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Page 2, News, Tuesday, January 1, 1991 All The World's A Circus Life, According To "Baba" In this, the age of the middle-aged urban professional profiteer, it must be difficult for a man to pry himself away from the greed and the grind to teach his son to drive. In this gadget-mad society - the "treadmill to toys" rat race in which the rats appear to be in (remote) control, the father/son family car ritual just ain't what it used to be. "Okay Jimmy, here's the key, son...now...no, no 3 Jimmy...don't put that key in 3 the ignition. This key, Jimmy, 3 is for the cellular phone : system...it unlocks the 832 channel spectrum and the 32- digit automatic dialing deck. "You see, Jimmy, you can : lock your car and somebody can still steal it, but without } this key, son, nobody can ever break the electronic code of your personalized, instant, international I.D. profile. "A car can be replaced son, but a Bell Cellular system is your corporate lifeline. "Okay son, now turn the ignition key...that's it and just head down the highway while I explain the operation of the hitech automobile. "Now Jimmy...pay close attention to those important indicators. What? Oh, no son, we don't worry about gas or oil lights. You run out...you just pick up the phone and the C.A.A.'ll come and get you ina jiffy. "What's that? A triangular sign? I guess it means. slow down or merge...yeah, that's it...merge. "Anyway press this button right here. this is your microphone mute for private calls...know what I mean, Jimmy? Learning to drive William J. Thomas "And this button is for Call In Progress Override so if the car stalls at high speed in heavy traffic, your phone conversati won't get cut off. ere "Well, sure I suppose you could Hitt emergency flashers when that happ but remember Jimmy, if the customer $ cut off just as he's about to give yow hi purchase order number...those flashers aren't. going to bring back your fat commission. "What's that? Oh, that beeping...no, no, that's not the seat belt alarm. Boy where do you come up with them? No Jimmy, that beep means Call Waiting. "Actually, I ripped out that annoying seat belt alarm a long time ago... "Well sure they say that seat belts save lives, but if you're all buckled up, Jimmy, just how are. you going to reach over here and work this little baby? "It's the latest in laptops, Jimmy...built- in disc drive and watch this...POP!...up comes the screen. Look at that...this week's stockmarket quotations...last week's office hockey pool scores...and...damn it, Jimmy, you gotta be more careful. When you skidded around the last turn, your brake foot kicked out the plug on the battery pack and the computer's down. "Remember, Jimmy...good driving requires great concentration. "What? A flashing red light? Might be just a traffic light with a short circuit. Just cruise through it... "Geez, I think we lost the seating plan rsauion Windshield washer? Ha...what a kid. No, ; for your sister's, wedding: off the computer}... screen... continued on page 11 f.year again. It's getting to that time e. - the mid- Youd fluffy white ywn fr eaden grey sky, w whether to rapturise or scream. Was atime when I did rapturise. A crazy kid time, when every blessed snowflake meant better toboganning on the hill behind our house in Vickers Heights, and the frosty bite- yer-nose-off nights meant super skating over at the outside rink beside Saipe's Store. And im the school yards, we built the biggest snow. forts ever, had the biggest snow fights ever, and made _flop-on-your-back angels all over the place. Then in the salad green days of our teens and twenties, it was swoosh and swoop down the slopes of Mount MacKay on our wooden skiis and clunky leather boots, feeling, oh so swish in our melton cloth snow suits and multi-coloured hand- knitted scarves. And riding the street cars with the special ski racks on their sides to get there. Oh boy, those were the days, and how I enjoyed winter then. Couldn't get enough of it. Then I got older. And still older. That's when winter started to look a heck of a lot different. Now the winter world is full of pain and dangers. Pain of frozen fingers, toes and nose 'cause the red corpuscles are slowing down on the job. And dangers of sloggy snow and treacherous ice just waiting like some nasty villains to chuck -Mid winter blahs Olga Landiak - cutting, no hoeing and weeding, no...oh, |" us down on our unsuspecting backsides. Whoops! Crash! Here comes another broken leg, ankle, wrist or hip. And all those extra clothes to be put on too. Shoosh. You'd think we were preparing for an Arctic expedition at least. Heck, too much bother. Might as well stay in and hibernate till the spring. Oh, if only one could! If they can freeze-dry-for-the-future some dead bods what think they're going to be resurrected all healthy, bright and beautiful in the new] millennium, why can't some High Wiz of Technological Wizardy come up with a sure- fire hibernation-for-humans scheme. I'll be the first one in line! Well, it's either that, or hop the first plane pointing its * metallic nose south. But unless you're going to spend the whole of our miz months in sunny climes, why bother? You just have to come back to the awful stuff and the traumatization is even worse than ever. So they tell me. I wouldn't know, never having experienced same. Everybody's got their own personal antidote for the blahs, but I have yet to hear or read of one that could satisfy most of the people all of the time. Apart from some kind of futuristic domed cities, that is. Maybe they could build temporary apartments in the new domed stadiums of today and rent them out for the winter months. In the meantime, I guess it's a case of grin and bear it, and comfort oneself with thoughts of no bugs, no sun bum, no grass = roll on, Summer, roll on! It's not very often that I get mail from a Member of Parliament. When I do, it's usually quickly tossed in my recycling bin. But this bit of mail was different. Quite independently, about a week apart, two MPs (Liberal Reg Belair, New Democrat Iain Angus) sent me a copy of FORESTS OF CANADA: The Federal Role. Both MPs were encouraging me to read this report of the Standing Committee on Forestry, since they knew I have written and broadcast quite a bit about trees. I don't usually do what politicians ask me to, but in this case, I am. did. If you want to bother with the report at all, you can get the main oints by just reading the executive summary and the list of 24 recommendations. The body of text after that is largely a waste of paper, albeit recycled. Recommending against reading it does not mean I don't like what it says. Quite the contrary - I agree with nearly everything in it. What makes:the 171-page report a waste of reading time (it took me over half a day, making detailed notes as I went) is that it sits like all other such reports - waiting for government action. So far, I haven't heard or read any indication that Ottawa plans to take this report seriously. Mulroney seems far too preoccupied with his own gloomy political fate to pay much attention to some fine rhetoric in an all- party report. And it is very fine rhetoric. The report points out that the federal Forestry Act, passed in February of 1990, is the first The report is not worth reading, as I° piece of federal legislation to include the lofty principle of sustainable development: "development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs". The Committee goes on to analyze the wide chasm between that definition and the actual programs operated by the federal forestry department, which are almost non- existent. The Some fine forest rhetoric future"? Or how can you dispute the Committee's call for an integrated data base, so we can really know what we have in all forest resources - not just trees, but also things like wildlife, soils, water, and heritage, aboriginal and tourism values. Fine, fine rhetoric. Similar thoughts have been expressed repeatedly over the years by the Auditor-General, provincial forestry commissions, and uncountable academics. What miss- Report points NORTHERN ing in Ottawa out that Parks INSIGHTS is political Canada ope- ean Up | leadership. As rates the: by Larry Sanders -- J well, the forests within National Parks, Indian:Affairs looks after forests on aboriginal lands, and the Department of National Defence looks after forests on defence reserves - thus leaving the federal forestry department with no forests to administer. The committee's solution to all this is obvious: take responsibility for anything to do with forests away from all other departments, and put all the responsibility under one super-department, under a new - name - "Forests Canada". The Report also spells out a mission statement, funding Suggestions, and public education programs which should go along with this new "super department". Fine, fine rhetoric. How can you argue with such pious phrases as: "The principles of sustainable development and stewardship must be the basis for public policy concerning the management of Canada's forests, both now and in the Committee lays out no strategy for developing that political will, other. than saying it's necessary. Because of this, the report will either be ignored, or become another political football - with the Conservatives arguing that they are doing the best they can with limited funds, and the Opposition parties castigating the government for botching yet another national treasure - in this case, the one half of our country that's covered with trees. I know there will be some of you who will dismiss my cynicism as out of place. You will argue, quite correctly, that public awareness and support for environmental action has never been stronger - therefore a report which actually tells the federal government what needs to be done with our most important ecological resource - the forests - should not be dismissed. If you're right, then where is the evidence of federal leadership on forestry? Where is the evidence of public clamouring for rational application of the principles of sustainable development to forestry, with Ottawa leading the way? I have not seen any. Gordon Baskerville, the Dean of Forestry at the University of New Brunswick, is one of five high-placed forestry academics who wrote a glowing endorsement of the report in a Forward. But Baskerville also pointed out in his own testimony tothe Committee the fundamental weakness in forest planning in Canada. "We have a constitutional Structure that literally is dangerous. The provinces (who own the resource) say, you can develop my resource if you spend the money my way; and the feds (who have more money) are saying, you can spend the money on your resource if you do it my way. Instead of co-operation, there is competition for taking credit." That's where my cynicism comes from. I have seen no evidence, either federally or provincially, that governments are willing | to set aside political motives and deal with forestry as a non-partisan resource. In Ontario for example, the Liberals and their New Democratic successors seem more interested in slamming the Tories in Ottawa than setting up real partnerships, as the Standing Committee calls for. Similarly, Ottawa seems more willing to spend money on advertising than on marshalling a national consensus aimed at achieving sustainable development continued on page 11 See eee eee Se SS Se