An earlier Mountie massacre

By GERRY WARNER
Staff Writer, Cranbrook Daily Townsman
March 11/05
The flags around town have been at half-mast for several days and rightfully so as this has been a tragic week for law enforcement in a country supposedly dedicated to peace, order and good government. When I first heard the shocking news out of Mayerthrope I was stunned like everyone else and wondering how such a catastrophic event could overcome four trained police officers of one of the most famous police forces in the world.
A week later many questions remain unanswered, not the least of which is how someone with a history of violence and a criminal record like James Rosko was ever allowed loose on the street in the first place. No doubt, we will hear more about this in ensuing weeks as the tragedy is investigated and reviewed by the RCMP and others. I think "others" is important here because I think there's a real need for an independent investigation outside of the RCMP investigating itself. This is not meant to be a criticism of the RCMP because I think it's only appropriate that they review the tragedy in their own way. But surely a tragedy of this enormity calls out for more than just an internal investigation? There's a public interest here as well and a need to reassure people that if mistakes were made the mistakes will be rectified. Now, just one day after the four brave mounties were buried, is not the time to be arguing the what ifs and what fors. There will be time later for that, but that time must come.
On a strictly personal level, the Mayerthrope murders recalled to my mind a story I covered early in my journalistic career. I was covering the case of a young man that had gone bad and had turned against his family in a drug-fueled rage. Turns out the young man had inherited a lot of money from an insurance settlement when he turned 16. He had then gotten heavily into the drug culture and problems with the law and eventually struck back at his mother and step-father, terrorizing them and trying to burn their house down. That's how he ended up in court and that's how I ended up hearing the "rest of the story" as the famous newsman Paul Harvey is so inclined to say.
And the rest of the story in this case turned out to be quite a story. As related in court, the young man was the son of an RCMP officer murdered in 1962 in the next worst massacre of mounties to the calamity in Mayerthrope. The insurance settlement had came from his dead father's estate. His dad was one of three mounties killed in Peterson Creek Canyon in Kamloops, now a city park, in an incident that has starkly similar parallels to Mayerthrope. In the Kamloops case, the mounties were called after receiving a report of a man that had strolled into a government office and calmly laid a rifle across the counter as he picked up his government cheque. (I can't recall if it was a welfare or unemployment cheque or some other matter that saw him in the government office.)
Whatever the case, the gun-toting man, who was some sort of a hermit character that lived in a cabin on the edge of town, totally freaked out the government worker that dealt with him which resulted in the call to the police. By the time the police arrived, the man was well on his way up a trail that followed Peterson Creek into the steep-sided canyon. Apparently they kept yelling at him to stop and he just ignored them melting into the ponderosa pine forest that filled the gorge. Then tragedy struck. The three RCMP officers were on a small bridge part-way up the canyon when the hermit, an expert marksman, turned around from his cover in the forest and started firing. In a space of a few seconds, the three young officers were dead. The hermit continued on his way, but it wasn't long before a RCMP posse was hot on his tail, and as someone said to me after court that day, they weren't looking for prisoners. The hermit was shot dead by one of the officers the same day, and like James Rosko and like the "Mad Trapper" Albert Johnson, we'll never know what was going on in his twisted mind nor the twisted minds of the other mountie assailants.
The parallels between the Kamloops and Mayerthrope incidents are quite startling. In both cases, the RCMP officers involved were young and relatively inexperienced. They both had to deal with alien loners with a penchant for guns and violence. And in both incidents, the mountie forces walked unexpecting into an ambush. And, of course, both incidents resulted in grieving widows and children left behind. All the more reason for an independent investigation, don't you think.
By the way, if you're ever in Kamloops take a stroll behind the courthouse up the Peterson Creek Trail and you'll soon come across a crumbling stone monument to the slain officers. At least it was there when I left Kamloops 15 years ago.
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China visit 2004

By GERRY WARNER
Staff Writer, Cranbrook Daily Townsman
It first hit me when we were speeding along the expressway into Beijing from the airport and I was gaping in awe at the wall of high-rise buildings that seemed to roll on forever. Surely this isn't a communist country, I thought to myself. With growth like this, was this ever a communist country?
I guess the blood spilled in Tiananmen Square in 1989 answers my rhetorical question, but oh how things have changed since then. Our ever-obliging tour guide put a quick end to my speculation. Communism in China today is not an ideology, he said. Communism is a "brand."A brand? Karl Marx and Chairman Mao must be rotating in their graves at such revisionist capitalist heresy. But let's get something straight right now. If you go to China today expecting to see communism, you will be sorely disappointed. What you will see is the fastest growing economy in the world with the People's Congress debating how to deal with "over-investment," hyper-inflation and how to reduce growth to manageable levels. Most politicians in the West would kill to have "problems" like this.
But don't kid yourself. China is still a one-party government and that party is communist. China is a demand economy; not a free market. According to Premier Wen Jiabo, the Middle Kingdom is bent on building "socialism with Chinese characteristics." One of those characteristics appears to be using communism as an engine of economic growth. Trust the inscrutable Chinese to pull off a trick like that. However, one shouldn't confuse an economic free market with a free market of ideas. Now the stereotypical communism of yore starts to rear its ugly head.
Reading the March 15 edition of the English language China Daily, I see a reference on page two to the "incident in 1989," which, of course, is code for the bloody Tiananmen Square uprising. And when we visited Tiananmen Square ourselves, I asked our guide if there were any protocols to follow. Well don't give any speeches or lectures, she told me. And you know what? Your politically incorrect correspondent did something he normally never does. He kept his mouth shut. Mind you with the grim visage of Chairman Mao starring down at me from the gates of the Forbidden City and those deadly serious soldiers of the Chinese Liberation Army marching around, it wasn't difficult to keep my lips sealed. And the sight of thousands of Chinese lined up to view Mao's mausoleum, cast a certain pall on the atmosphere there.
But again don't get the wrong impression. The great majority of people in that vast square seemed to be there just to enjoy an afternoon in the sunshine -- the fact the sun no longer appears to shine in China is another matter -- and the mood for the most part was relaxed and friendly. I even had a young Chinese businessman approach me in the notorious square to practice his English one me. We even exchanged e-mail addresses.
And it was like this everywhere we went in China. Friendly, open, curious people, eager to know more about the West. As well, a certain dignity that's hard to define. One thing is for sure -- they don't regard us as foreign devils anymore and at the same time you can feel a certain pride in them about the dynamic growth of their country and how the Middle Kingdom, which has always regarded itself as the centre of the civilized world, is now making that belief a reality. And considering the imperialist machinations of the current regime to the South, having another super-power to balance the American Empire doesn't seem like a bad idea.
Oh yes, the sun. There's a downside to the unbridled growth China is experiencing now -- unbridled pollution. The water is undrinkable and the smog is simply appalling. There's no other word for it. I can honestly tell you that in two solid weeks we never saw anything close to a blue sky even on days that were clear. A few times we saw the sun, an orange, brown orb, trying to shine through the leaden skies filled with automobile exhaust and smoke from the thousands of coal-burning factories. But it was a weak, anemic sun, nothing like the grand ol' sol of home. And the water? What can I say other then to tell you that they told us not to drink the water or even brush your teeth in it even when staying in five-star hotels. A glittering five-star hotel and you have to drink bottled water! The paradox of today's China.
But oh the temples, the pagodas, the Great Wall, the Beijing Opera, the Shanghai Museum, the theatre shows, the Terra Cotta Warriors, the misty mountains of the Three Gorges -- but most of all -- the engaging and dynamic Chinese people. This is a land that is a dream to visit and an experience never to be forgotten.And all of this for a base price of less than $3,000 for two weeks and in the company of a wonderful group of diverse Canadians that seemed to enjoy the trip as much as I did. (Call for more info.) But most of all, think of visiting China some day.
It might change your life.
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Senator Baucus causes cross-border ruckus - Feb. 28/05

By GERRY WARNER
Staff Writer
Cranbrook Daily Townsman
Montana Senator Max Baucus stared down a crowd of close to 100 angry Fernie residents Friday afternoon and didn't give an inch on any of the issues he came to talk about during a stormy two-hour meeting.
Baucus, a five-term Democratic Senator and highest ranking Democrat on the U.S. Senate Finance Committee, said he invited himself to the meeting and cleared it through officials in Victoria and Ottawa. But many in the often-hostile crowd didn't believe him, including East Kootenay MLA Bill Bennett, who accosted the Montana Senator before he even had a chance to enter the Fernie Senior Citizens Drop-in Centre where the meeting was eventually held.
"I'd like to tell you sir that you're actually not welcome here. I've read what you've said over the past 25 years about Canada. You don't want our softwood in the States. You don't want our beef. Now you have something against our coal mining."
Bennett said Montana has its own coal mining industry and generates electricity by burning coal. As a result, he said he couldn't understand Baucus's concern about coal mining on the Canadian side of the border. "I wouldn't dream of coming to Montana to tell you how to manage your natural resources so I resent the fact that you're here," said the MLA to large cheers from the crowd.
But Baucus stood his ground, saying he was visiting Fernie to hear the point of view of citizens on joint environmental issues such as a coal drilling project now underway in the Upper Flathead Valley by the Cline Mining Corporation."The more we talk and the more we share facts and get to know each other personally, the more it helps," he said. In a release issued prior to the meeting, Baucus said the drilling near the north fork of the Flathead River, which flows across the border into Glacier National Park in Montana, "has no economic benefits, only environmental consequences for Montana."
More fireworks erupted when Baucus faced the crowd inside the seniors' centre and told them that Cline had been turned down by the B.C. government the first time it applied for an exploration permit and then had been quietly issued one despite a lack of baseline data about possible harmful environmental effects. "It makes sense to make these decisions on the basis of sound science," he said, adding it was in the best interests of both Canadians and Americans to make cross-border resource decisions as "North Americans."
"We're North Americans, but there is a border and you're full of shit, shouted one of the hecklers in the crowd.
Baucus and Bennett tangled again inside the building over softwood lumber duties with Bennett accusing Baucus of leading the softwood duty battle against Canadian producers and calling for the $3 billion in duties collected by the U.S. government to be distributed to American lumber producers." Senator Baucus, this is not a Canada, U.S. thing," said Bennett. "You have chosen throughout your career to kick the hell out of Canada and you've got to stop doing it. If you want to have a polite, constructive dialogue with us about softwood, beef and mining, we're happy to do that, but you've got to stop kicking the crap out of us in the newspapers in Montana." Bennett eventually stormed out of the meeting followed by about 30 cheering supporters.
After he left, Baucus told the crowd, Americans will continue the softwood fight because they believe the Canadian lumber industry is subsidized despite several NAFTA and WTO decisions to the contrary."We believe the Crown sets stumpage rates at below market prices to create jobs in Canada and to send cheap softwood lumber down to the U.S."
Baucus also took on local rancher Faye Street, the president of the East Kootenay Livestock Association, telling her he doesn't support the re-opening of the American border to Canadian beef exports even though it's scheduled to happen March 7. Reminding Baucus of his talk before about basing decisions on science, Street shot back, "you're not basing your decision on science. You're basing it on political protectionism."
When the meeting was over, Bennett said he wanted to stand up for Canadians and make a point. "But we couldn't get any straight answers out of the Senator. He's up here in Fernie saying he wants to work with Canada and he believes in constructive solutions and that's B.S. He can't be trusted."
Baucus adopted a conciliatory tone after the meeting. "Essentially I heard the deep concerns of the Canadian people on a lot of issues and it's deep. It's fierce. I knew intellectually the Canadian concerns about BSE, lumber and the mining issue, but to actually talk to people here in British Columbia about these issues has raised my understanding to a new level." Despite the hostile reception he got, Baucus said he would be willing to come back to another meeting.
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Bush bullies Canadian politicians

By GERRY WARNER
Staff Writer
Cranbrook Daily Townsman
Feb. 25, 2005
So George Bush is up to his old tricks again. Stories surfaced in the
press this week revealing that on his trip to Canada late last year
he attempted to bully both Prime Minister Paul Martin and Opposition
leader Stephen Harper.
The issue was the U.S. military's goofy "Star Wars" missile defence
system, a system that has yet to be successfully tested and is
costing American taxpayers gazillions.
And as this is being written, the world's self-appointed police chief
(or should that be emperor?) is in Moscow telling soviet President
Vladimir Putin how "disappointed" he is in Russian democracy. Imagine
that, an American president lecturing the former head of the KGB on
democracy. I'd love to have been a fly on the wall when that took
place.
But I guess that's what you do when you have God whispering in your
ear all the time: "George, explain to 'Old Europe,' the error of
their ways. George, tell those blood-thirsty Iranians why they can't
have nuclear power like Americans do. George, enlighten those commie
pinkos about the virtues of democracy and George tell those wimpy
Canucks to shape up or we'll make them the 51'st state."
Not as far-fetched as it sounds, according to reports that have
leaked out about Bush's march into Ottawa last November. Apparently
when he was cloistered in a private meeting with Martin, Bush started
to ask pointed questions about why Canada hadn't yet come on board
with the missile defence system which could potentially involve
Canadian air space.
What Martin said is not known, but it probably didn't please the
president because Martin is now poised to announce formally that
Canada is not joining Star Wars. This is not a big surprise because
if Martin had signed on with the American program up to half his own
caucus would have bolted including the entire Liberal women's caucus.
And that could have meant bye, bye for the minority Liberal
government, which come to think of it, might well have pleased Bush
considering what Carolyn Parish has said about him.
But Bush's bullying of Harper is more puzzling, considering that the
Conservative leader is a bit of an ideological soulmate of the neocon
president and one of the few Canadian politicians that expressed open
support for the war against Iraq when the Americans first stormed in.
Harper didn't deny being pressured by Bush and an anonymous American
official said Bush chided Harper by demanding that he not play
"partisan politics" on the missile defence issue. Harper, somewhat
lamely, tried to defend the American president by saying he thought
Bush was "misinformed" about the Conservative position.
Come to think of it, wouldn't that apply to most of Bush's views of the world?
Be that as it may, Bush showed a lot of gall trying to push our
political leaders around on what was supposed to be a fence-mending
visit. Kind of hypocritical too when you consider he turned down an
invitation to speak to Parliament, which is the normal courtesy
extended to a visiting president.
Apparently the gun-toting and missile brandishing president refused
the offer to address Parliament out of fear of being heckled. What's
the old saying about bullies? Cowards at heart.
And it's not as if there aren't some serious problems in the
Canadian-American relationship that some enlightened presidential
leadership could help. Without a doubt, the greatest irritant between
our two countries is the softwood lumber dispute, which has been
dragging on for almost five years despite numerous decisions in
Canada's favour by NAFTA an d the WTO. Not only has the American
lumber lobby not tried to settle the dispute, but they've tried to
undermine the whole negotiating process and they've even started to
distribute some of the $3 billion in duties they've seized to their
own members.
They also closed their borders to Canadian beef exports for more than
a year and they've even stuck their nose into our own backyard right
here in the East Kootenay, questioning whether mineral exploration
can take place in the upper Flathead Valley south of Fernie.
You'd think Bush would have been waving a white flag on his Canadian
visit. Instead he offered us missiles.
But in the bigger picture of American imperial might these days, I
doubt if Canada even makes it on their radar screen. Uncle Sam has
got bigger fish to fry, like democratizing the Middle East, settling
the Israeli-Palestinian dispute and figuring out what they're going
to do when China surpasses them as the world's greatest economic
superpower.
And no amount of missiles is going to help them with that.
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