Huawei Technologies Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou leaves her home to attend a court hearing in Vancouver, May 27, 2020.Jennifer Gauthier/Reuters
Keep your Opinions sharp and informed. Get the Opinion newsletter. Sign up today.
Court consequences
Re Canada Braces For Economic Fallout From Meng Decision (May 28): It appears that Meng Wanzhou will be spending considerably more time in Canada contesting her extradition to the United States. However, the bigger picture involves her countrymen presuming they could bully and threaten Canada.
To me, this illustrates China’s disrespect for Canada’s independent judicial system. Canada and its allies should take a tougher stand against China. Its behaviour will likely not be lost on the rest of the world, nor sit well economically and diplomatically after the pandemic has dissipated.
Andy Buchan Burnaby, B.C.
Re The Meng Case Is A Symptom, Not The Cause (Editorial, May 28): The Globe editorial board’s four principles for dealing with China: Just wondering if it would recommend the same principles for dealing with the United States?
Don Hames Sarnia, Ont.
Careful consideration
Re State Of Things (Letters, May 28): I believe a letter writer has it wrong. If only a tiny fraction of the energy and money spent on the criminalization of marijuana had instead been spent on improving Ontario’s long-term care homes, the “horrific state” of things would almost certainly not exist.
P. R. W. Kendall CM, OBC, MD, FRCP, former B.C. provincial health officer, member of the 2016 Federal Task Force on Cannabis Legalization and Regulation; Victoria
To know how our elderly citizens should be cared for, just ask Veterans Affairs Canada how they run their hospital in Toronto.
My husband, who died last year at age 95, lived there for five years. Even with dementia and reduced abilities, he was always well looked after, clean and neatly dressed. I never heard him call out in distress for a nurse.
I visited him many times there, and I can only hope my own final years will be as comfortable and pleasant as his were. That may be just a hope, based on the recent revelations I have been reading.
Louise Slemin Toronto
Health history
Re How Infection Rates Expose Socioeconomic Inequalities In Canada (May 23): Such results are not surprising and not new. In 1932, Norman Bethune popularized this observation in the Canadian Medical Association Journal: “There is a rich man’s tuberculosis and a poor man’s tuberculosis. The rich man recovers and the poor man dies.” Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.
Philip Berger MD, Toronto
Economic equality
Re While Nothing Like A Basic Income, CERB Opens The Door To The Idea (Opinion, May 23): Over 40 years before his name was on every central banker’s lips, Hyman Minsky had a hybrid plan combining targeted basic income with another kind of guarantee: a job guarantee for all. It too can reduce poverty and directly contribute to wealth creation.
Mr. Minsky proposed additional subsidies that could also be described as targeted basic income, including children’s allowances and medical care for all. He also advocated lifelong learning for all and ending the cost of higher education. Mr. Minsky’s work had much in common with Franklin D. Roosevelt’s 1944 State of the Union speech, which proposed an economic bill of rights.
Joseph Polito Toronto
Bike bustle
Re Bicycle Lanes Will Help Stop Carmaggedon – If The City Uses Them (May 25): If there is to be a carmaggedon in downtown Toronto, it will probably come from those who use GO Transit and the TTC from the suburbs. If they don’t want to be near fellow commuters, they may drive into the city. Cycling for them is simply not realistic.
What would make a difference to this group would be to have downtown employers use more work-at-home programs and stagger office hours to alleviate transit crowding. More downtown bike lanes would be just one piece of a more complex transportation puzzle.
Norm Alexander Dundas, Ont.
Whenever the subject of expanding bike lanes comes up, there seems to be little or no consideration of the price, and I don’t mean in terms of finances. Bicycling is a fine activity for the young, the fit and the healthy, but there are large swaths of the population for whom it’s not accessible. The elderly, infirm and disabled have a right to free movement around the city, too, and that very often means they’re dependent on cars.
When bicycle lanes go in, long blocks immediately become no-stopping zones. A hefty fine likely awaits anyone who pulls over, regardless of who they are or whom they’re assisting, and heaven help them if they need to park near a store to shop.
Progressive government policy is supposed to expand fairness by making essential freedoms accessible to all. I believe a bike-lanes-at-all-costs policy does the opposite, favouring the strong over the less able.
John McLeod Toronto
Arts administration
Re Canada’s Arts Sector Needs Transformative Action Similar To Works Progress Administration (Online, May 25): A made-in-Canada Works Progress Administration for the arts could have profound, positive social, environmental and economic impact for our country. Canadians increasingly realize the centrality of creative expression for their well-being. The arts provide us with a context where democracy, tolerance and conviviality can be forged.
I encourage everyone to support this excellent initiative. Art is not a frill; it is a matrix from which our new world can grow.
Judith Marcuse Vancouver
Royal rivalry
Re King George VI And Queen Elizabeth Arrive In Toronto (Moment In Time, May 22): I was a cadet at Upper Canada College in the spring of 1939. We, with other cadet corps, 100-strong, lined the road in full uniform, with Ross rifles and fixed bayonets, between Queen’s Park and Hart House at the University of Toronto, where the royal couple were to have lunch after opening a session of the legislature. Due to the immense crowds, they were to walk over.
We’d been told the Queen would be wearing a blue dress and pass by first, followed a moment later by the King. A motorcycle appeared, driving slowly, with a woman in a blue dress sitting in the sidecar. The St. Andrew’s College cadets, in full highland dress, were ordered to “present arms!” Our commanding officer said he thought to himself: “The Queen can’t possibly be riding over in a sidecar … can she?” So we simply stood ready.
Turned out it was the mayor’s wife, who’d broken her ankle. In moments, the Queen strolled by with accompanying dignitaries to loud cheering. We properly presented arms for her, then again for the King. We never let St. Andrew’s live that down at future inter-school games.
Fraser McKee UCC ’43, Toronto
Letters to the Editor should be exclusive to The Globe and Mail. Include your name, address and daytime phone number. Try to keep letters to fewer than 150 words. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. To submit a letter by e-mail, click here: letters@globeandmail.com