The United States dollar took another pounding on German, French and British exchanges this morning

Hitting the lowest point ever known in West Germany

It has declined there by 41 percent since 1971

And this Canadian thinks it's time to speak up for the Americans

As the most generous and possibly the least appreciated people in all the earth

As long as sixty years ago, when I first started to read newspapers

I read of floods on the Yellow River and the Yangtse

Who rushed in with men and money to help?

The Americans did

They have helped control floods on the Nile, the Amazon, the Ganges and the Niger

Today the rich bottom land of the Mississippi is under water

And no foreign land has sent a dollar to help

Germany, Japan and to a lesser extent, Britain and Italy

Were lifted out of the debris of war by the Americans

Who poured in billions of dollars

And forgave other billions in debts

None of those countries is today paying even the interest on its remaining debts to the United States

When the Franc was in danger of collapsing in 1956

It was the Americans who propped it up

And the reward was to be insulted and swindled on the streets of Paris

I was there

I saw it

When distant cities are hit by earthquakes

It is the United States that hurries in to help

Managua, Nicaragua is one of the most recent examples

So far this spring, 59 American communities have been flattened by tornadoes

Nobody has helped

The Marshall Plan, The Truman Policy

All pumped billions upon billions of dollars into discouraged countries

Now newspapers in those countries are writing about the decadent war mongering Americans

I'd like to just see one of those countries that is gloating over the erosion of the United States Dollar build its own airplanes

Come on, let's hear it

Does any other country in the world have a plane to equal the Boeing jumbo jet

The Lockheed Tri-star or the Douglas-10?

If so, why don't they fly them?

Why do all international lines, except Russia, fly American planes?

Why does no other land on earth even consider putting a man or a woman on the moon?

You talk about Japanese technocracy and you get radios

You talk about German technocracy and you get automobiles

You talk about American technocracy and you will find men on the moon

Not once but several times and safely home again

You talk about scandals

And the Americans put theirs right in the store window for everybody to look at

Even the draft dodgers are not pursued and hounded

They are here on our streets

Most of them unless they are breaking Canadian laws

Are getting American dollars from Ma and Pa at home to spend here

When the Americans get out of this bind, as they will

Who could blame them if they said

"The hell with the rest of the world"?

Let someone else buy the Israel bonds

Let someone else build or repair foreign dams

Or design foreign buildings

That won't shake apart in earthquakes

When the railways of France, Germany and India were breaking down through age

It was the Americans who rebuilt them

When the Pennsylvania Railroad and the New York Central went broke

Nobody loaned them an old caboose

Both are still broke

I can name you five thousand times

When the Americans raced to the help of other people in trouble

Can you name me even one time

When someone else raced to the Americans in trouble?

I don't think there was outside help

Even during the San Francisco earthquake

Our neighbors have faced it alone

And I'm one Canadian who's damned tired of hearing them kicked around

They will come out of this thing with their flag high

And when they do, they are entitled to thumb their nose at the lands that are gloating over their present troubles

I hope Canada is not one of these

But there are many smug self-righteous Canadians

And finally, the American Red Cross was told at its 48th annual meeting in New Orleans that it was broke

This year's disasters have taken it all

And nobody, but nobody, has helped