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2 Orono Weekly Times, Wednesday, Qanuaiy 23, 2002 J) Weekly Times /■ Serving'East Clarington and beyond since Î 937 \ Subscriptions $28,04 + $1,96 G.S.T. = $30.0Q/year Publications Mail Registration No. 09301 Agreement No. 40012366 Publishing 50 Issues Annually at the Office of Publication "We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada, through the Publications Assistance Program (PAP), toward our mailing costs." 3 3 5310 Main Street, P.O. Box 209, Orono, Ontario LOB iMO E-Mail Address: oronotimes@speedline.ca Phone/Fax (905) 983-5301 Publisher/Editor Margaret Zwart A/ : f eSuS° The Orono Weekly Times welcomes letters to the editor on subjects of interest to our readers. Opinions expressed to the editor and grticlës are those of the writers and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of The Orono Weekly Times. Letters must be signed and contain the address and phone number of the writer. Any letter considered unsuitable will not be acknowledged or returned. We reserve the right to edit for length, libel and slander, If your retail or classified ad appears for the first time, please check carefully. Notice of an error must be given before the next issue goes to print. The Orono Weekly Times will not be responsible for the loss or damage of such items. • According to a recent Durham Region Health Department survey, 80 percent of the Region's residents are in favour Of stronger smoking restrictions in restaurants, restaurants, while 86 percent support stronger restrictions in workplaces. We've come a long way since the 1970s when smoking smoking was permitted practically everywhere but in church. Vocal anti smokers were considered whiners at that time, and that was before we were even aware of the health* risks associated with secondhand smoke. Gone are the days hospital patients could smoke in their beds. The smoking sick can now be found with their IV poles just outside the main entrance at our local hospital. Durham Region now has 18.4 smoke-free restaurants. This number has more than doubled since 1999. Now that society has come around to the idea that non- smokers do in fact have rights, smokers are running running out of public places where their right to smoke is tolerated. Current discussions around a total smoking ban in all public places within Durham Region has kicked off a protest from bar owners and their smoking patrons. Adults never take well to being told what to do, especially especially when they feel their rights are being infringed upon. ; . - Managers of two Newcastle, bars say they are opposed to a total smoking ban in their establishments because they will lose customers. Smokers might very well abandon their favourite .drinking establishment for another one down the road where smoking is permitted. The only fair way of introducing a smoking ban is if the same rules apply across the Region and ultimately the province. Untying CSiS's lands: one finger at a time? By Senator Cohn Kenny Any government agency that suddenly gets its budget, increased by a whopping 33% should be delighted about its enhanced capacity to do its job. Right? Hey, that's a pretty pretty dramatic boost in (hese fiscally fiscally frugal times. Yet I suspect that "delighted" "delighted" might not be quite the right word to describe the mood over at the Canadian Security Intelligence Service these days - although you'd never know from the poker tongue of CSIS chief Ward Elcock, who, when pressed on funding issues in committee makes Marcel Marceau look like a babbler. Here's the .situation that seems to strike Elcock mum. In December Finance Minister Paul Martin used part of his budget speech to remind any Canadian who had been in a coma for the previous three months that Canada needed to be more secure. He then bumped CSiS's funding from $200 million a year to $267 million a year. Well, that should get CSIS back to where it was , about a decade ago: under staffed, and underfunded, living in. a fatalist's haze. If fused. The Minister of Nation Since then the situation has we don't start getting a handle Defence said everything was deteriorated even further - on destructive people before fine and the uniforms were there have been all kinds of they arrive and disappear into great. The Chief of Defence cutbacks and layoffs at the cavernous North America, we Staff said it wasn't great but agency, in recognition of the are taking a^huge and very that he was fixing it - with fact that intelligence opera- stupid risk. blankets. Then I began to look tions have become less criti- The trick here is domestic at the pictures from cal since the cold war ended. and foreign intelligence. Afghanistan with more atten- Ha! My best estimate is Governments can heighten tion. that doubling CSiS's budget airport security all they want, In most of the pictures it might have at least set the but they can't put a shield looks as if everybody, agency on the road to being around every water reservoir, Taliban, ex-taliban, local able to identify a respectable hydro tower and large gather- police, local warlord guards percentage of the shadowy ing of people on the conti : etc, are wearing what often creatures that have been land- nent. Best, I say, to identify looks like a sandy blanket ing on North America's < "persons of, interest" before over a" pair of baggy, often doorsteps undetected, plan- 1 dark 1 trousers, ning events like those of - (continued page 11 ) All it will take is for one September 11. , ___ Canadian, trying to keep the Of course, the vast majori- sand out of his eyes, to pull a ty immigrants and political He died before he got y comer of his security blanket refugees aren't shadowy. *h e right uniform? ' partially oyer his face and - Good people, most, of them, . , he could be really dead. The and Canada needs them. But Dear Editor, • Americans- could shoot him. that tiny minority - those ' • - , Another Canadian could CSIS calls "persons of inter- , I was so relieved to hear shoot him. If. he is short, he est" can be very destructive. that Canadian military people m ight be taken for Omar and These are the people 'were being issued sapd-col- shot.■ If he is tall, perhaps a whose eyes keep glowing ored blankets to disguise their shaven bin Laud in? after the lights go out. And northern arboreal camoflage . He sure will not be recog- anybody who. assumes that , uniforms in sandy nized, or be recognizeable as September 11 was a one-of is Afghanistan. Then I got con- (continued page 11 )