WE'LL REMEMBER

Sick. It was the province's collective feeling late last week, along
with much of Canada and the world. More than that, it summarizes the
gut-wrenching anguish a small Alberta community is now living with.

When news of four RCMP officers being gunned down in the line of duty
near Mayerthorpe began surfacing last Thursday, we fell silent. Words
seemed empty.

The officers had been dispatched to a quonset to take down a marijuana
grow operation. After a lengthy ordeal, gunshots erupted and the four
policemen suddenly stopped answering their radios.

When law-enforcement colleagues swarmed the farm, they found the cops
dead inside the structure, along with the gunman, who apparently took
his own life.

Bill Sweeney, Alberta RCMP's commanding officer, said there hadn't
been such a brutal loss of RCMP life since 1885.

It was an extremely dark moment in Canadian history.

And for what? To protect a drug operation. To prove a point. To
inflict misery.

It's bad enough that four people were shot dead while doing a job most
of us wouldn't have the guts to consider.

It's even worse that it's a morbid reflection of the direction society
is taking.

When drugs and money take precedent over human life, it's a sure sign
things have gone too far.

But, unfortunately, more and more people are putting drugs and their
numerous side effects atop their priority lists. Think of the latest
murder in Red Deer and recent slayings in Edmonton and Calgary. Most
were linked to drug use in some way.

And we're not exempt in Lacombe and the surrounding area. Anyone who
thinks a drug problem doesn't exist here is horribly mistaken. Crystal
meth, for example, has a stranglehold on all of Central Alberta--an
area Lacombe lies at the heart of.

Don't kid yourselves. Drugs are a problem, regardless of your beliefs
on their effects.

It's our responsibility to support the men and women dedicating
themselves to protecting our communities from the pitfalls of a
destructive culture. Mayerthorpe's horror must not be forgotten. We
must collectively support the community and stand behind
law-enforcement heroes still carrying the torch that four of their
associates died believing in.

We will remember.