Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - February 27, 2001, Winnipeg, Manitoba A10 Winnith 2001 editorials Freedom of Trade Liberty of religion Equality of civil rights no Freebie for Centra Manitoba finance minister Greg in these Uncertain financial is acting like a kid left in charge of a Candy store and desperate to make How else could one explain the offer to Centra the wholly owned subsidiary of Manitoba to relieve it of a million annual established by the former tory administration at the time Hydro purchased the Gas company Selinger says he wants to help reduce the Price of heating for natural Gas con Selinger should look carefully at the math before his government makes his offer official and releases Centra forever from its obligation to pay million the Esti mate Given in 1999 into provincial the annual pay ment was part of a Deal struck Between the government of the Day and Manitoba which bought Centra for million from Westcoast Energy As a Crown Cor Centra would no longer be required to pay annual income taxes to the Federal and provincial that Money would instead be paid wholly to Provin Cial coffers starting with partial payment six years from now and full payment As of this special arrangement was billed As a major sell ing a Way Manitoban generally would Bene fit from the near monopoly the Purchase gave to Manitoba Hydro in the provincial Energy now battling the outcry of natural Gas Consumers who have seen their Bills is contemplating telling Centra to keep he justifies this As a Way to give Relief to those who heat their Homes with natural As though Selinger can predict How the wholesale Market for natural Gas with its wild Price fluctuations dependent on Supply and demand will behave a decade from the Promise of future savings Means Centra Gas might not go to the Public utilities Board yet again this Spring for an increase of per the resulting rate to pay for operating would have seen Consumers paying about per that Means the doer government is giving up million annually to relieve Centra customers of something less than a month this Why Selinger would make such an offer is curious at a strange twist in the concept of the finance minister is appointed to watch Over the use of taxpayers Money and the other revenues that pay for the services required to improve the lives of giving up the million a year does Centra customers Little Good it improves the Bottom line of the Crown corporation for but will make a measurable Dent in future provincial Selinger should not undo the unravelling what Little Good could come to Manitoban generally from the Purchase of Centra on horse race Bernard Landry is becoming Leader of the Rul ing parti quebecois because there is no other Candi a former Leader of Quebec Green who could Muster Only 816 of the signatures he needed to Complete his nomination with Drew from the race and left Deputy pre Mier to Lucien As the Only claimant for the party this will make him Premier of Quebec for about two years until he Calls an elec Landry promises to push vigorously for que Bec a candidate must make such promises to win the leadership of a separatist once he is Leader and Landry will have to address the wider Quebec Public that is not much interested in Quebec sovereignty and certainly unwilling to go through another referendum on Quebe cers voted for Lucien Bouchard two years ago out of respect for his abilities and because he promised to hold a referendum in winning conditions which was understood to mean he would not hold one unless the Public wanted which they clearly did that sly bit of equivocation allowed voters to elect him in full Confidence they were not inflicting a referendum on the Landry is a less Subtle Leader and he inspires less personal he will have More difficulty persuading Quebe cers to vote for a party whose program they the prospects of Liber Al Leader Jean Charest Are looking brighter every Landry will take command of a party that no longer knows whether it prefers Power or he will need to pursue both Aims As Long As he can but the two must finally collide Quebe cers will not go on indefinitely voting for a separatist party when they intend to remain in Landry weakness for verbal which he exhibited when he dismissed the Canadian Flag As bits of red is Likely to trip him up Charest and the liberals have yet to adopt a plan for adapting the Canadian Constitution to Quebec but if he can offer a plausible answer on that subject and avoid major he should expect to take Landry place As Premier a couple of years Day on display it was hard not to feel a Little bit sorry for Stock Well Day last week As he struggled helplessly to set the Agenda for the Days political Doest anyone want to talk about the recession he pleaded to a roomful of reporters on parliament guess what nobody nobody did for a couple of sound the first was so far at there is no recession to talk though one May be in the the second was that there was a far juicier topic on the the Little business of the donation to Days Cana Dian Alliance party from a member of the Law firm that billed him for several Hundred thousand Dol Lars in Legal a Bill that ended up being paid by the reluctant taxpayers of Day was not the Only party Leader in parliament to find his chosen Agenda being hijacked by rumours of prime minister Jean Chretien for months been battling to defend his integrity in the face of revelations of his role in the granting of a Large loan from the Federal business development Bank to a hotel in his rid both Day and Chretien adopted the strategy of saying As Little As possible about the issues in the Hope that they would go both have seen that strategy fail the parliamentary press gallery wont let Day forget about his libel Case and the Bill it and in conservative Leader Joe Clark has made a new career out of hounding the prime min ister to distraction Over the hotel both leaders can fairly claim that the emphasis on charges of scandal distracts parliaments attention from More important things the state of the new Trade the need for an updated both should know that they have Only them selves to blame for the fact that the focus of Par the news Media and the Public is More on charges of misdeeds than on the supposed great issues of the both men have been around politics Long enough to know Chretien has been in the business for a few Day is a Callow Rookie in parliament but he has been around provincial politics Long enough to know How things there is a kind of Gresham Law of political life which decrees that cheap politics will drive out serious the relentless Pursuit of allegations of Misbehaviour is More than just a matter of digging the it serves a Public purpose by revealing some thing important about the character and judgment of the people who presume to Rule it provokes the leaders themselves into significant acts of we know More about the character and judg ment of Jean Chretien and Stock Well Day than we knew before and this is useful information for people to have about their or would be the probing questions about Chretien intervention in support of a loan for a hotel in his Riding of Shawinigan reveal Chretien As an unrepentant practitioner of the old Ash toned Craft of the Story of Stockwell Days libel suit reveals the Alliance party Leader As careless of the Public careless of the use of Power and careless of the rights of this is useful information for the voters to have As useful in its Way As any thing we might learn from a now the moms too Twenty eight teenage twelve Middle aged five pounds of 30 bags of chips and enough Strawberry lip gloss to grease a four hours on a one Stop at the dinner at a pizza the kind where a Guy in a dog suit shakes your hand at the one 90minute concert featuring the backstreet a gang of Well chore graphed Young men who apparently cause the pulse rates of teenage girls to sharply inspiring them to shriek like banshees to relieve the pressure inside their one set of Yel Low foam ear one Long trip Back to the one lengthy visit with uniform wearing men while teenage girls Are made to understand the concept of the kind you have to pay not the obligation to respect your about the Only things missing from my recent Cross order cultural experience to grand Forks were a set of bagpipes and an accordion if they tossed in an insurance the trip would have been these Are the excursions you take in the impossible belief your child will treasure the moment some of the girls on the bus were having such causing them to burst into tremble like palsy victims and exude alarm ing amounts of these were the Omigo a passel of gals wearing glittery Eye Pink lipstick and shirts suggesting they would like to do possibly illegal things with the a couple of the mothers looked pretty Hott Trot As raising at least two my own daughter proved to be a member of the hokum an organization that holds regular meetings in my she is a True fan of that other boy the one with five Guys who dance change their clothes often and Are played on the radio around the they do sound just like the backstreet boys but my daughter swears her group is a Superior boy i have to take her word for i went to my first Arena concert when i was the who were playing loudly and there was danger in the there was something in the air but i was far too frightened of the consequences to we stood on our watched other people flick their bics and got our ears Sav aged by Pete Townsend guitar destroying his arms flailing and his shaggy hair i was actually there to gape at Roger As Shal Low at 18 As i am not a single member of the who no six Jearolds tossed Teddy bears on there we rent any mothers in the if there they we rent there with their it was inconceivable that my Mother would attend the it was As Likely that shed run off with Roger Daltry herself As spend four hours on a bus to take me to a but those were the Good old Days when parents knew their secure in the knowledge that they were in charge and their kids would find friends somewhere if it kept them off the bus trip from it was a smart in thinking of reinstating it at my in Way too old to listen to other Peoples daughters gabble through the the tour bus moving slowly across the the lights of semis the Only spontaneous shrieks at 2 Are More than any Well seasoned woman should be expected to i longed to stand up and shriek Back Howie was not smiling at Kevin is not going to father your child and someone Wash that girls Mouth out with is an obvious go to 9 of will someone please take that bottle of Jolt away from my daughter Twenty eight teenage twelve Middle aged four hours on a Cue the someone should have known Trade embargo on Cuba failed the following editorial appeared in mondays los Angeles times economic sanctions Over nearly four decades have had a negligible Impact on Cubas according to a 390page government study released earlier this this Doest come As a sur Fidel whose regime the sanctions were supposed to is still in the Trade embargo in one actually have helped allowing him to use the sanctions As an excuse for his own economic Lisman the International Trade commission in cold provides a Clear and convincing Case against the use of unilateral sanctions As a tool for helping achieve foreign policy the Bush in a Welcome change for the United is signalling that it will be More selective in imposing Trade the 1962 Cuba in subsequent years worked the Way most unilateral sanctions do they forced the target country to form alliances elsewhere and find substitute trading Cuba became dependent on Aid from the soviet Union and its communist withdrawal of the Aid after the collapse of communism in Europe hit Cuba harder than the Trade embargo Ever All it was the people of Cuba who not Castro and his comrades in the proliferation of economic sanctions in the 1990s eased late in pres ident Clinton second term when he signed legislation that excluded food and Medicine from Trade embargoes and a measure to relax the ban on this move was partly in recognition of the futility of sanctions which do not even have the support of americas closest allies and also reflected pressure from human rights groups and foreign policy makers in washing Washington Cuba sanctions stand today As a discredited and Bush Secretary of Colin is right to question their As he did during his confirmation but it would be wrong to exclude Puni Tive economic measures International sanctions helped topple the apartheid regime in South Africa and Slobodan milosevics corrupt govern ment in sanctions Are far More Likely to work As collective not unilateral cuban Premier Fidel Castro Winnipeg free press Winnipeg free press est 1872 Winnipeg Tribune est 1890 i vol 129 no 84 Winnipeg free a division of newspapers division of Thomson Canada limited published seven Days a week at 1355 Mountain Manitoba r2x pm 6977000 a member ome Manitoba press Council Rudy email Nicholas Fly Nam Deputy editor ;