Dear Sir,

Permit me to say goodbye to an old friend, Charlie Hebdo.

I bought my first copy many years ago. Scurrilous, rude, inflammatory, irreverent, provocative — yes, all of those things.

And also brave, taking on whatever Establishment bullies, blowhards and bigots required taking down a peg or three.

Politicians were among their favourite targets, along with activists and clerics from all religions when they spouted intolerant nonsense.

Perhaps the surviving members of the editorial team will find the remains of the last cartoons among the blood, coffee, cigarette ash and spent bullet casings. I hope they do and post them on the internet.

A Belgian cartoonist has already posted a cartoon of a terrorist with bloody sword facing the magazine’s decapitated editor. The tongue is defiantly sticking out.

Charlie would have approved.

— QUI BONO, City of Hamilton