from Pat Hickey of the Montreal Gazette,

This pouting sense of entitlement is a recurring theme across the world of professional sports, where billionaire owners have their hands out looking for taxpayer help in growing their businesses.

The whining in Ottawa is particularly distasteful because the billionaire owner in question, Eugene Melnyk, doesn’t know or care about the burden on the ordinary taxpayer because he had the wherewithal to avoid paying taxes by establishing his residence in Barbados. He rediscovered his Canadian roots two years ago when he needed life-saving liver transplant surgery.

If Melnyk needs a new arena, let him pay for it with all the money he saved by not paying taxes.

If the owners in Ottawa and Calgary aren’t happy with their arenas, there’s a new one in Quebec City crying out for an NHL team.

Bettman, who will be in Montreal this week to help celebrate the NHL’s 100th anniversary, could serve the game better if he stopped worrying about how Canadians spend their tax dollars and more about important issues like the rise in concussions and the anemic state of the game in places like Carolina, Arizona and South Florida.

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