The Commander in Chief is endangering Canadians

Perrceptions by Gerry Warner
“Suppose They Gave a War and Nobody Came” was the title of a forgettable 1970 movie that ironically seems to have some prescience now as Commander in Chief Stephen Harper prepares to expand our Iraq misadventure into an even larger war in Syria.
Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t believe Syria has declared war on Canada.
In fact, Syria is embroiled in a five-year civil war that shows no sign of ending and is, therefore, in no position to declare war on anyone, little alone us. But this minor detail doesn’t bother our brave Commander in Chief, who’s so eager to get into an even bigger war that he hasn’t even bothered with the diplomatic niceties of telling the Syrians he’s declared war on them, something that’s supposed to be done under international law and the United Nations in the vain hope that it will cause the country declaring war to have second thoughts.
That technically makes Canada an international war criminal, but our eager Commander in Chief doesn’t worry about technicalities even though our US partner in this dangerous venture took the time to inform the Syrians.
And what was the Commander in Chief’s justification for expanding this dangerous venture that has already taken the life of one Canadian? In the past, he said Canadian F-18’s would only go into Syria with the “clear support” of the Syrian government. But Tuesday in Parliament, he said: “The reality is that the Assad regime does not have the will nor the ability to counter the Islamic State in Syria.” In other words, the Syrian government, led by Bashar al-Assad, is in such dire straits from the civil war that it’s incapable of fighting back.
Obviously we have a very brave Commander in Chief.
Our brave Commander also likes to stoke the fears Canadians understandably have about ISIS, the fanatical, jihadist, terrorist group that has overrun parts of Iraq and Syria and committed ghastly beheadings in the name of a perverted brand of Islam that the great majority of the world’s Muslims don’t support. But the PM ignores this in a brazen bid to enrage his core supporters into supporting a holy war against a small but blood-thirsty band of Islamic fighters capable of causing havoc in the volatile Middle East, but with no capacity whatsoever to harm anyone in North America.
Does ISIS have missiles capable of hitting Canada? No.
Does ISIS have an air force that could drop bombs on us? No.
Does ISIS have a navy capable of shelling our shores? No.
Then what are we doing in Iraq and Syria attacking ISIS? Good question!
Unfortunately, ISIS does have a sinister way of harming us thanks largely to our Commander in Chief’s so-called “strategy,” which is playing exactly into their blood-stained hands. Remember the good ol’ days when Canadians were known internationally as peacekeepers? Now, thanks largely to Canada’s participation in the wars in Afghanistan, Libya and now Iraq and Syria we’re no longer seen as international good guys. We’re now seen as another Western, imperial power riding on the coat tails of Uncle Sam dropping bombs indiscriminately on Muslim believers in the Middle East whether they are jihadists or not. And so they hate us and out of that hatred and thanks to the Internet they’re able to recruit “lone wolf” terrorist wannabes in our own ranks that in a few isolated cases have succeeded in killing us. That’s the tragic consequences of what Harper’s bellicose, war mongering strategy is doing to us. Yet, if the polls can be believed, a majority of gullible Canadians support him.
Surely expanding this war in the most war-torn part of the world has deadly consequences we can hardly fathom. Don’t you think it’s time then to hit the re-set button on Harper’s folly?



Gerry Warner is a retired journalist that has lost all respect for the Commander in Chief,

Harper prepares for his next glorious war

Perceptions by Gerry Warner
Stephen Harper is a war monger and he loves guns too! No wonder he’s preparing to send troops into Syria and telling rural Canadians to arm themselves because the Canadian countryside is unsafe.
What else can you conclude after Harper’s bizarre comments last week on the need for a rural arms race and his musing about sending our jets into Syria after what started out as a “non-combat” mission in Iraq. And he even brought his own wife into his dark discussion!
“My wife’s from a rural area and obviously gun ownership wasn’t just for the farm, but was for a certain level of security when you’re a ways away from immediate police assistance.” Harper told the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities. Unfortunately, the Prime Minister didn’t say if Laureen kept a gun under the pillow while he’s away fighting the Taliban in Ottawa. But Harper’s remarks were troubling and ignorant on several levels not to say belligerent coming from the chief law maker of the land.
For starters, Canadian law does not give homeowners in urban or rural areas unfettered rights to blow away someone who unintentionally or intentionally happens to stumble onto your property in the dead of the night. “The suggestion that rural people have firearms in case the police cannot reach them in time is not really consistent with Canadian law on lawful use of force but smacks of American arming for self-protection.” said Wendy Cukier, president of the Coalition for Gun Control, in an email to the Ottawa Citizen.
It also smacks of taking the law into your own hands and vigilante “justice,” but this doesn’t seem to bother Harper and his core supporters, whom he was clearly playing to when he made his gun toting remarks. And with an election coming soon, there’s money to be raised for Conservative coffers as was made plain by Jenni Byrne, the party’s hard-bitten campaign manager and former deputy chief of staff in Harper’s office
“As someone who grew up in a rural part of our country, I was proud to hear what the Prime Minister had to say yesterday,” said Byrne in an email sent to Conservative supporters “Our Conservative party recognizes that guns play an important role in the livelihoods, recreation and safety of many Canadians. And we’re standing up for responsible gun-owning Canadians.”
The National Rifle Association in the US couldn’t have said it better.
And for those who bristle at Harper being called a war monger, have you ever considered how much of your tax money the Prime Minister spent on glorification of the almost forgotten War of 1812, which was actually fought on our behalf by
the British? Our spendthrift Prime Minister spent $28 million on the bicentennial celebrating the forgotten war, including such necessary adornments as a special silver coin, which cost $60-a-piece, a new national monument, funding for historical re-enactments, upgrades to historic sites and even a new mobile phone app! If you don’t think our Prime Minister enjoys a “good” war, you must think the Toronto Maple Leafs will win the Stanley Cup this year.
And then there’s Syria, a place Harper is obviously itching to go with an announcement expected in Parliament next week. The fact that Syria is not at war with us doesn’t seem to deter the Prime Minister nor the fact that the war would be illegal under International Law. But the US and its Middle East allies have been bombing ISIS in Syria since last summer and we know that legal niceties won’t
stop our Prime Minister from sucking up to Uncle Sam.
How sad! We’ve already lost one of our soldiers to “friendly fire” in Iraq and we lost 158 soldiers in 12 years of fighting in Afghanistan – and did not defeat the Taliban – while suicide took 178 Canadian Forces members over the same period.
Surely there’s a message here, but it seems to be lost on our war mongering Prime Minister.



Gerry Warner is a retired journalist, who believes politicians should serve in the wars they support.