So the Shafias want to appeal.

They wish to exercise rights granted under the Canadian judicial system, and no doubt they will have a chance to do so because we live in a society of laws and fair play.

A society of justice.

A society of equality.

Concepts unfamiliar to Canada's first family of crime.

Words cannot adequately convey the revulsion most of us feel toward these cold-blooded killers.

We will feed them, house them, care for them, for the next 25 years and when their sentences are served, they should be deported so they can live out whatever days remain, happily, in the Stone Age.

We must now take stock of what we have learned from this terrible event.

We now know so much more about cultures that view women as men's property, their bodies nothing more than receptacles for family honour.

Honour killing has become part of the lexicon.

 

Deaths exposed flaws

 

How do we protect women at risk?

A first step lies with schools, police, and child protection.

No one saw -- or more importantly, properly understood -- the warning signs.

The cries were there. We need to know the signals, the barest hints of trouble.

Specialized training is required for everyone involved in social services and law enforcement.

This is not to lay blame on anyone but we had a total system failure.

No one must be left behind because of their culture, or where they come from.

Not in Canada, not again.

 

Boisvenu's bad idea

I have so much respect for Pierre-Hugues Boisvenu, a man who has given victims of crime a voice has done much to make our society better.

But what the Senator said this week was wrong.

He later apologized but it is impossible to take back words.

It hits a primal nerve when someone suggests that convicted killers should be given rope to hang themselves.

Some might cheer but we cannot lower ourselves to meting out vigilante frontier-style justice.

We are better than that -- better than the Shafias and all others who believe themselves above the law.

The timing of the senator's remarks is, to put it mildly, unfortunate.

Suicide prevention week begins Sunday, and here in Quebec we have the highest suicide rate in the country.

Encouraging suicide no matter what the circumstances in wrong.

The senator is a good man. But some things are better left unsaid.

 

Tampering with success

If you are shopping around for a real Quebec success story you don't have to look further than Metro.

600 stores in Quebec and Ontario.

Not bad for a company founded in Verdun in 1947.

Now the Quebec's language pit bulls are complaining that Metro is naked: no accent above the e. It's an English metro not mey-tro.

Yes, Quebec's homegrown francophone grocery giant has been masquerading for years.

Well the secret is out, the conspiracy is growing.

What will they figure out next, the secret Anglo handshakes, or the wink?

Which, as they say, is the same as a nod to a blind horse?

Stay tuned.