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Times-Advocate, 1984-03-14, Page 4Pogo 4 Times-Advocote, March 14, 1984 imes Times Established 1873 Advocate Established 1881 Amalgamated 1924 •:r4 dvocate Serving South Huron, North Middlesex & North Lambton Since 1873 Published by J.W. Eedy Publications Limited 1ORNE Ft DY Publisher JIM 13ECKF FF Adkertrsing Manager 13111 BAI FEN Editor HARRY DI VRIES Composition Manager ROSS HA( 'CAI Assistant Editor DICK JONGKIND Business Manager Published Each Wednesday Morning at Exeter, Ontario Second Class Mail Registration Number 0386. SUBSCRIPTION RATES: Canada: $22.00 Per year; U.S.A. $60.00 C.W.N.A., O.C.N.A. CLASS 'A' and 'ABC' A Leap Year surprise February 29 comes only once in four years, but, Leap Year day in 1984 will be remembered for a long time by many Canadians. That's the day Pierre Trudeau decided to resign as Prime Minister and it was done in his usual unex- pected fashion, catching everyone off guard. Hundreds of media people were primed a week earlier to record Trudeau's resignation, but he kept them waiting at least seven days until everyone was lulled to sleep and not expecting any announcement. Regardless of one's political preference, Pierre Trudeau should be remembered as one of the most col- orful and flamboyant prime ministers since Sir John A. Macdonald and as a world statesman. For sure our Prime Minister made some mistakes, but if he didn't he would not be -human. The problems of a country can't be blamed solely on one man. On the positive side, one sees a prime minister who doesn't beat around the bush like some politicians do. He was flamboyant, but could relate to the public. He should be acclaimed for at least his actions dur- ing a number of overseas trips as a mediator and peace maker in days when the world appears to be close to nuclear war. He provided the vehicle to ease tensions between the super powers of the world and is respected as an intelligent and diplomatic leader throughout the world. Through his own determined and uncompromis- ing efforts, Trudeau was successful in putting our coun- try on a course of national bilingualism and multi- culturalism. He has changed the way English Canada thinks about this nation's French sector and opened doors for Francophone Canadians in Ottawa. More than anyone else he has kept Quebec in Confederation. Trudeau has also brought home a Constitution that maybe wasn't perfect in every detail but, with ultimate common sense and his own desire to see it completed was able to make it acceptable to most of us. Whether history will be kind or not to Pierre Trudeau, his impact on our country as an intelligent and forceful leader. will not quickly be forgotten. Fear continues About 25 years ago, when the cold war was at its height, many Canadians and Americans planned seriously to provide themselves and their families with fallout shelters. Some of us even bought supplies of canned and dehydrated foods and filled water jugs as a first move toward survival under nuclear attack. When the holocaust failed to materialize we gradually relaxed and eventually came to the realiza- tion that all such preparations were indeed a waste of time and money. Fallout shelters would mean little ex- cept a few weeks of delay in a no-win situation. Now fear is once more in the air. In fact there has' been renewed talk about commercially produced fallout shelters. President Reagan's threatening attitude toward the Soviets, the death of Yuri Andropov and the emergence of a new Russian leader have combined to breed a new era of fear. And if we, who have never known the presence of a foreign enemy on our soil ex- perience fear, just imagine what goes through the average Russian mind. It is only 40 years since their land was devastated, their people slaughtered, not in thousands, but by millions. Starvation stalked their land; their soldiers died in droves; some'of their cities endured years of siege. The .Russian people, without doubt, are totally determined that never again will they become the victims of aggression. It is true that we must have the weapons without which we would invite conquest, but the great and cry- ing need today is for the superpowers to demonstrate, not•their ability to destroy one another, but rather their unwillingness to ever again engage in the horror of war. Seatbelts for buses The bus accident on Vancouver Island that claim- ed the life of a 17 -year-old boy has focused the public's mind on the question of bus safety. The B.C. bus was more than 20 years old and had severely defective brakes in spite of a recent provin- cial government inspection. In addition to the dead youth, 63 injured, 15 serious- ly. One remained in critical condition several days after the accident. The chartered bus was carrying teenagers home from a school ski outing when it sped out of control, flipped on its side and skidded 30 metres before smashing into an embankment. Unlike cars, buses are not required to have seatbelts installed for their' passengers. While there is no guarantee that seat belt use would have prevented the fatality or some of the injuries in the bus tragedy, there is every chance it would have' made an impor- tant difference. Every day tens of thousands of children board buses for the trip to and from school. We have been fourtunate in the fact that there have been so few school bus accidents, a testimony in itself to the skill and caution of the vast majority of drivers and owners. But when there is an accident, the potential for death and injury involving so many young people is frightening. Yet, school buses and many other types of public transportation vehicles are not required to meet some of the safety standards enforced on private automobiles. As a start, all buses should have seat belts install- ed and wearing them should be made compulsory. If such action saves only one life, the investment will have been well worth it. In the wake of the recent accident, the B.C. government is considering making seat belts com- pulsory. The necessary legislation should be pushed through quickly and the other nine provinces, including Ontario, should follow suit. Rooting around our Opposites attract. That's good. They have their differences. That's bad. They patch them up and get married. That's good. 'Then they have to live under the same roof. That's had. Don and i are opposites. I'm fair, Don was a brunette when we were married, and blames me for turning his hair white. Ile likes thunderous renditions of Bach and Beethoven. i prefer lyrical Chopin and Mozart. 1 enjoy light opera; he tunes in country and gospel. • Ile reads everything he can find about World War iI ; i search out soniething with an uplifting message. He spears the white moat on the platter; i take the dark. We both enjoy playing our Electrohome organ, hut he plays hymns while i play hers. i live in the present; Don is intrigued by the past. i have very little interest in who my ancestors were, or what they did; he delights in family trees. Don has been delving into his own for years, tracing the paternal side back to the Rhineland in the 17(I0s through migra- tion to Britain, a further change Of both country and religion after a brawl with a member of the clergy, over the Atlantic to America, then on to Canada before this land became a nation. On his maternal side the trail leads from the isle of Tiree in the Outer Hebrides to forced resettlement -in the Queen's Bush in i3ruce county during the infamous Highland clearances. Don's Reynolds' Rap by Yvonne Reynolds 5� great-grandfather spoke only Gaelic, and if you didn't speak it tooyou obviously weren't worth talking to. ( The Duke of Argyll is still cursed in that ancient tongue when the brew flows freely in Tiverton or Glamis Ontario, on a Satur- day night.) Once Don had sorted out his family, he, started on mine. My father was safe front his prying, having emigrated alone from Ireland in 1919, leaving behind numerous brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles i have never met. Doing Irish research across the separation of an ocean is awkward, Don concedes. - Glengarry News roots My mother's side, however. is a dif- ferent story. Aided by a Targe, hard -cover history of one of the counlv's pioneer families, he has discovered that my genealogical chart is nol a tree but a tangled vine. i3ecause Turners married ('riches who married Townsends who married Turners, and first wives were replaced by second cousins once removed. I am related to half the old families in Huron. That and 40 cents will buy me a cup of cof- fee anywhere in the county. What does it matter that my lineage reputedly includes the daughter• of a i,rn'(I, who 'was disgraced and disowned after marrying the co' chman's son and com- ing with hini. ar new life in Canada? Who cares if the bloo of Scottish kings, now thinned to an alts( st invisible blue.. supposedly runs in my hu,,tiband's veins? Although Don and i agree about nothing except our funeral arrangements. his ancestors are on my side Buried deep in a family history is a bon trot from one of his forefathers who said: "if one relies on the notable achievements of an illustrious ancestor for his own standing, it is much like the proverbial potato...the hc,t part is underground." nc« Sietu� rM Al TIFr-Na ror(s� "Mush!" FagohTara ao„t 9/9i' Storm-troopers on ice We are well into another season of what passes these days for that once - thrilling Canadian sport of hockey. Far more interesting than being a spectator at games will be watching from the sidelines some renewed and determined attempts to decrease the potential mayhem in the former sport. As any intelligent eight- year-old knows, hockey is no longer a sport, it is an entertainment, superior to professional wrestling in this department only because it is faster, bloodier, and most of the participants, though not all, are not fat and middle- aged. Some are fat and young. Some are also middle- aged. Some are old enough to be grandfathers. And eighty percent of the so- called athletes in this new form of Grand Guignol vaudeville are grossly over -paid. A few discerning sports writers, and a good many former fans of the game, are sick at heart over what has happened to what was once the fastest and most thrilling game on earth. The great majority of the so-called fans, however, along with most sports writers and nearly all of management, derides any attempt to restore the skills and thrills of what used to be the most skillful _ and thrillfull sport of them all - professional hockey. Perhaps that is because the current crop of fans consists of yahoos looking for blood, the sports writers are sycophants looking for an angle, and the owners are stupid, as they have always been, Sugar and Spice Dispensed By Smiley looking only for a buck. In my view, a determin- ed effort should be made to stamp out the viciousness that has turn- ed pro hockey into a Roman circus. Assault and battery on the ice should be treated the same as it is on the streets - with a criminal charge. Let's put cops in the arenas and lay charges against the goons who try to decapitate an opponent with a stick, or' emerge from a spearing duel with the enemy's guts wrapped around the point of their sticks. Such a move, of course, will likely be greeted with hoots of scorn by the yahoos, the sycophants and the manipulators. Or as Variety, the showbiz magazine, might put it in one of its succint headlines: "HOCK JOCKS MOCK SOCKS". Translated that would mean that hockey people make fun of any attempt to stop the fighting and violence in the game. But such a move would be welcomed, however, by a majority of the people remotely interested in the game: the better sports writers, who have seen it go steadily downhill; kids who want to play hockey for fun, without being ter- rorized; parents of kids who play hockey; real fans of the game, who have seen their favorite sport turned into a car- nage of clowns. •Surely even the robber barons of hockey, the owners, with their nine- teenth century mentality, can see the handwriting on the wall, large and clear. The game is going down the drain. Let me give some frinstances. When I.was a youth, our town had a Junior A team. They played it fast and tough and clean. The referees jumped on slashing, spearing, boarding, knee- ing. Fights were infre- quent. In a town of 4,000, there were 1,500 at every game. A hundred cars would accompany the fans to play-off games 50 miles away. When I was a youngish man, I lived in a town of 2,000. We had an In- termediate C team, made up of young local fellows who loved the game. So help me, there would be 1,200 at every match. Today, I live,in a town of 11,000 which boasts a pret- ty fair Junior B team. The crowds at games run around two or three hundred. Hockey Night In Canada used to bind this whole na- tion together, from radio days well into television. Its ratings have dropped disastrously. What's happened? A lot of things. First, the quali- ty has gone down and the price has gone up. That's a no -no in any business. Sixty percent of the pros today couldn't have made a fair -to -middling senior amateur team twenty-five years ago. Arena owners, egged on by greedy players and those parasites, their managers, have hoisted the cost of tickets to the poit where ticket scalpers are commiting suicide. But most of all, the sheer viciousness of to- day's game, with its Nazi storm-trooper techniques, its open support of "in. timidation", its appalling messagefor young i.layers that violence beats skill and speed, has made a great segment of real fans turn their backs on it in disgust. When the players are all millionaires, and the arenas are half empty, maybe the morons who control the sport will get the message. Big chance for Senate Step right up folks. This is your big chance to belong to that exclusive fraternity, the Senate. Qualifications. All you need is a paid up member- ship in the Liberal Party, your cheerful attendance at three fund-raising din- ners and you're right in there. What's that you say? You're deaf and blind? No problem. You'll fit in with a lot of the other fellows there who haven't -seen anything wrong with a hill coming up from the Hpuse of Commons for the last eleven years. Able to sign your name? Great. You'll need to be able to do that when you sign for those cheap hair - because we wouldn't want you to be cut off from that fat salary too quickly. Perspectives By Syd Fletcher cuts and gourmet dinners in the Parliament buildings. Now one small question sir. Is there any history of early death in your fami- ly? No? That's good job security. Why I'm sure that he will be right in there plugging long after the bass -voiced Irish Frenchman is back mak- ing iron in Quebec. He's got all the angles figured out. Why anybody who can visit six countries in three days surely can get elected again. Just be con- ..,_.,,,..fident friend and take this lovely seat in the senate in Ottawa. Which way to Ottawa? I'd be glad to help you sir, right after I fill my quota here for other new senators. Me and the in- come tax boys, we get our jobs done on time. That would be a real shame. And don't you be afraid that our noble leader won't be there jo protect you, to watch over your