The whims and desires expressed by the Canadian Homebuilders Association as presented by Joanne Paulson may be for those who have a home and are making $100,000 a year. But in Canada, this is simply a dream image that has been marketed so that bigger homes are considered the ideal.
For example, more than 30,000 every day want to just live in a home — not a tent in a park. Many of those homeless also deal with chronic, excessive demands, just to feed themselves each day and not freeze to death.
Walk-in closets assume you have excessive amounts of cash to purchase clothes that you only need maybe once a year. These ideals of the home have been successfully marketed to the masses by telling everyone that bigger is better.
After all, the GDP promoters say that we must continue to grow and sell more and purchase more than last year. We must have the fanciest automobiles and cater to our friends with those lavish dinners.
The ingenious trick to being on this planet is to be frugal when it is important to be frugal, like now, and generous to others when you are blessed with the security of your life and what has been provided for you.
It is all about what we leave to our children and grandchildren and the planet that they inherit from you. Which will it be? A trashed planet with walk-in closets? Or a growing green space for life on this planet?
Jim Elliott, Regina
Trump struggles with geography
President-elect Donald Trump’s repeated references to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as governor of the 51st state should come as no surprise. Geography has never been Trump’s strong suit.
On Sept. 21, 2017 in a speech to the United Nations, then president Trump referenced the country of “Nambia.” There is no such country. Presumably, he meant Namibia.
On Jan. 12, 2018 Trump referred to African countries with an inappropriate adjective, prompting the UN to call the remark “shocking and shameful” and “racist.”
Following the 2020 Super Bowl win by the Kansas City Chiefs, Trump extended his congratulations to “the Great State of Kansas.” Staff had to inform him Kansas City was in Missouri, not Kansas. Former Missouri senator Claire McCaskill responded in a post: “It’s Missouri, you stone cold idiot!”
If he is this ignorant of his own country’s geography, he should perhaps be forgiven for not knowing the countries of the world. Trump needs to understand Canada will always be an independent country — one that has never had a 78-year-old convicted criminal as its prime minister.
Roy Schneider, Regina
