Monday June 30, 2008
COLUMNISTS 
A tale of two Canadians united by blood
It is a tale worth telling on Canada Day.It is the story of different regions in a country where the parts often rub against each other.It is about two generations, a man entering his 60s and a young woman leaving her teens, one facing probable death and the other soon to deal with pregnancy and birth.
EDITORIALS
The next president's predicaments
Whoever wins the U.S. presidency this fall faces graver problems than the Iraq war, or America's sagging international reputation. The U.S. economy is in serious trouble, as consumers struggle with high prices for food and fuel and heavy debt loads. Not even the roughly $120-billion (U.S.) in rebate cheques, which are now arriving in their mailboxes, can raise their confidence, or prompt them to open their wallets for much more than necessities. Three-fifths of the recipients are tucking that money aside for a still rainier day.
The right to offend
Offence won a valuable victory last week. The Canadian Human Rights Commission rightly concluded that certain words ''obviously calculated to excite and even offend certain readers'' were not hate speech.
Replacing the messenger
''I remain a fan of this prime minister,'' Sandra Buckler wrote in an e-mail last week announcing her departure as Stephen Harper's director of communications. Mr. Harper has long been a fan of Ms. Buckler, as well. But there is reason to believe that he may have had a change of heart, recognizing that it is time to move beyond the lockdown communication strategy deployed under her watch.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Mental health comes at a price
It is impossible to examine the dysfunction of Canada's mental health care system without acknowledging society's failure to address the needs of its most vulnerable, silent and underserved members - children and youth.
Rhubarb, constipation, trade
I was disappointed to find Lin Zexu's 1839 letter to Queen Victoria ridiculed in Social Studies. We are led to believe commissioner Lin was threatening to kill the English through constipation by depriving them of rhubarb root (Let My People Go - June 27).
No affection for this daddy
Your profile of CBC vice-president Richard Stursberg (Meet Mother Corp.'s Daddy Dearest - June 28) suggests Canadians can look forward to more of the same destructive decision-making that has beset the organization for years. Interesting Canadian television programs will continue to be cancelled in favour of U.S. shows, decades-old infrastructure will be further dismantled in order to save money, and our world-class performers and composers of classical music will be pushed even further from the public eye.
Mental health comes at a price
The 12-step program you outline takes a comprehensive approach to addressing the huge gaps related to all aspects of mental health care and education. Most of the steps, however, entail not just a national plan but a huge expenditure of government funds, starting with step three's $10-billion national mental health fund. From where will those funds come?
Swingers have rights, too
I woke up last week to find our club Menage a Quatre (an on-premise swingers club) in the middle of a media firestorm. Toronto councillor Mark Grimes had convinced city council to pass a resolution requiring city staff to look for ways to shut us down. Never mind that the licences we hold were legally obtained; never mind that our club is so discreetly located that, unless you know the exact location, you wouldn't know the club existed.
Energy and sanity
I was taken aback by Rex Murphy's commentary (Science By Intimidation - June 28) about James Hansen's warnings about the consequences of climate change. I urge people to read for themselves what Dr. Hansen said in his June submission to Congress.
Gun regulation, not prohibition
Re Gunning For The Constitution? (letters - June 28): Most gun owners, on both sides of the border, do not, in principle, oppose reasonable regulation. But advocacy of complete prohibitions by the anti-gun lobby only reinforces the position of hardliners who can then use the ''slippery slope'' argument to oppose any form of restrictions.
Mental health comes at a price
The character that Jack Nicholson played in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest was reduced to a vegetable not by electroshock therapy, but by a prefrontal lobotomy (The Romance-Of-Madness Myth - June 28).
Mental health comes at a price
Your proposal to create a $10-billion national mental health fund is a good one (Fix It: Twelve Steps To Improve Mental Health - front page, June 28). Unfortunately, it will probably join a long list of worthwhile endeavours we can't afford, as we budget half-a-trillion dollars for defence over the next 20 years.
Energy and sanity
Rex Murphy paints James Hansen and Al Gore as fanatic, firebrand activists; he falls short of recognizing that, in the face of competition fuelled and funded by oil companies, Mr. Hansen's and Mr. Gore's rhetoric might have to assume certain ways to undo the intense propaganda that anti-global-warming lobbies around the Western world have been feeding governments and people.
Energy and sanity
I wonder how history will look back on The Globe's front page on Saturday - concern for energy prices supplanting concern for climate change, side by side with Canada's mental health crisis. Given scientific projections of the harm we are causing to the planet and ourselves, do we, on a societal level, appear sane?
Energy and sanity
When will people get it? The energy crisis is about the environment (Energy Crisis Supplants Environment As Top Concern - June 28). A carbon tax is a good tax. It will help us make desperately needed changes. If future generations had a vote, we could win this.
Energy and sanity
Insofar as the recipe you published for a Strawberry Basil Mohini contains no strawberries (Barfly - Style, June 28), it reminds me of the Conservatives' climate-change plan, which contains no plan. Perhaps your cocktail should be called
