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The CBC sagely intones:
“Two high-profile international events bookended Harper’s year: welcoming the immensely popular U.S. President Barack Obama to Ottawa in February and making an overdue sojourn to China in December. Both generated mainly positive reviews.”
Wow, our PM is really rocking the house with deeply important meetings and visits vital to all Canadians. 
“Harper began the year facing huge political potholes at home but opted to hit the road internationally — a time-honoured coping mechanism of Canadian prime ministers.”
I guess we can gloss over stimulus-gate, the imperial misadventure in Afghanistan, and the perilous state of the Canadian social fabric.
“Move along move along…nothing to see here….”
*rolls eyes*
The Conservative government is handling our alleged abuse of Afghan detainees with an sublime air of stupidity that George Bush made (in)famous. It seems that outright lying has not worked. We are now own to indignant posturing and appeals to patriotism. Allow me to illustrate.
Richard Colvin, a senior intelligence officer brought to light Canadian misdeeds:
“According to our information, the likelihood is that all the Afghans we handed over were tortured,” Colvin told a parliamentary committee on Nov. 18.
Canadian Defence Minister War Propagandist Peter Mackay said:
“The member is suggesting by implication that the military did something wrong, that somehow they did not do the right thing. That is what is so despicable,” MacKay said on Dec. 10.”
What? How dare anyone question the character of our troops and our mission in Afghanistan! Especially when their allegations are false…
“The documents reveal that in 2008, military police launched six separate investigations into allegations of abuse involving Canadian troops.”
Errr….whoops! It seems like something is going on over there. However, so far we’re clean according to our military:
“The military police determined that the allegations were unfounded in five of the six cases, and the remaining investigation is ongoing,” said Maj. Paule Poulin, a spokesperson for the Canadian Forces Provost Marshall.
One can always trust the military to police itself.
And now the sour flourish:
“However, MacKay apparently never told the House there were allegations against Canadian troops, at least one of which is still being investigated.”
We can always trust politicians to act unethically. It is nice that Mr.Mackay provides such a clear example (via his briefing notes) of his dedication to the service and maintenance of power, justice be damned.
I’ve been keeping an eye on what has been happening recently with the Canadian Armed Forces and their handling of the detainee situation. The prognosis has been rather bleak. We are most likely responsible for people being abused and tortured while under our aegis. The Harper government has been doing backflips as of late to keep a lid on the story. Intransigentia has forwarded this article to my attention.
“The Harper government has effectively suspended parliamentary hearings on allegations that Afghan detainees were transferred to torture – boycotting attempts by opposition MPs to continue a Commons probe of the matter.”
Why are the Conservatives engaged in what seems to be a full on exercise in damage control if in fact, there is no substance to the allegations raised by Richard Colvin?
The Conservatives are blocking parliamentary inquiries saying insipid tidbits like this:
“It’s not the time to be having meetings that are implying, intentioned or not, that Canadians are somehow guilty of war crimes,” Laurie Hawn, the parliamentary secretary for the Defence Minister, said on CTV’s Power Play after the aborted meeting.
Well Mr.Hawn when exactly is the time to investigate possible war crimes perpetrated by our forces? The optics do not improve by stalling and delaying the House of Commons about the issue.
What is happening is that the Conservatives know they have a situation that will bring down their government. Delaying parliament is only the first step in the three ring circus that is forming around this issue. I guarantee this is only going to get worse.
The justice system in Canada moves slowly but this just in from the CBC:
“The girl, whom Kennedy identified as “Miss X” in his report, was a 15-year-old inmate at the Arctic Tern Young Offenders Facility in Inuvik when on March 13, 2007, she was subdued with an RCMP Taser while she was handcuffed and held face-down on the floor by jail staff.”
Well isn’t that nice. Yet another case of a taser being misused by police.
“Kennedy said the officer who used the stun gun, Const. Noella Cockney, had been called to the youth facility by staff who said the girl was not co-operating with their orders to go into a segregated area.
After Cockney gave Miss X several warnings, the girl swore at her and told her to go ahead and use the electric stun gun. The officer “deployed the Taser for a full five-second cycle, causing Miss X to co-operate,” according to the report.”
Here is what gets me. According to the above report the girl swore at her and told her to go ahead and zap her. I have personal experience in working with highly charged situations with youth. One must always remember to remain in control of your own emotions and thought processes despite the fact your heart is beat a million beats per minute and your nervous system has you jacked up and ready to react to the presented stimulus.
Was Miss X asking for it? Should that even enter into the equation? Especially after being handcuffed and restrained by two other individuals. As the chairman of the Commission for the Complaints against the RCMP, Paul Kennedy, states:
“You’re in a custodial situation; you’re not going to go very far. You’re handcuffed — that’s a problem — [and] you’re lying on your stomach and with three people holding you down. So obviously there’s no need for it.”
Kids have a knack for getting under your skin, and if you let them, you give them control of the situation. I would like to put forth the assumption that this is what happened in this case. The Miss X, the youth, pissed off the constable off and she reacted with more force than was necessary to subdue her. Something was amiss as later in the news story it was reported that there was two versions of the incident:
“Cockney [the constable involved with Miss X] filed a report after the incident, but it was undated and printed nine months later. Kennedy said that report did not provide any detail on what Miss X was doing to justify using the Taser.
Cockney was not certified to use a Taser at the time, as her qualifications had expired about a year before, Kennedy found.”
Huh. Two versions of the truth, again. This particular case seems to have a fair amount of CYA involved, but still the two reports are indicative the incident was not handled ‘by the book’.
I wonder how many more people will have to be subjected to electro-torture before we realize that stun-guns should not be in the hands of our police forces.
Welcome to Edmonton, your temperature is now a balmy -41 degrees centigrade. Your face will freeze off in less that two minutes if you are not careful. Rubber will snap like glass, the snow makes a new sound when you walk on it and if you have not plugged your car in well… enjoy your indoor stay.
Days like today are good for only one thing. Multiple blankets, cats, hot chocolate (preferably with peppermint schnapps) and a good book and warm radio.
Or you can be like me and have a choral concert to attend to. *sigh* The things I do to sing.
Oh hey, I found the windchill chart from Environment Canada posted here in all of its frosty glory. Make note of the helpful chart at the end we are almost in the red-zone, woo-haa.
*update* – The choral concert was a smash hit! A 2 minute standing O for us, it was great. Almost worth the frozen extremities.
Way to go Calgary police department. I mean really what should we be expecting from the justice system? Five years just seems to fly by while waiting for the people that raped you to go to jail.
Deputy Chief Murray Stooke said:
“Regrettably, we have a situation that demonstrates we don’t have enough checks and balances in place and we’ve had a catastrophic result,” he said. “Our police service does regret very much that we’ve had a file stayed on the basis of system delay.”
What perfectly ugly example to set for those women who right now are considering bringing charges up against their rapists? Like it isn’t hard enough as is.
Alberta Justice spokeswoman Kim Misik said this result is “extremely rare” and they understand the woman and her family must be disappointed.
“We’re taking this seriously,” she said. “We want to make sure if there are any gaps in the process, we identify them to make sure this kind of result doesn’t happen again.”
Well that is nice. It certainly looks like you are managing your public image and spin very well.
The issues women face, once again, are marginalized. How can you justify a five (5!!) year delay in getting this in front of a judge? What kinda of clerical errors are we talking about here?
As the article says the police are profusely sorry. Good for them, it should much to appease their conscious because what was taken from the rape victim does not get fixed by a ‘sorry’ or an ‘oops we screwed up’. A conviction does not ‘fix’ anything either; how could it? Rape is a gross violation of a woman’s autonomy and personhood, leaving lasting scars and traumatic wounds that will follow her for the rest of her life. A conviction is the very least of what should be done.
The police could not have set a worse example for women and their potential rapists. Thanks for nothing CPD.
What is not surprising is that Harper’s Government continues to stonewall the inquiry into the allegations that Canadian troops knowingly handed over captured Afghan prisoners. The playbooks seems to somewhat disorganized as Gen. Walter Natynczyk found out he needed to change his story to harmonize with what the current acceptable truth needs to be.
“The individual who was beaten by the Afghan police was, in fact, in Canadian custody,” Natynczyk told reporters in Ottawa on Wednesday.
Natynczyk had told a parliamentary committee that Canadian troops questioned the man, picked up during operations in Zangabad. But Natynczyk said it was the Afghans who took him into custody.”
Okay..but then….
“On Wednesday, the defence staff chief said he has received new information and learned that Canadians had taken the suspect into custody before handing him over to the Afghans.”
Whoops! Well, apparently we did actually have him in Canadian custody. The general was very apologetic. Also, the prisoner in question was also rescued by Canadian soldiers after they saw the prisoner being beaten by Afghan authorities.
This is just one case though. The amount of smoke and mirrors being produced in Ottawa as of late lead me to question our policy and presence in Afghanistan.
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
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