[Ian Mackenzie]

I didn't mind the speech too much (and I'm Canadian) - he might have gone over the top once or twice, but it's partially his job to be a cheerleader for the country he works for.

On a related note, I thought it was telling that the top ten list in the closing ceremonies referred to "Western culture" instead of "American culture". I might be going out on a limb here, but I suspect that FIRST might actually be succeeding at attacking the outsourcing issue in a way it probably didn't expect.

If you were an engineer and Texas and you lost your job to an engineer in Mexico, would you be most annoyed that you lost your job to someone geographically different? No - Alaska would be a lot further away, but if you lost your job to some upstart student in Alaska who worked for half your salary, I don't think it would be quite the same thing. I think you'd be most upset that you lost your job to someone who didn't share your values or your culture - someone who just seemed 'foreign'.

As well as inspiring and training American students to become excellent, more competitive engineers, in some small way FIRST is helping to build a broader, more inclusive 'Western' culture - we have international teams (1596), cross-border friendships (e.g. 48 and 1114), and all sorts of graciously professional interactions between teams (playing together on alliances, advice on Chief Delphi, sharing parts and tools in the pits, etc.)

If engineers and technicians worldwide could figure out some shared values and get used to working together in a graciously professional sort of way, we might be able to take the 'out' out of 'outsourcing' - if we all share a strong cultural set of values, who exactly is 'out'? I think FIRST is a great way to do this, and in some ways it might be an even more permanent solution.

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I apologize in advance if any of the above comes across as insulting or arrogant or anything - it's taken me at least half an hour to edit this, but I'm still not sure it's worded right. Personally, I'm proud to be Canadian, but I have an immense amount of respect for what America has been able to accomplish over the last few hundred years. I want to work to make Canada the best it can be, but I hope that doesn't preclude me from being able to work along side some of the amazing American students and engineers I've met through FIRST.