Latest news with #AlMichaels
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
How to Watch Thursday Night Football on Amazon Prime Video
PCMag editors select and review products independently. If you buy through affiliate links, we may earn commissions, which help support our testing. Football fans are accustomed to changing channels if they want to watch games. After all, the NFL eagerly slices up its schedule to sell matchups to CBS, FOX, and NBC. With the popularity of streaming video services, there's room for another company to get in on the gridiron competition. And few companies are more powerful than Amazon. Prime Video has the exclusive rights to stream Thursday Night Football until 2033. Prime Video costs $8.99 per month, or you can get it as part of your larger Amazon Prime subscription for $14.99 per month or $139 per year (there are no extra fees for NFL streaming). If you want to see the new NFL rookie class in action or the Philadelphia Eagles' attempt at a Super Bowl repeat, check out everything you need to know about streaming Thursday Night Football. Finding streaming-exclusive NFL games shouldn't be too complicated for most viewers. Instead of hopping to a specific traditional broadcast channel, simply fire up the Prime Video app downloaded to your smart TV or media streaming device. You can also watch Thursday Night Football on Twitch, the Amazon-owned live-streaming platform (unfortunately, the app isn't available on Roku TVs). You can stream the games live or check out the replay afterward. Amazon's Thursday Night Football covers the 16 games listed below, as well as an undisclosed NFL Wild Card game on either January 10 or 11, 2026. 9/11 Washington Commanders versus Green Bay Packers 9/18 Miami Dolphins versus Buffalo Bills 9/25 Seattle Seahawks versus Arizona Cardinals 10/2 San Francisco 49ers versus Los Angeles Rams 10/9 Philadelphia Eagles versus New York Giants 10/16 Pittsburgh Steelers versus Cincinnati Bengals 10/23 Minnesota Vikings versus Los Angeles Chargers 10/30 Baltimore Ravens versus Miami Dolphins 11/6 Las Vegas Raiders versus Denver Broncos 11/13 New York Jets versus New England Patriots 11/20 Buffalo Bills versus Houston Texans 11/28 Chicago Bears versus Philadelphia Eagles 12/4 Dallas Cowboys versus Detroit Lions 12/11 Atlanta Falcons versus Tampa Bay Buccaneers 12/18 Los Angeles Rams versus Seattle Seahawks 12/25 Denver Broncos versus Kansas City Chiefs You can also enjoy pregame, halftime, and postgame entertainment led by broadcasters Al Michaels and Kirk Herbstreit. The pregame starts at 7 p.m. EST, and you can view cool matchup details via Prime Vision with Next Gen Stats once the game starts. Naturally, Amazon's stream encourages you to buy plenty of NFL merchandise from the Amazon store. A VPN lets you virtually travel the world by spoofing your geographic location. So, if you want to watch Thursday Night Football from outside the US, perhaps from a country that calls the NFL American football, a VPN is theoretically your best bet. However, Prime Video is one of the many major streaming services that block VPN traffic due to licensing deals. Watching Thursday Night Football on Twitch may be a workaround worth investigating. For more on how to watch football, check out our guide to this season's games and our roundup of the best NFL streaming services.
Daily Mail
06-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
NBC to bring NBA broadcasting icon Jim Fagan back from the dead next season
NBC is brining back more than a theme song when the network resumes its NBA coverage next season. In addition to Roundball Rock, TV personality John Tesh's immortal basketball-inspired anthem, NBC will be relying on the famed voice of Jim Fagan despite the fact the narrator died in 2017 following a battle with Parkinson's Disease. Thanks to advancements in artificial intelligence, and an agreement with Fagan's surviving family, promos for NBC's NBA coverage will include a digital recreation of the announcer's voice. NBC Sports has already produced one promo featuring the late Fagan's voice, but the reaction wasn't entirely positive. 'You can't find a living announcer?' one critic asked on YouTube. 'You've got to zombify a legend? AI is the worst.' 'In poor taste and weird,' one fan followed. 'Please stop doing this.' Another added: 'Besides AI sucking I feel like this is a signal that they're going to rely solely on nostalgia in terms of marketing/branding.' NBC pulled a similar move with Al Michaels voice, although he is still alive and handling Amazon Prime's NFL coverage. Rather, NBC used an AI-replication of his voice for daily Olympic recaps during the Paris Games, given the legendary announcer's place in Team USA history with his famed 'Do you believe in miracles?' call at the 1980 Winter Games. Fagan, a former college football player at West Virginia, did promos for a variety of NBC programming, including the network's Saturday morning hoops show, NBA Inside Stuff. Prior to that, Fagan originally came to New York to perform on Broadway. 'I was a pretty good singer,' he told WVU Sports prior to his death in 2017. Ultimately it was his wife, Jamie, who did commercial jingles and later pushed him towards television. 'I guess I was born to do it, I got the voice, I looked OK, and I could read, so I started doing commercials,' he said. NBC also decided to bring back Tesh's famed Roundball Rock, which holds a special place in the hearts of NBA fans of a certain age because it often preceded highly anticipated Chicago Bulls games involving Michael Jordan. The NBA's new 11-year media rights deal begins next season, with Amazon and NBC gaining league media rights alongside ESPN in a $77 billion agreement. The WNBA also cut its own deal with Amazon, ESPN and NBC worth around $2.2 billion (or $200 million annually), has learned. What's more, the 'W' is still free to make other media deals, potentially adding to its nine-figure annual haul. Although the NBA's regular-season ratings were down again in 2024-25, the playoff coverage has seen a 13-percent uptick from last year on ESPN, the network recently revealed.
Miami Herald
19-04-2025
- Sport
- Miami Herald
Cote: Resurgent Miami Heat win again, make NBA playoffs. Wait, do you believe in miracles?
Al Michaels said it on air 45 years ago, and it has resonated and echoed across time ever since -- five words that embody hope in sports and beyond. 'Do you believe in miracles?' Do you, Miami? Do you, Heat fans? 'No!' says America. 'No!' say the pragmatists, probably laughing at the notion. But these last two games by the Heat have made plausible at least asking the question. Miami, after a 37-45 NBA regular season wrought with chaos and controversy, hijacked by the Jimmy Butler drama and trade, has fed its fans late cause to hope, at least, if not quite believe yet. Friday night's 123-114 overtime play-in victory in Atlanta, on top of Wednesday's impressive must-win in Chicago, has saved a sinking season and sent Miami into the NBA playoffs proper, as a No. 8 seed facing No. 1 Cleveland in Game 1 Sunday in Ohio. The mighty Cavaliers had by far the best record in the East, better even than reigning champion Boston. Not even fans wearing Heat face-paint might rationally bet on their team right now to advance past the Cavs. But they have earned the shot, the chance. After this crazy season, that is something of a triumph in and of itself. What a game Friday was! A must-win play-in is sort of a poor-man's Game 7, but this one had a playoff intensity and feel. The Heat in this tough season lost 15 games it was leading entering the fourth quarter, a league-high. One would not associated the clutch-gene with this team, this season. Friday, though, Miami was 5-for-5 on 3-point shots in OT to win a second straight must-win game on the road. 'Every single run they made, we answered,' said star Tyler Herro, after a 30-point night. 'This entire season up to this point is Heat Culture.' Butler left to become a darling in Golden State. In that context, I found it interesting that two of the players who arrived in Miami in return absolutely were at the forefront of Friday's triumph elevating twhe Heat to the playoffs. Andrew Wiggins popped 20 points. Davion Mitchell scored 15 of his 16 after halftime -- had three 3-pointers in OT -- and defended Hawks star Trae Young like a crazy person. 'He's a dog. He's a pitbull,' said Herro of Mitchell. 'He's been a tremendous pickup.' Miami has owned Young, holding him to a 17-point average on 35 percent shooting this season. He scored 29 Friday, but it wasn't enough. The Heat has sunk since the February Butler trade, including a 10-game losing streak, but that adversity has fed the team. Coach Erik Spoelstra has said so, preached it. Miami rallied, finished strong, believed, and these past two play-in games have nourished that belief. Guaranteed: Cleveland could have thought of teams it would rather have faced in the first round. 'This team does not fold,' said Spoelstra. Miami has become somewhat of a play-in legend, the first team to advance from that purgatory to win a first round series (in 2023) and now the first to advance from a No. 10 seed into the main playoffs. That's a shaky accomplishment to be proud of. The play-in tournament means you are certified to have had a mediocre season, like Miami's 37-45. It means you are only one of the seventh to 10th-best teams in a 15-team conference. It is something you want to avoid, be better than. But if you are consigned to that -- make the most of it. Miami did that in '23 in unexpectedly reaching the NBA Finals before falling. Doing that again, well, who on Earth is believing that now? Headed to Cleveland, maybe only the Heat themselves are. That's not nothing.
Yahoo
23-02-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Canada Is Taking Trump Seriously and Personally
Last Saturday, I was in Montreal for the Canada-U.S. hockey game in the 4 Nations Cup. I knew I needed to be there. A few nights later, I was at home in front of our TV for the final game, which Canada won 3–2 in overtime. I watched every moment, from before the game began to after it ended. I almost never do that. Those games, I knew, were going to say something—about Canadian players, about Canadian fans, about Canada. Maybe something about the United States too. I didn't know what. Sports can tell big stories. I was one of two goalies for Canada in the Canada–Soviet Union series in 1972, the first international best-against-best hockey series. Until that moment, professional players from the NHL were not eligible to compete in the amateurs-only Olympic Games or World Championships. Canada was where hockey originated, where all of the best players in the world were born and developed. To the total annoyance of Canadians, year after year the Soviet Union, not Canada, became known as 'World Champions.' The 1972 showdown was eight games: four in Canada, four in Moscow. Everyone—the Canadian players and fans, even the Soviet players and fans and the experts from both countries—knew that Canada would win decisively, likely all eight games and by big scores. In Game 1 in Montreal, the Soviets won, 7–3. Imagine the reaction all across Canada. Then multiply that by 10. Instantly, the stakes changed. Something deeper than hockey pride was on the line. We were the best in the world when it came to hockey; the rest of the world didn't think about Canada that way when it came to many other things. Now we had lost. What did that say about us? About Canada? About Canadians? The next seven games would decide. These were the stakes. We left Canada trailing two games to one, with one game tied. We lost the first game in Moscow. The series was all but over. Then we won the next two games, leaving it to one final game. In 1972, not many North Americans traveled to Europe; almost none went to Moscow. Three thousand Canadians were in that arena. They were there because, somehow, they knew they had to be there. For the last game, on a Thursday, played entirely during work and school hours all across the country, 16 million out of Canada's population of 22 million people watched. Behind two goals to start the third period, we tied the game, then won it, and the series, with 34 seconds remaining. I felt immense excitement. I felt even more immense relief. In that series, Canadians discovered a depth of feeling for their country that they hadn't known was there. In 1980, I was the other person in the Olympics booth in Lake Placid, New York, when the U.S. beat the Soviets and won the gold medal. (When Al Michaels said, 'Do you believe in miracles? Yes!,' I said, 'Unbelievable.') At the beginning of the Olympics, for the U.S., there were no stakes. The team was made up almost entirely of college kids. The Soviets, at the time, were the best team in the world. Even after the U.S. team won some early games, their players seemed on a roll to enjoy, not to be taken seriously. Then they beat the Soviets and two days later defeated Finland to win the gold. This was not a good time for the U.S. in the world. Among other problems and conflicts, Iran was holding 52 Americans hostage in Tehran. Weeks passed. The U.S. seemed powerless to get them back. Unbeknownst to all but a few, six of the hostages—all American diplomats—had escaped and were being hidden in the Canadian Embassy. The Canadians sheltered the diplomats for months, and eventually helped them escape. The news that the diplomats had made it safely out of Iran came just before the Lake Placid games began. Everywhere I went around the village, Americans came up to me and said, 'Thank you, Canada,' as if they were otherwise friendless in the world. In 1980, hockey was not a major sport in the U.S., and so Americans had no expectation or even hope of winning against the Soviets. What they did have at stake in 1980 was the Cold War. That they had to win. The hockey team's victory in Lake Placid felt like part of this bigger fight. It fit the story Americans wanted to tell about themselves. And although hockey was a fairly minor sport, 45 years later, for many Americans, the 'Miracle on Ice' remains their favorite patriotic sports moment. Now to today. Now to the 4 Nations Cup. Being Canadian these past few months hasn't been a lot of fun. The threat and now the coming reality of high tariffs on Canadian goods exported to the U.S.—and the disruptions and dislocations, known and unknown, that these tariffs will cause—is never out of mind. Even more difficult in the day-to-day is Donald Trump's relentless and insulting commentary. Canada as the U.S.'s '51st state'; Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as 'Governor Trudeau'; the U.S. using 'economic force' to annex Canada, its nearest ally and inescapable geographical fact of life. It's the kind of trolling that Trump does to everyone, to every country, whenever he wants to, because as president of the most powerful nation on Earth, he knows he can. He loves to watch the weak wobble and cringe, and those who think they're strong discover they're not. Na na na na na. It sets a tone. It lets everyone know who's boss. It's what he'd done all his life in business. And although at a boardroom table he wasn't always the guy with the deepest pockets, in the Oval Office of the United States of America, he knows he is. Being Donald Trump got him elected, but being president is what allows him to be Donald Trump. On November 5, nobody had as much at stake in the election's result as he did. He needed to win to hold the world's highest office, to avoid lawsuits and prison time. He needed to win to be him. It's been amazing to watch world leaders of proud, historically significant countries, kings in their own domain, suck up to Donald Trump, to see billionaires and business titans, who know how the game is played—cater to political authority in public, play hardball in private—who reside proudly and smugly above and beyond politics, fold like a cheap suit. And later, when they do respond, because prime ministers, presidents, and CEOs eventually have to say something, their words sound so lame. 'There's not a snowball's chance in hell that Canada would become part of the United States,' Trudeau said. By answering at all, you end up making any slur sound slightly, disturbingly legitimate, and you make yourself look weak. How would Americans react if a president or prime minister of another country said the same about their president? That he's crooked, crazy, a lunatic, a loser? That he's the worst president in the history of the world? That their country is just another failed empire in its final death throes? That both president and country are a disgrace and everyone knows it? Probably not well. But what do you do? What do the decision makers in other countries do? What do average Canadians, average Panamanians and Danes, what do ordinary people anywhere do? That's why I needed to be at that game in Montreal. Thirty years earlier, in 1995, on the weekend before Quebec's second referendum on independence, my family and I went to Montreal to wander the city, to try to sense what Quebeckers were feeling, but mostly just to be there. On a Saturday night, we went to a Montreal Canadiens game. We wanted to be there for the singing of 'O Canada.' The next day, a reporter for an English-language newspaper wrote that it was the loudest he had ever heard the anthem sung at a game. What he didn't notice was that 10,000 people sang their hearts out, and 10,000 people were silent. Last Saturday in Montreal, the arena was filled with fans in red-and-white Canada jerseys. The NHL and the NHL Players Association, which had organized the event, did what organizers do. They asked the fans to be respectful of both teams during the anthems. The fans decided not to be managed. They booed 'The Star-Spangled Banner' loudly. They were not booing the American players. They were booing Donald Trump. Why shouldn't he know how they felt? Why shouldn't Americans know? How else would they know? Five nights later in Boston, at the final game, the fans booed 'O Canada,' but not very loudly. The game was a classic. The two best teams in the world: Canada, the heart and soul, conscience and bedrock of the game; the U.S., in its development and growth, the great story in hockey in the past 30 years. Both teams played as well as they'd ever played. Their great stars played like great stars; some other players discovered in themselves something even they didn't know was there. The U.S. could've won. The team was good enough to win. Canada won because of Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon, and Sidney Crosby—and for the same reason Canada won against the Soviets in 1972. Everybody, every country, has something inside them that is fundamental. That matters so much that it's not negotiable. That's deeply, deeply personal. Something that, if threatened, you'd do anything to protect, and keep on doing it until it's done, even if it seems to others to make no sense. Even if it seems stupid. This is how wars start. For Panama, some things are fundamental. For Denmark, China, Russia, Germany, Ukraine, Canada—for everyone—it's the same. And when you get pushed too much, too far, you rediscover what that fundamental is. Poke the bear and you find out there's more in the bear than you know, than even the bear knows. For Canada and these other countries, you don't poke back against Donald Trump. You don't troll a troll. You look into yourselves and find again what makes you special, why you matter, to yourselves, to the world, and knowing that, knowing that that is you, with that as your pride and backbone, you fight back. The U.S. has its own fights. It faces these same questions. What is fundamental to America? 'Greatness'? Maybe. But greatness depends on the needs of a country and the needs of the world at a particular moment and time, and being great in the ways that are needed. These next four years will not be easy for anyone—and they will be perhaps especially difficult for the United States. As for the 51st state crap, knock it off. It's beneath you. For Donald Trump, everything is a transaction. You look to make a deal, you push and shove, scratch and claw—you do whatever it takes. And if that doesn't work, you do some more, until at some point you walk away and make another deal. It's just business. Only some things aren't business. Every so often, Canadians are defiantly not-American. They will need to be much more than that in the next four years. Canadians will need to be defiantly Canadian. Canada won in 1972 and again last week because winning was about more than business. It was personal. Article originally published at The Atlantic
Atlantic
23-02-2025
- Sport
- Atlantic
Canada Needed That Win
Last Saturday, I was in Montreal for the Canada-U.S. hockey game in the 4 Nations Cup. I knew I needed to be there. A few nights later, I was at home in front of our TV for the final game, which Canada won 3–2 in overtime. I watched every moment, from before the game began to after it ended. I almost never do that. Those games, I knew, were going to say something—about Canadian players, about Canadian fans, about Canada. Maybe something about the United States too. I didn't know what. Sports can tell big stories. I was one of two goalies for Canada in the Canada–Soviet Union series in 1972, the first international best-against-best hockey series. Until that moment, professional players from the NHL were not eligible to compete in the amateurs-only Olympic Games or World Championships. Canada was where hockey originated, where all of the best players in the world were born and developed. To the total annoyance of Canadians, year after year the Soviet Union, not Canada, became known as 'World Champions.' The 1972 showdown was eight games: four in Canada, four in Moscow. Everyone—the Canadian players and fans, even the Soviet players and fans and the experts from both countries—knew that Canada would win decisively, likely all eight games and by big scores. In Game 1 in Montreal, the Soviets won, 7–3. Imagine the reaction all across Canada. Then multiply that by 10. Instantly, the stakes changed. Something deeper than hockey pride was on the line. We were the best in the world when it came to hockey; the rest of the world didn't think about Canada that way when it came to many other things. Now we had lost. What did that say about us? About Canada? About Canadians? The next seven games would decide. These were the stakes. We left Canada trailing two games to one, with one game tied. We lost the first game in Moscow. The series was all but over. Then we won the next two games, leaving it to one final game. In 1972, not many North Americans traveled to Europe; almost none went to Moscow. Three thousand Canadians were in that arena. They were there because, somehow, they knew they had to be there. For the last game, on a Thursday, played entirely during work and school hours all across the country, 16 million out of Canada's population of 22 million people watched. Behind two goals to start the third period, we tied the game, then won it, and the series, with 34 seconds remaining. I felt immense excitement. I felt even more immense relief. In that series, Canadians discovered a depth of feeling for their country that they hadn't known was there. In 1980, I was the other person in the Olympics booth in Lake Placid, New York, when the U.S. beat the Soviets and won the gold medal. (When Al Michaels said, 'Do you believe in miracles? Yes!,' I said, 'Unbelievable.') At the beginning of the Olympics, for the U.S., there were no stakes. The team was made up almost entirely of college kids. The Soviets, at the time, were the best team in the world. Even after the U.S. team won some early games, their players seemed on a roll to enjoy, not to be taken seriously. Then they beat the Soviets and two days later defeated Finland to win the gold. This was not a good time for the U.S. in the world. Among other problems and conflicts, Iran was holding 52 Americans hostage in Tehran. Weeks passed. The U.S. seemed powerless to get them back. Unbeknownst to all but a few, six of the hostages—all American diplomats—had escaped and were being hidden in the Canadian Embassy. The Canadians sheltered the diplomats for months, and eventually helped them escape. The news that the diplomats had made it safely out of Iran came just before the Lake Placid games began. Everywhere I went around the village, Americans came up to me and said, 'Thank you, Canada,' as if they were otherwise friendless in the world. In 1980, hockey was not a major sport in the U.S., and so Americans had no expectation or even hope of winning against the Soviets. What they did have at stake in 1980 was the Cold War. That they had to win. The hockey team's victory in Lake Placid felt like part of this bigger fight. It fit the story Americans wanted to tell about themselves. And although hockey was a fairly minor sport, 45 years later, for many Americans, the 'Miracle on Ice' remains their favorite patriotic sports moment. Now to today. Now to the 4 Nations Cup. Being Canadian these past few months hasn't been a lot of fun. The threat and now the coming reality of high tariffs on Canadian goods exported to the U.S.—and the disruptions and dislocations, known and unknown, that these tariffs will cause—is never out of mind. Even more difficult in the day-to-day is Donald Trump's relentless and insulting commentary. Canada as the U.S.'s '51st state'; Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as 'Governor Trudeau'; the U.S. using 'economic force' to annex Canada, its nearest ally and inescapable geographical fact of life. It's the kind of trolling that Trump does to everyone, to every country, whenever he wants to, because as president of the most powerful nation on Earth, he knows he can. He loves to watch the weak wobble and cringe, and those who think they're strong discover they're not. Na na na na na. It sets a tone. It lets everyone know who's boss. It's what he'd done all his life in business. And although at a boardroom table he wasn't always the guy with the deepest pockets, in the Oval Office of the United States of America, he knows he is. Being Donald Trump got him elected, but being president is what allows him to be Donald Trump. On November 5, nobody had as much at stake in the election's result as he did. He needed to win to hold the world's highest office, to avoid lawsuits and prison time. He needed to win to be him. It's been amazing to watch world leaders of proud, historically significant countries, kings in their own domain, suck up to Donald Trump, to see billionaires and business titans, who know how the game is played—cater to political authority in public, play hardball in private—who reside proudly and smugly above and beyond politics, fold like a cheap suit. And later, when they do respond, because prime ministers, presidents, and CEOs eventually have to say something, their words sound so lame. 'There's not a snowball's chance in hell that Canada would become part of the United States,' Trudeau said. By answering at all, you end up making any slur sound slightly, disturbingly legitimate, and you make yourself look weak. How would Americans react if a president or prime minister of another country said the same about their president? That he's crooked, crazy, a lunatic, a loser? That he's the worst president in the history of the world? That their country is just another failed empire in its final death throes? That both president and country are a disgrace and everyone knows it? Probably not well. But what do you do? What do the decision makers in other countries do? What do average Canadians, average Panamanians and Danes, what do ordinary people anywhere do? That's why I needed to be at that game in Montreal. Thirty years earlier, in 1995, on the weekend before Quebec's second referendum on independence, my family and I went to Montreal to wander the city, to try to sense what Quebeckers were feeling, but mostly just to be there. On a Saturday night, we went to a Montreal Canadiens game. We wanted to be there for the singing of 'O Canada.' The next day, a reporter for an English-language newspaper wrote that it was the loudest he had ever heard the anthem sung at a game. What he didn't notice was that 10,000 people sang their hearts out, and 10,000 people were silent. Last Saturday in Montreal, the arena was filled with fans in red-and-white Canada jerseys. The NHL and the NHL Players Association, which had organized the event, did what organizers do. They asked the fans to be respectful of both teams during the anthems. The fans decided not to be managed. They booed 'The Star-Spangled Banner' loudly. They were not booing the American players. They were booing Donald Trump. Why shouldn't he know how they felt? Why shouldn't Americans know? How else would they know? Five nights later in Boston, at the final game, the fans booed 'O Canada,' but not very loudly. The game was a classic. The two best teams in the world: Canada, the heart and soul, conscience and bedrock of the game; the U.S., in its development and growth, the great story in hockey in the past 30 years. Both teams played as well as they'd ever played. Their great stars played like great stars; some other players discovered in themselves something even they didn't know was there. The U.S. could've won. The team was good enough to win. Canada won because of Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon, and Sidney Crosby—and for the same reason Canada won against the Soviets in 1972. Everybody, every country, has something inside them that is fundamental. That matters so much that it's not negotiable. That's deeply, deeply personal. Something that, if threatened, you'd do anything to protect, and keep on doing it until it's done, even if it seems to others to make no sense. Even if it seems stupid. This is how wars start. For Panama, some things are fundamental. For Denmark, China, Russia, Germany, Ukraine, Canada—for everyone—it's the same. And when you get pushed too much, too far, you rediscover what that fundamental is. Poke the bear and you find out there's more in the bear than you know, than even the bear knows. For Canada and these other countries, you don't poke back against Donald Trump. You don't troll a troll. You look into yourselves and find again what makes you special, why you matter, to yourselves, to the world, and knowing that, knowing that that is you, with that as your pride and backbone, you fight back. The U.S. has its own fights. It faces these same questions. What is fundamental to America? 'Greatness'? Maybe. But greatness depends on the needs of a country and the needs of the world at a particular moment and time, and being great in the ways that are needed. These next four years will not be easy for anyone—and they will be perhaps especially difficult for the United States. As for the 51st state crap, knock it off. It's beneath you. For Donald Trump, everything is a transaction. You look to make a deal, you push and shove, scratch and claw—you do whatever it takes. And if that doesn't work, you do some more, until at some point you walk away and make another deal. It's just business. Only some things aren't business. Every so often, Canadians are defiantly not-American. They will need to be much more than that in the next four years. Canadians will need to be defiantly Canadian. Canada won in 1972 and again last week because winning was about more than business. It was personal.
