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Times -Advocate, September 21 1983
imes
Times Established 1873
Advocate Established 1881
Amalgamated 1924
dvocate
Serving South Huron, North Middlesex
& North Lambton Since 1873
Published by J.W. Eedy Publications Limited
. IORNJ Ftl)1'
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i door
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Should have volunteered
Prime Minister. Trudeau has been accused of
dereliction of duty in not checking out the background
of former mines minister Roger Simmons who resign-
ed his cabinet post after a brief 10 -day stay because
he was facing charges of tax evasion.
The criticism is justified although it would appear
that the main concern is that Trudeau would appoint
anyone foolish enough not to decline the appointment
when he knew of his difficulties with the revenue
department.
Simmons suggests that had he been asked if there
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1980
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was anything in his background that may embarrass
the government, he would have revealed the situation.
Obviously, he should have volunteered the information
and that such a lack of common sense was displayed
is incomprehensible.
Nonetheless, cabinet appointees who all have ac-
cess to sensitive and confidential information should be
routinely subjected to exhaustive security review
before they take office as well as being required to
search their own souls for reasons that they should not
be placed in such as high level of trust.
Get the habit
Wearing seatbelts in cars should by now be a mat-
ter of habit in Ontario. Yet Transport Canada statistics
indicate that barely half of the province's drivers
buckle up.
Perhaps Ontario Solicitor -General George
Taylor's campaigns to have the law enforced more
rigorously will encourage remiss drivers and their
passengers to wear seatbelts - but for how long? Once
police relax their vigilance, any offenders will
doubtless revert to their old, bad habits.
One city's experience with spot seatbelt checks
suggests that intensive campaigns toenforc„:the law
get immediate resuits. Police report that when the
checks began only half the motorists were complying
with the law.; by the end, 82 percent were wearing their
belts. In the longer term, however, there's clearly a
lot of backsliding.
To some citizens of course, compulsory seatbelt
legislation remains an encroachment of their rights.
They are. strongly, if misguidedly, opposed to man-
datory use of seatbelts. Many more, however, go un-
buckled out of indifference; or because they're
lackadaisical or simply fogetful.
Still, it's )Hard to understand how half the drivers
in the province can continue to ignore seatbelts when
they're a fixture in cars. Evidence of their safety value
is far more persuasive than claim's that seatbelts are
sometimes an impediment to occupants of a car.
To the extent that they reduce injuries on the road,
and consequently medical bills paid through public
health insurance, seatbelts have a lasting social and
economic value. The claim that compulsory seatbelt
legislation offends individual rights is specious. It's no
more a violation of rights that the mandatory use.ofhard hats on construction sites-
What happened to Sunday?
Although Sunday is still a day -of worship for many,
it has also become a day of frantic activity - far remov-
ed from what the Bible indicated was to be a day of
rest. Moral and religious grounds entirely aside, a
great many people seem to have forgotten that rest is
a necessary component of successful living.
Listening to radio early this past Sunday morning
we heard a long list of places and events where the
restless could go to spend the day. Fall fairs, parades.
sports events, boat and horse races, baseball games.
The list seemed endless.
It is true, of courFe, that rest may be described as
any sort of change from the daily grind required to
earn a living, but one of the great values of worthwhile
rest is found in the quietness which provides room for
reflection, for enjoyment of family affection and relief
Disadvan tage
Those who remember the old cartoon
strip which featured a chap by the name
of Henry will recall the numerous occa
sions when he was banished to sit in the
corner of his classroom with a dunce cap
placed upon his head.
The scene was not unusual perhaps in
classrooms of a previous era when: a
youngster was punished in that manner
for misbehaving or for poor academic
performance.
When it was the latter, the student's
poor performance was only compounded
by the punishment as he fell even farther
behind his classmates as he sat With his
face to the wall while they continued to
(earn their lessons.
To an extent, it would appear that the
negative results of that situation are be-
ing attained by the action being taken
against the Soviet Union regarding the re
cent shooting down of a Korean airplane
in which some 280 civilians died.
As punishment for That atrocity, the
Moscow Circus performances were
cancelled in several Canadian cities and
daily now we hear of North American
basketball and hockey teams cancelling
games with touring groups from Russia.
- The cancellations of those visits appear
justified. but one wonders if those
cancellations aren't negating the oppor
tunity to inform the average Ivan about
the incident and to let him know how bar-
baric it is considered.
• * « «
The fact is, the average Russian citizen
knows very little about the magnitude of
the incident. Reports from Moscow would
indicate that the Soviets are telling their
citizens only that a spy plane was shot
down over Russion territory.
Given that same information, most of
us would quickly dismiss any suggestion
from the fierce activity which the workaday world
demands.
So many people have lost the ability to simply relax.
If they must stay home at the weekend, out comes the
power lawn mower to help fill the void created by lack
of more mercenary activity and to drive quieter
neighbors nuts.
As is the case with so many of the guiding rules
set out in scripturc., the designation of Sunday as a day
of rest was based on a wise understanding of human
beings. We need one day in seven to recharge our men-
tal and physical batteries - a difficult achievement if
we are rushing off at top speed to catch a parade 75
miles away.
to du
of wrong -doing oil the part of our national
defence system.
1t would then follow -that we would not
be particularly upset over the fact our
basketball team's trip to North America
BATT'N
AROUND
with the editor
had been cancelled because the citizens
of North America were upset over the fact
()tie of their spy planes had been shot down
while violating Russian Territory.
The Soviet leaders know well the
reasons for the cancellations, but you can
rest assured that those reasons are not be-
ing conveyed to the teams involved or the
general population behind the Iron ('ur-
tain. That's not the wad the system
works!
In effect, the basketball and hockey
players are being banished to the corner
of the room to the dunce's chair and any
chance there may have been to inform
them of the incident is thereby lost. Also
lost is any opportunity for those players
to return home with information that
could have been passed along to their
friends and acquaintances.
« ♦ « • «
A person would have to be naive to think
that details of the incident could be easi-
ly passed along to a group of Russian
athletes visiting in North America. They
are generally well -protected from any at-
tempts at indoctrination or communica-
Wingham Advance Times
e's chair
tion with the people they are visiting but
they can not be totally protected. Some
well-placed placards On Russian, of
course ► in the auditoriums or arenas they
visit could give them some hint of the
situation.
Even some messages over the public
address system could he employed.
The reaction of learn officials would
probably be to pull their squads off the
playing field, but at (east they would have
some questions to answer from the
athletes. •
• * * •
Some would argue that such attempts
at propaganda would be useless, but it
does appear that it is worth the attempt.
II is impossible for this writer to
assume that the average Russian citizen
has been totally programmed to not think
or question that which he may see or hear
in a foreign country
No state can control a person's mind to
that extent over a prolonged period of
time, although it is undoubtedly easier to
control when the influences of the outside
world are cut off.
There is little doubt that it is akin to
walking a tight rope to exert any punish-
ment on the Soviet (Inion without adding.
more fuel to the cold war or negating
some of the small links of communication
that have been established.
History, and indeed current events.
would indicate (hat the Soviet leaders will
seldom be swayed by pressures exerted
from the outside world; many of those.
such as wheat embargoes. being seft-
defeat ing:
The main hope still stems from
pressures from within but they will never
be successful if the free world makes the
Russians sit in their corner of the world
with their faces to the wall.
Same old racket
CJf
rimencusaxitliticeM,A,
An ode to the young
One of the many things
that occasionally arouse
my ire is ancient, self-
satisifed, right-wing jour-
nalists who reiterate that
Canadian young people
are basically bums, spoil-
ed by affluent parents,
ready to flop onto welfare,
eager to grab unemploy-
ment insurance after a
few months of work, lazy
on the job, irresponsible,
averse to anything
resembling a dirty job, or
a menial one, whatever
that is.
These writers would
prefer our young people to
besemi-robots, like the
Japanese, who join a com-
pany, eat with the coni-.
pany, suckle from the
company, clap hands
when the company gives
them a holiday, and are
retired when they are too
old to work any more, but
not fired: they get a job
sweeping up the joint at
barely enough yen to put
rice on the table.
The same writers
celebrate young Germans
who go into an appren-
ticeship at 14, work like
dogs for peanuts until they
are journeymen, and by
the time they are master
craftsmen, are too old to
enjoy anything but a glass
of beer and a snooze in
front of the television set.
That is a lot of crap, and
one of the worst purveyors
of it is R.J. Needham, an
occasional columnist with
Canada's self -boasting ti
tle of Canada's National
Newspaper, one of the
great misnomers of the
century.
if a man bites a dog in
Toronto, it's front page
stuff. If a dog bites a man
in the Yukon, or a halibut
bashes a fishing -boat in
Newfie, that's a little
"amusing" paragraph on
Page 18.
' Mad dogs attack
natives". —Crazed
monster fish smashes
dinghy; four killed."
But back to Needham
and people like him. When
he began his column, then
daily, I liked it. He was '
good for an aphorism or
two. He had a refreshing"
attitude toward women
and young people. Some of
Sugar
and Spice
Dispensed By Smiley
his fairy-tale analogies
were delightful. He got out
and talked to. kids. He
thought they swere great
and their straight middle-
class parents were all
wrong.
He has changed almost
completely. He now thinks
most young people are
bums, that Canadians
have no spunk left in
them. He goes on and on
about how he's never been
out of a job in his life. He
quotes the Wall St. Jour-
nal, and most of his wit
comes out of Bartlett's
Familiar Quotations. He
carries on his fiction that
there isn't a male in
Canada with any sense of
gallantry, humor or
courtesy toward the op-
posite sex.
He makes snide
remarks about homosex-
uals, and gives the general
impression that he'd like
to see the cops out with
clubs. keeping "order" by
bashing anybody who pro-
tests against anything.
i have signaled out Mr.
Needham, but he's only a
symbol. I once heard him
say that no poetry had ben
written worth reading
since Tennyson. That's
because Tennyson rhym-
ed, you see. I gave him the
appropriate one -word
answer, and he had the
grace to back off a bit.
But what I am getting
to, and it's taking me a
while, is that most of the
young people in Canada.
and their elders, are will-
ing to work, and want to
work, but they. don't want
to be slaves or blue-collar
workers necessarily They
want to be independent.
They don't want to say,
"Ah, so!" when the boss
says they are going to get
a wage cut; or "Bitte
schoen" when the boss
says they'll work Sunday
morning; or else. •
This is brought home to
me time and again when I
meet former students
sweating away as
waitresses or laborers so
that they can go to college,
instead of lying around on
welfare or unemployment
or bumming off their
parents.
Oh, sure, there are some
who do. But they're bums.
and they always will be.
And there are plenty of
them in other countries.
And always will be. But
parents are smartening
up, and saying, "Out or
get a job." iU is tightening'
up, and about time.
Welfare is being cut back
to those in real need.
But most people want to
work; and are happy when
they are working. I've
seen an excellent example
in the past couple of
weeks. A construction
company has torn our
street to ribbons with their
huge back -hoes and front-
end loaders.
These guys are mostly
young. They work like
dogs, but' there's nobody
going around with a whip
to make sure they don't
slow down., There doesn't
even seem to be a
foreman, running around.
shouting epithets. They
enjoy what they're doing,
though it's hard, - back-
breaking work, long
hours, and most wages
below $7 an hour. (Try to
get a plumber or electri-
cian for that.)
They're happy; they're
pleasant; they're co-
operative. They don't quit
the minute it's noon, or
six. They finish what
they're doing. They don't
as a government ' crew
might do, stand around
with one guy digging a
hole and six others wat-
ching him.
The work they do in an
hour would exhaust the
average postal worker,
teacher, civil servant, in
eight. They don't take five
coffee breaks a day. They
hate some of the things
they're doing, but they're
happy to be working.
And what do they have
to look forward to when
the job's done, and bad
weather slows construc-
tion work to a crawl?
They'll probably have to.
go on pogey, to keep their
families alive. If that's
wrong, then let's create a
state in which a guy is told
where he's going to work.
how much he's going to
get, what size accom-
modation he can have, lots
of whips and guns, no right
to say what he wants
about his boss or the
prime minister - a mass of
"happy" workers, produc-
ing like hell. for no known
reason.
Horns of a dilemma
One of the courses that
young doctors are being
asked" to take in Ontario
universities is a course in
ethics. There are so many
situations facing doctors
in which the question put
to them is not so much a
medical one (usually that
decision is fairly
straightforward), but a
problem such as abortng
an unborn infant or sup-
plying an ;illegal dose of
heroin for a cancer victim
who is begging for a more
effective pain -reliever
than the one which is mak-
ing him constantly sick to
his stomach along w ith
severe al)dominal pains. it
tln'ns out during (he suhse-
Perspectives
By Syd Fletcher
other side-effects.
An interesting case that
has been coming up
recently is in emergency
wards where a patient
comes in complaining of '
quent operation that the
doctor finds a soft plastic
container of drugs inside
the intestine. The patient
has swallowed it for some
reason (probably illegal)
and now the doctor is put
on the horns of a dilemma.
Does he pretend he has
never seen the drugs?
Does he merely hand
them hack to the patient?
Does he call in the police
and the Itt'I4l1''' I thereby
violating his oath of pa-
tient confidentiality).
Does he wish that he
hadn't come in to work to-
day? No doubt
Sometimes I'm sure no
atnount of high salary
compensates for the grey
hairs of that kind of deci,
sion making.