Overheard

Sounds about right

"I think they view environmental scientists as people who supply fuel to the crazy environmentalists that we all know get billions of dollars from foreign contributors to block good clean industrial development in Canada."

-- Canadian scientist David Schindler speculates as to why the federal government seeks to close the Experimental Lakes Area near Kenora.

 

A silent epidemic

"The level of awareness must be much higher. It's a national emergency."

-- Dr. Gideon Koren, director of the renowned Motherisk Program at Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children, calls for a social campaign against the use of narcotics during pregnancy. Canadians today are among the highest users of prescription opioids in the world -- and the number of addicted babies being born is rising.

 

Taking pride

"It may simply be that Canada is just a slightly more civil society (than the U.S.), where ordinary people can't stand the idea of their neighbours being denied the same rights. To put it bluntly, you don't have to march in a Pride parade to be proud of the relative absence of bigotry."

-- Bartley Kives, Free Press columnist

 

Six decades on the throne

"I will continue to treasure and draw inspiration from the countless kindnesses shown to me in this country and throughout the Commonwealth."

-- Queen Elizabeth II, in a rare televised statement, calls this week's 60th anniversary celebrations a "humbling experience."

 

Watch the wording

"You have to look out for candidates who keep using the word 'bold.' Mitt Romney does it all the time, and he is so not."

-- Gail Collins, New York Times columnist

 

Land of the free, home of the Big Gulp

"Unfortunately for Mayor Bloomberg, New Yorkers find the glass to be half empty on his proposal to ban super-size drinks."

-- Pollster Lee M. Miringoff reports that New Yorkers dislike their mayor's latest effort to improve the city's health by cracking down on the sale of super-sized sugary sodas.

 

A light goes on

"When someone hands you a hand-me-down like that, you have to be excited. They're not sitting around at Walmart."

-- Adam Riess, Nobel Prize-winning astronomer on a proposal that would give NASA a telescope no longer in service with the National Reconnaissance Office to study dark energy in the universe.

 

A rose by any other name

"No more euphemisms. If anyone's interested, the names The Sensitive Youth Association, The Just-Haven't-Met-the-Right-Girl-Yet Choristers and The Very Close-Knit Society of Right Girls are now up for grabs."

-- Tabatha Southey, Canadian columnist, celebrates the Ontario government's announcement they will legislate high schools' Gay-Straight Alliances' right to use the word "gay" against the Roman Catholic Church's objections.

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition June 9, 2012 J2