I am utterly opposed to Canada becoming the 51st state. I have several reasons for this. First of all there will be nowhere left for us to get away from our own country, especially during those times like now, when we are constantly arguing about which one of us is the real WE THE PEOPLE. Canada was always a happy getaway, where people were polite, the food was pretty good, and the weather in the summer was wonderful. Besides, we are likely to ruin your environment, destroy most of those beautiful glaciers, and put condominiums and ugly strip malls everywhere. You’ll go from being a beautiful paradise to a permanent minority in purgatory.

Second, you should not be one state. You’re too big. The only way you should come into the United States is if you become ten states to correspond to the ten provinces. That way, you’ll get 20 senators and heaven knows how many people for the House, although if you’ve ever been to our House of Representatives you probably will run the other way. They are an ornery and incompetent group who have trouble getting a majority vote to adjourn for dinner.

If, however, Donald Trump makes you an offer you think you can’t refuse and you decide to join us, hold out for 10 states. That would give you a clobbering good minority. And as part of the deal I suggest you cause us to give up some things.

First of all, our national anthem, which no one can sing. We could have a contest for a new one.

Secondly, I suggest you ask that we only have one Dakota instead of two. Nothing personal, but it’s a large mass of land with a handful of people in it, and the elected ones that come from there are, well, as we say, different.

Third, you should ask for Texas to be broken into three. East, Central, and West have very little in common with each other and a little humbling would be good for Texas. You also should negotiate for Ted Cruz to be permanently relocated to an island. 

Fourth, we should have a contractual agreement that you get to elect every third president without us participating. We’ve pretty well screwed this up for a while now. You couldn’t do worse.

Fifth, require that French and English be the official languages of the United States or else you’ll have to give Montreal their freedom. And maybe New Orleans. I suggest that you negotiate for Puerto Rico to become a state and Florida become the District of Hurricanes that could be owned by America and Canada jointly as a kind of national vacation spot where no one has to live and State Farm could stop insuring anything.

Sixth, you should ask for the controlling votes on the Kennedy Center board. We are already dreading what’s to become of it.

Seventh, have Hudson Bay be renamed the Gulf of Mexico, just to mess with us. 

Finally, if you see a strange man coming towards you with a black hat and a child on his shoulders, just tell us no deal. 

That is my best advice to you. If you get the 10 states then you could pretty well decide who’s going to run things and you can veto just about anything worthless, which is about almost everything that comes out of our Congress most years.

Personally, I think you’d be a fool to let that beautiful place get tangled up with the likes of us. And don’t believe it when he tells you how great we’ll be together. That’s the kind of talk a lovesick teenaged boy tells a girl, or a slick salesman tells people when he’s selling a load of dried out manure or a flood prone piece of real estate. You can end up a bitter ex wife that way. Ask Mexico. They probably wouldn’t take Texas back unless we had to take custody of Greg, Ted, and Ken what’s-his-name. Oh, and if he offers everyone a free hat and a futuristic pickup truck, just politely decline.

Somebody wrote that we might invade you. Nah. I guarantee the army would be a bunch of militia nuts from one of the Midwestern states. The southern boys have seen this play before and it didn’t turn out too well for us. The rest of us would politely say  “Sorry, no. We’ve already got plans. We’re going to Lake Louise this summer.”