Source : Globe & Mail

In this space, we tackle the big issues, just as Lloyd "Boy" Robertson does on CTV and Pastor Mansbridge does on CBC. (By the way, this space is the Television column. If you're looking for the Weather or the Horoscope sections, they're around here somewhere, just keep looking.) Today's issue is Canadian-U.S. relations.

We have three levels of relationship with Americans: 1) We make fun of them. 2) We get furious with them. 3) We are in awe of them. Basically, we feel superior. It's not healthy. We also obsess about this relationship. It's all over the TV menu. That's even less healthy.

Winnipeg Comedy Festival (CBC, 8 p.m.) features a bunch of standup comics, as you'd expect. As you might further expect, the special has a theme. The theme is "Sleeping with the Elephant" and that means it's all about the differences between Canada and the United States. It manages to cover all three levels of our relationship with the people to the South. Somehow, this seems to be CBC's role in the nation's affairs.

Now, for some reasons, all the comics are male and they all look like middle-management types, in their inelegant suits and boring neckties. For a start, I don't think a platoon of American standup guys would look this boring. The host is Jebb Fink who, in a very CBC-twist, is an American from Los Angeles who has been living in Calgary for years. His routine involves promoting the innocence and all-around niceness of Canada. Right away, for instance, he says that it's so cute that Canadian TV news reports cover every single local murder. Then he does some weather jokes and indulges in a gentle ribbing of the Mounties for not talking bribes from speeders.

Best of the bunch is Brett Butt, whose CTV series Corner Gas is very good and airing to great reviews on Thursdays. Butt has a nice, droll sensibility and, even when he's doing dumb beaver jokes, he's funny. John Wing, who adds some variety by wearing a bowtie, does some deft political humour, but none of it is particularly memorable.

Near the end, along comes Ron James who is, as usual, a bundle of fierce energy. His rapid-fire rants are always well written and scathing. But even he gets into the territory of cliché. On the topic of American television, he says this: "Survivor? Surviving in the tropics, nonetheless! Jeez, we're a winter nation. I'd like to see those Darwinian foot soldiers of the American dream tucked into a minus-40 lean-to up there in Lake of the Woods country!" At this point, there is raucous cheering in the Winnipeg theatre. This is the natural reaction to jokes about the weather. Emboldened, James continues on his "Canadian Survivor" theme: "Jeez, those that hadn't cannibalized their teammates the first day out would be food chain fodder before sweeps week was finished!"

The upshot is an hour of mostly hoary old jokes about how Canadians are polite, hardy and honest. Americans, in contrast, are loud, complaining and arrogant. It's comedy based entirely on petty, ignoble and neurotic feelings of superiority. Mind you, there isn't a single one of these Canadians comics who wouldn't leg it to L.A. if he got a sitcom deal.

You know, if you consider the entire night on Canadian television, much of it is devoted to reflecting our tangled relationship with the United States.

Before the Winnipeg Comedy Festival special, CBC begins a new, highfalutin five-part Nature of Things series (CBC, 7 p.m.) about the Arctic being in peril. Oh, it's definitely about science and nature, but the images it presents are meant to signify both our hardiness and our fragility. There are icebergs and polar bears, tough Inuit hunters and emphatic scenes of determined Canadians going forth to the Northwest Passage. It is stirring and it induces anger about the destruction of the Arctic ecosystem, as it is meant to do. Sure, the problem is partly our fault, but it's really their fault.

Meanwhile, CTV airs another hour of American Idol (CTV, 8 p.m.), which isn't Canadian but is rich in the sort of America attitude that causes us to get all tangled up in complicated feelings.

This edition of American Idol has been notable for the startling parade of talentless, no-hopers who appear before the judges to be dismissed. Until now, it was mostly snotty Simon Cowell who brought an edge of realistic sarcasm to the proceedings with his put-downs. Right now, it seems that Paula Abdul and Randy Jackson are getting in on the act.

And yet, part of the strong attraction for Canadians, I think, is watching those brave young Americans who believe so much and so blindly in their talents. Some of the contestants have received vicious reviews from the judges and they still believe firmly that the judges are wrong. They're going to be superstars one day, with or without American Idol.

We admire them and get to feel superior. Up here, we have a more cautious approach to the star-making situation. When Canadian Idol aired last summer, there was much less arrogance and fewer delusions about talent. It was all so much more nurturing. Besides, Canadian Idol was a phenomenon with teenagers and younger kids. Adults didn't have to take it seriously. They're above that sort of thing and can feel superior. There's that attitude again.

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