At the age of fourteen years, a young man was enjoying his life growing up in a town not too far from Windsor, Ontario.

This young man was riding his bicycle, and even gave a helpful lift for a classmate he knew. You could tell that this man was very gentlemanly.

Suddenly, in a blink of an eye he was arrested, charged and brought to death row, reportedly staying there for over a decade. The young man found out that his classmate, the one he gave that helpful lift to, was murdered, and he was the culprit least according to the authorities at the time.

The outrage caused by his potentially lethal sentence was reduced to time in prison, and after he was released the man had lived discreetly, never to be heard until recently.

Stephen Truscott sought to clear his name, and the same court system that sentenced him to the gallows, acquitted him.

As a miscarriage of justice, it was about time he was cleared of something he didn't do. This case shut him out from enjoying the most lively years of his life, and I for one am angry that it has happened in the first place.

At least Mr. Truscott can live the rest of his life confident that he was vindicated. That is good to hear.

A Californian has got me riled up again.

Ignoring the ridiculously airy fluff you can otherwise find in budget ice cream at your local Loblaws, comes the frothy but lucrative views of American politics.

The constituents that elected the House of Representatives of our southern neighbour passed a resolution that doesn't affect them at all. In fact, a good-sized group of Maritimers would be affected first (if it affects anyone at all).

Tom Lanos, a US representative from the Golden State presented, and successfully passed, a bill condemning the so-called "stunning barbarianism of Canadian hunters".

Might I remind you, I have fumigated most of this premises before with the seal hunt. But this has happened in the wake of Belgian lawmakers giving us a shot in the foot.

Let's face it. Some politics are dirty. And some, corrupt. But this is ridiculous...

Given that seal pelts are sold mainly in China and the less confrontational (compared to Belgium) countries of Scandinavia.

 

It's obvious that patriotism will be in quite a high recently, given that our humble Canadian Dollar has soared into the sights of rates we haven't seen since "King of Kensington" was still on television. It's not very shocking at all for some, but others are worried of a possible death knell to an important part of the Canadian economy. But that's life in a capitalist society like ours.

Canada has been known to be cheap. So cheap, a lot of economic life depends on us being cheap. And other than those "No Name" brand generic products you see in the supermarket, it's quite a good thing to have. That means more employment for people all around, from moviemakers who have moved their craft to Spadina Crescent for a good vigorous filming to carmakers who like their parts being a bit cheaper to produce.

But the heydays of a booming Canadian economy leading from the 90s are ending, quite soon perhaps. We have been in quite the limbo when you think about it. Economic resources and unusual politics have given us some more wealth, but the manufacturers and city governments who used to cherish those dollars coming in are worried they would cease to exist in advantage to other places because our loon has flew up near space.

Should we be worried? In my opinion, no. Back when the Canadian Dollar was worth less than the Canadian Tire dollar in morale and spiritual principle, residents were complaining of how much their money isn't worth so much in places like ahem... south of the border.

Maybe that spending from companies outside the country will be headed back to where they originated? We all don't know.

But we remain envious of Alberta's flower gardens; remember, they have no debt anymore!

I am reminded by a commercial for Wal-mart that aired a few years back. An employee of this conglomerate approached a member of the famous country group, Lonestar, asking if he knew a particular tune that caught her attention. It was, quite obviously, one of Lonestar's early hits that this employee was belting out, and this member of Lonestar decided to follow the sing-a-long. That was the first commercial I've ever seen from Wal-mart.

Several years later, this large retailer decided to put the word "Christmas" back into holiday shopping. The mandatory advertising campaign that most retailers undertake has seen a dramatic turn into the politically correct, and Wal-mart decided to revert to "the good old days", when speaking of holidays were not frowned upon.

I am reminded by the outrage that was the result of renaming Toronto's Christmas Tree. Critics and pundits alike feasted on this decision with indulgence, claiming that "Holiday Tree" simply doesn't make sense for a holiday mostly celebrated in Canada by Christians.

In my opinion, the kind of changes we have seen to have our December holidays more inclusionary have done quite the opposite, creating havoc to those that are religiously convicted.

No one in this right world will say "I'm Dreaming of a White Holiday" or re-tooling that hit by Wham, "Last Holiday". Mariah Carey won't say that all she wanted for holiday is you. That's like touching the Koran and calling it "The Religious Book".

Regardless of my opinion in the severity of making the holiday season politically correct, I believe that Wal-mart's right. We should be inclusionary, not exclusionary to everyone.

 

School shootings have been a plenty recently here in the great continent of North America. It comes as no surprise, as we have all gone through this before, and the only thing we can do is hope it doesn't happen again.

But how do these shootings happen in the first place? Some say that the social fabric of an educational institution can leave a few out of "the mainstream". Others believe the system of gun control, or lack of one, may be the cause of all this. Or could it be the parent to blame, not preventing their attacker/child from performing all this suffering?

In my humble opinion, it's probably a combination of some or all of these factors. The childhood playground may serve as a temporary nirvana to students, relatively innocent to the eye.

But the prescence of bullying can be just about common in many playgrounds, isolating those who then consider themselves as "loners". As a child, I admit I had been subjected to this kind of war tactic, but although I remained peaceful into the high school years, some may want to take revenge. If this was the cas,e inclusion to the social fabric would have solved most of the concern.

As some people may bring grudges into adulthood, our next step to preventing such heartbreak would be controlling the flow of guns. If a possible assailant can't get ahold of his killing machine, we needn't worry. But we obviously know that we cannot control every single gun.

Our could it be the parents? The shooter in the Dawson College incident was an avid collector of guns, and his mother never realised his deadly potential.

All in all, we cannot pinpoint on any one cause. We need a very effective strategy to figure this all out.

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