Dear Mr Harper: About that Poll…
On Thursday I answered the phone and it was you Mr Harper (well, your robot pollster lady) wondering whether I’d answer a 30 second political survey. While I can’t be…
ISIS
Are we reaching a critical mass on climate change?
Convincing people that anthropogenic climate change is real is a tough slog. Quite aside from the difficulty of selling inconvenient truths, powerful interests have been arrayed against the science. Nonetheless,…
Will Canadian troops in Ukraine have to train radical Islamist volunteers said to be tied to ISIS?
PHOTOS: Defence Minister Jason Kenney explains who Canadian troops will train in Ukraine last fall. Below: Prime Minister Stephen Harper in Ukraine in 2010. Photos are from the CBC and…
Why Britain is culpable for the slaughter of its citizens
British Prime Minister David Cameron is enraged at the massacre on a beach at the Sousse resort in Tunisia last week. And well he should be: thirty of his countrymen…
Difficult To Talk About, Important To Try
This is a difficult subject to talk about, because highlighting it could easily be viewed as hypocritical. In my defense, I’m not defending Trudeau because I want him elected, and…
The Final Chapter for Bashar Assad
Things are not looking up for Syrian strongman, Bashar Assad. His first problem is the Sunni Muslim coalition of Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia (ordinarily not the best of friends)…
Why The "Fight Against ISIS" Is A Farce
Prime Minister Harper’s current political “divert the public’s attention” strategy is to beat on the war drums over ISIS. Yes, ISIS is a brutal lot, and they are doing a…
Why The "Fight Against ISIS" Is A Farce
Prime Minister Harper's current political "divert the public's attention" strategy is to beat on the war drums over ISIS. Yes, ISIS is a brutal lot, and they are doing a…
Best Thing I’ve Read On ISIS
It’s run by Saddam’s old gang from the Baath party. The best bit: Rayburn questions whether even some of the foreign volunteers realise the extent to which they are being…
"Whack a Mole" is No Reason to Go to War.
We spent a decade in Afghanistan playing whack-a-mole, essentially achieving nothing. We had no coherent vision of what ‘victory’ might even look like much less how it could be achieved.…
Has Harperland Made Canada a Rogue State
The Tyee’s Crawford Kilian argues that Harper’s Canada has become a rogue state. Kilian disposes of the arguments of those, including several Liberals, who see a “moral imperative” in our…
Deliver Us From Evil
Why do we tolerate Saudi Arabia when the kingdom, and its Sunni state allies, seems determined to deliver Yemen into the control of ISIS and al Qaeda? Gwynne Dyer writes…
Some Inspiration From A Clear-Thinking Citizen
That’s what I derive from Donald Crump’s Star letter. It is a shame more of our fellow citizens are not possessed of such critical faculties: Increasing risk of terror in…
Want Canada to Make a Difference? Let’s Back Tunisia.
Face it. There’s not much hope that we’re really going to achieve anything significant from our air war in Iraq, regardless of whether we get stuck into Syria also. All…
What Has Jason Kenney Been Smoking?
Seriously. I’m wondering if our fledgling defence minister was high, high, high, when he proclaimed that, after we defeat ISIS, Iraq and Syria better not look to Canada to create…
Penetrating The Fog Of War
Today I turn, once again, to Star letter-writers to inspire both sanity and hope in our troubled land: No ‘middle’ in Mideast war debate, March 25 Prime Minister Stephen Harper…
It’s a Muslim Religious Civil War and We’re Going In Blind.
When we see one of our closest Arab allies, Saudi Arabia, go after a Shiite bunch engaged in combat with ISIS and al Qaeda forces, the same groups we’re supposedly…
Finally, a Mulroney We Can Believe In.
David Mulroney served as a deputy minister in charge of Canada’s Afghanistan task force. It seems he learned a thing or two from the experience, enough to know that we’re…
Tony Blair and his "Bloody Crusades"
Tony Blair’s former deputy prime minister, John Prescott, thinks he can explain the radicalization of Britain’s Muslim youth – his former boss Tony Blair’s “bloody crusade” to topple Saddam Hussein.…