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6 -- PORT PERRY STAR -- Tuesday, July 5 1988 Editorial Comments FLIGHT 655 There are a lot of un-answered questions about what exactly happened just after 10:00 o'clock Sunday morn- ing in the Persian Gulf when an Iran passenger plane was shot from thé sky by an American war ship with the loss of 290 lives, many of them children. ~The American government has ordered an investiga- tion into the tragic incident, and no doubt some of the questions will be answered. We do know that the American cruiser Vincennes which fired the missiles was heavily engaged in a battle with Iranian gun-boats when the plane was shot down. The American captain of the cruiser claims the plane was out of the civilian air space, travelling at a relatively low altitude of just over 7,000 feet, and the crew of the Airbus ignored repeated requests to identify itself and al- ter course.. Fearing that the Airbus was an F-14 fighter, the order was given to fire three missiles, and at a range of less than six miles, the result was deadly. One question of chilling proportion for all civilian air travellers is how the crew of the Vincennes, a ship equipped with the latest in sophisticated electronic gad- getry could mistake a large cumbersome, slow moving air-liner for an F-14 fighter, at a range of six miles and just over 7,000 feet. Granted, the Vincennes was under fire at the time, the air liner failed to respond to repeated radio warnings, but it doesn't leave one with a great deal of faith in the ability 'of computerized radar and detection equipment to distin- guish between fighters and civilian craft. What probably happened is that the crew of the ship feared the air-liner was loaded with explosives for some kind of a suicide attack, and the crew opted to fire first and answer questions later. So what happens now. The Iranians are already de- nying all the American claims about the circumstances surrounding the tragic incident, and they are promising retaliation of some kind. If they follow through on this promise, will they pick a civilian target? Aside from that uncomfortable possibility which can r only lead to escalation in the war between Iran and the United States, this incident, like the destruction of a Kore- human beings have their fingers on the trigger. 7 It doesn't leave the average person with a great deal * of confidence in the ability of the military to avoid future | mistakes with even larger and more tragic consequenc- es. The world has become an armed fortress bristling with weapons (conventional and nuclear) of tremendous killing power. And in many areas of the globe those weapons are being used every day. One is tempted to say it is inevitable that civilians will get in the way with bloody results. How long will it be before a mistake, a simple case of mistaken identity, touches off a major ex- change of weaponry? DEER ~~ Anes ahe Ana ae a 3 ------ Chatterbox by Cathy Olliffe Port Perry STAR 235 QUEEN STREET - PORT PERRY, ONTARIO Phone 985-7383 P.0.Box90 LOB 1NO J. PETER HVIDSTEN Publisher Advertising Manager (=) Member of the Canadian Community Newspaper Association and Ontario Community Newspaper Association. Published every Tuesday by the Port Perry Star Co. Ltd., Port Perry, Ontario. J.B. McCLELLAND Editor Authorized as second class mail by the Post Office Department, Ottawa, and for cash payment of postage in cash. | | an jet three years ago by the Soviets, tells the world just how quickly a military error can happen when worried CATHY OLLIFFE | News & Features Brno AN COMMU pr. 14 v, Goa oi Subscription Rate: In Canada $20.00 per year. 2524 00s gs0CRE Elsewhere $60.00 per year. Single Copy 50° © COPYRIGHT -- All layout and composition of advertisements produced by the adver- tising department of the Port Perry Star Conipany Limited are protected under copyright Second Class Mail Registration Number 0265 NOT-SO-GOOD HOUSEKEEPING Anybody want to buy a recently renovated starter home on the cheap? Anybody? | really want to see our house sold. Two rea- sons. First off, we have an offer in on another lace that won't go through unless we sell our ouse. Secondly, / don't know how much longer | can go on cleaning every day. Arrgh! Every day it's the same thing. Make the bed. Do the dishes. Sweep and damp mop the tile floors. Vaccuum the carpets. Tidy and dust. Swab out the toilet and the sinks. Empty the garbage. Do more dishes. Cut the grass. Prune the flowers. Sweep off the ve- randah. Do more dishes. My life right now is an endless cycle of housecleaning, and it's driving me bananas. Anybody who's ever had their house up for sale knows exactly what I'm saying. I mean, it's not good enough to keep your place tidy, you have to keep the darn thing sparkling enough so the real estate ads don't lie. You have to make sure it's a "spotless two bedroom bungalow, neat as a pin" otherwise somebody'll be sueing you for false advertis- ing or dirt disease or some such. ~ And | really hate housecleaning. | swear, | should have been born to money so | could just hire maids. But, alas, | work for a living, and must come home at night and do more work--housework. Before our house went on the market, | could leave doing the dishes until after sup- er--or even the next day if | was feeling extra azy. | only had to wash the kitchen floor once a week. And | only made the bed when | felt like it (more often than not it was still in a heap at bedtime). Life wasn't "neat as a pin", but life was good. Nowadays, I'm a slave to the Mop 'n Glo. | spend more money on cleaning supplies than I do on groceries. | actually have dishpan hands--and yes, | use Palmolive! So much for soaking in it. But as bad as cleaning is, there's something that bugs me even more about having your house up for sale. What really bugs me is when the house is being shown, and | have to vacate the premis- es. Having the house shown doesn't bug me, but having to leave certainly does. | want to be there when someone is looking in the closets and checking out the bathroom. | want to be able to show them, in excruciating detail, how much work we put into the pine wainscotting ("real pine," I'd say, "not the fake stuff. See how thick those babies are?"), how great the broadloom is ("only been down a couple of weeks, real expensive stuff, Berber, it'll last longer than you will"), and explain that our house is so on a foundation with plenty of insulation underneath ("my husband and his friend nearly suffocated sticking that stuff on"). | want to show them the lattice ceiling and tell them how many hours (nay, days) it took to paint the darn stuff. | want to explain what the. place looked like when we first bought it and how much blood and sweat is actually baked into the walls. | want to show them the spots under the drywall where old treasures are bur- ied--pictures of Ronald Reagan when he was just an actor, and pages from the Toronto Tel- egram dating back to the dirty 30's. But | don't get to do all this. | am forced to sit outside on the front stoop, cooling my heels and biting my nails while complete strangers tour through my bedroom. | wonder what they're looking at, what they're thinking of our house, our pride and joy--the result of nearly two years of hard la- our. | want them to really appreciate it--1 want to hear their comments, their compliments--I guess | just want them to love it the way we do. Which is impossible, of course. A house is a personal thing, a safe place in a storm, the keeper of memories, a haven from the pressures of the outside world. ¢ It becomes an integral part of who you are, and it's so uniquely special that it can't ever possibly be completely appreciated by strang- ers during a five minute showing. Like most vendors, | expected our house to be sold the moment it hit the market. In my hear, | believed that the first person to see it would be swept off his or her feet, and would instantly put in an offer. And like most vendors, | am extremely disap- pointed that no one has seen fit to do so--yet. Our real estate agent, Lynda Kendry (whom we think is the best darn agent ever invented) tells us to be patient. She says the market is slow---it's a buyer's market, yet she is confi- dent the house will eventually sell. However, patience has never been one of my virtues. | want someone to fall in love with our house now. The way we did. »~ and may not be reproduced without the written permission of the publisher.