Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 2004-07-22, Page 5Arthur 44. Black THE CITIZEN, THURSDAY, JULY 22, 2004. PAGE 5. Other Views Are you ready for the new golf? Let me declare my bias right from the tee-off: I do not golf. I have never golfed. I never intend to take up golf. - My reasons are several: for one thing, golf is too expensive. Second, I have little inclination to dress up like a pimp. And third, I've got much better ways of spending a sunny summer afternoon than humping around a manicured lawn trying to push a ball into a hole with a stick. Besides, golf is too...stuffy. There's the polyester-heavy dress code, for starters. • Then there's that fake-jock locker room banter to endure and all the correct procedures to observe when you're out on the course. The scorecards, the dinky gloves. the dorky shoes — it's all 'way too much like Boy Scouts. Mind you. that may be changing. That would, seem to be the lesson to be learned from the first annual Shoreditch Urban Open Tournament held recently in England. You read it right — "urban". At the Shoreditch Open, the players (there were 64 of them) swatted golf balls through the streets of a chi chi section of London. Naturally, • certain...adjustments have to be made to play golf downtown. The Shoreditch Open organizers persuaded the City Fathers to temporarily close off several streets to traffic. The mechanics of the game changed too. Urban golf balls are cotton-stuffed leather orbs. They travel only about half as fast and half as far as your Spalding Three-dot, but there's no chance of them shattering a AProgressive Conservative premier once called an election for mid-March and a snowstorm prevented the Liberal opposition leader from flying to northern Ontario to unveil his policies for that region. Premier William Davis chortled while Stuart Smith described his plans for helping logging and mining at a makeshift news conference in a Toronto airport. Davis had called the election for March, although votes normally are held in weather more suitable for travel, because he felt he had already done enough to win and his opponents would be caught off guard. Smith attacked Davis for calling a winter election and said it showed how little the premier cared for the north, but the Tories still won, in 1981. Premiers now have a huge advantage in being able to set election dates. They have to call an election within five.years, but mostly call one after four to avoid an election when they may be unpopular and have no time to recoup, and they have plenty of room to manoeuvre in between. Liberal Premier Dalton McGuinty has moved to end this unfairness and has legislation being debated under which elections will be held on fixed dates, on the first Thursday in October every four years starting on Oct. 4, 2007. almost four years to the day after McGuinty won. No other party when in government had been willing to surrender this advantage and the Liberals deserve praise, but are not quite as generous as they. sound. Two premiers who called elections early and one who called one late were punished severely by voters. Liberal premier David Peterson called an election in 1990 only three years after he won a record 95 of 130 seats. Peterson still had anexceptionally high 50 per cent in polls, but there were signs a period of strong economic. growth was ending and Peterson wanted to get re-elected before it hit window. • Newspaper kiosks, storm drains, lampposts and fire hydrants substitute for the usual water hazards, sandtraps and rough. The Shoreditch Open didn't throw the entire rulebook out the window. Players were required to use regulation clubs. Any shot that landed on `private property' was ruled out of bounds. Any player who hit a telephone wire with his drive had to replay the shot without penalty. The object of Urban Golf? To have fun — which makes it pretty much the polar opposite of traditional golf. The winner was a duffer who answers to 'Tuna' and came in at 19 over par. Shoreditch organizer Jeremy Feakes explains his motivation: "I didn't like all the rules and attitude involved with proper golf, but I like Urban Golf because it's all about being playful." John Dean would no doubt agree. Dean's the publisher of a brand new magazine called Golf Punk. "It's the golf magazine for the rest of us," he explains. The magazine is dedicated to turning the traditional game inside out. Peterson claimed Canada was going through dramatic political changes and he required a renewed mandate to tackle them, but few fell for this explanation. Criticisms of his many tax increases also snowballed and complaints lasted throughout the campaign he called an election that was unnecessary and cost $40 million, and Peterson lost not only government but his own seat and political career. Davis called an election in 1977, two years after one reduced his government to a minority, fretting at having to go cap in hand to opposition parties to get laws passed and not having the absolute power his party had for tbree decades. Davis postponed potential irritants, had difficulty finding an excuse for calling an election, but finally took the plunge after the opposition parties defeated his plan to allow landlords an annual rent increase slightly higher than they considered fair. The issue was minor, but Davis claimed he had been defeated on a vote of confidence and had_ to call an election, few accepted his Final Thought • Are you bored with life? Then throw yourself into some work you believe in with all your heart, live for it, die for it, and you will find happiness that you had 'thought could never be yours. —Dale Carnegie Looks like. the game of golf is changing faster than Randy White's political fortunes — and on more fronts than one. There was a tiny item on the sports pages last week about David Morris. Mister Morris is a professional British golfer who's been accused of cheating. The man's crime? Seeing. David Morris is the reigning world blind golf champion. His detractors are suggesting that he's not blind at all. The amazing part of this story to me is not the possible peccadilloes of David Morris, champion blind golfer. It's that there exists such a thing as a Blind Golf Championship. Blind golf???? Who knew? Not me — and not my pal Eddie either, apparentlji. Eddie tromped into a Chicago clubhouse recently and discovered Stevie Wonder sitting on a bench, his white cane on one side of him and a bag of golf clubs on the other. "You a member here, Stevie?" "Oh, yeah," replies Stevie, "I try to get in at least 18 holes a week." "Oh," says Eddie. "So what's your, um, handicap?" "Actually, I'm a scratch golfer," says Stevie. "I only play for money. Thousand bucks a hole, minimum." By this time, Eddie's rubbing his hands together (A blind guy! A thousand dollars a hole!) "Ahhhh, Stevie," he says, "any chance you'd play a round with me?" "Sure," says Stevie. "Just pick a night." reasoning and he fell short again of winning a majority. One deficiency in McGuinty's legislation is that it does not appear to rule out a future government contriving a defeat on confidence and precipitating an election. Peterson also called another election early and won a huge majority, but the circumstances were different. Peterson had led a minority government from 1985 supported by the New Democrats on condition he implemented specific policies and when he called an election two years later he had fulfilled most of his obligations and many felt he deserved his own mandate. Bob Rae, after being elected NDP premier in 1990, alienated a wide range of voters by massive budget deficits and backing off dreams such as public auto insurance, and delayed calling an election until his five years were up, hoping his prospects would improve. Rae had to endure many taunts he was scared to call an election and when he did still was turfed out, so premiers have not always found having the power to call an election a benefit. Letters Policy The Citizen welcomes letters to the editor. Letters must be signed and should Include a daytime telephone number for the purpose of verification only. Letters that are not signed will not be printed. Submissions may be edited for length, clarity and content, using fair comment as our guiceline. The Citizen reserves the right to refuse any letter on the basis of unfair bias, prejudice or inaccurate information. As well, letters can only be printed as space allows. Please keep your letters brief and concise. High cost of housing Twenty-five years ago, my hubby and I were dewey-eyed betrotheds, ready not just to begin a life together, but to build one. The first item on the agenda, of course, a home. The idea was for a new house, designed to suit our needs. Plans had been chosen and final details discussed. Of course, location was everything and a lot had been purchased that afforded us the privacy we covetted; having lived in an apartment for some time; and the view that our Libran-aesthetic craved. Then an evening bike ride with a friend, an off-hand remark and destiny took a re-routing. Passing by an unremarkable but spacious old home, my attention was caught when my friend told me the asking price of this two- storey Italianate. With nothing to lose; or at least that's what we thought at the time; Mark and I arranged a look through and the rest, as they say, is history. The house has been the source of frustration and head shaking. While the sow's ear may have come cheap, the costs incurred in the making (still ongoing, I might add) of the silk purse have mounted. It has been a money pit. But it has also lived up to the potential we idealistically dreamed of those many years ago. Thus, we chalk it up to a learning eitperience. And it is with this hard-earned knowledge that we have been called upon to advise one of our kids as he and his fiancée strive to become new homeowners. For the most part, it's refreshing. Warm fuzzies abound as we step into a fixer-upper and remember the rosy naiveté that coloured practicality. Faded, dismal wallpaper, sloped floors and peeling paint bring all the memories back. However, we're older and tired now, far too realistic to be fooled; After all, we recall that while a fixer-upper comes cheap ... But wait. That was then, this is now. An aged, simple home with none of the character of the well-built has an asking price modestly set at a few thousand over its assessment of $170,000. Granted, it's 10 minutes from the city, the yard is spacious and it's close to a school and playground, but $50,000 more wouldn't cover all the work. This explains why more and more people are driving further and further out of the cities to try and find affordable quality housing. Lots in towns not too far away are running in the area of $100,000. Condos and townhouses sell in the range of what a fairly decent home went for not long ago in the city. It has been a seller's paradise when it comes to real estate recently and economists predict that it has to turn around soon. That said, rumours also abound that interest rates are going to rise. So the big question for many people out shopping for a home is which way to take a chance. . Personally, I'm still enough of a dreamer to know that if I wanted a home now, I'd not likely wait. But I wouldn't be fooled either. Some places are definitely not worth the price; others. as we saw in our old gem, have potential. Perhaps all those years ago we'd have been better to have built a new home rather than shovel cash into the money pit. But, we took our chance and there have been so many good times, much laughter (generally at our own expense) while we put it all together that I've never really cared whether it was the right move or not. Premiers have abused the elections