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OPINION Do you think the punishment meted out to the two boys who killed two yearâ€"old James Bulger in Britain was proper? The two boys should remain in jail forever. They did this hideous crime at 9 and I don‘t know what their sick minds would do at 30. they need to receive a lot of counselling so they know what they did was horrible beyond belief. There is no excuse for it whatsoever. Ian Oliver Publisher Robert Glasbey Advertising Director Norman Alexander Editor Geoff Hill Circulation Director Teri Casas Office Manager Tim Coles Production Manager The Oakville Beaver, published every Sunday, Wednesday and Friday, at 467 Speers Rd., Oakville, is one of the Metroland r'nlisg,eP ishing Distributing Ltd. group of suburban newspapers which includes: Ajaxâ€"Pickering News Advertiser, Barrie Advance, Brampton Guardian, Burlington Post, Collingwood Connection, Etobicoke Guardian, Georgetown Indrme lent/ Acton Free Press, Kingston This Week, Lindsay This Week, Markham Economist and Sun, Stoutfville/Uxbridge Tribune, Mitton Canadian Champion, Mississauga News, Newmarketâ€"Aurora Eraâ€"Banner, North York Mirror, Oakville Beaver, Orillia Today, Oshawa/Whitby This Week, Peterborough This Week, Richmond Hil Thomhil/Vaughan Liberal, Scarborough Mirror. All material published in the Oakville Beaver is protected by copyright. Any reproduction in whole or in part of this material is strictly forbidden without the consent of the publisher. Advertising is accepted on the condition that, in the event of a typographical error, that portion of the advertising space occupied by the erroneous item, together with a reasonable allowance for signature, will not be charged for, but the balance of the advertisement will be paid for at the applicable rate. The publisher reserves the right to calegorize and reject advertising. In the event of typographical error, advertising goods or services at the wrong price, goods or services may not be sold. Advertising is merely an offer to sell thdrawn at any time. Robert Glasbey Advertising Director Norman Alexander Editor Geoff Hill Circulation Director Teri Casas Office Manager Tim Coles Production Manager And it‘s not like we don‘t have experience in having the U.S. rip us off for our energy and water. Remember the infamous Columbia Water Treaty? It saw U.S. access to our water at bargain basement prices. And then in recent times there was a sweetheart deal for the U.S. in buying Canadian natural gas at a fraction of the cost west coast consumers were paying for the stuff. Canadians might be good at a lot of things but it seems forging trade treaties is not on the list. Trade agreements are wonderful things if you‘re on the winning side. Much of Canadian business sees NAFTA as a positive, opening up a market of 320 million people. Opponents see is as the opening of a faucet of natural resources that once opened, cannot be closed. Time will tell. who will have the upper hand. And while Canada has similar guarantees as far as our culture is conâ€" cerned, we have no protection in the document as to how our energy and water resources will be controlled in the future. So Chretien, having been stonewalled by both the U.S. and Mexico, came out last week declaring that Canada would interpret the agreement to the benefit of Canadians. But those people who spend their lives interpreting complex trade agreeâ€" ments say that you can drive a truck through the loopholes that ‘protect‘ our natural resources. As it stands now, NAFTA would force Canada to share our energy resources even if we needed them for ourselves.Any attempts by Canada to protect our resources, based on NAFTA, they say, would see us lose and lose big. Unfortunately, there are two main clauses in the deal that should be of concern to us and following generations of Canadians. And it should surprise no one that these two items are Canada‘s two top natural resources...energy and water. We‘ve got both in substantial quantities and the U.S. wants at both of them badly. Chretien went to President Bill Clinton seeking concessions on both issues and came away with absolutely nothing. Curiously, though, the Mexicans won a complete exemption for its energy industry, an industry that has substantial reserves of oil and natural gas. In fact, the NAFTA agreement that will be officially proclaimed on Jan. 1st, looks like the same deal the Tories approved. The only difference is that now Chretien, who railed against the document when in Opposition, now thinks the deal is great. Regardless of what side of the NAFTA deal you happen to support, the prime minister‘s claims that he has no regrets in agreeing to the deal, ring hollow. has no regrets in approving the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) because in his view, Canadian interests have been upheld. It kind of reminds us of another prime minister, one Neville Chamberlain of England who, after dealing away part of Europe to Adolf Hitler, came home waving a treaty and proclaiming he had achieved ‘peace in our time‘. And we all know how what happened after that comment. The image of Prime Minister Jean Chretien last week claiming that he EDITORIAL ___ _ It is written 467 Speers Road, Oakville, Ont. L6K 354 Classified Advertising: 845â€"2809 Circulation: 845â€"9742 or 845â€"9743 845â€"3824 Fax: 845â€"3085 \QUESTION OF THE WEEK Give us your opinion on this topic by calling 845â€"5585, box 5012. All callers are allowed 45 seconds to respond and must provide their name, address and phone number for verification. A sampling of the best answers will be published in the next Weekend edition of the Oakville Beaver. The town has undertaken a plan to improve Coronation Park. What do you think should be done to improve the lakeâ€" side facility? A. Seves Tree hugging is as natural a human activity as line dancing, cursing the Post Office and making love. I‘d be a treeâ€"hugâ€" ger myself except that I live in a part of the country that‘s been logged over more times than Elizabeth Taylor‘s been marâ€" ried. Hug a tree in my neck of the woods and it‘s apt to die from asphyxiation. 4 MR Not so in England. I just an L2 item*about called Tree..=.s.s. The Druids worshipped trees. Mayans and Visisgoths and Polynesians and Laps and Maoris all bowed down, in one way or another, to trees. Small wonder that here in the 20th century, arboreal activists from Vancouver and North York, Seattle and Scarborough eagerâ€" ly scramble to get arrested in defense of the Ancient Growth Forests around Lake Temagami and Clayuquot Sound. Our love affair with our leafy brethren is one that‘s been percolating for some time. Kilmer penned these immorâ€" tal lines in the early years of this century, whereas humankind has been making Gooâ€"Goo eyes at trees for milâ€" lenniaâ€"â€"probably since the day we shinnied down them and started living on the ground. t would be tempting to I blame Joyce Kilmer for the outbreak of unabashed Tree Love that‘s going around these days. Tempting, but not just. I think that I shall never see A poem lovely as a tree Yearning for someone to talk to? Try cozying up to the nearest tree Joyce Kilmer "You can trust a tree," conâ€" fides the magazine. "It will never tell anyone else." No, I suppose not. Martin Blount is editor of the Tree Spirit magazine and founder of the organization. It began 10 years ago with a small campaign to save a grove of oak trees threatened by a proposed subdivision. Martin and his band of merry treeâ€"huggers saved the. oaks â€" and just...branched out from there. Today, there are many hunâ€" dred members across England. They don‘t just protest and ma_rc‘:h and wnte letters. Most of a 54009 " Q ) )v‘ Further on, the editorial advises readers to share their deepest feelings and secrets, treating the trees like a close friend. Spirit, which has its headquarâ€" ters in Worcester, England. Members of Tree Spirit don‘t merely hug trees, they chat with them, pass along tree gossip, even lay their heads on the tree roots for personal psychotheraâ€" pYâ€" "Whenever we travel," says an editorial in Tree Spirit magaâ€" zine, "we talk to the trees where we camp. We tell them of the beautiful trees where we live...we tell them about the weather in places other than their own." d Life doesn‘t have to be a f, beech, you know. . And when you think about it, walâ€"nut? It‘s chestnut fair. Oh, elm not saying we should pine or make ashes of ourselves, but maple we‘d be more poplar if we didn‘t go around aspen fir trouble. I think that‘s why we get sycamore than we yewsed to. If we could just cedar way clear to spruce up a little and not lilac we do, things would be Aâ€"oakâ€"A. Butternut to wait until we‘ve cottonwood splinters in our backsidesâ€"â€"willow join with me and turn over a new leaf now? "You have to go out and explain the situation to the tree. You have to tell the tree why you‘re doing it. You show the tree respect and then you thank it for its timber." Martin Blount is very much attached to trees. He believes that different species have speâ€" cific personalities. "Silver birches are very feminine and happy and joyous. But they don‘t live very longâ€"â€"70 or 80 years. Nothing for a tree. Yews can live for 1,000 years. They grow so slowly. They‘ve seen a lot of things. They are very wise trees." An infidel is tempted to ask, if they‘re so wise, how come so many trees wind up as fireâ€" wood, telephone poles and Kleenex? Martin Blount has an answer for that. He doesn‘t see the act of chopping down trees as ethically indefensible. their energy goes into planting saplings of native species.