CKNW Editorial
for May 1, 2000

I do this editorial, traditionally, on Sunday morning after the Vancouver Province arrives and yesterday I discovered how wise it is that I wait until then. For one of my subjects was the sneering and smarty pants antics of Glen Clark, the man that left his party in tatters and his Province not much better off. But there was my colleague, Mike Smyth with an excellent column on just that subject so I’m left to simply record that given the mess he’s left and bearing in mind the Premier and the government he left behind are in tatters, one might have expected if not an apology, at least an indication of how ashamed of himself he was.

I had had another thought of course – I’ve become interested and indeed amused all the marijuana grow-ops that the fuzz are busting and the suggestion that the landlords of these mostly rented houses be prosecuted. Police minded politicians and the police themselves love these stick it to the owners bits because it’s so easy – it’s like photo radar. If you’re stupid enough to own and lend a car, or own and rent a house, both legitimate acts in themselves why sure you must be responsible – otherwise the Crown couldn’t win and we couldn’t have that now, could we? And I began to wonder why we bother. Of course marijuana is bad for your health. How could it be otherwise? The question gets down to how much public money the state is going to spend on the health of those who wish to burn out their lungs. I know that it’s no argument to say that alcohol and cigarets are just as bad if not worse for you but geez louise, isn’t this a bit like the prohibition days that made so much good TV fare years ago, when Elliot Ness smashed illegal stills and threw speakeasy found-ins in the slammer? But there it was – Jim McNulty had written my editorial for me. Drat!

So I racked my brain and though of expounding on my editorial of last week which saw the Progressive Conservative Party disappearing into the sunset only to be replaced by the Canadian Alliance, same people, different name. And I though of how foolish Joe Clark looked, riding this financially and politically ruined donkey as it passes from the scene and wonder why the perpetually geriatric, brain dead but oh-so-nice Joe Clark didn’t simply dismount and walk home with his dignity intact. And there it was – Diane Francis with my editorial on the op ed page. What to do?

I thought briefly of saying that despite my gruel thin interest in hockey I could show the teeny buzz I still get when I see the Toronto Maple Leafs lose but after all, that did seem so petty. It is still fun when they take gas though.

So all you get today is this. Since we’re poaching ideas these days, why doesn’t Tom Long poach my idea and suggest a federal Constitutional Reform Commissioner be appointed, not by the government, but by Parliament, after unanimous agreement of an all party committee, so he can get this burden of having to be careful what he says in BC because they ain’t going to like it in the East off his back? It would be a neat political move since he could then say to the likes of us "I agree that the Senate is a bad joke and that the entire parliamentary system, including the way we vote for it, ought to be carefully examined and, if recommended, changed." Nice and neat. I suggest this not just as a political deflector for Mr Long and other Canadian Alliance candidates – though it would be that - but because we in fact do need a constitutional talk shop. Talk shops are good things, provided you have the ability to implement their recommendations. So Mr Long as a companion pledge must promise the repeal of the phoney baloney ersatz amending formula Jean Chretien brought in in Deceember 1995 where the Commons agreed to veto any constitutional change under the 7 & 50 rule at the request of any of the five regions - meaning in effect that Quebec and Ontario have vetoes over all changes … they being the two provinces that wish to bask for all time in the status quo. If Mr Long were to do these two things, and if they were implemented, we would get the ferment of debate going again in this country and we’d all see that serious thinking and exchange of ideas could save the country – or at least give it a chance.

So there we have it – not too much at editorial time today … except my last suggestion is a very serious one and is one that the Canadian Alliance, the only party in position to defeat the constitutional caveman who runs things now, could well do some thinking about.