Like a great many Canadians, I was born within an easy drive of the U.S. border. Close enough – and back when security was lax enough – that teenagers could drive down to the States just to get a late-night burger.
Sure, America always felt and looked a bit different, and people in down east Maine do sound different, but with the obvious exception of their outsized love of guns, they seemed a lot like us.
Even their politics were similar. Republicans and Democrats often found common sense solutions on common ground and there was passionate civility in their disagreement.
That’s no longer the case on either side of the border but it’s particularly so in the U.S. Their two major parties have grown so far apart, there’s scarcely any common ground. And beyond their profound differences of opinion and all the hyperbole, the quality of much of the political …