{"id":10470,"date":"2011-12-30T11:00:49","date_gmt":"2011-12-30T16:00:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/accessniagara.com\/blog\/?p=10470"},"modified":"2011-12-26T20:46:45","modified_gmt":"2011-12-27T01:46:45","slug":"ontario-sanitized-for-your-protection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/accessniagara.com\/blog\/2011\/12\/30\/ontario-sanitized-for-your-protection\/","title":{"rendered":"Ontario, sanitized for your protection"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Toronto Sun<\/a> newspapers had an opinion piece recently about Ontario, and how the government is trying to “protect us” (they called it a Nanny State). At one point, it uses Niagara Falls as an example:<\/p>\n

These days, the architects of our bubble-wrapped, peanut-free society have their sights set on the daredevil community.<\/p>\n

The nattering nabobs of nannyism at the Niagara Parks Commission won\u2019t give permission to highwire walker Ken Wallenda to walk a tightrope across the Falls. Wallenda wants to start in Niagara Falls, N.Y., enter the mist, and re-emerge on the Canadian side. Fantastic!<\/p>\n

Stateside, politicians who want to help the economically depressed city of Niagara Falls, N.Y. have championed Wallenda\u2019s proposal, and lawmakers in Albany have approved the stunt.<\/p>\n

But a snag has been encountered in \u2014 where else? \u2014 Nanny State Central. You see, Wallenda\u2019s stunt isn\u2019t being embraced by the testicular-challenged bureaucrats at the Niagara Parks Commission. Officials are frowning on what they deem to be a Falls folly.<\/p>\n

Doubling down<\/p>\n

Apparently, \u201crisky business\u201d in Niagara Falls, Ont. these days is confined to the rubes doubling down at the government-run blackjack tables.<\/p>\n

When Wallenda first proposed the stunt, the Commission\u2019s Janice Thomson remarked: \u201cDoing something for one day doesn\u2019t seem like sustainable tourism. It harkens back to those early days when Niagara Falls was a carnival-like atmosphere. We have come so far away from that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Egad! Has Thomson ever strolled up Clifton Hill, home to House of Frankenstein, Castle Dracula, and numerous other wax museums and freak shows?<\/p>\n

Niagara Falls isn\u2019t exactly Vienna on the Rhine. Actually, it can be cheesier than a bucket of Bulgarian feta.<\/p>\n

Isn\u2019t it disheartening that in our increasingly sissified culture the safety mavens are now turning their sights on daredevils?<\/p>\n

So much for Dalton McGuinty\u2019s oft-repeated boast that Ontario is \u201copen for business\u201d \u2014 Wallenda\u2019s stunt stands, or stood, to rake-in millions for the region.<\/p>\n

But that\u2019s sanitized-for-your-protection Ontario \u2014 a province that wants bread, not circuses.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Toronto Sun newspapers had an opinion piece recently about Ontario, and how the government is trying to “protect us” (they called it a Nanny State). At one point, it uses Niagara Falls as an example: These days, the architects of our bubble-wrapped, peanut-free society have their sights set on the daredevil community. The nattering…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6111,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[74,2],"tags":[6648,6647,59,1111,6646,320,3827,6650,10410,99,5673,2635,6649,1016,261],"class_list":["post-10470","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-niagara-falls-daredevils","category-niagara-falls-news","tag-blackjack-tables","tag-castle-dracula","tag-clifton-hill","tag-dalton-mcguinty","tag-frankenstein-castle","tag-house-of-frankenstein","tag-janice-thomson","tag-nanny-state","tag-niagara-falls-ontario-2","tag-niagara-parks-commission","tag-nik-wallenda","tag-risky-business","tag-sun-newspapers","tag-toronto-sun","tag-wax-museums"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/accessniagara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10470","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/accessniagara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/accessniagara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/accessniagara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6111"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/accessniagara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10470"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/accessniagara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10470\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/accessniagara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10470"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/accessniagara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10470"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/accessniagara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10470"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}