MONTREAL - The deaths of three teenagers on the railway tracks are a terrible thing.
They were only kids. I feel for their families having to endure such a loss.
But in the aftermath of this tragedy, it is time to have a conversation about graffiti.
I cannot understand how some people still come to its defence; I think it's vandalism, pure and simple.
They call themselves graffiti artists. There is nothing artistic in defacing public property.
The city I live in put up brand new signs a couple of years back. In no time, they were covered in paint.
Why? I don't get it.
It's a dangerous game as we found out this week. The consequences were tragic and pointless, because the words of the prophets are not written on the subway walls or tenement halls.
Tremblay's tax on cars will drive people away
Here's another great idea from the anti-car Tremblay administration.
A new tax on cars. Not just in the City of Montreal, but island-wide.
We already pay a special gas tax: the highest in the country.
We already pay a special public transit tax every year when we renew our licences.
And the cost of parking at a meter in Montreal has skyrocketed.
Now the city says it wants to improve public transit, but it really wants to make up its budget shortfall on the backs of drivers.
It should be looking at reducing the size of a bloated bureaucracy and the largest city council structure in North America.
Franchement, how many borough mayors and borough councillors do we need?
This move is simply a tax grab.
What about people on the West Island who actually drive their cars to take trains or buses? They will be penalized too
Why don't we just ban cars in Montreal? It might be easier, and everyone would be issued a Bixi bike.
Of course we would also ban winter, which our esteemed local leaders probably think they can do.
One person one vote? Not in Quebec if the Liberals have their way
Now talk of electoral maps may be like watching paint dry, but this is important.
Once again the Charest Liberals are playing with your rights.
Your provincial vote in Montreal is worth half as much as votes in rural areas like the Gaspé because the population of urban ridings is much higher than rural ridings.
Quebec's chief electoral officer has been working on changing this for years, but now the government has cut him out of the picture.
The plan was to make three rural ridings disappear and create three new ones in and around Montreal.
But Premier Charest disagrees.
There is a provincial byelection in Kamouraska-Temiscouata later this month, where the Liberals already sold their souls by signing a non-tendered metro car deal to prop up the Bombardier factory.
So, political opportunism once again trumps what is right.
And it may not come as a surprise, but that riding, the one Liberals dearly want to hold on to, it was one of the ones slated to disappear.
Isn't that a coincidence?
