We Americans should be a helluva lot more thankful for having such a friendly (and understanding) neighbour like Canada. We could, but we probably won't. We Americans are so fixated on building our foolish and short-sighted consumer/gladiator-show culture that it's easy to forget who provides most of our imported oil.

Harper has been a great friend to Obama: supportive of the U.S. global warming approach at Copenhagen and Cancun, supporting the U.S.-led NATO mission in Afghanistan, and offering to sell renewable hydroelectric power as well as oil and gas to energize an American economic recovery. But as many have discovered, it doesn't pay to be Obama's friend.