Canada does not equal U.S.A.

I'm miffed about a rather depressing "clarification" in a Guardian article about how fashionable reusable shopping bags are. At the end of an article, designer Kresse Wesling describes the impetus behind her latest design for a UK supermarket chain and the Guardian helpfully decides that there is no border between Canada and the US.

'I grew up in Canada,' she says, 'so I love the shape of the brown paper bag [used to carry shopping in the United States]. That's what we've made: a brown bag, double-wide, with a really long shoulder strap.'

The square bracketed "explanation" even occurs in the same sentence in which she mentions growing up in Canada. What, did Canada not have brown paper shopping bags? Did Wesling's family go cross-border shopping (for groceries!) where she would longingly gazing at American brown paper bags?

Well done, Guardian, for implying that Canada and the US are virtually the same country. If only it were, so I could vote for Obama.