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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Brussels Post, 1977-03-09, Page 2Snow scene - Sugar and Spice . by Bill Smiley Who needs taxes ? .4.Brussels Post WEDNESDAY, MARCH 9, 1977 RIONIIELS ONTARIO Serving Brussels and the surrounding community. Published each Wednesday afternoon at Brussels, Ontario by'McLean Bros. Publishers, Limited. Evelyn Kennedy - Editor Dave Robb - Advertising Member Canadian Community Newspaper Association and Ontario Weekly Newspaper Association • CNA J. Subscriptions (in advance) Canada $8.00 a year, Others 514,00 a year, Single Copies 20 cents each. Give more authority There's nothing quite like a blizzard to prove that people can be funny. Or perhaps "stupid" would be a more appropriate definition. How else can one explain the apparent desire of some people to risk their lives by heading out onto the highways when it is obvious that travel is virtually impossible? And yet, there were repeated examples throughout last week of motorists tempting fate to reach a destination. It is not difficult to .sympathize with people who were caught in the frightening throes of the blizzard when it,quickly descended and in minutes reduced visibility to nil and made travel extremely hazardous. Weather forecasts have never been able to provide accurate indications of the extremity of any weather movement to the point where it can be determined well in advance what is to befall us. However, it is difficult to sympathize with people who head out into such a storm once it has arrived and end up in the carnage of wrecked vehicles which dotted area highways.. Some people would argue; that a citizen has that freedom of choice.. They would claim that such drivers are endangering no one but themselves or others who may be similarly displaying their. lack of intelligence. But. that is not correct! Once those people get into trouble they expect ambulance drivers, policemen. , tow truck operators and snow plow crews to come to their assistance. It 16 an illegitimate expectation. It becomes apparent that the police must be given greater authority to halt traffic when the need arises to save foolhardy motorists from themselves, and to alleviate the risk that must be subsequently taken by their rescuers. (Exeter Times Advocatd) To the editor Seeks information on Ellis family I am attempting to get information regarding the family of William and Sarah Ellis who came to Canada from Ireland in the late 1860's or early 1870's. They brought 3 children with them-2 daughters and 1 son, I believe. The daughters were Mary and Sarah and I do not know the son's name. I am led to believe that they landed in Halifax, and then went on to Brampton, Ontario, then Brussels and finally to Ingersoll. I know that they were in Brussels in 1881; as my father was born there at that time. There are no members of the family left, and I am unable to find out the name of the son who came with them. My father was Robert Ellis i . Is there anyone there in Brussels who may be connected with the Ellis family-be it cousin or whoever. I would greatly appreciate any informationwith which yoU may supply rate;. however meager it may be. I do not know how many other children were born in Brussels or Brampton, but do know that there were quite a number of them. I think that my grandmother passed away in Brussels in 1925, and my grandfather went to Ingersoll (but I May. be Wrong). Maybe there *Mild be something in the local paper, as they-the Ellis familp•had lived in Brussels for so long, I hope I'm on the right track. Thank you very much for your Consideration of this letter. Yours truly, Irene (Ellis) Grant 102-110 BOWreri Avenue, Quesnel, 2H2, There's something wrong with the economic set-up of our society. This conclusion was the one I came to after checking over my T4 form the other day. I turned white and then red when I saw what everybody is 'clipping out of • my pay cheque. The first, and worst deduction is for income tax. The feds got me for more in taxes than my hard-working father ever made in the two best years of his life put together. Then I started wondering what I get from Ottawa for, my thumping contribution. I wasn't exactly impressed When I totted it up. I don't get welfare or unemployment insurance or the old age pension or the baby bonus. I get the Trans Canada highway, which I use every 12 years, if I can find a spot in the never-ending line of Americans hauling trailers of campers. I get the CBC, which is one of the country's great losers, financially and culturally. I get the Mounties': Who needs them? I get protection from our gallant armed for ces, who could probably wrestle Iceland to a draw, although I wouldn't bet on it. I get the privilege of contributing to those handsome pensions of MPs and civil servants, with their cosy, built-in excala- tion. I have the privilege of kicking in so that Otto Lang can fly around like H enry Kissinger. I help pick up the tab for those federal-provincial meetings, at the last of which so many of the provincial premiers were hard into the sauce that it wound up in a verbal donnybrook. I also receive the privilege of helping pay for Skyshop bribes in Quebec, and nuclear bribes in Argentina and Switzerland and Israel and lord knows where else. I have the additional pleasure of helping to pay for a wildly proliferating civil service that offers me such inessentials as Manpowers, ads telling me not to smoke or drink too much, and vast quantities of propaganda churned out by the hacks of Bytown on the Rideau. I am permitted to help pay for the annual deficits of the Post Office, the CNR, the CBC, and practically any other "business" run by the feds. In addition, they'll let me kick in to help pay our native Canadians millions of dollars for a lot of moose pasture and tundra that wasn't worth a plugged nickel until someone decided to run a pipeline through it. As I said, somebody has got things backward. The government offers me all sorts of things I don't want or need, and fails to offer the any of the things I do need. And that's only the beginning. Insurance To the editor The Huron Perth Lung Association, your local Christmas Seal Organization sincerely appreciates the consideration and co- operation Of all facets of the Community in the 1976-10/ Campaign juSt completed, We received $42,311.58, which is an all time high fOr this area. Special thanks to the local Post Offices and Media for their continued support. We are deeply appreciative also of the Church Service proceeds of the Perth County` Juhior Farmers and the special dance project proceeds of the students of companies are taking me to the cleaners: fire, life, term, health, automobile. And the only way I can get even is to set fire to the house, smash up the car, contract a disabling diseases, or die. It doesn't seem fair. I paid a chunk into the Canada Pension Plan. The only way I can get it back is to get old. Unemployment Insurance cost me $172 and I've never been out of a job in my life. The union cost me $325, which is probably used for a fund for a strike, 'in which I will not participate. In addition, they levied me $1,750 toward a pension plan. By the time I get around to collecting from - it, one of two things will have happened. Either I'll be dead (and I hear there are no pensions in heaven), or my annual' pension will be worth three loaves of bread and a can of beans, with infaltion. And the whole thing expands • downward. The provincial mafia nails me ,for hard-top roads into cottage country when I don't have a cottage; weed cutters, geologists, fishing inspectors; health care for every hypochondriac in the Province; .homes for the aged and homes for the insane and homes for foster children; and a hundred other things I do not need. Then the county takes its cut.1 help pay for reeves to go and get drunk at the Good Roads Convention, for County Health Units, County Assessors, County educational empires. And finally, the municipal mafia puts the gears to me, for arenas I dori!'t skate in, swimming pools I don't swim in, healthy salaries for firemen and cops and every other bird who can get on the payroll. But when I say "Don't cut down my trees, please," they tell me I am standing in the way of progress. Nor does it end there, unfortunately. It comes right down beside you at your own hearth. The old lady wants a gourmet cookbook, $20; the daughter wants $250 for fees for a university course; the son should have a little donation in Paraguay to keep him from st arving; the grandboys need new shoes at 12 bucks a rattle. I don't need a single one of these things, yet I am the one who has the tamboureen constantly, shaking under my nose. Free enterprise be hanged. There's nothing free about it, and the only enterprise involved in the considerably' amount used by various parties to separate me from every nickel I earn. On the other hand, maybe I'm lucky that I don't need a single item from the endless list of garbage for which I am being clipped. You have to get old or sick or stupid' or poor to collect most of them. Witighani District Secondary Scheel. Respiratory DiSeage is the fastest growing health. probelni of this continent and the most common cause of absente- eism in schools and industry. We 'are working to change this pattern in educational, rehabilitative and research OrograrliS. We can not operate at all without the constant assistance of the residents of Anton and Perth counties. Sincerely, • 1\41'S.-fiery Duinsnior Ite& if Executive Director Lung association says thanks 1(