I am strong I am invincible. I am Canada

     "Peter, I know the importance of the hook and how you use rock songs to draw people into your posts. The problem is when too many commenters respond to the hook rather than the message."

          Comment from a college classmate

The title of this blog post is from Helen Reddy's feminist anthem, "I Am Woman." 

Helen Reddy

And I've been down there on the floor
No one's ever gonna keep me down again

Whoa, yes, I am wise
But it's wisdom born of pain
Yes, I've paid the price
But look how much I gained
If I have to, I can do anything

I am strong (strong)
I am invincible (invincible)
I am woman (ooh)

She belts out the song. She is assertive and proud. Feminine is a good thing, a strong thing. I am male, but I feel entirely entitled to express what kind of feminism I like. I like Helen Reddy's kind. Confident. Not the #MeToo kind, where women complain of long-past injuries where they got injured but didn't say anything. I like the in-your-face, I-demand-respect-now kind.

I suggested that readers send me appropriate song lyrics for the Canada-USA relationship. The popular music world is full of breakup songs. Canada is publicly breaking up with the USA, voiced in the speech in Davos by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney.

I wanted people to notice that Carney wasn't longing for the good old days and getting back together. Readers needed to find lyrics where the singer initiated the breakup because the former sweetheart became violent toward her and others. He begun hanging out with a bad crowd. He justified taking things from others. She wasn't that kind of girl and would not stand for it.

Notice that Carney didn't say that the USA suddenly "went bad" under Trump. He said the USA had always been a bully, that the USA had always felt entitled to demand that the world bow to its interests. The USA has been a self-righteous hypocrite from the moment it survived World War II with its industry and military intact. The difference now is that the selfishness is celebrated by Trump, not denied under the guise of being a benevolent policeman. Carney said that Trump exposes the truth about the relationship. The strong do as they will; the weak suffer as they must.

Probably no American politician can dare say what Carney said. It would be insulting America, and we don't want to hear an unpleasant truth. Americans understand our nation to be the shining beacon of truth, justice, and international law. We are Ronald Reagan's virtuous city on the hill. Possibly that self-image made the U.S. a better, less hypocritical, great power than we would otherwise have been. We wanted to live up to the hype. 

Carney admitted that the Pax Americana of the past 80 years has had some benefits for Canada. That is why Canada could accept the relationship for so long.

Reader comments suggest that people engaged with Carney's speech. Several mentioned "You're No Good." I became aware of that song when Linda Ronstadt recorded it in 1974. It captured Carney's statement that great powers had always been hypocrites, and that Canada feels great to be moving on.

Feeling better now that we're through
Feeling better 'cause I'm over you
Learned my lesson, it left a scar
Now I see how you really are
(Chorus)
You're no good, you're no good, you're no good
Baby, you're no good

Others mentioned Kelly Clarkson's 2004 song, "Since U Been Gone."

But since you been gone
I can breathe for the first time
I'm so movin' on, yeah, yeah
Thanks to you
Now I get, I get what I want
Since you been gone

Taylor Swift writes brilliantly and often about hurt. Her song "Mean" has these words:

You, with your words like knives and swords
And weapons that you use against me
You have knocked me off my feet again
Got me feeling like a nothing

Taylor Swift writes for this generation, not mine. I am old, still stuck back in the 1960s and 1970s. I don't hear anger or hurt in Carney.  As with Helen Reddy, I hear resolve and clear-headed purpose in Carney's speech. It's a new world for middle powers like Canada. 

You can bend, but never break me
'Cause it only serves to make me
More determined to achieve my final goal
And I come back even stronger
Not a novice any longer
'Cause you've deepened the conviction in my soul

I am strong (strong)
I am invincible (invincible)
I am woman

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