The annual Speech from the Throne was made by Lieutenant-Governor Michelle Jean in Ottawa today. Jean, whose main purpose seems to be to deliver ceremonial speeches, outlined several key policies that will affect Canadians in the upcoming year.

In what is essentially a throwback to the days when the Queen of merry old England would address her entire British empire, Jean explained that the Conservatives plan on tackling several key issues in 2010, including reducing unemployment, encouraging economic growth and increasing the universal childcare benefit. In the interest of the overall tone of the speech, every letter c was delivered in lowercase.

In response to this apparent rehashing of old ideas, the oppostion responded, “Rabble rabble, rabble.”

They added, “Rabble rabble.”

But amongst the usual beauracratic doublespeak, one nugget of interesting legislative change emerged in the revealing that the Harper administration plans to change the lyrics to our national anthem, O’ Canada. Yes, that national anthem, the one drunkenly sung in chorus all over the city for the last three weeks will forever be altered by our Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

The proposed change is that instead of saying, In all thy sons command, the new version will read, In thou dost us command.

The new version is actually more in line with the original lyrics from 1909, but it is actually being changed to satisfy gender neutrality. For real. Because people are wondering why we aren`t doing things in all our daughters command as well. No joke. This is what we shut down parliament for today.

Dost thou protest the changes?