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Opinion General
PARKER: A new standard for driving in the city
There is a great scene in one of the Sex and the City episodes in which Carrie Bradshaw thinks driving standard for the first time in twenty years is like remembering how to ride a bike. She makes this mistake on a hill. I’ve been driving an old 5-speed through the city for the past...
JONESIE: Supporting education isn’t the same as supporting teachers
If it appeared something was amiss with the column found in this place on Monday Sept. 15, you were right. An early draft was published in place of the finished work and not discovered until Monday evening and by then, dozens of comments were already published. The unfinished piece appeared antagonistic, cynical and insincere. That...
BROTHEN: Notes on a sex tape
It's an odd scene in Kamloops Supreme Courtroom 5D this week.
HELSTON: Tag, you’re it Vernon
Vernon has a pretty distinct flavour when it comes to street wall art, but a new trend is adding some diversity—wanted or unwanted—to the scene. If you didn’t know, the vast majority of the city’s downtown murals were designed and painted by one extremely talented, motivated and prolific artist. You have her to thank when...
ARCHER: Heritage homes add character to Penticton
There’s something about an old house that I just love. I get this giddy feeling hearing the old wood floors creak as I was across a room, the dated wallpaper, hand-cranked appliances, and little odds and ends of years long past. And it still feels, in a way, like home. So when it comes to...
GOG: Time could have left a few things alone
I’m not given to bleating on about “the good old days” but you have to admit, there are some things that were good before, and now they’re terrible. Here are a few that slapped me in the face recently: Power Outlets. You used to be able to put a plug in the socket either way...
LOEWEN: What happens when court rulings and Christy Clark collide
British Columbians have front-row seats for one of the bloodiest political contests to ever unfold in our province. It’s a shame that it’s over one of the few values that our nation and province holds sacrosanct: the necessity for provincial governments to provide a high-quality of public education. Children require schooling. It’s their constitutionally-enshrined right....
PARKER: Wobbling between Jesus and Jim Beam
On any given Sunday morning you will find me chatting up beautiful aging ladies in a church hall over mediocre mugs of creamy coffee. On any given Sunday night you will find me chatting up leathered aging bachelors in a dimly-lit bar over mediocre cocktails. Just to clarify — in case either of my bosses...
JONESIE: Spare a little empathy for government in teachers dispute
It’s so darned easy to support teachers in a dispute like this because we all know teachers. We see their faces, we know their families, our kids play together, we walk dogs together—they are real people.
ARCHER: City staff aren’t immune from taxpayer scrutiny but here’s a better idea
PENTICTON - City Hall has quite the series of plot lines going these days, with lawsuits, legal threats to citizens, complaints from residents and rallies outside on the street. Mayor and city councillors have taken a lot of heat from the media and public, whether it’s about vote results, a development project, or the use...
BROTHEN: How to break the rumour-mill in your small town
The village of Ashcroft recently learned that the Central Cafe, a fixture in the little town, would shut its doors permanently. Most business-owners would just pack up and keep mum on the details, but cafe owner John Douglas took to social media to tell his customers the truth about why he couldn’t run his restaurant...
STAHN: Even our goals for voter turnout are sad
In the 2011 municipal election less than 30 per cent of eligible people voted in Kamloops. This is a typical trend across B.C., and even the country, in most municipal elections. To break it down into very simple terms, less than a third of people chose to speak up when it mattered most. Nearly everyone...
PROSKIW: The lesson of the day: It’s okay to fight dirty
At a recent B.C. Teachers Federation anti-government rally, one of the speakers brought someone with her to the microphone. Her five-year-old son was suddenly before 300 cheering people on the side of a busy highway. The boy tries to hide in her arms a few times but after some gentle prodding he eventually parrots “I want school.”...