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EDITORIAL

Democratic process had no place in the
charade that led up to Prime Minister Brian
Mulroney’s secretive signing of the NORAD
pact with the U.S. And the end result, giving
Canada the status of pawn in the hands of
Reagan’s Star Wars plotters, makes the Tory
government in Ottawa unworthy to speak for
the Canadian people, the majority of whom
want peace, not Star Wars, and who owe
their allegiance to Canada, not to U.S. impe-
nalism.

With his signature on a five-year renewal
of the North American Aerospace Defence
Command pact, Mulroney committed the
worst act of irresponsibility since coming to
power with a hidden right-wing agenda in
September, 1984.

Despite widespread protest, the Tory
majority on the parliamentary committee
reviewing NORAD forced through support

_ for Washington’s policy. The Liberal and

New Democratic members of the committee
were even forbidden to present a minority
report.

Then came the soft sell, delivered with all
the public relations oil for which the Tories
are notorious — assuring the public of one
thing while doing another.
~ Mulroney, echoed by his external affairs
minister, wants the people of Canada to swal-
low his assurance that Canada will not
become involved in “active ballistic missile

_ defences,” i.e., Star Wars. But the signing of

the NORAD pact — minus the clause assur-

ing no such involvement — means that Can-

ada is now an active participant.
The Tories say Star Wars can’t mean
“active ballistic missile defence” because the

Oppose NORAD/Star Wars

U.S. abides by the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile
Treaty with the Soviet Union. Presidential
spokesman Larry Speakes put it a little differ-
ently: the U.S. “thas pledged to abide by the
ABM Treaty until we say otherwise.” How
binding is that? As a matter of fact, how
binding would be an ABM clause in
NORAD, if the U.S. decided to “say other-
wise’?

And when scientists say the whole Star
Wars fantasy is unworkable, the Reaganites
say, brazen it through, spend the billions,
make the military-industrial complex richer
and more dangerous. Those of the North
American public who can separate truth
from the thin tissue of lies that is Reagan’s
trade mark must be coming to realize that this
is precisely Mulroney’s style for dealing with
the Canadian people, whatever the issue.

No Canadian patriot, or anyone who real-
izes that the struggle against Star Wars is a
struggle for human survival, can afford to
give up the battle because of an agreement
cooked up by those who have abdicated their
responsiblity to Canada and its people.

The fight to keep Canada out of Star Wars
and Star Wars out of Canada has to be accel-
erated. Every Tory sellout to U.S. imperial-
ism makes this country a more pliant pawn in
the U.S. war game.

In the long run the right to abrogate the
NORAD pact and to declare Canada’s sov-
ereignty in domestic, foreign and military pol-
icy has to be -won. Only in that way can
Canada stand up as a builder of a peaceful
world instead of grovelling before human-
kind’s most dangerous enemy, the U.S.
military-industrial complex.

/ REAGAN AN
THe SANDINIS

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LIBYAN THREAT |f

TRIBUNE |

Editor — SEAN GRIFFIN
Assistant Editor — DAN KEETON

Business & Circulation Manager — MIKE PRONIUK | Z

Graphics — ANGELA KENYON

Published weekly at 2681 East Hastings Street
Vancouver, B.C. V5K 1Z5
Phone (604) 251-1186

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Second class mail registration number 1560

Al

t’s no small wonder that the Socreds in -

§ Victoria have repeatedly refused regular
televising of the proceedings of the legisla-
ture when you look over the verbal per-
formances of some of their backbenchers.
Since many of them pride themselves on
never having finished high school, it
apparently never occurred to them that
rational thought should proceed speaking
and their responses in question period
often are utterly detached from the ques-
tion, not to mention from reality.

A case in point is Socred Little-
Mountain MLA Doug Mowat’s tirade in
the legislature March 14. Because he used
the word “lies”, he eventually got turfed
out of the house for the day. But even
before that point, anyone listening to him
must have wondered whethr he was still of
this world.

The occasion was NDP MLA Robin
Blencoe’s remarks on the Expo evictions
and his call for the government to demon-
strate a little compassion to the world and
to protect Downtown Eastside tenants by
enacting the necessary amendments to the
Residential Tenancy Act.

Suddently Mowat was into the fray.
“T’ve sat here for three and half years and I
think that’s probably one of the worst
speeches I’ve ever heard,” he complained.
“Tm telling you all I hear from that
member is bashing of the disadvantaged,
bashing of the disabled.”

Coming from Mowat, who is himself
disabled, that may have seemed like a
good tactic to whip up some indignation
— except that even a certified paranoic
couldn’t have found any such reference in
Blencoe’s remarks. On the contrary, he
was citing the problems the poor were
experiencing. But from there Mowat got
even more unreal.

People and Issues

“T think this government is a very com-
passionate government(!),” he said. “We
have within British Columbia one of the
finest housing programs for the disabled
and disadvantaged. ..

“Tm really ashamed to think that the
members gets his statistics from Jim
Green, an American, a member of COPE
and the Downtown Eastside Residents’
Association. He never has the time; he’s
never been down to look at it. I want to say
that I’m really shocked at that member,
that he’s doing that kind of thing. I’ve got
to say that all I’ve heard from him is a pack
of lies this morning, and he should get off
his butt...”

Called on by the Speaker to withdraw
the word “‘lies,” Mowat muttered, once
more with great indignation, that he could
“not accept that member continuing to
bash the disabled and ride on the backs of
the poor. ..” At that point, he was ordered
out.

But you couldn’t say that sanity pre-
vailed for the rest of the morning. West
Vancouver Socred MLA Ted Reynolds
proceeded to rant about Jim Green being
a “one-man Expo-destroyer in the city of
Vancouver” and Science and Communi-
cations Minister Pat McGeer followed
that with a demand “to disband the CBC
because it is a national disgrace.”

Put a show like that on television and all
the Patrick Kinsellas in the world couldn’t
save the Socreds from themselves. _

* * *

en your immediate family is as big
as is George Gidora’s, by the time

you reach the venerable age of 90, the
family members themselves are enough to
fill a large hall. And they were indeed all
there March 30 as George celebrated his
nine decades in White Rock’s Sunnyside
Hall, but there were also many, many more
who came out to wish him well and to
honor him for his commitment to the
peace and progressive movements.

Master of ceremonies, grandson Steve
Gidora, introduced several friends and
family members as well as representatives
from various organizations, including the
Association of United Ukrainian Canadi-
ans, the Fraser Valley Peace Council, the
Federation of Russian Canadians and the
Tribune, all of whom have benefitted from
George’s work. From Toronto, there were
special greetings from William Kashtan,
general secretary of the Communist Party.

Tribune editor Sean Griffin especially
noted George’s longstanding commitment
to the paper, in the financial drive and
year-round, and added that the Tribune
would once again be counting on him to
be a pace-setter in the upcoming drive.

And for George that will only be part of
a regular routine of activity. Told by his
doctor at 75 to “come back and see me in
20 years,” he still goes to dances several
nights a week, a fact noted by several
speakers. And Saturday’s celebration was
no exception, as he wound up the event as
he so often has — on the dance floor.

* * *

or years Barbara Stewart, with her
warm, smiling approach, was a famil-

iar face to thousands of workers at the old | &
Burrard Shipyards. Every publishing day, |)

regardless of weather, she was at the gates, 1&
selling the Tribune, and as former edito! ||

Hal Griffin said in his tribute to her, “if? |]
rare occasion she were not there, they |)
missed her.” Layoffs at the shipyards 2 |}

recent years have reduced the once larg’ |} |

work force to a skeleton crew, but Barbal@ ||
was not there to see the desolation of 4 a
proud industry. f a
Over the past five years, the first ® || |
seVeral strokes forced her to curtail i q..
activities, which included the raising 9 | 4
thousands of dollars for various charitabl’ ||
causes and, of course, for the Tribune. on 3
March 21, she died at the North Val ||
couver nursing home where she spent hef | |
last days. |
~ At funeral services in North Vancouve! ||
March 27, Barbara’s organizational wo ||
in the Hotel and Restaurant Worke® ||
Local 44 during the Thirties was recalle® ||
Born in Regina, where she witnessed the || _
RCMP attack on the ON-to-OttaW? ||
trekkers in 1935, she came to Vancouv!
to work as a waitress. Here she met be
husband, William (Bill) Stewart, who w4
then the union’s secretary, joined th?
Communist Party and married him. Du |
ing the protracted Trocadero Cafe strike ||
in 1936, which etablished the union as #
militant voice in the old Vancouver Trad
and Labor Council, she marched with
on the picket line. And when the outbreak
of war brought thousands to work in thé f
revived shipbuilding industry, she SUP” |)
ported him in the successful struggle 10 I
organize them into what became the Marine |
Workers and Boilermakers’ Local 1, 9
which he was secretary. Until his death %
1974, it was for both of them a profoum

influence in their lives.

4 PACIFIC TRIBUNE, APRIL 2, 1986 —