As some of you may have noticed, this page pulled comments from a poster who calls himself 'Reason', which were in response to my column about Canadian military commanders demanding that Canadians civilians shut up about what's happening in Afghanistan because Canadian soldiers have been killed. 'Reason' believes this page to be a hypocrite and an idiot because I'm discouraging dialogue at this site. For those you scoring at home, smear tactics do not amount to dialogue: Not only did 'Reason' claim that opponents of the Afghan occupation disrespect the Canadian military and their families, he also said we've been calling them 'babykillers'.
Those of you who are regular readers, and those of you who have seen me on Babble know that I am capable of saying some very cruel things. I have prayed for Vancouver May Sam Sullivan to rise from his wheelchair and walk again so that we don't have to feel guilty about someone beating the sh*t out of them. I have advised anti-union trolls to go f**k themselves with something sharp. I should have the term "waste of skin" trademarked before the end of this year. However, I HAVE NEVER REFERRED TO ANYONE AS A "BABYKILLER" DURING THE AFGHAN OCCUPATION, NOR AT ANY OTHER TIME. Neither has Linda McQauig, Heather Mallick, Rick Saultin, Avi Lewis, nor anyone else among the too few progressive voices in the mainstream Canadian media. I also haven't seen anyone on Babble call anyone a "babykiller" either. At this point, Reason should understand why his comments were pulled.
'Reason' is under the impression that when Canadian soldiers are killed, their families rush out to buy copies of the Toronto Star and Canadian Dimension so that they can be told how evil their fallen loved ones are. WRONG: I think the families are either too busy looking at the maple leaf flags people are hanging from the highway overpass as the funeral motorcade goes by, or they're starting to agree with the opposition and have some serious questions about what kind of orders the Harper government was passing down to their children. Another thing - If 'Reason' thinks military all military families submissively rally around the flag, he needs to learn who Cindy Sheehan is.
'Reason' doesn't get that in a democracy, people not only say what's on their minds, they also choose what they want to hear, no matter what day of the week it is or if it happens to be raining outside. Reason obviously disagrees, but the "War on Terror" is a phony war being conducted for a multitude of reasons which have nothing to do with stopping terrorism. If Canada were serious about fighting terrorism, our troops would be marching into Pakistan where Al Qaida forces routinely retreat to, and we'd also be infiltrating on a certain six-star hotel in Dubai where Osama Bin Laden has been seen a few times over the past three years. My source on that is a pair of former UAE government employees who picked it up through the local rumour mill, but it's still a way better lead than sending Canadian soldiers into the Afghan hills and waiting to see if they come back.
This war, as this page sees it, is really about securing an oil pipeline from Iraq through Afghanistan, but what it's really about keeping western democracies in a perpetual state of war so that governments can eradicate the freedoms our fathers (including mine) and grandfathers fought to preserve in previous wars. If Canada is perpetually at war against "terror", Canadians are always going to be killed, and someone like reason or Colonel Jon Vance will always be telling us to shut up and not ask questions. When everyone's too afraid of upsetting grieving families and rocking the boat, who needs martial law?
'Reason' has a choice - he can debate what he perceives as the merits of Canada's deployment in Afghanistan, or he can continue his personal attacks on this page and anyone else who opposes current Canadian foreign policy. If he continues to choose the latter, those attacks won't be showing up here.
*NOTE: "Reason" posted up more comments which have been expunged - it appeared at one point we were actually to get some actual dialogue that could have proved to be interesting - he did point out that apparently English isn't Col. Vance's first language and that he was adamant about people needing "breathing space" in the face of tragedy. Unfortunately, he regressed into calling me a hypocrite and called out Babblers such as Unionist and Jingles, accusing them of using the 'babykiller' tag. Reason - if you hate Babble so much, why go there, or for that matter, come here? Geez - what part of "my blog, my rules" don't you understand?
