Street Level

A few years ago, our managing editor at the time, Gord Kurenoff, would write columns that didn’t have a single theme.

He’d call them things that bugged him that might eventually grow into big columns.

Today, in honour of Gord, things that have made me wonder what’s going on in our world today.

• First, Facebook.

In particular, how it has managed to become so addictive to just about everyone I know — including that face in my mirror every day. We don’t use e-mail anymore; we Facebook-message people.

Can’t remember when a friend’s birthday is? Don’t check your calendar. Log on to Facebook to see if it’s there on the right-hand side of your profile page.

I have friends supporting issues with pages on Facebook — and these same friends, who would comparison shop in a grocery store, don’t bother to check out the legitimacy of these causes.

But the final straw? Wednesday, I finally rolled chili and a bun.

And I pumped the air.

How sad is that? And if you don’t know what I’m talking about, consider yourself normal.

• We move on to Surrey and, in particular, Princess Margaret School, where 15 Sikh students were told they could not wear their T-shirts bearing the image of Sant Jarnail Bhindranwale, a militant in their homeland who sought creation of an independent Khalistan before he was killed by the Indian army in 1984.

What better way to get these students’ passion for this cause fuelled than to tell them their shirts are banned?

Anyone who has ever raised a child, or even spent time with one, knows the surest way to encourage defiance is to tell them they can’t do something. Let them wear the shirts and turn what is now a controversy into a teaching moment.

Isn’t that what schools are supposed to do?

• Anyone notice the amount of money being dropped off in Kamloops by our local provincial politicians these days? Thousands are being left behind as Claude Richmond and Kevin Krueger rush from photo-op to photo-op.

On Monday alone last week, they both remarked how hectic that day would be as they raced to a variety of non-profit agencies throughout the city.

For those of you who care to keep track, the next provincial election is in 375 days and counting — both money and headline-buying funding announcements.

And, while we’re on the topic of elections, is there anyone out there who still believes Stephen Harper and his Conservatives see Kamloops as a riding they can retain?

Kudos to Fred Bosman for putting his name forward but, with the lack of interest the local party riding association is showing in holding a nomination meeting — and the $600,000 that has somehow disappeared from Betty Hinton’s much-hyped airport extension funding announcement — it looks like Harper’s scratched us off his to-do list.

• Maybe, when we finally do have a federal election, we can put in a government that will get serious about our justice system, just as a public inquiry starts to wrap up on the murder of a mother, her son and parents were killed by her estranged husband.

Just weeks after Sunny Park tearfully was videotaped predicting what would eventually happen to her family following what police called a bizarre vehicle accident that saw Park’s husband drive into a hydro pole, crushing the side of the car Sunny was sitting in, the man who was told to stay away fro his family made his final visit.

More recently, in Prince George, police arrested a man who had assaulted his wife and threatened to shoot her — only to see him released on bail.

Innocent until proven guilty is a key underpinning of justice, but the innocents are the underpinning of our society – and they need to be protected.

• Finally, while on the subject of justice, a goodbye and good luck to our most recent police reporter, Cassidy Olivier.

A lot of young reporters have entered and exited through what we have sometimes joked is a revolving door into the editorial department, each one bringing their own qualities and, hopefully, leaving with a bit more knowledge about this wacky job of reporter.

For someone who started in this business many, many years before the young Cassidy learned to say his first word, having such an enthusiastic, dedicated and fearless young reporter around has been refreshing — and reassuring that those who predict the end of the newspaper business is nigh are quite simply wrong.

Posted by Dale at 2:22 p.m. Comments