Letters: January 8

Nail on the Head, Helen Gomez

Re: Harber and Mugabe, Edward Kennedy

Santa & the Senate, Ken Fisher

"Stanley Cup Returns to Toronto", Francis MacDonald

Re: Tie Goes to the Loser, Karin & Terry Reynolds

Fed Up

I want to comment on two letters, one from Elinore Duncan, and the other from Doug Steele, in your December 18, 2008 edition. They spoke directly to all that I myself had been thinking!

Elinore hits the nail (or should we say the Harper government) on the head. We do not need blatant attacks on the honesty and integrity of opposition parties, which, by the way, came many long weeks before the election was called with TV attack ads of doubtful veracity, disrespect for Elizabeth May, who with her worry over climate change has much more integrity than Harper will ever have. Elinore is right with her enumeration of the Conservatives’ failings. As Chantal Hebert said on "At Issue", summing up the Harper entire cabinet as "a colony of mice" on an airing at year’s end.

Doug Steele makes reference to the browbeating and smear tactics, bullying that we would not allow on our schoolyards, now front and centre as a role model for the entire country! Mugabe in Zimbabwe (I too had noticed the similarity between his and Harper's tactics) refuses to step down when he loses the confidence of his government. This may go on there, to their shame, but surely not in Canada. The mere thought of a coalition, ready to LEGALLY govern, sends our press into a tail spin of condemnation and sends the West into a tirade of shouting, "But we didn't elect the coalition!" Do they not believe in democracy and the rules of our elected parliament?

Do they believe that by turning themselves into a shouting rabble that they can change all that? Evidently they do! Wake up, Canada! Democracy is at stake! The Governor General may not be able to save him a second time!

Helen Gomez, McDonalds Corners

Re: Harper and Mugabe

Reading the December 18/08 Frontenac News, I find the attacks on Stephen Harper, based on mere subjective bent, plus the comments against Mr. Cameron's "Democracy is a messy business", in agreement with Voltaire when he said "Ignorance is a voluntary misfortune".

Edward Kennedy, Harrowsmith

Santa & the Senate 

During the 1984 Liberal Leadership convention (Turner vs. Chretien) I ran into CBC’s Anne Medina and asserted that she was very good at reporting the more left end of the spectrum of the news. At the time I was working for the Liberal Research Bureau. “No, No,” she replied, “I only report THE NEWS.”

In 1991, while facilitating a workshop for “Introducing the World”, I had Pamela Wallin as a participant. I said to her that her reporting was very much to the right of the spectrum. “No, No,” she replied, “I only report THE NEWS.”

In watching Mike Duffy live recently, I saw him interpret Stephane Dion’s confusion over the English past perfect (Let’s do another take, please) as a “Bob Stanfield drops the football” moment. “Honest Bob” was not a jock like Pierre Trudeau.

Then, on December 3, when Mike Duffy reports that the GG "can even take advice from her hairdresser", one really knows that it's over in terms of non-partisan reporting, never mind derogatory comments about the coalition and the Bloc.

So, Santa, in the light of their Senate appointments, tell us that Pamela and Mike are objective and only report THE NEWS.

Ken Fisher

“Stanley Cup returning to Toronto!”

That was the headline of a letter published in the National Post a couple of weeks ago. The letter writer went on to explain how the Toronto Maple Leafs, feeling that the Detroit Red Wings had lost the confidence of the NHL, had formed a coalition with the Ottawa Senators and the Montreal Canadiens. This new coalition, having collectively more wins last season than the Stanley Cup winning Red Wings, has demanded that Gary Bettman hand over the Cup to the coalition-leading Leafs immediately. It was a mildly humorous (albeit crudely simple) analogy of the recent events in Canadian politics. What makes this letter more amusing is the fact that this same logic is being applied by the coalition leaders along with letter writers Ken Fisher (Dec.11), Elinore Duncan, and Doug Steele (Dec. 18) and I think they’re serious.

Francis MacDonald, Arden

Re: Tie Goes to the Loser, NF Council Dec. 4/08 

In regards to Council ultimately not passing the motion to winter maintain Crotch Lake Access Road, we have the following to say: Winter road maintenance in North Frontenac Township is not being delivered equitably, a fact which Mayor Maguire, and councillors Perry and Good fail to acknowledge.

We could not have imagined the smoke and mirrors that would appear when we made a simple request to have a township road winter maintained. Crotch Lake Access Road is a township road, and we live on it year-round. Our request was regarding a very short section of the road off of Ardoch Road to our home. The public works manager, John Ibey, must have taken a great deal of time to prepare an extensive report citing many reasons to not winter maintain our road; strangely though, his reasons contradict what is presently being done, on a regular basis, to other roads in North Frontenac Township. For instance, Mr. Ibey claims that only 66ft wide, paved roads are eligible for winter maintenance by tandem-plow. We know for certain that many small gravel roads are presently done with tandem-plow. The simple solution for our road would be to use the township’s private contractor, rather than tandem-plow. But Mr. Ibey claims this solution is “cost-prohibitive” as said contractor is not in our immediate area. The fact is, the contractor would have to travel less than three miles to include our road. Based on this, Mr. Ibey’s argument isn’t very convincing. Besides, our tax dollars fund this service regardless of where we reside within the township.

Our road is incorrectly classed as an M1 road. M1 technically means seasonally maintained. It’s a mystery to us how any township road can be designated M1 “seasonal” when permanent year-round residents live on it. There are many documented, precedent-setting examples where the township has extended regular winter maintenance to M1 roads having year-round residents. In fact, most M1 roads in North Frontenac are already being winter maintained. Apparently though, our tax dollars are not quite good enough to warrant this basic service that has been granted to so many others with the same, legitimate scenario. Or, we don’t quite meet the ever-changing, arbitrary criteria required to be eligible. What greater, compelling argument needs to be presented to council in order to get a yes vote from Mayor Maguire? It should be noted that Mayor Maguire, in fact, also lives on an M1 “seasonal” road, and his road is winter maintained.

We are a young family, committed to living, working, and paying taxes in North Frontenac Township. It should be a given that all ratepayers (not just a select group) living year-round on township roads be entitled to winter road maintenance. It is unfair to compromise our safety and expect us to bear the financial burden of clearing a public township road. We simply request that we receive the same level of service that has already been granted to other ratepayers on M1 roads. Thank you to the council members who support our request and are working to run a fair and equitable township. We are not finished with this issue.

Karin and Terry Reynolds