Moonlight Graham

I'd rather Canadians themselves use their votes to fire the Conservatives if so chosen rather than relying on a foreigner who derives 100% of her power from who her mommy and daddy were.

Because you don't get it.

I didn't stereotype anyone. I said "many" older people, not all.

How have you felt this fear in your own life? I think many older people ie: baby-boomers and up are much more "scared" of Muslims and Arabs than younger, more open-minded people. People fear what they don't understand. This being the case, many older adults never went to school with a Muslim or know many if any personally...and so comes some fear. On the other hand, some people are just ignorant.

This is fantastic. Found it somewhere on the web.

More Afghans are joining the Taliban everyday. What people need to understand is that the Taliban isn't just some isolated group of corrupt warlords & terrorists. The people joining the Taliban are everyday Afghans who are tired of centuries & millenia of foreign powers invading & occupying their country. They also want jobs. The biggest thing is that the Afghans want us gone & they want to determine the path of their country & gov't by themselves. I don't blame them. If a foreign country invaded Canada you bet i'd grab a gun and try to send them packing.

That's not an accurate comparison. There was nobody in Canada when the aboriginals came from Siberia, so they were the 1st owners (unless you count the vikings). What we did to the natives was wrong. However, much of the wars on this planet has been fought over land ownership. Europeans basically went to war with the natives and won, thus taking control of the land. I feel bad for the natives that were slaughtered, but it can't be undone. I don't know enough about the current state of aboriginals in Canada to comment further.

Canada?? Wait no thats not right...

It is a joke. The objectives will never happen the way their going about it. Oh, and i love that part of the NATO and ISAF objective is "reconstruction" (and as if this is an honourable thing). You can't reconstruct a country unless you deconstruct it first. You know you're history BC, why can't you learn from it?

These aren't hookers on the street corner. This is being done by people hired by the U.S. gov't and representing the country over there. It's quite disgusting. More shocking than the allegations originally mentioned in this thread.

I agree that our troops should be given big credit for doing a great job during their time in Afghanistan. Very brave and competent men and women. HOWEVER, the entire gameplan NATO has in Afghanistan is a joke. I can't believe how many of you smart people on these boards support the current war. We have been in Afghanistan for 8 freaking years, and we have clearly seen that we are not going to defeat the Taliban militarily. The best we've been able to do is push the Taliban from a impoverished, militarily weak country and into a much more powerful & unstable nuclear-armed country that helps fund them courtesy the ISI. At least we've given the poor folks there some employment opportunities as members of an unrelenting insurgency. When are people, politicians, and military leaders going to get it? The Afghans don't want us there, don't want us deciding their fate for them, and will not stop fighting until we are gone. We need to focus our efforts & money on helping them build their own country...if they want us to. We need to give them reasons not to hate us and reasons not to want to support a group that wants to blow-up our subways and crash planes into our buildings, unlike what the West has been doing for decades and centuries in Afghanistan. The NATO mission is a joke. Making little headway and doomed for failure with the current philosophy. If we install a puppet gov't like we've done, the moment we leave there will be a coup. If we try to train an Afghan police/military security force, the moment we leave they'll be slaughtered by the Taliban/insurgents that massively outnumber them (the rate of new Taliban recruits vs the rate of new adequately trained Afghan police/military men is a joke). A military solution for Afghanistan/Pakistan is not possible. Why then do we continue the military approach? Let's get the Taliban to the table & find realistic solutions. Yes, the higher ups in the Taliban (and most Afghan elite) are brutal war criminals and drug lords. Welcome to Afghanistan.

I agree 100%. We need more people exposing this crap. And really, i agree with BC. This news isn't very shocking. Important, yes. But shocking or surprising given what we've heard about Blackwater in the news for years? No.

Maybe when the Blackwater owner rides the lighting?

Some shocking accusations from 2 different witnesses:

Well the USS Cole incident is a good point. Not sure how cozy the CIA would be to Bin Laden after that. Upon further thought, given Bin Laden's hatred towards the U.S. after the 90's Gulf War (as seen in pre-911 OBL interviews with western media), i'm skeptical of how much OBL would want to deal with the US. So ya, i suppose it is a far-fetched tale.

Exactly.

The point is that he is Canadian and shouldn't be subjected to torture and whatever other crap the U.S. military does in Gitmo. If Khadr is guilty of the accused crimes, bring him back and let him rot in our jails amidst some basic human rights.

Is it honestly that much stretch of the imagination?

I try to avoid watching FOX, minus the odd Bill O'Rielly for poops n' giggles. So i have no idea who Glenn Beck is nor do i care.

Would not be surprised in the least if this were true.

Oh no the sky is falling. Much ado about little.

You think the ends will justify the means in Iraq? It would have probably taken Saddam and his sons quite a while to kill 100,000+ of their citizens and blow up tons of infrastructure. But then again, Bin Laden and Saddam were in constant contact so i guess you win.

Well, non-violent civil disobedience is basically the same things dropping bombs on people to solve problems.

Yes, expectations will not be met. He is now a part of the "machine" and is puppy to all the interest groups that control White House policy. But as far as U.S. Presidents go, he'll probably still go down as one of the better ones post WWII. Maybe as his term goes on we'll see a dip as exceptions sour, and then a slow climb as reality hits it that he's doing ok. Though he might get some big blame in a couple years when people realize the Afghanistan policies of Bush/Obama are a joke.

I have no use for the monarchy. I'd prefer something more, well, democratic as our head of state than who your daddy was. So this visit will be a yawn for me.