I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing

So I was over on AMC's (AKA my blog crush) blog today, and his guest poster mentioned this site.
I strongly suggest you hop on over there and cast a vote.

Now in case you're dying to finish reading up this post before you hop on over there, I want to point out the site's opening line: November 4th 2008 the American people will choose a new president. The president of the United States of America is the most powerful person in the world.

I've been hearing that a lot lately. That the president of the US is the most important person on the planet. In fact one of my favourite bloggers wrote that very thing in a post about month ago.
If you read that post, you'll notice that in the comments I made a lot of commentary about that statement.

Now before anyone gets all up in arms, I am not one of those Canadians who like to criticize her American neighbours. Just because they forget the letter "u" in all their words doesn't make them an inherently flawed people.

It's just the sentiment that bothers me. I mean, how can one country's leader be considered the most important person on a planet? It just seems silly to me. But the site that I pulled those words from? It was created by some guys in Iceland.

If my darling Americans make that comment, I'll just think that they're expressing some national pride. But foreigners? Well, that gives me pause.

You may or may not know that Canada had an election last month. In my mind we lost.
It didn't escape me though that I saw more editorializing on Canadian, American and European blogs about the US election than there was about ours. Now, in our defense, we called and election and it was done a month and a half later. The entire world hasn't been hearing about it for two years.

But, the day of one of our debates? Well it was the same day as one of the US debates. And on the radio that morning, all I heard about was how the DJs were going to be watching the US debate rather than our own.

Now for anyone who's been on this blog for longer than- well this post...you know that I'm all about the fluffy here. I did not watch either debate that night. Politics bore me silly. But c'mon people- we do live here. It's embarrassing to care more about the cool country below us than about what actually affects our day-to-day lives.

And no. I do not think that my PM Stephen Harper is the most important person on the planet either. My Dad is.

No?

Ok, how about this scenario: the President? He gets elected in by the people for up to 8 years. Then no matter what, he's done.

The Queen? Yeah, she's in because of blood. And she's in for good.
The Pope? Elected in by his peers. Until he dies.

If I were to run into George W today. How would I feel? Not much. I would probably be polite- cause well, I'm Canadian and it's what we do. But it wouldn't affect my day much.

If I ran in to my PM? I'd roll my eyes.

If I were to run into the Queen? I would be bowing and sparkly and thrilled to bits. OK, yes, I'm part of the commonwealth- so she's our Queen too.

But the Pope? I'm not Catholic kids. But you'd better believe that I would maybe feel the presence of God radiating from him. And I would probably be bowing and be all calm and peaceful.

In my mind? Policiticans - NOT the most important people on the planet. All they want is power. Maybe some of them want to do good, but for the most part? I don't think so.

But perhaps I'm wrong.
Who do YOU think is the most important person on the planet?

xo