Out of Afghanistan by February of ’09.

That’s become the favourite bleat of the federal Liberal party of late and the “bring them home at any cost” crowd have seized upon it like a flock of seagulls fighting over a dead fish.

“Support our troops; bring them home!” they snivel, as they try to cloak their self-serving abhorrence of all things military in the colours of patriotism. And every flag-draped casket that returns to Canadian soil seems to make them worse and worse, as they sickeningly caterwaul the same old bullshit over and over again:

Our young men are dying for George Dubya Shrubâ„¢ and Big Oil®. It’s America’s war, not ours. The Afghans beat the Soviet Union so what chance do we have? They don’t want us there; the only ones who want us in Afghanistan are the “chickenhawks.” And perhaps the worst one: we’re the ones who are the oppressors and it’s the insurgents guerillas murdering sons of bitches that are the freedom fighters 😯 and our soldiers don’t want any part of that; they’re just following the orders of Stephen Dubya (for Warmonger) Harper and his Extreme Far Right Agenda.

I don’t have the time to pick these apart one by one and give them the full treatment that they deserve, so I’ll just summarize…

• Harper didn’t send us to Afghanistan, the Liberano$ did.
• It’s the UN‘s mission, NOT the US’s (You guys remember the UN, right? The international toothless tiger that you think should make all the decisions?).
• The Afghans didn’t beat the Soviets, the Americans did; Afghanistan was just another front in the Cold War, which was won by the West, NOT by Islamofascists.
• Have you ever asked an Afghani if they want us there? Get back to me after you’ve tried that. I already have.

And as far as the “chickenhawk” and “they don’t want to be there” arguments go, that’s utter bullshit. Have any of these idiots ever even talked to a soldier? A real one, that is; not some gutless Yank hiding out from his unit up here. The ones who are most dedicated to the mission are the ones who have to actually put their asses on the line for it, and who pay the real price. The price that is measured not in votes or sound bytes or how many potheads show up for the latest “peace” rally. Contrary to the cliche, it isn’t even measured in blood. It is a price measured in lives, snuffed out forever. It is paid in that horrible place where the world turns to fire and every sound is drowned out by the roaring fury of armageddon until it is finally driven away by the voice of your maker calling you home.

It is a price not paid by the likes of you and I; it is paid by our betters. Paid by women like the Capt. Nichola Goddard and men like Cpl. Brent Donald Poland:

Soldier: ‘If I die, that is my destiny’
Sat, April 21, 2007
By JOE MATYAS, SUN MEDIA

Pupils from Temple Christian Academy throw petals onto the road in Sarnia yesterday in front of the hearse carrying the body of Cpl. Brent Poland killed on Easter Sunday in Afghanistan, doing what he most wanted. (MORRIS LAMONT Sun Media)

SARNIA — He was an officer who gave up his higher rank and higher pay to serve in the Canadian Forces infantry.

And Cpl. Brent Donald Poland, 37, died in the service of his country, doing what he wanted to do, 1,400 mourners were told here yesterday.

“My brother loved this country, believed in Canadian values and believed in freedom,” Mark Poland, a Kitchener Crown prosecutor and major in the reserves, said in a testimonial during a funeral service at Temple Baptist Church.

Poland packed up his kit bag and boarded the military flight to Afghanistan “with eyes wide open,” said Mark, adding his brother, always independent of mind, was convinced he was doing something meaningful.

During his last meeting with his brother, when they were huddled on a porch smoking “big stinky guitars,” Brent asked Mark:

“How would you like to live in a place where women aren’t allowed to read and where children have no hope?”

Brent was both nervous and excited about going to a combat zone, said Mark.

He was prepared for anything and said: “If I die on the battlefields of Afghanistan, then that is my destiny.”

The complete article is here; read it. Not getting it yet? Here’s something from Poland’s hometown paper, the Sarnia Observer:

Cpl. Poland laid to rest
Mourners numbered about 1,200
By DAN McCAFFERY
Local News – Saturday, April 21, 2007

Cpl. Brent Poland was remembered Friday as a courageous soldier who loved his family, friends and country.

Poland, one of six Canadians killed by a roadside bomb in Afghanistan on Easter Sunday, was laid to rest following an emotional funeral service at Temple Baptist Church.

His younger brother, Mark Poland, told an estimated 1,200 mourners that Brent could easily have avoided combat, had he wanted to.

In fact, Brent had suffered a back injury in training that made it impossible for him to continue serving as a 2nd Lieutenant. At that point, he could have transferred out of the infantry, retained his rank and accepted a less demanding job in the Canadian Forces.

But “he would not hear of it,” Mark said. “He loved the infantry.”

Instead, although he was almost twice as old as the average foot soldier, he accepted a demotion of several ranks and remained in the infantry as a corporal.

Capt. David Ferris, who trained with Brent, confirmed the story. “Brent once said if he couldn’t lead soldiers, then he would be led, but either way he would be on that battlefield.”

Mark Poland said Brent went to war fully aware of the risks. Shortly before he went overseas he gathered old high school buddies for a reunion and made a point of visiting family and friends. “He was preparing those around him for the possibility this very day could come,” he said.Mark recalled discussing the Afghanistan mission with Brent the last time they met. When someone questioned the wisdom of the operation, Brent replied by asking whether they’d like to live in a country where women weren’t allowed to read, or where people had no future.

Mark noted the terrorists who murdered 3,000 civilians on Sept. 11, 2001 were trained in Afghanistan. “It was into the fierce winds of 9/11 that my brother stepped with his head held high,” he said.

Mark said Brent “went into the mission with his eyes wide open. That is the very essence of courage and the very definition of bravery.”

Brent wrote a letter for his family that was only to be opened in the event of his death. In it, he wrote, “Hi folks. If you are reading this, I bought the farm in Afghanistan.” The first point he wanted to make, he said, is that they should “stop blubbering.” He had, he continued, experienced more in his 37 years than most people had in three lifetimes.

He joined the army, he said, because he had been “miserable” while working as a project manager in the Toronto area.

During his life, Brent earned two university degrees, travelled through Europe and even spent time teaching English in a tiny Greek village.

Born in Sarnia, he was raised in Camlachie and spent many a summer day on his grandparents’ farm just outside Brigden.

Mark said his brother lived an idyllic childhood in which he loved to roam the woods, beaches and open fields.

When he enrolled at York University, Brent invited Mark and his friends to visit him, despite the fact they were still in high school. Some on campus may have thought it wasn’t a “cool” thing to do, Mark said. “But Brent could have cared less. Brent lived life independently minded and fiercely loyal to his family and friends.”

As Brent was borne to his grave, hundreds of people lined Quinn Drive. School children tossed flowers and waved flags.

The procession, which stretched for as far as the eye could see, wound its way through rural Lambton, finally ending up at Bear Creek Cemetery, a little country graveyard not far from his grandparents farm.

As the hearse turned down a dusty road leading to the cemetery, a lonely piper stood in the bright sunshine, playing ‘Going Home.’

Noni Seybrook of the Forest Legion Pipe Band said as a young lad Brent had undoubtedly roamed the fields he was now passing on his way to his grave. “Bear Creek ran behind the Poland property and you know how boys are with tadpoles,” she said. “I’m going to play ‘Going Home.’ It’s a nice tune, and it’s fitting. He’s coming home.”

Our soldiers aren’t dying for oil, they aren’t dying for Dubya or for Haliburton and they aren’t God damned stupid, so stop acting like they are!! They do what they do because they’re doing what’s right. The Cindy Sheehan-grade idiots may not be able to figure that out, but those who wear the uniform know it. They know it in their bones. They know it so well that they will go out of their way to risk their lives for it, and die for it if they have to.

So, to those “bring ’em home” types out there: the next time you open your piehole to say that you support the troops but not the mission, don’t bother. Lie to yourself, if you want but don’t expect me to eat up your bullshit like ice cream. Saying you support the troops but not the mission is like saying that you support freedom but think Hitler should have been left alone.

The troops support the mission.
They support it with their lives.
They aren’t stupid.
They know what they’re doing.
They’re doing the right thing.

Quit pretending that you support them.
You don’t.
And we all know it.

As most of you know, I am often highly critical of those who work in the mainstream media. I still am, because I truly believe that, more often than not, my criticisms are fully justified.

Whether for ideological, agenda-driven purposes or from a simple desire to get a bigger slice of the media pie at any cost, members of the media mislead us each and every day. Some of them even outright lie to us.

Sometimes though, one of them will just make an honest mistake. Perhaps a lapse in judgment, perhaps simply an inability to keep up with the maelstrom of information that swirls around a particular story as it unfolds. But still, a mistake. And then the weasely son of a bitch still tries to worm his way out from under it, rather than admit he was wrong.

Alleged link to killer an insult to victim Emily

I am very pleased to say that the TO Sun’s Thane Burnett is not such an individual. Thane screwed up. Big. But instead of puking up a bunch of weasel-talk and trying to shift off the blame, Thane stood up, admitted what he did, said in no uncertain terms that it was wrong, accepted the consequences and took it like a man [aw, crud; the feminists are gonna poop on me now…]:

BLACKSBURG — In the stampede that followed the massacre at Virginia Tech, victim Emily Hilscher was cut again and again.

Including by me.

Emily was likely the first of Cho Seung-Hui’s victims here, along with Ryan Clark, inside West Ambler Johnson residence. Clark had rushed to her aid when he heard the first shots of the day on Monday.

Police have not officially called Cho the pair’s executioner, because while the same weapon was used in their deaths as the 30 others inside Norris Hall a few hours later, they have not proven that connection beyond their own professional benchmark.

Which is a good reason to bring me back to 18-year-old Emily, and the insult news writers like myself placed on her memory. In most early stories — including my own for Sun Media — Emily was offhandedly referred to as a possible girlfriend to Cho. Or that they, at least, had a relationship.

There were other stories printed elsewhere which went beyond, accusing her of leading him on or of cheating on him. That loose end was tied up and we went on to the next of how many more disturbing facts — leaving Emily to linger too long in the filth of an unlikely association.

Even yesterday, an overseas online headline read: “Gunman’s Love Spat Sparked Massacre.”

Sickening enough that a madman killed her. Now add the slur she was involved with him romantically.

How the ghost of Cho — who took pictures of girls secretly and would not say hello to them but stalked them via the Internet — must have grinned at that link.

Police said yesterday they were still trying to find a connection between Emily and the twisted character who liked to be known as “question mark.” But it seems clear now her world, or any of the important elements in it, didn’t likely include Cho.

She was light, happy and loved to ride in the country with her mother — whom she called almost every day.

He was dark and angry — worrying his own parents he was suicidal.

Tommy Pendleton, a friend of Emily’s, pointed out in an online posting: “Emily Hilscher is not related to the shooter in any way regarding a serious relationship.”

While the probable lack of any relationship has been amended and clarified deep inside news copy which has flowed out of here, I feel guilt that I had any part in drawing her into an embrace with a killer.

What seems beyond question is that Emily Hilscher didn’t deserve to appear in the same sentence as vile Cho Seung-Hui, let alone maligned by the allegation he held a place in her heart.

The emphasis, of course, is mine.  I apologize, Mister Burnett, if I am not adequately able to state my feelings at having found a journalist demonstrating such integrity. It is an experience to which I am most unaccustomed.

But it is most welcome. For that sir, I thank you.

No doubt about it, today is a damn fine day to be from Wild Rose Country. HMPM Harper has announced in the House today that, with the retirement of Sen. Dan Hays in June, he will be appointing Alberta’s Bert Brown to the upper chamber.

Brown — a farmer from Kathyrn, Alta., who once plowed the message “Triple-E Senate or Else” into a barley field — was actually chosen by the people of Alberta in their third senate election in 2004. Brown will become oly the second elected senator in Canadian history, after Stan Waters; who was appointed in 1990 by Brian Mulroney (another conservative… hmm).

You can read more about it here, here, here and here.

Interestingly enough: if your only source of news is the Ceeb, you’d never know about this. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe it’s just buried under something else. “Canada’s news,” indeed… 🙄

. . . Not again. That’s what’s been running around in my head, over and over, for the last several hours. If you’re one of the three people that hasn’t heard yet, there was a school shooting at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Va. this morning (footage from CTV, CNN and the Ceeb).

As I write this, the latest toll stands at 29 wounded and 33 dead; including the shooter. You don’t need to be a genius to know that it’s going to get worse.

You also don’t need a PhD to know that this is going to end up being the latest and greatest cause celebre for the anti-gun nuts. Others will go the opposite way. Either way, these poor people and their families are damned likely going to find themselves yanked every which way by unsavoury types with an axe to grind from both sides of the issue.

The anti-gun moonbats are going to say that guns are too easy to get, loose laws are at fault, if only guns were harder to get, this would never have happened, etc, etc, ad nauseam… There’s one little hole in all this: it gets pointed out over at LGF that, about a year or so ago, the widget waxers in the Virginia state legislature killed a measure that would have prevented public institutions (like Virginia Tech) from banning licensed conceal & carry of firearms on their grounds.

Virginia Tech’s governing board rejoiced, saying it would make their students, faculty and visitors feel safer.

Apparently Virginia Tech is very proud of its “violence prevention” policy, which bans guns on school premises.

Sounds like the shooter hadn’t read the policy.

Sounds like it. I don’t want to politicize this any more than I absolutely feel the need to but… is it just me, or does anybody else think that the body count could have been one hell of a lot lower if somebody on hand had been able to return fire?

Consider, if you will: Columbine, Edinboro, Pa, Pearl, Mi and the University of Virginia became household topics and gun control buzzwords in the ‘States and brought howls for stricter laws. But all the leftist, MSM coverage of these incidents left out one very important fact that you may not be aware of.

Three out of these four incidents were stopped by armed bystanders.

You read that right. Three of them were stopped, not by any namby-pamby gun registry or by finger-wagging from some pantywaist moonbat, but by superior firepower.

• The Edinboro incident was stopped by nearby restaurant owner James Strand, who got the drop on the asshole the with a shotgun as he was reloading.
• The Pearl, Mississippi incident was stopped when the assistant principal retrieved his his own firepower from his truck and stopped the killer. Like above, the attacker found himself on the wrong end of a 12 gauge and gave up.
• The Virginia incident ground to a halt when two students pulled their own guns and forced the killer to drop his.

Then there’s the Civilian Gun Self-Defense Blog, which lists literally hundreds of cases of criminals running afoul of an armed “victim.”

Um, okay… Not… really… sure… where to file this, to be honest.  I really don’t want to have me a “Lighting Your Own Brainfarts” category on this sight.  It would be kinda unsightly, ya know…

Over at DMB, ol’ Brainfart Badwulf seems to have finally cashed in on his Andy Warhol / War of the Worlds / Blair Witch Project minutes…  Just click the links, read the comments (check the ones on Red Tory), scratch your head and go have a beer.

I did.

It didn’t take me long after I sat down in front of my PC today to stumble over Paul Jackson’s latest offering at the Calgary Sun, “Appeasement is pure folly.” As most of you already know, I have a bit of a habit of checking out what’s on Paul’s mind from time to time. Sure, he sometimes comes off a little too pro-American for my taste but more often than not, he has a habit of being spot-on.

In today’s column, he talks about a little something that was passed on to him recently:

A remarkable document came into my hands the other day from a Republican friend in Washington and it is something that should be read by all patriotic Americans and Canadians.

It should also be read by lib-lefters, appeasers, sell-out artists and cowards in all western democracies who want the U.S. and Britain to pull out of Iraq, and the U.S., Britain and Canada to pull out of Afghanistan, and the West to just give in to the demands of fanatics such as Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and North Korea’s Kim Jong Il.

It’s entitled Europe — Your Name is Cowardice and was written, strangely, by a German, Mathias Dapfner, CEO of the huge publishing house Axel Springer (AG) and published in Germany’s largest newspaper Die Welt.

Alright Paul, you’ve got my attention. And after a bit of digging around, I find myself agreeing with you; this is definitely something to file in the “must read” column. The problem is: which version?

Ever since German periodical Die Welt published the editorial by Mathias Döpfner on 20 November 2004, there have been literally dozens of versions of it popping up here and there around the internet, in just about every Western language you can care to name. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing — like I said, I consider it a must-read — but the problem is that a lot of the English-language translations of this editorial that have been circulated via the Internet include alterations and additional invective that weren’t present in the original. Judging from the quotes in the article, Paul must have gotten one of these. Not that I’m trying to beat Mr Jackson over the head or anything but if we’re going to quote someone, let’s at least do our best to get it right.

So… before I get any more long-winded than I’m already being, let’s cut this short. Reproduced below is the most accurate-to-the-original translation that I could find (thanks to Snopes). Even without the extra barbs, it’s still damned good…

UPDATE: for those looking to split hairs, click here. 

A few days ago, Henryk M. Broder wrote in the Welt am Sonntag, “Europe — thy name is appeasement.” It’s a phrase you can’t get out of your head because it’s so painfully true.

Appeasement cost millions of Jews and Gentiles their lives as England and France, allies at the time, negotiated and hesitated far too long before realizing that Hitler had to be fought, not bound to agreements. Appeasement stabilized the Communist Soviet Union and the former East Germany, those parts of Eastern Europe where inhuman, suppressive governments were glorified as the ideological alternative. Appeasement crippled Europe when genocide ran rampant in Kosovo, and we debated and debated and were still debating when the Americans finally came in and did our work for us. Rather than protecting the only democracy in the Middle East, European appeasement, camouflaged behind the fuzzy word “equidistance,” relativizes the fundamentalist Palestinian suicide bombings in Israel. Appeasement generates a mentality that allows Europe to condone the 300,000 victims of Saddam’s torture and murder machinery in Iraq and condemn the actions of George Bush in the self-righteousness of the peace movement. And in the end it is also appeasement at its most grotesque when Germany reacts to the escalating violence of Islamic fundamentalists in Holland and elsewhere by proposing a national Muslim holiday.

What else has to happen before the European public and its political leadership realize that there is a form of crusade underway, an especially perfidious one of systematic attacks by fanatic Muslims targeting civilians, directed against our free, open Western societies. This is a conflict that will likely last longer than any of the great military conflicts of the last century, waged by an adversary who cannot be tamed by tolerance and accommodation but is instead spurred on by such gestures, mistaking them as signs of weakness.

Two recent American presidents had the courage needed for staunch anti-appeasement: Reagan and Bush. Ronald Reagan ended the Cold War, and Bush — supported only by the persuasive Social Democrat politician Tony Blair — recognized the danger in the Islamic war against democracy. His place in history will need to be evaluated a number of years down the road.

In the meantime, Europe snuggles into its multicultural niche instead of defending the values of a liberal society with charismatic certitude and acting as a positive center of power in a delicate balance between the true global powers, America and China. We instead present ourselves as the world champions of tolerance against the intolerants, which even Otto Schily [Germany’s former Federal Minister of the Interior] justifiably criticizes. And why, actually? Because we’re so moral? I fear it’s more because we’re so materialistic.

For his policies, Bush risks the devaluation of the dollar, huge amounts of added national debt, and a massive and lasting strain on the American economy — because everything is at stake.

Yet while America’s so allegedly materialistic robber baron capitalists know their priorities, we timidly defend the benefice of our social affluence. Just stay out of it; it could get expensive. We’d rather discuss our 35-hour workweek or our dental coverage or listen to televangelists preach about the need to “Reach out to murderers.” These days, it sometimes seems that Europe is like a little old lady who cups her shaking hands around her last pieces of jewelry as a thief breaks in right next door. Europe, thy name is Cowardice.