Editorial Our turn for peace Step by step — bilateral and unilateral — the Soviet Union and other member-states of the Warsaw Pact have taken new initiatives in recent months, both to cut back on armaments and armies and to create a climate for detente and disarmament. In crucial areas — nuclear missiles, conventional forces and chemical weapons — the USSR has shown unmistakably that it is committed to stepping back from the brink of world war. Its “peace offensive” has captured the hearts and minds of millions of people, many of whom previously felt threatened by the Soviets, or were skeptical of their intentions. This peace offensive, enunciated so dramatically by Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, is part of broad re-evaluation of where humanity stands as we approach the 21st century. And the ideas he placed before the United Nations last month reach far beyond “simple” disarmament. The Soviet leader, in fact, challenged our thinking. He advanced as a possibility, a realistic option, a vision of a world drastically different from today’s. He spoke of a common international effort to eradicate hunger and disease. He challenged us to preserve space for peaceful purposes. He said our environment can be saved only by acommon effort. He offered that the terrible disparities in today’s world cannot continue, that a new economic order must be achieved. He urged us all to think of what could be if we turned the resources, talents, energy and technology now wasted on war and preparations for war toward peaceful pursuits. He argued for a global approach; for global solutions to global problems. Contrast this “new thinking,” these challenges and the actual practical steps we've seen toward cutting arms and armies with the dismal, dangerous, demeaning testing over Canada of U.S. air-launched cruise missiles going on now. Methodically preparing for nuclear war by the Tories in Ottawa is a moral outrage that should be ended. Continued agreement to ride the American nuclear war bandwagon is a threat to our sovereignty and survival. It’s anti- peace, anti-Canadian and anti-human. Join the growing demand for an end to the dangerous militarism of nuclear subs and cruise missiles and for a new foreign policy based on peace and co-operation. Canadians need their own “peace offensive.” CAPITALSY RESTRUCTURING Me i . EDITOR Sean Griffin ASSISTANT EDITOR Dan Keeton BUSINESS & CIRCULATION MANAGER Mike Proniuk GRAPHICS Angela Kenyon Published weekly at 2681 East Hastings Street Vancouver, B.C., V5K 1Z5 Phone: (604) 251-1186 Fax: (604) 251-4232 Subscription rate: Canada: @ $20 one year @ $35 two years @ Foreign $32 one year Second class mail registration number 1560 erger madness is upon us, with the frequency of lightning in a prairie storm. In the wake of the free trade deal. and following a path already cleared by de-regulation, major oil refineries, brewer- ies, airlines and several other corporate entities have merged to form new super- “This firing is only the second shoe and companies to supposedly make Canadian (Globe publisher) Roy Megarry has as capital competitive in the tough survival many in his closet as Brian Mulroney.” war that follows the dismantling of tariff walls. . ge eee That’s the basic thrust of the newspaper analysis concerning the current round of rom the out-of-the-horse’s-mouth PE OP Rees corporate cannibalism. There is some mention of the fears that the unregulated near-monopolies will be jacking up prices and fares soon. The pages contain token coverage of the thousands of jobs lost as the new enterprises merge their assets. But for the main part, the writers are editorial- izing about the benefits of corporate con- centration, as if their editors were also sitting in the boardroom. Which perhaps isn’t too surprising, since the mainstream media seems to put- ting more business oriented news people on the editorial boards. For an example, let’s look at Canada’s flagship newspaper, The Globe and Mail. The paper announced the other day the latest appointment within its senior staff, noting the ascension to the position of managing editor of Timothy Pritchard. Pritchard had been editor of the paper’s Report on Business section for the previous 5% years, and replaced Geoffrey Stevens, managing editor since 1983. Pritchard was appointed by editor-in- chief William Thorsell, himself a recent replacement for Norman Webster. Webs- _ter termed Stevens’ ouster, “an appalling, shabby and stupid way to treat the best managing editor in the country.” Stevens made a pertinent comment when he predicted more replacements: Ts department: The Vancouver based Fraser Institute has traditionally been the organization of right-wing fringe: types who state what is on the minds of Cana- da’s mainstream business people and pro- business governments (and who, not so fringe-like, actually help those goverment make policy). Only the Fraser folks put it more frankly. The right-wing think tank is continuing the tradition with a newspaper advertise- ment for its latest book, Privatization: Tac- tics and Techniques, which purports to carry essays by experts in the field. The ad notes; accurately enough, that “‘privatiza- tion is buzz word of the times.” To say that we’re opposed to the Fraser Institute and everything it stands for is the zenith of understatement. That group has published books such as Walter Block’s sexist attacks on women’s fight for equal- ity in the workplace. It has trashed rent controls and in general is known as the apostle of unapologetic corporate greed. But we can’t disagree with the institute’s frankness, when it states: ‘Margaret Thatcher’s government is intent on selling off Great Britain and, with the appoint- ment of a Privatization Minister in Can- ada (by Prime Minister Brian Mulroney),’ it seems that Canada will soon follow suit.” ISSUES A warning, however inadvertent. PEE Ses Tos been at it for some 22 years now. But with the arrival of a brand > new diesel engine, the Nicaraguan boat pro- ject seems that much nearer to comple- tion. The project was initiated back in 1986 after members of the United Fishermen and Allied Workers Union returned from a trip to San Juan del Sur, a fishing community in Nicaragua. They had discovered that most of the community’s aging fishing fleet was beyond repair, and following their return to B.C., the boat project was born. Fisherman Al Brown has been co- ordinating the project from a North Van- couver boat shed. Several members of various unions have volunteered their skills, and numerous local marine busi- nesses have either donated, or sold at greatly reduced prices, items such as throt- tle and clutch controls and cabin seats, while individuals have supplied things such as stove pipes and steel fabrication. The new Caterpillar engine comes cour- tesy of a $15,000 donation from the Lefty Morgan Foundation, administered by the late fisherman’s widow, Margaret. Proba- bly the most important and expensive pur- chase, it heralds completion of the Nicaragua-bound vessel. Of equal value are the words of encour- agement of other trade unionists, includ- ing the statement of a Canadian Auto Workers leader quoted in the UFAWU newspaper, The Fisherman. Buzz Hargrove sent a letter calling the effort one of the “most courageous projects ever under- taken by any individual organization to simply show solidarity with other people in the world who desperately need help.” * * OK he maintenance worker who had laboured in, among other things, B.C.’s now defunct whaling industry, was not a leader in the full meaning of that word. But Jack Ewing was a stalwart in the progressive movement and a loyal suppor- ter of the Pacific Tribune for his long life — a life, we regret to report, that ended Jan. 23 at the Oakridge Hospital in Vancouver. Jack was born Aug. 9, 1903 in Win- nipeg, but his family moved to Saskatche- wan to take up a life of farming. Jack, unlike many other workers, attended uni- versity as an agriculture student but left before his education was completed, due to a shortcoming that faces most workers — a lack of money. He moved to the B.C. coast during the Thirties and became active in the Single ‘Unemployed Association and the effort to organize relief camp workers. He also made what became a lifelong commitment when he joined the Communist Party dur- ing that period, and was a member of the West Side club in Vancouver at the time of his death. From the Forties on, Jack worked as a machinist, performing maintenance work at the whaling station on northern Van- couver Island, and later in the Orpheum Theatre through the Fifties and Sixties. He was retired for many years, pursuing a hobby of writing short stories. A lifelong bachelor, Jack leaves no des- cendants, but has left a legacy of hard~ work, including many years as a diligent seller of subscriptions for the Tribune. 4 « Pacific Tribune, February 6, 1989 Bias