Calgary's been making headlines and inciting jealousy across Canada after Premier Stephen Harper called them “the greatest city in the greatest country on earth.” Politicians and cities have responded rapidly, with journalists in both Vancouver and Toronto already making the case for their hometown. Yet in Edmonton, it has been rather silent.

PHOTO CREDIT - CalgarySun.com

Edmonton - July 15, 2012 - So the Stampede just turned one-hundred, and Calgary seems none the worse for it.

That is, at least,until last Friday. Since then, Calgary's been making headlines and inciting jealousy across Canada after Harper called them “the greatest city in the greatest country on earth.” Jason Markusoff quickly welcomed the PM's comment in his Calgary Herald piece “Calgary is indeed the greatest city, thank you very much” while other politicians and cities also responded rapidly, with journalists in both Vancouver and Toronto already making the case for their hometown.

But Edmonton, somewhat surprisingly, has been rather silent, and with the Edmonton Journal offering only a tame news piece on the topic, it seems the task of commenting on Calgary's dig at us Edmontonians falls to yours truly at Our Hometown. After all, Calgary Herald's piece took special aim at us, Markusoff writing: “who would have thought it was the PM who would settle our city’s rivalry, once and for all?” And he's right, in a sense, that there is a fierce rivalry at stake we can't just simply ignore. If any city were to take offence at Harper's and Calgary's claim to greatness, it should be us.

But so far, it seems, we could care less. And therein, I argue, lies our greatness.

See, Edmonton's a special sort of city in the sense that we don't have to go around playing the “better than you” game against anyone other than Calgary. And even with that so-called rivalry, we're not so much fixated on the fact of our own greatness, than that of Calgary's lameness. Take our sports rivalries, for instance: although we're not thrilled that the Flames and Stampeders may currently be “better” than the Oilers and Eskimos--but only by a bit (until Friday, anyway)--we're happy to admit that the margin between sucking badly and sucking epicly exists in so many words by telling Calgarians to their face that their teams, well, suck. In the meantime, we have have no expectations to live up to-no pretensions to endorse. We simply like where we are, and are content enough with us that there's no need to shout it to the rest of the world.

But it seems that Calgary's different, and, unable to settle for even “just a bit better” than Edmonton, has to tell the world that they are number one. At the end of the day, perhaps Harper hasn't done Calgary much of a favour in creating controversy around what was supposed to be a celebration. It wasn't, after all, as if the Stampede didn't have enough controversy to begin with, especially after Calgary's very own Alberta Views criticized the event in their feature article last month on animal cruelty.

Just this Thursday, in fact, the Stampede suffered its first blow this year in a horrific chuck wagon crash that killed three horses and injured more-a public spectacle, protesters argued yesterday, degrading some of the only animals this society values. So Congratulations Calgary--Canada's now paying attention to you for all the wrong reasons. Greatness? I think not.

At least not yet.

So let's leave the bickering to Vancouver, Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, and now, yes, Calgary.

We don't have to be the best. We're okay with letting the rest of you play that game, while we Edmontonians continue just being our usual content old selves.