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The Lucknow Sentinel, 1988-02-10, Page 4Page 4—Lucknow Sentinel, Wednesday, February 10, 1988 P.O. Box 400, Lucknow, Ontario NOG 2H0 528-2822 Established 1873 Thomas Thompson -Advertising Manager Subscription rates in advance: Rob Bundy -Editor Pat Livingston -General Manager 61790 Outside Canada $6090 51490 Outside Canada 55800 Senior Citizen Second class mailing reg. no. 0847 Advertising is accepted on the condition that in the event of a typographical error, the portion of the advertising space occupied by the erroneous item together with a reasonable allowance for signature, will not be charged for, but the balance of the advertisment will be paid at the applicable rates. Poor of Brian in many ways, you have to feel a little sorry for of Brian Mulroney. It seems he tries so hard and just when things appear to be going his way...a member of his cabinet commits a boo-boo. The latest in the rash of scandals that have rocked the Federal P.C.'s was the firing of Supply and Services Minister. Michel Cote. Cote's fall from grace came as a result of the fact that he failed to correctly report the acquisition of a $250,000 loan from a developer friend. To his credit. the PM didn't try and sweep the faux pas under the carpet or try and defend his minister. He simply gave him his walking papers and is now busy telling members of the media to stop making "a' big national drama out of it". Brian has a real tough time with his cabinet during his reign as Prime Minister. Who can forget the 'tainted tuna' affair, or the recent. report that Energy Minister Marcel Masse broke election spending regulations in 1984. And what about Sinclair (Sink) Stevens? The situation is clearly getting more serious all the time. It may very well be true, as the PM would hove us believe, that this sort of thing happen with every government formed in Canada. It's just that he has gotten caught more often. But this is no excuse. We, the electors of this country, would like to beleive that the guys we elect to lead us are above reproach, that they simply don't fall to temptation. Obviously, this is not the case. Not the case in the Mulroney govern- ment at least. With a possible election call in the air, Mr. Mulroney didn't need this scandal. He seems to have Free Trade nailed down, and most of us have forgotten the fact that he owns more shoes than Imelda Marcos. Will he put off a call to the polls due to this latest indiscretion? Only he knows. Will •he make it to the summer, without more egg on his face? Maybe, maybe not. - And will the next government be any better? , It's doubtful. R.B. 70 years ago February, 10, 1918 Have you heard...Canada is boring. Yep, according to the Economist, Bri- tian's leading business magazine, Canada is "irredeemably boring". The magazine arrived at the conclusion following the release of a survey of all the countries in the world to see which would be the best place to be born in 1988. In spite of the fact that Canada ranked very low on the "yawn index", our true north strong and free is the fifth best place to be born in the world. The top four are, in order, the United States, France, West Germany and Italy while the three worst places in the world to be born this year are Iran, Iraq and Zimbabwe. One of the reasons we as a country didn't place any higher on the 'best to be born list' survey is because of the fact that we maintain a high level of cultural poverty, according to the magazine. And apparently, the only reason we got to be fifth on the list is because of our "natural beauty".„1 suppose they're talk- ' ing about the Rockie Mountains and the Great Lakes and not the fact that all Cana- dians are beautiful people. What do they expect? It's tough to look sexy in a parka and a toque with a scarf wrapped around your face. One thing we do have over almost all the nations in the world is the fact that we possess the most desirable passport. We, as Canadians, don't need special visas to visit most countries, and we have an much easier time finding work in Com- monwealth countries and the U.S. The British magazine also notes that Canadians are "unlikely targets for terrorists". But back to the bit about being boring. Canada is considered as boring as Belgium, Denmark and Saudi Arabia and even more boring than Switzerland, East Germany and New Zealand. Could it be that the guys who did this survey happened to watch a Maple Leafs' hockey garne.:.or listen to an Ed Broad- bent speech before deciding we were boring? ON THE SIDE Maybe they just happened to be in Canada doing their research at the time of the Annual Potato Chip Throwing Festival held each summer in Pumphandle, Saskat- chewan, but missed that great Grey Cup game or the Canada Cup final last fall. They probably didn't even get a chance to experience a Toronto rush-hour but rather, spent a week driving across the prairies. Even I'll admit that's boring. But boring in an, awesome sort of way, don't you think. And how could we become less boring? I suppose we could drop a few bombs on Libya or stage a couple of cultural skir- mishes between Blue Jays fans and Expos fans. Maybe we would have ranked higher if we could have a couple of journalists kid- napped in Lebanon, or had a tanker sank in the Persian Gulf. Other countries might just sit up and take notice if we sold a few million dollars worth of weapons to Iran. Sure, that would move us up the list a bit. Obviously, the British magazine didn't look very hard at us when they decided who was the most boring in the world. They must have missed Gret- zky...Trudeau...Morgentaler...Fox (Terry and Michael J.). So we did lousy in the boring part, but we placed high in the best place to be born part. And really, where would you rather live: in an exciting but dangerous country, or in a beautiful and serene one? So, maybe we are boring, but I for one say that's just fine, thank -you. And let's face it...can anyone honestly say Britian is LESS boring than Canada? I doubt it. Have a good, old, boring Canadian week. S0... BARRING ANY - UNFof?ESEEN CIRCuriSTANCES, EXPECT AN IMMEDIATE ELECTION CALL Family has close call - William Smeltzer and his family, of town, had reason to think last Friday morning that a German bomb, or some other kind of bomb, had hit their house and exploded right in their kitchen. But it Wasn't that, though there was a terrific explosion and things in the kitchen were pretty badly wrecked. It was another case of the waterpipes in the kitchen range exploding due to ex- treme steam pressure...not an uncommon. occurrence during extremely cold weather. The result was an explosion which blew parts of the range to all parts of the kitchen with great force. A cold Village Council - The second ' regular meeting of the Lucknow Village Council is frequently the most interesting of the year. At this meeting, the officers for the year are generally appointed and a number of matters of importance discussed. The Council meeting held last Tuesday was no exception. To begin with, with a SENTINEL MEMOIRS view towaras economizing fuel, the meeting was held in the Clerk's office. This was much more comfortable on the cold evening than the chambers would have been, unless a goodly amount of precious coal was burned in heating it up. 50 years ago February 7, 1938 Prize list totals $100 - The most spec- tacular event in many moons promises to be the monster ice carnival to be staged in Lucknow next Tuesday night. The event is under the direction of the Arena Club who also staged the street carnival last summer, The admission will be 10 cents for children and 25 Cents for everyone else. Everyone has a chance to take home at least some of the $100 in prizes as many draws will be made throughout the evening. The highlight of the evening promises to be the performance 'of fancy skating by Patricia Manuel, a professional skater from London. Her show starts at 8:15 p.m. Nominations necessary - Ashfield Township, which returned its Council Board by acclamation last November, is now required to hold another nomination due to the vacancy caused by the death of Reeve Richard Johnston. The nomination date is set for Monday, February 21 with an election, if needed, scheduled for the following week. Mr. Johnston's death is the first occas- sion in municipal history that a Reeve has passed on while holding office. 25 years ago February 13, 1963 Everything lost in fire - Mr. and Mrs. Fred Shropshall and their four sons lost all their belongings, except for what they were wearing, when fire desortoyed their home in lower Wingham Wednesday evening. The escape of the four children was cause for much thankfulness. Three of the boys were in bed when the oldest, Donald, who was still up, smelled smoke and discovered the chesterfield on fire. He roused his brothers and led them to safety in sub -zero temperatures. Donald then, with one shoe on and one off, ran a block to his grandmothers house to inform his mother. Mrs. Shropshall was feeding calves in a barn on the property. When firefighters arrived, nothing could be saved after a two hour fight. 10 years ago February 8, 1978 Standpipe overflows - The Lucknow standpipe overflowed early Thursday mor- ning spilling 100,000 gallons of water to form a cascade of ice down the side of the tower. Town Foreman, Cliff Grawford. said the signal to shut off the main pumps was short-circuited by water in a man hole on Campbell Street. Crawford said he knows of no damage as most of the water was absorbed by snow or turned to ice.