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The Citizen, 2003-12-17, Page 5THE: CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2003. PAGE 5. Other Views And now - There are more things in heaven and earth. Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy. - Hamlet, Act 1, Scene 5 Shakespeare got that right. Every passing day of life’s cavalcade brings weirdness undreamed of to the eyes and ears of this bit player. Why. just last week I read in the paper that the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, my old alma mater, has hired a public relations firm. An American public relations firm, Edelman Worldwide by name. Their other clients include Kraft Foods, the GAP and Kentucky Fried Chicken. They’re also the folks that helped re-gloss the Exxon image after the Exxon Valdez dumped several million barrels of crude oil onto the shores and beaches of Alaska a few years back. I must confess I found the story passing strange. Why would the CBC. Canada’s paramount communications company, feel the need to hire an American communications company for anything? "We are involved in a lot of different issues, some criticisms, some on a pro-active basis and., .like any other business we want to make sure we're presenting ourselves in the best way possible,” said CBC spokeswoman Ruth-Ellen Soles, not altogether helpfully. I’ve read that explanation a half-dozen times and it’s still about as clear as a Paul Martin soliloquy. But if I’m not reading too much into it, I think Ms Soles may be hinting that the CBC needs help in the image department. Perhaps Ms Soles is right. There was another item in the paper recently showing a photograph of the brand new lobby of the CBC’s headquarters in Ottawa. The lobby floor features a huge map of Canada Some skeletons are rattling the Tories Skeletons keep popping out of the Progressive Conservatives’ closet since they lost government and they should scare off any visions the party had of a quick recovery. The one that is doing the most rattling, and will damage the Tories most, is their pretense in the election they would give the province a balanced budget this year, while an independent auditor now says it is headed for a $5.6 billion deficit. This figure is not set in stone and will be reduced by the Liberals cutting spending and probably a stronger economy bringing in more revenue than predicted, but voters know the Conservatives painted an over-optimistic picture trying to win an election. The Liberals mention it every day. The Tories also are seen to have kept hydro rates artificially low to please voters and left the Liberals the unpleasant job of raising them to a realistic level. The Tories estimated rebuilding the giant Pickering nuclear power station would cost about $1 billion, but an independent commission estimates it will cost close to $4 billion. The most constant complaint against the Tories has been that they reduced services to cut taxes and the provincial auditor’s office has now warned they have left a huge risk of contaminated food and water, three years after seven people died and 2.300 became sick after drinking tainted water. Thousands accused of criminal offences also may have charges dropped because the Tories did not hire enough judges and prosecutors and delayed trials, which is ironic because the Tories claim to be the only party fighting the latest CBC news painstakingly inlaid in finest pre-Cambrian granite. Sort of. Actually, the map includes the U.S. state of Alaska - which would be a nice hands-across- the-border gesture but for the fact that the map does not include the rather substantial Queen Charlotte Islands. It also performs a little cosmetic surgery on Vancouver Island, transforming it into a perky little peninsula jutting out of the mainland. A west coast Viagra-ized counterweight to America’s droopy east coast Sunshine State, as it were. Now it must be said that the CBC is not responsible for this bit of geographical revisionism - they merely rent the building from a private company. But you'd think somebody might have noticed before they signed the lease. Maybe that's how the PR flacks will earn their keep - by picking up on tiny things like that. Too bad the trouble-shooting firm wasn’t around for CBC’s darkest hour, public relations-wise. That would be in 1995 when Perrin Beatty took over as president of the CBC. Mister Beatty was a tad light in the saddle for this job - for any job really. He was first elected as an MP at 22 and never has got his nails dirty with actual, you know, work. Eric Dowd From Queens Park crime. The public had some forewarnings of these Tory flaws, but it is still a little like a respected uncle dying and his family discovering he had three mistresses. The Tories also left behind a bad odour when they were last tossed out of government, in 1985, and it delayed their return to office. This is, in fact, the only other time in the last 60 years they have been thrown out of office, because they have been in government 50 of them. They were sent packing then after premier Frank Miller’s government of only a few months was reduced to a minority and the New Democratic Party helped install the Liberals. But it was the legacy left by Miller’s predecessor for 14 years, William Davis, oddly now revered in his party as a patron saint, which hurt them most. Davis boasted like earlier Tory premiers he provided prudent financial management. But after Davis left, the Liberals had to sell stock in Suncor Inc., on which he spent $800 million to provide insights into the oil industry, for less than half what it cost. The Liberals had to sell a company that designed and built commuter rail systems, into which Davis poured $140 million, for a mere Still, he was eager to make a good impression, so he invited a Globe and Mail reporter to his office one day. Beatty explained to the reporter that he was a real 'techno­ junkie', and to prove it, he played one of his prized CDs. The recording was pretty awful in terms of quality, but it was unmistakably Chopin's Minute Waltz. And the bad quality was excusable because, as Beatty proudly explained, this was the oldest known recording in the world, from 1847. And the pianist was Frederic Chopin himself. Incredible! The rest of the world believed that Thomas Edison made the first phonographic recording - and not until some 30 years later. Beatty smiled tolerantly and told of how, in 1990, construction workers in the town of Nohant, France had dug up a steel box containing a glass cylinder. Buried with it was a letter from one Hippolyte Sot, a French inventor. The letter explained how Monsieur Sot had perfected a primitive method of recording sound, and tried it out on his neighbour. Monsieur Chopin. It was a wonderful story and The Globe gave it lots of ink. Unfortunately, there were one or two moth holes in the CBC president’s wardrobe. There never was a French inventor by the name of Hippolyte Sot. ‘Sot’ is, however, a French word, meaning ‘fool’. The record label the ‘historic’ CD was published under was XOHA - which is an anagram for HOAX. And the number stamped on the CD? 010491. Which translates as April Fool’s Day, 1991. I don’t think even the spin doctors at Edelman Worldwide could have done much with that one. $30 million. The northern resort Minaki Lodge, on which Davis lavished $50 million to keep it afloat, fetched a measly $4 million and the Tories lost any reputation they might have had for business acumen. The Tories also became renowned for handing lucrative government contracts to those who ran their election campaigns when Liberal prime minister John Turner called Davis ‘‘the master of patronage.” Davis’s habit of ignoring his MPPs and making decisions with a small clique of unelected advisors also became a byword when backbenchers spoke up after he left. In addition the Tories bore the burden of Davis’s last act before leaving, that of extending full provincial funding to Catholic high schools. This is something he had refused in order to win an election in 1971. Many resented it. This baggage helped the Tories under Larry Grossman lose an election in 1987 by their widest margin ever and when the Liberals threw away government in 1990, voters still did not turn to the Tories, but to a party that had never been in government, the NDP. It was not until 1995 that the Tories under a radically different leader, Mike Harris, with new, far right policies, got back in power and they could have another long wait. Final Thought Life was meant to be lived, and curiousity must be kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life. - Anna Eleanor Roosevelt Bonnie The short of it Missing at Christmas It was a typical family holiday,scene. Walls were busting at the bricks with grandparents, moms, dads and kids, aunts, uncles and cousins. The table was burdened under the weight of more food than any needed. There was laughter and chatter. Around the piano gathered a group of people and the special magic of holiday music brightened the room. Then they played I’ll Be Home For Christmas and I, who proudly in the company of a new man was spending the first Christmas away from her parents, siblings and nephews, sped off to try and find a quiet place to shed some tears. 1 had never felt lonelier than 1 did in those moments. Sure I was surrounded by a a welcoming crew, but 1 was linked to them only by our fondness for one particular guy. The family who I had spent my teen years wishing from time to time that I could avoid, was now all I wanted. I desperately missed the familiar and our traditions. In the years since, things have changed, ot course. While my affection for my parents and siblings certainly never lessened, our own growing families took precedence. As my husband’s and my babies grew I wanted our Christmas to be spent with them, at our home. I wanted them too to think of it fondly when the time came that we would no longer be together that day. Now, amazingly, that time has come much too quickly. For the first time, this year all mv children will not be home Dec. 25. It was inevitable. Children grow up and away. They have significant others who also have family to visit. But I don’t have to like it. As our children got older it’s been more difficult to find the times when they can all be under our roof together. Dec. 25 was one of those rare occasions when everyone just tried a little harder. There will be a hint of melancholy that this too has now changed. There are those for whom the emptiness is more severe. Whereas I know that I will see the one who will be absent from our gathering at some point over the holidays, there are those separated by too many miles, who have not seen each other in months, even years. Then there those for whom the separation is permanent, when the idea that their loved one was just a phone call away would be a dream come true. But missing is missing. It’s relative to who you are and what the circumstances are at the time. When presence is important absence is noted. And perhaps, even more than the missing of this particular loved one, is the fact that from here on in Christmas will never be as it used to be. No more can I count on everyone being home Christmas morning. No more can I assume that everyone will able to make it home. It is this that may even be harder to accept. Such is life, however. Life brings us change. So when I awake before others stir in the quiet pre-dawn Christmas hours, I will begin my routine, the one that has been part of our holiday for years. I will get myself prepared for the busy time ahead, before taking a few quiet minutes by the lighted tree. Slowly, others will join me. Then the stockings so stuffed with care, the presents wrapped with love will be dismantled amidst laughter and chatter. That voices are missing we will accept, though they will be no less missed.