6 - North Shore News — Friday, October 27, 2000 criminal charges have got to be the final nails in the provincial NDP coffin. To see the deflated NDP stalwart slink out of his lawyer’s office on Friday continuing to proclaim his innocence and wishing to clear his mame in court evokes pity. Clark is charged with defrauding the govern- ment ard breach of trust in relation to a casino licence application for the North Burnaby Inn. that dates back to 1997. Unfortunately, anyone who has followed this woeful saga knows that Clark brought most of this on him- self by his appalling lack of judge- JHeineat premier Glen Clark’s VIEW POINT: ro] ician If he had done just that, no allega- tions, including criminal ones, could have been made. Clark should have known this, but apparently he needed a new deck on his house. The NDP government could have saved us a lot of disappointment and disgust by calling an election soon atter Clark resigned in August 1999. Clark hung in there until the end and only resigned when it became official that he was under criminal investigation. Calling an election then would have been the right thing to do. Now it seems a sure bet that the fragment- ed NDP party will lose big time at their next bid for power even with a “moderate” NDP leader such as Ujjal CHRETIEN SANS HE CALLED THE ELECTION BECAUSE STOCKWELL DAX TOLD HIM To \ im ~ " DANG! You MEAN ALL WE MAD To DO TO GET Rip OF CHRETIEN WAS TELL wh Dosanjh. There was an election called fast Sunday. Too bad it wasn’t the desper- ately needed provincial one. S FAM \\ oat, MA MWY RQ \ \ ws ment. - Clark should have stayed far away from any player wanting a lucrative casino licence from his government. 4\ \ i Ilr Z Nuys V7 = aC esses 00 Fire ignites motherly instinct Ma a \ s mailbox - Lifelong Liberal - soured by Chretien : Dear Editor: + Open letter to Prime Minister Jean Chretien. : I-am ‘saddened and disgusted’ by a number of recent events bearing the unmistakable hallmark of Jean Chretien: ®@ your decision to hold an election now when the govern- ment has two years left in its mandate. You appear to have majority support, so what’s the rush? "your increasingly apparent dictatorial attitude in almost every decision you,make; - > § the continual, _ gaffes: you commit when you represent ‘Canada abroad; ago. Surely whatever law school you attended could have | taught you'in your first year something akout the funda- ntal principles of a democratic society. ° Appointing candidates to run for public office? Is this what it means to be a Canadian?-I' volunteered four years f my life id the Second World War to (supposedly) help. aintain ‘a way of life’ thar at feast tries to be democratic and fair; .. four: bringing Mr, Tobin (Captain Canada) into your cabinet when he.hasn’t even a seat in the Commons. - b “New Look,” another sell-out to the mth In fairness to the U.S., however, 1 must ‘your apparent, determination to ‘continue ‘your reign indefinitely...” : Well; prime ‘minister, although’ I have been’ a Liberal upporter most of my life (1 am now $3) I have reached the point where, witha ‘clothespin holding ‘my. riose;'I may - ‘ al Alliance incumbent rather than ; have to vote for. th LAST Saturday I felt like a mether otter. “Ha,” you say, “Fellow’s daft. Has these fits now and then.” No. It was about 7:30 in the morning. | heard the fire reels from nearby Tiddlycove sta- tion. Idly, 1 looked out the window to see where the truck was headed. And, like a clip from a movie, saw a tower of flame and smoke across the road. Fire, Fire as tall as the tall trees. Fire that seemed to be on the old tree-thick Ingledew estate. A mother otter, when she perceives danger, spanks her little ones and sends them packing. Gets them out of harm’s way: Then turns to confront the threat. ° I spanked no one. But I went to the adjoining doors of our children’s bed- room — Mom absent, on her way to a conference in Richmond. No need to relate that I cried out all their names. One body, the Youngest’s, stirred . reluctantly. One, the Middlest, didn’t. ’ The Oldest, behind her door, was silent, deep in sleep. I urgently repeated the roll call. “Get dressed, children. There’s a fire across the street.” "They sat up. They moved. They asked predictable questions. Acall to Mom's cell phone. Her first “thought: “Get the dogs on their leashes cand find the cat — cats s hide when they’re Fightened. mo The fire was an obelisk of heat, of what looked like burning trees. How to describe it without banality? The smoke was, well, black, what else, and thrust skyward, what else — a murcle if it went the other way. And it looked perilously close. I threw on clothes, then changed my mind: The" shirt’s buttons resist my all-thumbs, the pullover ° is the garment of choice, dummy. Such are the little stupidities . in a crisis. They go with jagged thoughts about what treasures you'll try to save if a tall flaming tree falls across the road... on to your trees — which then obligingly - transport the flames to your house where, . they consume cv erything immovable. : I shambled my way across already closed, fire and police vehicles gathering, The surprise was that the fire. “wasn’t on the nel old but deserted and overgrown old Ingledew estate. The 2). flames were eating a nearby house, and. the meal was well along the way. . A man came out of the house next“ door. He turned out to be Dal Brynelson, former owner of our house, : how returned to the neighbourhood. And cool he was, though the flames — in © : four score Jast ‘month)- the brush and creeping up trees near the. burning house — were only an easy Lui: ’ Passaglia field goal from hishome. __ Neighbours gathered in a small knot in the brush. All-had had the same iflu-.” sion — of how close to them the fire -- seemed when they first saw it. The house was a goner. No human victims, ‘though. - We watched, stunned and fascinated. "All thought: Good thing rain had doused everything a day or owo carlier. All. thou ght: Good thing this wasn’t summer. fire crews slowly wrestled down. the flames. Alex von Kleist, my next-door.” neighbour, said off-handedly: “It’s for . -this moment that we pay them. Just | for ate! this.” Yes, just | for this. - 00 Next day, Sunday: A barn- burner ofa a: different kind..“A Satute to Austria,” the” «. debut in West Van United Church of =" Sinfonia Orchestra of the North Shore and what a glorious and acoustically ”..’ " grand setting — was a total sensaticn, the musicianship superb, the witty and infor: mative showmanship of conductor Clyde ” Ab, if oily News columnist Noel Wright were still with us — he'd note. th 80th birthdays this year o' lovely Key Alsop, and the impossibly con troversial Doug Collins (who reached: aa ~“Applause too for cart - Peterson; winner of the Bruce ‘Hutchi . Lifetime Achievement Award; tobe pre co: /csented-at the Jack: Webster: Awards dinne _ Moncay at the ¢ Bayshore LETTERS TO THE EDITOR must incude your * game, fuil. 2ddress and telephone number.» via o-mail tc: mbecker@rsnews.com 1139 Lonsdale Avenue, “After Hours Bows Tips: 965-2131 (press 3): ciburban newspaped ‘and. qualiice under Scheduie - “411, Paragraph 111 of the Excise Tax Act. is published | each Wednesday, Friday. and Sunday by HCN fications Company and distributed to every door.. fi the; North Shore. Canada - Post: Canadian ; * Pubileations. Mas Sates Product Agreement. No. . Fi : 7238. tating fates available on request. Entire’ ¥ contents ¢ Ks} 2000 HCN Publications ‘Company. All ights ~ Testtyed, ‘Average: circulation for ‘Bee Dhaliwal HAYPromotions Manager General Manager Enea tes Manager 985-2131 (210) 985-2331 (133) ? 4 $85-2131 (160) tnetersizasneus com Timothy Renshaw Executive Editor 985-2131 (756)