is not one of these. But there are many smug, self-righteous Canadians.

And finally, the American Red Cross was told at its 48th Annual meeting in New
Orleans this morning that it was broke.

This year's disasters... with the year less than half-over... has taken it all and
nobody... but nobody... has helped.

ORIGINAL SCRIPT AND AUDIO
COURTESY STANDARD BROADCASTING CORPORATION LTD.

(c) 1973 BY GORDON SINCLAIR
    PUBLISHED BY STAR QUALITY MUSIC (SOCAN)
    A DIVISION OF UNIDISC MUSIC INC.
    578 HYMUS BOULEVARD
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