ROASTED & TOASTED

YOUR CHANCE TO OFFER UP A PAT ON THE BACK OR A KICK IN THE PANTS

ROAST: It’s a sad statement on where we are as a civilized society when so many are willing to gamble with the lives of students, teachers and support staff in schools. All learning should be computer based until this virus is done or until we have a vaccine.

ROAST: If you are going to have a religious church service do it in an open area or outside with people spread apart.

Large collections of churchgoers in an enclosed building is simply dangerous to you and all others you may infect.

ROAST: To King Arthur (Trudeau) for snowing Canadians on his carbon tax farce. It is just like the feudal days of yore. The rich tax the poor so they can gorge themselves. Now Trudy says he has to tax us more for some pipedream the rich came up with in Paris. Let’s think how this works. You tax the poor to pay the rich to fix their polluting factories so they can make more products to sell to us, the poor. We need another revolution to get rid of the pollution in Ottawa. Then Trudy gives $600 million to Ford (American company) to make electric cars. Once again, the poor paying the rich for the privilege to work for them so we can again pay them for their product. Seems they figured a real green way to steal our green.

TOAST: To the Lethbridge Vipers, very exciting news for our youth in Lethbridge who want to carry on with a football career but stay in Lethbridge. We often have wonderful prospects in this region from our Indigenous population, rural residents and kids who don’t have the resources to extend their football careers and their education. Many of our students who have extended their football athletics in the U.S.,

Edmonton, Calgary and Montreal don’t come back to Lethbridge, my own son included. I was involved years ago with an attempt to bring junior football to Lethbridge so this is very exciting news for me.

ROAST: To our lazy union garbage/recycling driver who won’t bother to pick up your bin if you move it across the street because you didn’t make it for his first go around. This same driver won’t get out of the truck to pick up bins he has knocked over, and just leaves them on the ground, contents open to blow in the wind. These union employees need proper supervision which is not happening with this current administration.

TOAST: At a time when Alberta’s government is planning to cut back health services, I must Toast the extraordinary medical care of Dr. Don Gibb, the dedicated professional teams at St. Michael’s Health Centre and the Lethbridge Area Stroke Team. Without their expertise and exceptional efforts, I might have become an invalid.

TOAST: To the southern Albertan faith-based communities who have chosen not to congregate until further notice. Thank you.

TOAST: To the City of Lethbridge for employing two of the nicest and kindest Waste Management employees, Matt and Lyle, who were not only doing a terrific job to keep our city clean, but also went over and above to help our family. They provided service to us on an unscheduled garbage pickup day, as well as removed some unwanted “garbage” material. Thanks so much, guys. Cheers to these two terrific City employees and to our City of Lethbridge for having two really great employees!

ROAST: To the obviously racist person still complaining about the Aboriginal transition house in Scenic Heights. You don’t even live that close to it and you won’t stop your racist rant. Of course the operators of the organization get paid, they have to live. They do more for people in a week than you probably have your whole life. Not everyone is perfect like you think you are.

ROAST: To all the semi truck drivers (especially car carrier ones) using their engine brakes on 43 Street South. All professional truck drivers know you do not need to use them on flat, level surfaces.

TOAST: To the Geek Squad at Best Buy. I wrongfully clicked on “Allow” when I should not have, and ended up with never-ending notifications. I was unable to resolve the problem but they were able to fix it for me. I am most appreciative. Kudos to the “Geek Squad.” Thank you.

ROAST: A big Roast to the management at a Lethbridge big-box store. I have been to this store on two occasions in the past three weeks and each time I have notice numerous patrons not complying with the company’s own masking requirement nor the City’s direction making it mandatory that persons be masked when being in indoor public places. Security people are posted at the doors; however, they do not seem to be required to stop these people from entering the premises. This half-hearted attitude by the store management is not going to stop the spread of COVID-19. Maybe ticketing the offenders, both patrons and management, might be the answer.

ROAST: OK, I don’t know who the genius is who gave the order to practise digging a hole but I’m sure there had to be a better place than 6 Avenue and Mayor Magrath Drive South. I mean, really, what were you thinking? The access road has been blocked for three weeks and no work done? I’m sure the bus drivers who have had their regular route totally inconvenienced are really impressed with your amazing organizational skills, too. Fix it already, that is a main artery. Is this a cash cow to catch speeders who are ticked off with the 30 km/h speed limit change around Henderson Lake North? Boo, hiss!

ROAST: Huge roast to the NDP and the unions for fear mongering about the transfer of jobs from Alberta Health Services to the private sector. Saying that it will cause chaos and it’s cruel that 11,000 health-care jobs are being eliminated isn’t true. They are being transferred to the private sector so taxpayers don’t have to keep paying people not to work (extended vacation, sick time, stat holidays, etc.). Huge toast to the UCP for making the right decision!

TOAST: to DJ Trump on his re-election Nov. 3 and a Roast to the Democratic Party, the corrupt media, anti-police groups, ANTIFA, BLM, Hollywood and all the other promoters of false news who I believe have simply become unbearable to the majority of the American people.

TOAST: To the numerous shoppers last Friday at

Fairview Safeway all wearing masks while shopping. Way to go.

TOAST: To the Lethbridge Tennis Club volunteers Howie, Ingrid, Al, Christian and Steve who installed new windscreens along the courts. This will help extend the tennis season deep in to the fall. Thank you!

TOAST: To young women who don’t follow the current trend of wearing long claw-like fingernails and long false eyelashes. They look ridiculous, and the chemicals used to apply and remove them are very unhealthy for the lungs.

TOAST: To all cyclists who have lights and reflector tape on their bikes for safe night riding.

TOAST: To drivers who regularly check their vehicle headlights to make sure they are both working. So many on the streets aren’t, which makes for risky driving.

TOAST: To all men who don’t have the bad habit of spitting on the street (ground), especially in this time of COVID-19. Women never do it.

ROAST: To the young guys with their noisy little cars and trucks, who cruise and race up and down Mayor Magrath Drive in the evenings, disturbing and annoying everyone in the area.

TOAST: To the City when they put in a noise bylaw to deal with loud cars and trucks and improve the situation, and to the police who ticket the drivers.

ROAST: Take off your mask when being interviewed! That would be especially the mayor, councillors and others. We get it. You are pro-mask. There are people who lip read. They have no way to know what is being said, or have someone signing for them. Even Dr. Hinshaw is mask free. She does have someone signing!

ROAST: To golf courses that allow golfers to play music. Really? Music does not belong on a golf course. Your music may not be others’. And they are getting louder. Stop it before it gets out of hand.

TOAST: To The Herald. Finally very little written about wearing masks or not. It was getting to be pretty much already, reading it over and over. People, let’s Roast or

Toast something actually more than the issue of masks.

ROAST: To Rachel Notley and Shannon Phillips for not speaking out against the Alberta Federation of Labor and Gil McGowan for the boycott of businesses that donated to the UCP in the last election. How many people could lose their jobs if this stunt actually works? The NDP is now crying about AHS contracting out jobs even though they had no problem with putting laundry workers out on the street after they took power in 2015. Keep up your callous behaviour and people will start donating more money to the UCP. By the way, that sound you hear is the curtain coming down on your failed commie union socialist ways.

TOAST: To Kathleen Mah for her Guest Column Thursday, Oct. 15. I am sorry you had this experience with racism. And a big Roast to the drug store and its ignorant employees.

ROAST: To all unions. What don’t you understand? It is very simple math. Spending more than you take in is not sustainable. We haven’t heard one suggestion from any union on how we can get to a balanced budget. All we hear is negative comments from you.

ROAST: To the local church responsible for 42 virus cases. Did you believe God was going to protect you? If you believe that why not do away with seat belts and fire extinguishers?

ROAST: To the manufacturing plant responsible for 10 virus cases. Telling the public that you made your staff start to wear masks on Oct. 6 indicates you didn’t take the situation seriously. I think people will take your brand seriously and not buy your products.

TOAST: To the 52 per cent of American voters who appear to be giving Trump the boot — based on consistent national polls, based on consistent swing state polls in the last three months. Joe Biden is not perfect, and the election will probably be more of an antiTrump vote than a pro-Biden vote. But like hundreds of millions of people around the world who are sick of Trump’s reckless selfishness, we are just interested in having a moderate manager of the world’s biggest democracy and economy.

TOAST: To anyone who can understand this theory: Russia and China are doing their best they can to meddle in the election to support Trump. The Russian and Chinese leaders hate democracy, they hate it in their own country, they hate it in Hong Kong, they hate it in Ukraine, they hate it in Belarus. Anything that makes the Americans look disorganized, corrupt and stupid is what they want (with Trump they have succeeded). Then they can turn to their people and say look, democracy produces fools and clowns as leaders, stick with me as a strong man (Turkey, Hungary and North Korea would also agree) who can run your country.

TOAST: To Joe Biden and Kamala Harris who hopefully will be the next president and vice-president of the U.S. They will have a huge mandate to clean up the absolute mess that Trump and his spineless enablers have made of the country.

ROAST: To the Alberta UCP government who have neglected the schools in this pandemic and now plan to cut 11,000 health-care jobs. Albertans are in big trouble with this type of thinking.

ROAST: As Lethbridge gets more and more COVID cases we need to be wearing masks everywhere possible. And store security, please stop the non maskers from ignoring the mask-wearing law. They are endangering all of us.

ROAST: To the way the Oct. 15 question of the day was worded. It is not 11,000 healthcare jobs being eliminated. It will be approximately 11,000 support positions that will be transitioned to the private sector with the supporting management layer eliminated. This not only saves us taxpayers huge dollars, the money is to be reinvested into patient care. Shame on you for a very inflammatory, unfair question.

ROAST: To the Lethbridge Overdose Prevention Society: You want to demonstrate to the city? Here is a thought: put your pop-up tent on your own front yard instead of mine to hand out your naloxone kits in the daylight. Why don’t you? You don’t want drugs around your neighbourhood? Weird, neither do us tax-paying citizens! Law enforcement needs to pump up the fines or start laying serious charges. They have the mobile site. The City is doing something to help out.

TOAST: A huge toast to the emergency department at our Chinook Regional Hospital for their service and attention to me last Wednesday. Even though I waited two hours before my name was called because they were very busy, the service I received was first class. A great bunch of people.

TOAST: Welcome back, Beebe! We missed your weekly articles. Now that you are back we will certainly enjoy hearing from you every Saturday.

ROAST: To Kenney and his bold-faced lie when he said he was going to create jobs and better Albertans’ lot. Well, now he wants to cut 11,000 healthcare jobs in the middle of a pandemic so he can take the money and give it to big oil. So the history of big oil lackeys continues to be Alberta’s legacy. Don’t worry, folks, it’s happening around the world. The people on the top of the big oil food chain are the greediest disease on Earth and we need a cure. How did our natural resource end up in the pockets of foreign investors and not ours? Now there’s a grand crime of biblical proportions that for some reason will never likely be solved. Just like how the NDP quietly sold our power grid to Warren Buffet. Politicians, it seems, all seem to feed out of the same trough.

ROAST: To Facebook and other social media platforms for not paying their fair share of taxes in Canada. This has a major impact on other Canadian media outlets. Last year, Facebook’s Canadian revenues were hoovered into the multinational’s $19-billion global revenues. And thanks to the Canadian government looking the other way, it didn’t pay corporate or value-added taxes here. They do the same tax dodge in every country.

PUBLISHER’S NOTE: And local businesses use Facebook to market their message of “shop local”?