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Page 4, Tuesday, October 6, 1992 e @ ee Our Opinion == Echoes of Bible Bill coming from Alberta Back in 1935, in the depths of the Great Depression, a Social Credit politician named. William "Bible Bill" Aberhart came to power in Alberta with what many voters hoped was the solution for hard times. Why, Aberhart asked, were people poor? Because they had no money, of course. Aberhart's solu- tion? Print lots and lots of money. Unfortunately for the people tricked into voting for him, Aberhart's plan had no basis in reality. The so-called "prosper- ity certificates", which he issued in place of real money, weren't worth the paper they were printed on. Voters who had been promised $25 a month in relief payments were paid with the prettily-coloured paper that soon took its rightful place beside the Eaton's catalogue in the family outhouse. The hard times continued, and Aberhart's campaign platform went down in Canadian history as the most spectacular example of politi- cal wishful thinking. Until now. Reform Party leader Preston Manning's claim that if Cana- dians vote 'no' in the upcoming referendum it will mean an end to constitutional wrangling makes Bible Bill's claims seem reasonable in comparison. Looking back at the history of the current constitutional debate, keep in mind that it took former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau more than ten years to patriate the constitution from Great Britain, and he did so without the consent of Quebec. he couldn't reach agreement with them all. The purpose of the Meech Lake Accord was to bring Que- bec back into the constitutional fold. When that deal began to unravel, largely as the result of sideline sniping from special interest groups wanting in, Brian Mulroney made the mistake of creating a crisis atmosphere, complete with non-stop bargaining sessions and high-level pressure tactics. While those tactics may be common in labour negotiations, they are risky way to deal with a constitutional crisis--espe- cially when they fail. Once Meech fell apait, it became apparent that a constitu- tional pandora's box had been opened, and putting the problem back in the box wasn't going to be easy. The so-called Canada Round involved numerous public consultations, and the scope of the Charlottetown accord was expanded to include a new senate, native self-government, economic union, etc., as well as Quebec. And still, many special interest and lobby groups are complaining that they were excluded from this agreement. Logically, if this deal collapses the way Meech did, not only will we be looking at the all-but-certain separation of Quebec, but we'll have to expand the process next time to include the rest of the groups excluded this time. The process will be big- ger, consensus will be that much more difficult to reach, nego- tiations will take place under extreme economic and social pressures, and it wili drag on and on and on. And even worse continued on page 15 The Nipigon-Red Rock Gazette and the Terrace Bay-Schreiber News are members of Laurentian Newspapers Limited 158 Elgin Street, Sudbury, Ontario P7E 3N5 (705) 673-5667 John Thompson, Vice President [& ini E [ 5) Members of the Canadian Community Newspapers Association and the Ontario Comminity Newspapers Asscoiation EDITORS ADVERTISING PRODUCTION Cindy Laundry Ad. Manager & Quality Control Darren MacDonald Linda Harbinson Supervisor OFFICE / ADMIN. Ad. Consultant Heather Michon & Circulation Cheryl Kostecki Clara Dupuis PUBLISHER...A. Sandy Harbinson Local offices are located at 145 Railway Street, Nipigon, Ontario POT 2J0 (807) 887-3583 fax 887-3720 and Highway 17 & Mill Road, Terrace Bay, Ontario POT 2W0 (807) 825-3747 fax 825-9233 2nd. class mailing permit 0867 One year subscriptions are available by contacting your local newspaper at one of the addresses listed above. Rates are:- Local seniors $12 Other local $18 Outside "0 mile radius $29 USA $38. GST must be | added to all subscription purchases. | ss Vi: So ISSSS 4 ' \ SHO LSS SS : WW SSS : TRAE EAE - ) re ae Be ' F THIS DOESN'T GRAB'EM, THE ALTERNATIVE I$ A MERGER WiTH ANOTHER CARRIER ue Y AEEAL OD AAS psn Mount Everest becoming That was a decade of wrangling with only ten people, and still -- to we ri nn 0 dg a rb a ge d 8 | m Pp Everest n. Mount, a mountain in S Asia, on the boundary between Nepal and Tibet; the highest mountain in the world. --Webster's College Dictionary It stands a towering five and a half miles above sea level, the highest gable on the rooftop of the world. It's been the subject of poems, ballads, books and films. Humans have died by the scores trying to climb its flanks. Adjectives like "spectacular" "awesome" and "magnificent" seem puny and pathetic in the presence of it's sheet, mind-unhinging majesty. It's been called the most beautiful sight on the planet and the Eighth Wonder of the world. It is also a dump. Specifically, a garbage dump. One created by wealthy, arrogant, § supposedly wilderness-loving e humans who should know better. Chris Bonnington is a member § of that extremely elite group of § mountaineers who can claim they've climbed Everest and lived ° to tell about it. His summation? "Everest is the highest junkyard in the world. It is littered with discarded tins, tents, food and empty oxygen tanks. There's so much up there that a full-scale expedition would be needed to remove it." To a non-mountaineer it seems incredible, but the fact is thousands of mountaineers from around the world converge on the slopes of Everest every year to try their luck. It costs may thousands of dollars even to fail to climb the mountain, so the people who come are most often rich. The kind of folks who are used to having "other people" take care of their garbage. There are no garbage trucks or blue boxes in the Himalayas, so the trash gets left behind at the campsites or tossed into ravines. Fortunately, not every visitor to Everest is a pig. There's a group called Youth To Everest, made up of Canadian and New Zealand volunteers, who ponied up more than $4,000 apiece for the privilege of flying to the slopes of Everest and cleaning up the junk. Arthur Black It's not a Club Med vacation. The volunteers endured six hour hikes and debilitating bouts of altitude sickness. Even halfway up Everest a human has to drink four litres of water a day to avoid dehydration. And it's exhausting. "at 15,000 feet" says volunteer Dawn Sinko, "even tuming the pages of a book can be exhausting." Aromatic, too. One of the culture shocks they had to get used to was going without hot baths for months at a time. The only way to heat water is by burning wood. And the forests are almost gone. The volunteers stuck it out, to the admiration of the Nepalese who have had to ive in the rich people's : litter. They remember the days when there were no Yuppy trekkers on Everest. Dawn Sinko says "you'd ask them what it was like before the tourists came = and they'd get really sad and say: 'oh, it was wonderful.'" Maybc it will be again. Meanwhile, I notice from my local paper that a bunch of volunteers spent last weekend cleaning up a river right here in Canada. The Speed River is a tiny stream that will never be mistaken for the Amazon or the St. Lawrence. Truth to tell, you can walk across it in rubber boots and not get wet most of the time. Nevertheless, a group called Friends of the Speed managed to fill six dumpsters and 700 garbage bags, and to fish out more than 150 rubber tires. What's heartening is that it wasn't just a bunch of dewy-eyed eco-freaks who pitched in. The dumpsters were donated by a waste disposal firm which also hauled them to a landfill site. The municipality waived the usual $90-per-tonne dumping fee. A local plant allowed organizers to pick up the discarded tires. -- You know, sometimes it seems as if we might just get our act together yet.