BENDING THE RULES

Someone once said that "politics is the art of bending the rules to suit one's own needs". Today's K-W Record appears to have two examples of that as does the current comments on the Cambridge Advocate website dealing with the Children's Aid Society (CAS). The front page of the Record has a story " Activist charged with defaming undercover officers". You've got to be kidding me. These police officers infiltrated a legitimate group namely Anti-War at Laurier (AW@L) in order to allegedly preempt issues at the Toronto G20 summit. They were discovered and "outed" by the students including less than complimentary remarks on a website. The police after being outed then turn around and charge a student with defamatory libel. What an incredible and disgusting abuse of process. Waterloo Regional Police, you should be ashamed of yourselves.

The front page of today's Local Section in the Record has this story: "Cost of cleaning pond to drop". This is in reference to removing contaminated sediments in Victoria Park lake. These suddenly discovered to be only "mildly" contaminated sediments will be deposited in both the Cambridge and Erb St. Landfill at much lower cost than if they were to be classified as hazardous waste as had been originally determined. Now let's see. Who physically takes the samples? Who enforces the rules as to what can go into our local landfills? Have there been behind the scenes discussions between the City of Kitchener and the Region of Waterloo regarding sediment disposal. How many Kitchener Councillors are also Regional Councillors? If everyone currently in positions of authority are willing to turn a blind eye to the rules, what other accountability is there? Ahh human beings we are the masters and destroyers of our own futures.