[nolanw]

This is so laughably wrong as to be absurd. Your explanation for Canadian telecom entrenchment and protectionism is that it's anti-American? Canada and its provinces have imported America's love of faux-competition in media, telecom, electricity, non-health insurance, and other areas nearly whole hog.

Anti-Americanism also runs contrary to Canada's: plans to imprison more of its population; paying extra for ill-performing military hardware; treating its First Nations like shit; increasing gap between rich and poor; busting of unions; beating the hell out of protestors; resisting all meaningful measures against climate change; and fighting pointless wars.

Canada could use some of this "we're different from the Americans" attitude that you claim pervades the nation. Sadly, I don't see much evidence of it in any of several areas of society, especially the telecom industry.

[earlyresort]

I'll agree that the current federal government is a bit of an aberration compared to past Liberal and Conservative governments, but playing up differences from the Americans to justify political policies (good or bad - I suppose that depends on your personal politics) has been a big part of Canadian political life since Trudeau's first term in the late '60s.

Whether Canada is actually all that different from America or whether 'different from America' is just used as a cynical political tool is another question.