Category: History

Every Time You Call an Election, Santa Claus Kills a Kitten

Despite Paul Martin’s invocation of the wrath of Santa Claus as a reason not to campaign over Christmas, Parliament was dissolved yesterday, and Canadians finally have a chance to stick it to the arrogant kleptomaniacs who’ve turned the True North into their private banana republic.

Now polls are showing the Liberals’ popularity falling in, of all places, Ontario.

It’s not that Harper is the second incarnation of Christ or anything. But at least he might actually acknowledge the fact that there exists little tiny bits of Canada west of Mississauga.

Damian Penny has some good advice for the Tories:

1. Don’t let the Liberals set the agenda. They have betrayed the public trust, and the onus is on the Martin government to show why it deserves to stay in power – not on Stephen Harper to prove he isn’t “scary”.

2. Don’t be afraid to run as Conservatives, not a “Lite” version of the Liberal Party of Canada. Canadians are much more open to new ideas in areas such as health care and immigration than the CBC or Toronto Star would have you believe.

3. Lock Ralph Klein in the basement until after election day. No, it isn’t fair that Alberta gets all the blame for “destroying” medicare when Quebec is further along in introducing private health care. And it isn’t fair that the Conservatives are dismissed as a “Western” party, when the Liberal caucus is overwhelmingly from Ontario. But that’s the line the Liberals want to push, and many Canadian media outlets (I’m thinking of a newspaper whose name rhymes with “Robe and Bail”) will enthusiastically push it for them. The last thing Harper needs is Ralph Klein to open his mouth about medicare.

4. If the Liberals bring up Iraq, throw Paul Martin’s statements in support of the war back in their faces – and emphasize that Iraqis are lining up for hours to exercise their right to vote, while the Liberals are trying to make you believe it’s somehow too hard for Canadians to exercise that right in the winter.

5. If the Liberals accuse the Tories of plotting to “destroy” medicare, ask Paul Martin where his personal physician works.

6. And most of all: it’s not enough to tell Canadians they shouldn’t vote Liberal. Canadians want an alternative. Let’s give them one.

Iraq Miscellania

Instapundit links to a revealing article about the troops’ view of the war:

Like many soldiers and marines returning from Iraq, Mayer looks at the bleak portrayal of the war at home with perplexity – if not annoyance. It is a perception gap that has put the military and media at odds, as troops complain that the media care only about death tolls, while the media counter that their job is to look at the broader picture, not through the soda straw of troops’ individual experiences.

More discussion here.

LGF points to an article debunking the “massive civillian casualties” myth.

In April 2004 I took a survey of left-wing casualty numbers for the invasion and first year of occupation of Iraq. They ranged from 10 to 20 thousand civillians killed. Human Rights Watch had estimated that Saddam Hussein killed at least 30,000 of his citizens every year. So in the war and the first year of occupation, the United States saved the lives of at least 10,000 Iraqis who would have died under the genocidical tyrant who now stands in a courtroom whining about stationary.

Urban Legends about the Iraq War

What you think you know about President Bush and his foreign policy is wrong.

Via several sites comes a link to a comprehensive debunking of urban legends about the Iraq war.

Urban Legend: Helping democracy take root in Iraq was a postwar rationalization by the Bush administration; it was an argument that was not made prior to going to war. In the words of a November 13, 2003 New York Times editorial, “The White House recently began shifting its case for the Iraq war from the embarrassing unconventional weapons issue to the lofty vision of creating an exemplary democracy in Iraq.”

Reality: The President argued the importance of democracy taking root in Iraq before the war began. A February 27, 2003 New York Times editorial shatters the very myth the paper was perpetrating just nine months later: “President Bush sketched an expansive vision last night [in an American Enterprise Institute speech] of what he expects to accomplish by a war in Iraq. Instead of focusing on eliminating weapons of mass destruction, or reducing the threat of terror to the United States, Mr. Bush talked about establishing a ‘free and peaceful Iraq’ that would serve as a ‘dramatic and inspiring example’ to the entire Arab and Muslim world, provide a stabilizing influence in the Middle East, and even help end the Arab-Israeli conflict. The idea of turning Iraq into a model democracy in the Arab world is one some members of the administration have been discussing for a long time.” President Bush’s 2002 State of the Union made the same case….