REBAGLIATI GIVES HIMSELF A CHANCE

In 1991, a young Ross Rebagliati lived in Whistler, working as a
busboy at Sushi Village and training as a professional snowboarder,
for which he would eventually win a gold metal for Canada at the 1998
Olympic Winter Games in Nagano.

One day, former prime minister and Liberal Party juggernaut Pierre
Elliott Trudeau came into Sushi Village for a bite to eat.

"I had the honour of clearing Mr. Trudeau's table," recalled
Rebagliati at a meeting Monday night in Penticton where he won by
acclamation the Federal Liberal Party nomination for the
Okanagan-Coquihalla riding.

"He asked me about what I did and what my future held. And I told him
that I was a professional snowboarder.trying to become successful at
it."

Trudeau signed a napkin for Rebagliati, writing on it, "Good luck with
your snow boarding."

"It stayed with me my whole life," said Rebagliati, who grew up in
Naramata. "I admired a lot of things about Trudeau, not understanding
politics at all at the time, but I did know that he drove a cool car
and that all the girls liked him.

"That was one of the last times that I ever admired a politician for
those two things," said Rebagliati, naming U.S. President Barack Obama
and B.C. Premier Gordon Campbell as politicians he admires today.

Rebagliati said that he thinks a lot of today's youth have a similar
attitude towards politics and politicians.

"All of my friends are my age or younger," said Rebagliati, 38,
defining youth as anyone under 40.

"I see where they are completely uninterested with the political
process and I can understand why," he said.

"They don't watch news on TV. They don't read the newspapers. And they
could care less about listening to the radio if there isn't some
techno beat going.

"I think it is because that the representatives who represent the
political process don't care about the youth. And they haven't made an
effort to connect with them and to tell them why it is important.

Rebagliati said that he thinks youth alienation from politics has been
around "since the dawn of time" (which includes the Liberal government
dominated 1990s) but that he wants to change that, which is one of the
reasons why he will be running in the next federal election.

"I believe that I am going to be able to raise awareness in the voting
process and in democracy itself," said Rebagliati.

In selecting Rebagliati as their candidate, Jodie Taylor, the
Penticton vice-president of the Liberal Okanagan-Coquihalla
Association, said the riding brain trust was looking for someone who
knows how to win. "We were looking for a candidate that had a proven
success record," said Taylor.

"Someone that could speak on the issues that are important to us as a
constituency and someone who had demonstrated commitment in a field."

Although Rebagliati admits that up until recently he has not been an
official member of the federal Liberals, he said that he has gained
political experience working "closely with the Liberal Party as a
sounding board for the issues" and that in the last several years he
has been helping former Kelowna-Mission MLA Sindi Hawkins with "her
plight with the (B.C.) Liberal Party, as well as her fight against
cancer.

"Since I have returned back from Nagano, I have (also) made a point of
contributing to the communities that I live in through different
charities, including the Make-A-Wish Foundation, Kids Help Phone line,
as well as numerous other ones including Big Brother," said Rebagliati.

Asked whether Canadians were ready for an election, Rebagliati said:
"We just recently had a couple of elections in the not too distant
past so I think at this point and time there has been practically a
non-confidence vote and the Conservatives have been basically just
dragging there feet and not really accomplishing a lot, so as far as I
can tell, I think Canadians are ready for a change."

And on the weed that almost cost him his Olympic gold medal,
Rebagliati said that while the marijuana issue is obviously something
that is going to follow him around for the rest of his life, he did
not want to be thought of as an one-issue-candidate.

Having said that: "(marijuana legalization) is an issue for sure and
it will be dealt with at a later date."

Rebagliati will be taking on Stockwell Day the current MP for
Okanagan-Coquihalla, who received 58.1 per cent of the vote cast in
the last election.

“Anybody has a chance to win,” said Rebagliati before quoting his hero
Wayne Gretzky: “You miss every shot you don’t take.”