Oh Canada: Praise for Our Neighbors to the North

Attention all Facebook users: We owe Canada a big ole' thank you for pushing our favorite social networking site to amend and improve their privacy policies. The changes include requiring "third-party applications" (Mafia Wars anyone?) to specify the type of personal information they want to access each and every single time they want to dig around in our data. Although many of us realize that Facebook owns our identities has some holes in their privacy policy, only Canada was bold enough to step forward and say "Um, excuse us, but could you please comply with our national laws?"

This bit of digital watchdogging isn't the only gift Canada has given the world over the last few centuries of its existence. In fact, the list of North North American contributions is so long that we owe it to our neighbors to enumerate their accomplishments and honors. Owt with it already, eh?

Comedic genius: Most people know that Mike Myers, he of Wayne's World and Shrek genius (let's just forget about The Love Guru), is Canadian. But apparently, the cold climate breeds a strong sense of funny. SCTV, a mid 1970s-80s sketch comedy show, rivaled the best of classic Saturday Night Live and featured comedians like Harold Ramis (later of Ghostbusters fame), as well as Catherine O'Hara and Eugene Levy (both of whom appear in Christopher Guest mockementaries, such as Waiting for Guffman and Best in Show). Check out old clips of The Great White North, a recurring sketch featuring Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas as brothers Bob and Doug Mackenzie. Added bonus: On this episode, they discuss the wonders of Canada!

Basketball: When we think of basketball we usually think of overpaid talented, tall hoopsters born and bred in the US of A. But no Canada, no Michael Jordan. No joke: Basketball's inventor, James Naismith, was a native of Canada. Ok, so he became a naturalized American citizen, but he grew up in the Great White North and has been inducted into the Canadian Basketball Hall of Fame. (Right next to...wait, who else would be in a Canadian Basketball Hall of Fame?!)

Loonies: Everyone knows how Canada's dollar coin is called a Loonie cause it's got a picture of a Common Loon on one side (you knew that, right?). But we wanted to point this one out because we're so giddy at the thought of asking someone, "Hey, can I borrow a loonie?" Call us suckers for silly-sounding words, but start doing this with your friends and see how fast it catches on.

Great movies: There's nothing more American than Hollywood and the golden era of the silver screen, right? Wrong. Warner Bros., one of the oldest movie studios around, was founded by Harry, Albert, Sam, and Jack Warner, immigrants from Poland who settled in Ontario, Canada. Not only was the studio part of the Big 5, a group that also included MGM and Paramount, but they also released the very first movie with sound, 1927's The Jazz Singer. Without Canada, you might still be watching silent films accompanied by dialogue titles and a live piano score.

Donuts: Alright, so the Canadians didn't invent donuts. But in the past couple months, they've shared the glorious deliciousness of Tim Hortons donuts with New York City. There were other Tim Hortons locations in the USA before this, but your kind SparkNotes editors live in NYC, so we didn't know what we were missing. Now we can't live without the sweet, donut-y ecstasy of a Tim Hortons chocolate glazed. Wha-? Sorry, we're not available right now; we're in a sugar coma.

What Canadian delights did we forget about? Any other famous Canooks or notable Canadian history that we in the rest of the world should thank you for?