Emotionally, I’m drained. Instead of reading my babbling, today you get to view a list of links and reasons why I think you should click on them…

• CRFA 580 (Talk Radio in Ottawa) is holding a public rally in support of Canadian Troops on Friday Sept 22, 2006 at Parliament Hill in Ottawa from 12:00 Noon – 1:00 pm.
• Take a few minutes to visit the Canadian Forces Personnel Support Agency (CFPSA). Buy something nice. Grapes recommends the hats.
• The Amazing Wonderdog dissects the study published by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives titled Canada’s Fallen: Understanding Canadian Military Deaths in Afghanistan. Actually, I can’t honestly call this a study and look my ethics professor in the face ever again. It’s a prime example of making statistics match a pre-set theory and discarding or refusing to acknowledge any dissenting data. I should not be surprised though. Both of the authors are affiliated with the Polaris Institute. One of the authors is the very same Steve Staples that I’ve ranted about before. Realizing this, it’s hard to be surprised by the content and quality (or, imnsho, lack there-of) of the report. After all, if Mr. Staples can’t get something as simple as AWOL right, then it’s hard to give creedence to anything else he has to write relating to the Canadian Forces.You can also mosey on over to Dust my Broom, The Prarie Wrangler and Tart Cider to read their take on the offending report.

Technorati Tags: red friday, support the troops, rally, canadian forces, polaris institute, CFRA 580, Steven Staples, AWOL

For those who participated in Red Friday yesterday, my family thanks you.

TrustOnlyMulder over at OfficiallyScrewed.com explains why he’s participating in the Red Friday campaign. His heart is definitely in the right place and I’m all for the wearing of red on Fridays – even if it means I look like a bloated shiney rudolph nose a little worse for wear for the day. However, I just can’t get behind the red ribbon car magnet idea. TrustOnlyMulder explains why he’s supporting a red ribbon over a yellow one this way:

For those who ask “Why not Yellow?”, the response I heard today was that the yellow ribbon is a welcome home ribbon for soldiers. The Red Ribbon/Red Friday campaign is just a way we are showing support to the soldiers and their families. It is likened to friends shaving their heads to show support for a friend with cancer.

Some people have even helpfully posted in the comments where you can find the cheapest red ribbon car magnets.

It’s a nice sentiment, but I really hope too many people don’t buy the red ribbons and instead continue to purchase and display the yellow or camo ones.

Yellow and camo ribbons can be purchased on bases at the Canex or Military Family Resource Centre (MFRC) and from Military Kit Shop websites. The money raised from the purchase of these items goes to the military units (when purchased from kit shops), or to the Military Family Resource Centre (when purchased from the MFRC or Canex). The funds are used to directly support military members and their families. Items purchased from Legions provide much needed funding to support our vetrans.

The point is, we shouldn’t be purchasing the cheapest items, or the one with the coolest background story. If we’re really interested in showing our support for our troops and their families, there are things we can do to put our money where our mouth is.

The Red Friday’s clothing campaign is a way of displaying solidarity, but until the funds generated from a red ribbon campaign are turned over to the MFRC, I’ll be continuing to support the yellow ribbon campaign.

Since I don’t agree with the purchase of Support our Troops car magnets from anywhere other than the MFRC, Legions or a Unit Kit Shop, what can you do to show your support you do if you don’t live close to a base?

1. Purchase a yellow ribbon from an MFRC website, such as Edmonton MFRC.
2. Purchase a yellow ribbon from an official Military kit shop, such as the RCR Kit Shop.
3. Purchase t-shirts, ballcaps, magnets, dog tags, lapel pins, etc. from the Canex Web site.
4. Make a donation to deployed soldiers.
5. Send a letter or postcard to any deployed soldier. To send a care package, you must know the name, rank, unit, etc. of the serving member.
6. Purchase a We Support Our Troops lapel pin or magnet (pg 10) from your local branch of any Royal Canadian Legion or order on-line.

Once you’ve done that, consider joining or supporting the invisible ribbon campaign.

h/t owed to Shere Khan over at Dust my Broom

Technorati Tags: support our troops, red fridays, car magnets, MFRC, invisible ribbon

After years of domination and subjugation to the whims of Chretien and the wishy-washy rudderless stylings of Paul Martin, I can’t believe a Liberal leadership candidate said the following (Source: Yahoo! News):

Canadians have an obligation to keep their “moral promise” to Afghans despite a mounting death toll, Liberal leadership contender Michael Ignatieff said Wednesday as the bodies of five more soldiers returned home from the battlefield. “This is an agonizing mission for Canadians but it’s a mission that amounts to a moral promise,” Ignatieff said following a rally in downtown Toronto where he unveiled a new campaign platform. “It’s a promise in which Canada said ‘We’re going to help Afghans get their country back on its feet.’ And the Canada I love and the Canada I respect always keeps its promises.”

It’s like a breath of fresh air…a potential Liberal leader who is willing to take a stand. It’s not necessarily a popular one, and might hurt his credibility with a large portion of his party members, but he’s made his views known for good or evil. The line has been drawn in the sand. We know which side Ignatieff stands on on this issue.

Just don’t scroll down the article too far or you’ll bump into the following statement:

The former academic said that the Liberals need to be strong, bold leaders because the country is tired of being “manipulated” by Stephen Harper’s Conservatives.

I know I’m young (only been voting for just over a decade) and blonde – so I have two strikes against me – but I just can’t get over the audacity of Ignatieff’s statement. Harper’s Conservatives have yet to hold power for 12 consecutive months and hold a minority government at that. They can’t manipulate anything without the support – overt or tacit – of the other sitting party members. For example, the government could have easily been brought down over the budget vote, but weren’t. Canada assumed command of the Kandahar Province Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) before the Conservatives took the reins (August 2005). All the Conservatives did was extended the pre-existing Liberal committment (from 2007 to 2009).

Now, read the highlighted statement (above) from the article again. Please tell me how we’re being manipulated by the Conservatives while the Liberals are shiney, spanking clean of any manipulation related tarnish? Obviously, I’m missing something important in the nuances of Canadian politics.

It’s days like this where I’m really glad that I vote for politicians based on their personal convictions, local platforms, and past histories rather than on party affiliation. If I based decisions based on blindly following a party into the brink, I don’t think I could live with myself.

Technorati Tags: Ignatieff, moral promise, Afghanistan, Liberals, Conservatives

Since the dawn of time those sneaky leprachauns have been trying to convince us that a pot of gold resides at the end of a rainbow. The members of the 408 Squadron (Canadian Forces) on exercise in Wainwright in September 2005 were able to discover that the “pot” at the end of the rainbow is not filled with gold.

Technorati Tags: rainbow, pot of gold

I’ve often complained in this blog about Canadians (safe at home) demanding we pull our troops out of Afghanistan. With the CTV reports of the most recent deaths of our troops outside of Kandahar, I expect the clamouring to begin anew.

One thing I don’t think I have done well is explain why I think we need to remain in Afghanistan despite the losses on both sides. As Canadians – I’m sure I’m guilty of this – we tend to sit back and watch world affairs from afar. We then pass judgement on other countries politics, behaviours, etc. from on high while smugly sipping our coffees and munching on Timbits.

There needs to be stability before there can be lasting peace. Peacekeeping requires both sides of any armed conflict to be willing to put down their arms and commit to a cease-fire. Afghanistan is not a good candidate for peacekeeping at this time. What use is laying down arms to build schools if the Taliban will destroy all that you build? Why should the people and democratically elected members of the Afghani governement be asked to sit back, stop fighting, and resign themselves to a return to the “old ways” of the Taliban? Isn’t this what we’d be condemming the citizens of Afghanistan to if we walk away now or replace our fighting force with a band of peacekeepers? Peacekeepers are not allowed to intervene – even if they’re watching someone being murdered in front of them – unless directly fired upon. Ask Romeo Dallaire how successful UN peacekeeping measures are in a country where one or both sides of a conflict are bound and determined on slaughter, occupation, domination, and death.

I’m sure it’s obvious that I don’t believe the main purpose of the Canadian Forces is peacekeeping.

There’s a near mythical attitude towards the term peacekeeping in Canada amongst civilians. Modern Canadians have deluded themselves into believing that the only reason why Canada was respected on a world scale was due to it’s peacekeeping efforts. They completely ignore the actions of Canadian soldiers in WWI and WWII where Canada proved herself worthy of standing up for her convictions. Peacekeeping is but one tool in a chest of options to select from. When you’re building or repairing anything, you have to choose the best tool for the job. At this time, I believe it would be folly to select peacekeeping as the preferred course of action in Afghanistan. There is no point in selecting a hammer to repair a leaky pipe…

Additional Reading
Sun columnist, Licia Corbella, hits the nail on the head in her response to Jack Layton‘s most recent call to negotiate peace settlements with the Taliban. I’ve often argued that we cannot hold our heads high and claim we support international women’s rights and yet walk away from the current conflict in Afghanistan. Ms. Corbella paints a vivid picture of what life under the Taliban was like for Afghani citizens, especially women.

Technorati Tags: Kandahar, Afghanistan, Canadian Forces, Taliban, Peacekeeping, Romeo Dallaire