Editorial

D oes anybody hear?
This is a question we find ourselves asking to the tune of the iconic Bruce Cockburn song of the same name. Why, you ask? Because it seems to fit with a rather disturbing trend currently taking place on private and publicly-owned woodlots.
Statistics and research carried out by stewardship councils in Prescott-Russell and Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry (SD&G) have shown that the amount of forest cover we have is dwindling.

It wouldn’t be overstating things to say that 2011 was a year of change. For many, both locally and globally, it was also a year of challenges, frustration and hardship. The world watched as a tsunami struck the coast of Japan, as protestors toppled dictators across the Middle East during the Arab Spring, as the United States remembered 9/11 and as the Occupy movement gained steam across the globe.

Children, and young people in general, are known to look up to adult idols – especially celebrities and professional athletes.
When children see hockey players using fancy footwork and outworking the goalies, they see that as part of the game. When they see hockey players deliver hard hits to their opponents, they see that as part of the game.

Cambridge Public School has postponed its Christmas concert until February and that got some parents and CFRA listeners into a frenzy. The Review’s Facebook page item about this story received 35 comments and some of them were disturbing.

As municipalities make a start on their 2012 budgets, it feels much like other years. Few ratepayers show up at the meetings to discuss the budgets. Some meetings take place during the daytime, when most citizens are at work. And if you do plan to find out more, listen to discussions, or ask questions, the most important question you can ask first is: can you see a copy of the draft budget so you can be as informed as the decision-makers sitting at the council table.

Sometimes it creeps in. The so-called good news items fill our pages and before you know it, happy schoolchildren, carved pumpkins, certificate presentations, cheques, parties, anniversaries and donations to the food bank seem to be all that you read about.
These days, traditional newspapers are up against it in more ways than one. People want the news to be free, they want to select the news and finally, they want it fast.
But we know and you know: it’s not that simple.

The recent spate of teen suicides is especially disturbing given how bullying and/or mental illness is a common denominator.
Jamie Hubley, a 15-year-old openly gay student in Ottawa, is the latest young person to commit suicide after allegedly suffering merciless bullying at the hands of fellow students. It was bullying that left him feeling demoralized and unable to go on, as he wrote in one of his many online blog posts prior to his death.

What happens to municipal mayors when they move on to greener pastures? There is no great philosophical rumination here: they simply resign and are replaced. Such was the case in North Glengarry last week, when Mayor Grant Crack stepped down to take on his new post as an MPP.

The recent International Plowing Match was an event that was close to home in every sense of the word. With agriculture at its centre, how could we not embrace everything that the IPM represented?
It was hearwarming to see youngsters trying their hand at milking a virtual cow and  downright tasty to savour Kawartha Ice Cream, made the way real ice cream should be made so it tasted the way ice cream should taste.
And we could look on the bright side at the walking . . . and the walking . . . which we hope burned off some of the calories we consumed at the food concessions.