is (yep Faws-Camesr 5 SO BOB... YOUVE SEEN CANDIDATES ... WHAT DO ‘YOU THINK... No boys wanted on Grace’s and Rita’s sandlot THE LADIES battling each other for the Socred lead- ership will, no doubt, be suitably outraged by the accusa- tion that they’re using gender bias as a campaign weapon. NEWS VIEWPOINT This side up EST VANCOUVER high school graduates were recently given a crash course in how the federal government operates and how it perceives the world outside Ottawa, courtesy of Capilano-Howe Sound MP Mary Collins. They were sent certificates of con- gratulation on their scholastic achieve- ments, and true to government form, the certificates were printed upside down. A female recipient of a speciai Tory upside down certificate was also greeted with the salutation of mister. The gesture by Coilins was astute public relations; the follow-through was marveilously bureaucratically inept. Bat it was an invaluable lesson for all the new graduates receiving the certificates and all new graduates everywhere: the world as viewed from Ottawa's lofty seats of power is an upside down kind of place. That distorted view explains a lot of Statements, decisions and policies made from Ottawa that most folks might previously have thought were merely the result of incompetence, political buf- foonery or bad judgment. it explains some of the logic behind ap- plication of the GST; it explains how an Iraqi diplomat and mouthpiece for a repressive and destructive regime was ushered into the country and into a North Vancouver property without so much as a raised Tory eyebrow; it explains how east- ern shipyards are treated to multi-million dollar bailouts while West Coast shipyards are tossed anchors. It explains just about everything except how this country expects to survive ifs leadership. LETTER OF THE DAY Store prices rob the consumer Dear Editor: Superstores — who's robbing who? All stores must take responsibil- ity in theft because it is the stores who want something for nothing and leave the customer open to temptation! We once had stores that had all things behind counters and thus goods were not stolen. But now we are robbed continually by store owners who leave goods lying open but don’t want to give us service. Customers are robbed dai- Publisher Managing Editor Associate Editor... Advertising Directo Comptiolier...... . a .Peter Speck Timothy Renshaw .Noel Wright Linda Stewart Doug Foot ly by storeowners —— buy a bun or cookie and pay $1.65 and take it home to find out it’s so old you can’t bite into it. Is this not rob- bery? There is no monitoring of stores on how much they up prices on goods. I do not feel any sympathy for Superstores or any department store — it is their own doing. You get what you give out. For too fong people have been robbed by government and taxes. If you don’t want robberies, br- ing back the old-fashioned stores Display Advertising 980-0511 Reai Estate Advertising 985-6982 Classilied Advertising 986-6222 Newsroom 985-2131 Fax Distribution Subscriptions Administration with service! My advice to customers: pay the 10 cents extra and shop at your local store and let those big non- caring giants go down the drain where they belong. They psychologically rob people by get- ting you in their stores and you end up buying things you don’t need because they look cheaper in price. Thus you spend far too much. June Vos West Varicouver 986-1337 (Zona North Shore 986-1337 [ite managed 985-3227 985-2131 North Shore News, founded in 1969 as an independent suburban newspaper and qualified under Schedule 111, Paragraph il! of the Excise Tax Act, is published each Wednesday, Friday and Sunday by North Shore Free Press Lid and distnbuted to every door on the North Shore. Second Ciass Mail Registration Number 3885 Subscriptions North and West Vancouver, $25 per year Matling rates available on request Submissions are welcome but we cannot accept responsibility for uncalicited maternal including Manuscnpts and picluies which should be accompanted by a stamped, addressed envelope V7M 2H4 Faq ORCS ON WONT AND WE ST eEaeCOUVE north shore. MEMBER SUNDAY + WEDNESDAY - FRIGAY 1139 Lonsdale Avenue, North Vancouver, B.C. SDA DIVISION 61,582 (average circulation. Wednesday, Friday & Sunday) Entire contents <+ 1991 North Shore Free Press Ltd Alt rights reserved But what Grace McCarthy and Rita Johnston want, when dele- gates start voting tomorrow in the Vancouver Convention Centre, is a quick one-to-one fight — with no tiresome ‘‘compromise”’ can- didate delaying it, let alone threatening to sneak to victory up the middle. So during the past week both the female front-runners have been confidently assuring everyone and his dog that it will be game over in (wo ballots — the first ballot eliminating all three of their opponents, Which, of course, would just happen to mean eliminating at one fell swoop all the maje contenders. The gender bias inherent in this tidy little plan, however, is by no means purely accidental. When it comes to challenges, one factor is that the sexes still get their real jollies competing against their own kind rather than sex vs. sex. Something to do with biolo- gy, | guess. The other and more immedizte factor is the Socreds’ desperate need for a radical change of image with which to face Mike Harcourt and the socialist horde at the upcoming election. B.C. has already won a new place in the history books as Canada's first province with a woman premier. So what better symbol now of a spiritually renewed, highly contemporary party than an officially endorsed womiar leader — especially one personally untainted by its naughty "scent past? Take your pick here between Grace and Rita. Under the voting rules, first- ballot candidates placing third and lower whose COMBINED votes don’t equal those of the second- place candidate must ALL drop out. Given that Grace and Rita are expected to start pretty well neck-and-neck, Norm Jacobsen, Mel Couvelier and Duane Cran- dail thus need to share 34% of the total votes if at least one of them is to force a third ballot. With Duane on the men’s team, that hope seems slim — which is what the ladies are counting on. But the hidden message to dele- gates in their confident forecasts has as much to do with genders as numbers, **This is a girls’ game,’’ they’re Noel Wright HITHER AND YON saying. ‘Don’t waste your votes encouraging the boys to think they can take over OUR sandlot!’’ TAILPIECES: Senior North Shore couples with incomes not exceeding the $27,000 p.a. gov- ernment ceiling still have the chance of a neat one-bedroom apartment in the new 80-unit West Van Kiwanis Park development at 22nd and Gordon. Ready for oc- cupancy by December, rents will be $550-575 and application forms can be obtained from Carriage Management, 922-3237 ... Gener- ous North Van District is celebrating its 100th birthday by handing out goodies ali round to local worthy causes — among the Jatest being $7,000 to Capilano Community Services Society, $3,000 to the North Shore Counselling Centre and $2,000 to Big Sisters ... And if you don’t yet have tickets for tonight’s glamorous talent and crowning extravaganza climaxing Gertie Todd’s 40th Miss North Shore Pageant at 7 p.m. in the Centen- nial Theatre, you might still just be lucky by calling 985-0555 — like right at this very moment. WRIGHT OR WRONG: A politi- cal optimist is the candidate who believes one good term deserves another. GRACE AND RITA... campaign gender bias more than just an accident.