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Rockies for a variety of reasons). After the election it seems Wilson fell in love with Judi Tyabji, another Liberal provin- cial member. No harm right?? Well when you are married, there is harm. Both sides got divorced, joined a fringe party and lived in lovers bliss happily ever after. Right? Wrong. Wilson man- aged to go 180 degrees on the political spec- trum by ending up with the NDP and he even got a plum cabi- net post. Now he hopes to run for the leader- ship but folks are having there doubts. Concerns about run- ning up another Visa bill are hampering him.

No surprise there. I’d be a little leery of electing someone leader who can’t manage his own money. What the hell would he do with

British Columbian’s

Both sides got Tera h OUTER LS

party, and lived in lovers bliss, me

money? Not sure but I here he’s giving away casino licenses cheap!

From the Rock...

Comes another strange tale. Seems our good

Newfie brothers have

recently decided to allow a bulk water export license to a company that applied for it some three years ago. I only mention this because of my shock. After much controversy, the folks in Quebec, Ontario, BC, and Alberta de- cided that exporting a key resource is not only wrong but potentially environmentally threat- ening. Yet the folks out on the Rock insist that the application passed the necessary tests. I say yeah so?? Why?? Water is a precious resource. It must be managed properly. Any massive transfers of water out of an area to another is bound to cause envi- ronmental damage. If those folks can’t see that then they better ease off on the rock they are smoking...

Joe Who, that’s who. Mr.Clark has managed to tighten the reins on his indebted Tory party. After thwarting off advances by the United Alterna- tive (which is really a bastard child of the Reform) he held a conference last week. He has promised to field candidates in all 301 ridings in Canada. More importantly for you right wing con- servatives out there, he has finally figured out a fundamental Canadian

political law. In order to get elected federally in Canada, a party must attempt to posi- tion themselves as close to the middle as possi- ble. Canadians are not really radical. They get a little spooked by parties on the fringe (see Reform in the Maritimes and the NDP in Quebec for two examples). They feel comfortable with parties that don’t threaten them with too much change from the status quo. So the Tories master manoeu- vre is this: they will try to sway Liberal votes their way instead of competing head on with Reform. This is smart for a couple of reasons. First off is that the Liberals presently have about 55% of the electoral pie and the Reform and Tories probably have around 25%. Instead of scrap- ping over little bits from their own section they are going to go after the bigger por- tion. Makes sense

right?? Took them

hE TELE TLE are not really radical. They

get spooked hy Eee ATT

seven years to figure that one out. Look for

this strategy to pay off in the long term as Joe Clark will start seeming like a whole lot less threatening then Jean Chretien (my fingers still can’t believe they've been ordered to type that last sentence!)

Skiing isn’t the only... Thing to do at Mont

Tremblant. The feds

ME aE WEL AER ke TTT mes

surprising. Usu- Ae RL ae Tm LB

have again showed their immense amount of wisdom in holding a conference on federal- ism in the place which probably has the weakest appetite for it. The boys have opened themselves up to a nightmare of the worst sort. Here’s how it played out. PQ Inter- governmental Affairs minister Joseph Facal started the week off by announcing to anyone who'll listen that his government will be the ones to set the rules for the next referendum and further they are not too concerned about the Supreme Court ruling about a clear question and a clea: majority. This defiance of the law is interesting

but not surprising. « Usually I would’ve just filed this under ranting. But alas, the federalism conference was the next day. Headache #2 involved Mr.Bouchard getting a private meet- ing with Bill Clinton and Mexican PM Ernest (goes to Tremblant and is in for one helluva Canadian surprise) Zedillo. This is not some momen- tous event because as host of a conference of this sort, it is not strange to get a chance to shoot the breeze with these world leaders (see Glenn Clark and APEC some time after the pepper spray cleared). Head- ache #3 was the worst though. Mr.Facal gets up in a seminar and starts ranting about federalism to the surprise of more than a few foreign observers. What do you expect? For him to praise the virtues of it? A little friendly piece of advice before I sign off... next International Confer- ence on Federalism should be anywhere but in Quebec to avoid this sort of things. You can bet Ernie ain’t having any conference of these sorts in his embattled Chiapas province. Oh well, live and learn....

GONZO OUT

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END