At the tail end of my last column, a typing error reads, "why couldn't they have crushed Obama right at the beginning." It should had read Osama. You know, bin Laden, the monster, not Obama, whom I love like everybody else.

I see our Premier Floyd Roland addressed Edmonton businesses on April 20 at the Edmonton Chamber of Commerce. I would love to read his speech. I hope he called a spade a spade and gave them the true relationship between Edmonton and the Yukon and NWT. For the past two centuries, the Klondike in the Yukon is gold rush; then in the NWT, the HBC, fur traders and adventurers all started their journey in Edmonton, when Edmonton was just a little dirt town. They bought all their supplies in Edmonton, wagon loads pulled by oxen and horses, all heading North through Peace River country to reach the territories.

Now, after hundreds of years in up to date travel, we are still travelling the same path in jets and motors, still buying our supplies in Edmonton in the billions and billions of dollars! Edmonton, which is known now as the gateway to the North, was made what it is today by the three territories. Edmontonians should give their voice and support to our cry for help in building the Mackenzie highway as we are trying to get out of isolation. Can you imagine how much more money we would spend in Edmonton if we had a highway right through the NWT from Alberta to the Arctic Ocean and Tuktoyaktuk?

Oh yes, I wrote to Premier Ed Stelmach and the previous Premier Ralph Klein, asking for support for the highway. I received nice letters of support and encouragement from them. Like the hundreds of letters I received from people in power, letters mean nothing!

In the meantime, life goes on and the paper headlines read "NWT mental illness rampant," it is the third most illness in the territory. Well, make life a little more affordable and free, able to spread our wings, jump in our cars or trucks, no matter where you are, even in the Sahtu, and drive to Edmonton, to New York, etc etc. Then, maybe, mental illness will go away! We need outside help, the GNWT is brain dead. After 50 years they couldn't even get us a dirt road built to each and every community. All the MLAs today, and for the past 50 years, should hang their heads in shame. What surprises me is why are the business people so quiet and silent. The big problem with the NWT is only one-quarter of our territory - Yellowknife and regions are developed. The three-quarters remaining of our territory is still bush country and isolated. That is why we need outside help - maybe China?

I see a big ad in the paper from Hay River. Start your Engines best show to date? A lot of big names coming from May 17 to 19 to Hay River. I sure would love to be there, to see four of the groups coming. The U.S. and Canadian military, Arctic sovereignty, government leaders and the Chamber of Mines. It sounds great, but we have had so many high profile elite group meetings for the past 50 years, but three quarters of the NWT is still out of sight out of mind. What we need is a challenge. Maybe the challenge will or could come from the Arctic region and our sovereignty? This is where the U.S. and Canadian military come in.

I don't want to believe that federal Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq made the comment that she doesn't have a working relationship with our MP Dennis Bevington. They are both too smart not to communicate. We are in the same boat, fighting for the same things, etc. It is up to us, the citizens, to make things work for us in Ottawa. I have a lot of faith in my MP - even though he is NDP - ha ha - just joking, Dennis!

I kind of like the scribblings of John B. Zoe, he is a good down-to-earth writer. I wish he would write more about education problems in the NWT, and push and encourage the young people, especially the ones that end up in our jails. So many young, beautiful youth out there and everywhere in the NWT, who need guidance and a shoulder to cry on or tell their problems to. I'm glad they gave John the space in News/North, where my only true cousin, George Blondin, used to write until he passed away. George's dad and my mother were brother and sister. George was one in a million, raising a great family, etc.

That was a nice message, Archie K. Thank you.