Editor, The Times:
As my late waggish friend once put it, “Just because the news is bad doesn't mean it can't get worse.
I was thinking about that with the news that Saudi Arabia had executed some 40 souls, among them a respected cleric whose only crime appears to have been opposing the Saudi royal family — a no-no to be sure.
Then came the Trudeau government's decision to complete the Harper deal to sell armoured cars to this medieval gang of head-choppers (where do you think ISIS gets its ideas from?), arm amputaters and suppressors of all dissent.
Could things get any worse?
Well, as Rowan Atkinson stated in Blackadder, "Of course they can."
Recently, the news came over the air. That bizzare gang of hermits, the People's Republic of North Korea, announced that they had blown up a miniature hydrogen bomb.
If the North Koreans have perfected a miniature hydrogen bomb, then it is a remarkable feat indeed.
Or else it's just plain nonsense.
I'm not trying to defend North Korea. It is such a weird blot on the face of the globe (something like Saudi Arabia) that it is beyond the pale!
However, I have no doubt if these chamber of commerce – board of trade types would, if they thought they could get away with it. We don't sell armoured cars to North Korea.
Also, with the totally isolated mentality that governs all aspects of North Korean life, no doubt the threat of invasion to go after weapons of mass destruction from the U.S. or some other power seems very real. The fact that Barack Obama is far more cautious ('chicken' according to the Right, even here in Canada) than George Bush Jr. ever was, simply doesn't register in the craniums of these total isolationist minds.
So where do we go from here?
Frankly, I don't have a clue!
Unfortunately those in charge don't seem to have any better idea as to what to do.
And that is the worrying part of all of this.
Dennis Peacock
Clearwater, B.C.