A book tour by a former US President is always a great time for reinvention but, if this article in the Glob is anything to go by, it is really an opportunity for Canadians to feel badly about themselves in new and duller ways. Canadians right now fall into two classes of feeling badly. First, conservative Canadians feel badly because Canada is so evil, that it "doesn't get it" and that... err... well that is about as deep as it gets. They have given up. The more traditional Canadian feel badly thing is more active, more essential - the neediness that Canadians bring to any discussion. In this case, the article about G.W .Bush's memoir is actually called "Canada almost nowhere in Bush memoir". Could you imagine Norwegians behaving so poorly, so weakly? Anyway, this is all pretext to point out that I love this bit and how it reminds me of a better time, a time of great leaders like George and Jean:

As host Mr. Chrétien apparently tried, but failed, to silence Mr. Bush at the G8 summit in Kananaskis, Alta., after then French president Jacques Chirac took a cheap shot at American “unilateralism.” But, said Mr. Bush, he wasn’t about to be quieted by the Canadian leader. “I butted back in,” Mr. Bush writes and told the group. “America did not colonize African nations, America did not create corruption and America is tired of seeing good money stolen while people continue to suffer.” Mr. Chrétien’s reaction isn’t recorded.

For all I know, Chretien set up the moment to bring out the worst in the French and American leaders.