| sa ie be. ee The North Shore News is published by North Shore Free Press Ltd., Publisher Peter Speck, from 1139 Lonsdale Avenue PETER SPECK Publisher 985-2431 (101) BS) fg 5 cle ‘| bac! : " oe o 3 wal Boug Foot See Dhaliwal Cometeoiter Tiamin Resouces Manages 985-2131 (133) 965-2131 (177) Linda Stewart Save 8 Marketing Owecter | $80-0511 (319) Tey Peters ~ 985-2131 (160) Distribution Man: oath bution Manager ive Serviers S86-1337 (124) RASTER, oe bint eRe wir AONE toe YO Ieee 965-2131 Michael Beckar-News Editor 985-2131 (114) Andrew ticCredia-Sports Community Eitor 985-2131 (147) LETTERS TO THE EDITCR Letiers must include your name, full address & telephone number. VIA Internet: trenshaw @ direct.ca COMPUTER BBS - 980-8027 User (D:mailbox * Password:letters | North Shore News, founded 2 1409 av ai ndopening schatun pewpuper and qusified unkt Schade I. Paagaph 111 of the Excise Tha Ack. 6 publshal exh Washnelay Fry and Surntay by Noth Shore Frve Press Lit | ant drial ws every duran the North Shore. Caraula Mea ! Canshen Publicis Mail Sikhs Preakat Agreoment Nu WORT. Marling ran avalitic ont raged member. Entre contents © 996 Nortn Shore Free Press Lid. Alt nights reserved Mind your business ILE the big business story screaming for our attention in recent weeks had to do with the bailout of Canadian Airlines, a local small business story provided a more telling tale about a more dangerous economic trend. Independent small business enterprise is under attack in Canada. Our good soldiers are being picked off onc by one. Aubrcy Schneider, who for 10 years has operated a furniture retail store in the Lower Lonsdale arca of North Vancouver, is one of the wounded. He’s shutting down his business because the retail landscape has changed. We have bought into the American mega-store retail reality. Too many of us believe that bigger is better. Massive stores, massive malls, over- whelming choice and low prices (thanks to the slave labor rates possible in devel- oping countries) are the stimuli for open- ing our wallets. There’s a big lie that comes with the package too. If you’ve ever been to Disneyland, you’ve probably sauntered along Main Strect U.S.A. The cultural archetype presents lots of little shops, the mom and pop store sce- WE CALL THESE CHRETIENS... THEY DO ABSOLUTELY NOTHING FOR YOU, BUT FOR SOME UNKNOWN REASON. You FEEL GOOD ANYWAY, CELL All nario idealized. i Visitors worship at the altar of this dream, but behind the small business ¢f facade stands a very large and voracious ! mouse. The mouse owns all of the stores. If we are to stand up to this mouse in ; sheep’s clothing, consumers will have to support our local independent service and i retail operators. . Where possible, buy things that are made in Canada. if not, Main Street Canada will likely also become a fictitious construct in some 7 theme park. Write on and ~ on, Mr. Collins Dear Editor: ; wo My husband and f enjoy: Dou Collins articles and hope ‘thar h continues on and on and on! We are both “seniors” and. my son who lives in Vancouver and is ari avid ian of Doug Collins gave: m your paper’s_.: address. «on Internet, and every week I go print out copies of the’ articles: in your paper. Bt They in turn go to anot! ly who enjoy them. cee Hope this is OK! Keep up the Good Work! . £ Val Thomas . MAILBOX POLICY LETTERS: to the editor .must. be legible (preferably. rypewritten) and include your name, full address'and telephone number. © : Submissions can be faxed to.985 2144. voy, Glen Clark & Co. an illegitimate gov't POSSIBLY you have noticed that I have not mentioned the government of British Columbia in these columns for some time. Possibly you haven’t. Possibly you do not give a tinker’s curse one way or tother. Care or not, there is a reason. | am reluctanz to state it. This is pure cowardice on my part. Quite possibly the following is, technically, sedi- tious. They can send you to jail for this sort of thing. And my babies need the food [ provide, to say nothing of my inspiring and sagacious fatherly example. However, after months of mulling the matter, fam prepared to go public, go to jail, and not collect $200 or be able to buy Boardwalk on the way. Prudent or not, here it is. | do not recognize the Glen Clark regime as a legitimate govern- ment. That’s right. It is certainly a matter of depree, but f consider it to be illegitimate, like a regime run by the colonels sn Voleanovia, Or wherever the colonels currently hold sway. Actually, the colonels have pretty well disap- peared from increasingly democratic Latin America. Ironic that their likenesses, minus the funny hats and uniforms with the tin medals, and of lett-wing ideology rather than right-wing, have materialized here in Banana Columbi A Kelowna printer named David Stockell is legally challenging the May provincial general election “won” by then-new Premier Glen Clark and his reshod old New Democratic Party hors- . es, Stockelt has formed an organization, HELP B.C., proclaiming that the election was fraudu- lently won because the NDP knowingly misrep- resented the province’s finances as in the black when they had, and withheld from voters, figures showing the budget was very much in the red -— and still sinking. the latest figure being $369 million in the glue. 1 applaud Stockell, whose court case this week was adjourned until next month. But HELP will not win. The New Democrats will argue that the fig- ures produced by their finance ministry bureau- cracy were only among a range of projections, that no one could predict accurately, that they sincerely chose more optimistic figures, and that anyway budget forecasting is an inexact science — that in a budget of $20 billion-odd, an error of millions represents just.a couple of percentage points. No court would dare overturn an election on HELP's grounds. f understand that. Even agree with iz, in my head, aware of the politic, economic upheaval that would hurt society’s weakest most. But, at the plain visceral level of a plain citizen, I feel certain that the NDP witch doctors knew exactly what they were doing — and that, once comfortably back in office, they'd be fireproof, For five vears. I believe they are the most arrogant bunch of rascals that ever governed this province —- far, far more wicked than anything the penny: ante Socreds ever dreamed of. Rotten to their ideo- logical core. Elitist as only scif proclaimed “champions of the Htte fellow” can be. It is unbelievable, to take a small example of that arrogance, that Glen Clark's top guru would campaign for the NDP — while on the public payroll. oes Moe Sihota’s record runs from being su pended from practising law to the latest alleg; tions of contacting the Motor Carriers Division | before a hearing impinging on a good friend’s_ business whose operations manager was Moc’s cousin. Innocent of intent or not, such cofitac’ Caesar's wife territory — the very appearanc the making of such a call by a cabinet minister, simply intolerable and should have been followed: by Sihota’s instant resignation until the miatter was investigated and aired. : wean 8 Bur the B.C. socialists don’t recognize hono: able parliamentary principle and precedent.-Not when they’re in power. at T have long held the belief that the B.C. NDPers are so self-righteous, so sure that they the anointed ones of progress, so stuffy with ‘the belief that although they may humanly err here: and there, history is on their side, that they are incapable of ethical self-criticism. : But [ have touched on only a few points. The flip-flop on gambling, resisted even by the old. , socialists. The huge waste of the NDP's chaotic & version of the “Closer to Home” health reorga- ” nization. The coming unfairness of “no-fault” insurance, Opposed by a spectrum that includes Ralph Nader. These guys are not just ethical morons. They're incompetent ethical morons. 1 will pay my taxes and not walk across the road against the tight, but in my heart FE consider this govern- ment illegitimate. : — the Nortiy Shove News believes strongly in freedom of speech and the right of all stdes in a ‘debate to be heard. The coluamnises published in the News present differing points of view, but those views ure not necessarily those of the newspaper itself.