Flashback: How to derail a committee

Frustrated about how things are going in the Special Committee on the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan?

Let's take a trip down dirty tricks lane:

Opposition demands release of alleged Tory 'dirty tricks' manual

Last Updated: Friday, May 18, 2007 | 2:28 PM ET
CBC News

Opposition parties on Friday demanded the Conservative government make public a reported 200-page guidebook on how to create chaos in parliamentary committees.

MPs from all three opposition parties used question period to call on the government to table the alleged document, which was reported in the National Post.

The guidebook, reportedly handed out to selected Conservative MPs, offers advice on how to favour government agendas, select party-friendly witnesses, coach favourable testimony, obstruct debate and, if needed, storm out of committee meetings.

"Table this playbook so Canadians can see how petty, vindictive and undemocratic this government is," said NDP MP Libby Davies.

Bloc Québécois MP Monique Guay said the document shows a "flagrant lack of respect for government," alleging it was being "deliberately guided by the Prime Minister's Office."

"Table the manual of dirty tricks. It's a contempt for democracy akin to Richard Nixon," said Liberal MP Ralph Goodale, referring to the former American president forced out of office by the Watergate scandal.

So now you want an election?

The Liberals have been handed many reasons over the past few months to call for an early election, the most recent being the Cadman scandal. The TO Star reports that "Liberal MPs are openly musing about toppling Prime Minister Stephen Harper's minority government". Fine. But why weren't they "openly musing" about an election when they found out that the military is handing over Afghan prisoners to people who might torture them again? Why are they leaving it to groups like Amnesty International to raise the red flag inherent in such a move? What has changed in the 4 short months since the hand overs were halted?

As inviting as it may be to force the Cons into an election over the Cadman affair, investigations have yet to even begin. There is, however, much more evidence and reason to be concerned when it comes to possibly handing over Afghan citizens to be tortured in shady prisons. Why isn't that worth calling an election over?
 

Is the Harper Government Providing Cover for a Torturer?

The Globe & Mail lays out the case:

The Harper government knew, but tried to keep secret since last spring, allegations that the governor of Kandahar was personally involved in torture and abuse of detainees.

The allegations against Governor Asadullah Khalid, appointed directly by President Hamid Karzai and a key political partner to Canada's nation-building efforts in southern Afghanistan, were regarded as sufficiently credible that senior officials in Ottawa were immediately informed and Canadian diplomats secretly reported them to the International Red Cross and Afghanistan's main human-rights group.

Government documents detailing the accusations were heavily censored by the government which, claiming national security, blacked out the references to “the governor.” But multiple sources, both inside and outside the government, confirm that the words “the governor” have been censored as have whole passages referring to secret cells allegedly run by Mr. Khalid outside the official prison system.

Last spring was the time that Harper et al were very busy trying to convince Canadians that any torture allegations coming out of Afghanistan were just Taliban propaganda. Today, even after the government finally had to admit that there might be credible cases of detainees being tortured, the Cons' pit bull on the issue - Peter van Loan - called the allegations against Khalid and the obvious cover up "histrionics and hyperbole." We didn't believe them the last time they used such a weak, ad hominem defence and there's certainly no reason to believe them this time either since documents confirm that there were concerns raised about Khalid and his secret prisons.

Rumours have long linked Mr. Khalid to secret prisons. That he had close ties with U.S. intelligence agents and special forces had been known since Canadian troops arrived in southern Afghanistan in early 2006. But Ottawa didn't confront an accusation of the governor's direct involvement in the interrogation and torture of prisoners until it sent diplomats to inspect the main secret police prison in Kandahar on April 25, 2007.

“Another prisoner beckoned to us,” begins the crucial passages describing the first inspection of the secret National Directorate of Security police prison in Kandahar city.

The detainee, like others in the secret police jail, was in leg irons, according to the documents. He told the Canadians his name and described how he initially had been imprisoned for nearly a year, most of the time shackled alone in a room in one of the governor's private prisons. “He went on to state he had been interrogated by foreigners and the governor,” said the report by Gavin Buchan, a Canadian diplomat and Linda Garwood-Filbert, the head of the Canadian Corrections team in Afghanistan.

“He alleged that the governor beat him and gave him electric shocks,” Ms. Garwood-Filbert wrote in her inspection report. Eventually the prisoner was moved to the NDS prison where he gave his account to Canadian officials.

Within days, senior Canadian diplomats had passed on the reports to both the International Committee of the Red Cross and the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission.

It also looks like government lawyers attempted to obstruct justice by not fully releasing the information concerning Khalid:

One meeting was with the International Committee of the Red Cross; the other with the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission. When the briefing note was finally made public late last year as part of the government's delivery of documents in the Federal Court case brought by Amnesty International Canada and the B.C. Civil Liberties Association, it also had the words “the governor” blacked out, multiple sources have confirmed.

Despite sharing the allegations with the Afghan government and outside agencies, Ottawa kept them from a Canadian Federal Court judge hearing a case brought by Canadian rights groups. It claimed the national security exemption.

Why would Khalid be protected by claiming the release of his possible involvement in torture would be a "national security" risk? That's a handy Bush-like excuse for not revealing the truth about torture allegations. It's the same reason Maher Arar's case against Rumsfeld and the US government has had to go through appeals.

The G&M notes that we, the lowly peasants, have no way of knowing if the accusations against Khalid were investigated and it's important to keep in mind that he is a darling of the Bush administration and now, apparently, of the Harper government as well.

In other news on the torture front:

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - The Afghan human rights agency charged with investigating the condition of arrested insurgents says it wants to reopen talks with Canada about turning detainees back over to Afghan authorities.

A spokesman for the Afghan Independent Human Rights Agency says they weren't told by Canadian officials that they'd stopped transferring detainees to Afghan authorities in November.

Farid Hamidi says the agency learned of the policy change from the media last week and only after that were they informed that the Canadians have arrested between 18 to 20 people since that time.

He says the assumption is that they are being held at the Kandahar Airfield, but he doesn't know that for sure because his agency isn't being kept in the loop.

Yet another secret.

This entire detainee debacle is a classic display of the incompetence of this government and its ferocious need for secrecy. What possible excuse could it have for not telling Afghanistan's Human Rights Agency that it had supposedly suspended transfers? I'm sure they'll shout "operational security" about this major whopper too.

Meanwhile, Rick Hillier is saying that if Canadian troops remain in Kandahar past February 2009, they will have to be in a combat role.

Oh....and...wait for it... :

Hillier also refused to comment on the number of detainees currently being held by Canadian Forces at their military base in Kandahar, citing the need for operational security.

Either I'm psychic or this government is way too predictable.

Related:

German troops to stay in Afghan north (despite Gates' "strongly worded letter")

Senators Challenge White House Approach on Afghanistan

Taliban shifts tactics in Afghanistan

Australian troops 'still needed in Afghanistan in 15 years'

Rice heads for London as Afghan crisis looms
 

Coderre Says McKay Has 'Chronic Pinocchio Syndrome'

The approved PMO talking points about the bungled Afghan detainee situation were out in full force during Monday's Question Period as the Cons who spoke to the issue went to great lengths to again blame the Liberals for their "flawed" detainee transfer agreement that the Cons supposedly improved upon. (Remember when they said the Red Cross was monitoring those detainees and the Red Cross staunchly denied it?. So much for the Cons' assertions and so much for their defence.)

In response to one opposition member's question, Peter McKay pulled out this old line as well:

"We're not going to talk about the details...because that only helps the Taliban."

How, exactly? No one really knows, but it's a handy talking point that once again infers that the opposition parties are only interested in helping the Taliban and don't care about Canadian soldiers. What he fails to get, obviously, is that when allegations of torture result from the actions of our soldiers while his government completely mishandles the issue, he puts our soldiers at risk.

And Harper had the audacity to say, after being challenged with the point that even the secretive Bush administration announces its operational handling of detainees, that at least the Canadian government doesn't send its transfers to Gitmo. If that's what he thinks about Gitmo, why isn't he doing anything to free Omar Khadr from that gulag?

When confronted by Stephane Dion about the fact that those sacred "operational details" about the transfers were released to the court (in the case the BC Civil Liberties Association and Amnesty International are involved in surrounding these allegations) and not to the house, Harper had multiple choice answers. Initially, he said that is was revealed in court to "show clearly that the Canadian forces and authorities in the Canadian government at all levels always respect our humanitarian and international obligations". But, when pressed further by Dion who wondered aloud why information that is "good to be disclosed in court" isn't good to reveal to Canadians Harper said, "for their only legal reasons, the lawyers in that case chose to disclose this information". And that is exactly what did happen: the government's lawyers had no choice but to disclose it. It wasn't about them trying to show how wonderful we are. It was a court-mandated release of information.

On top of that, the current status of the agreement has now been muddied with Harper stating that the military has the "discretion" about whether to turn over detainees now. So, first the Cons stated the transfers had stopped and now they're saying that they haven't really. When pressed about where these detainees are now ending up, the government refused to respond. "Operational security", you see.

But the best line of the day went to Dennis Coderre who said McKay has "chronic Pinocchio syndrome". At the rate his nose is growing (along with the rest of his partisan liars), he'll soon end up poking somebody's eye out. In response to that accusation, McKay said, "Nobody has said that I had no information about what was happening...". Pardon me?

In an e-mail to The Globe and Mail on Thursday, Prime Minister Stephen Harper's communications director, Sandra Buckler, said the military did not tell the government about the suspension [of the transfer agreement].

Ms. Buckler called Friday to say she “misspoke” but would not say whether the military had or had not informed the government.

Can you lie just a little bit more, Mckay?

Radwanski of the G&M reported this quote today from Harper's press conference during which he supported Manley's so-called "blue ribbon" panel on the future of Canada's role in Afghanistan:

"There has been no issue that has caused me as Prime Minister more headache, and quite frankly more heartache..."

Hmm...that sounds familiar:

During an interview on NBC's Today show Wednesday concerning Malaria Awareness Day, Laura Bush talked to Ann Curry about "other challenges her husband is facing."

"You know the American people are suffering watching --," Curry said to the first lady.

"Oh, I know that very much," Laura Bush responded. "And believe me, no one suffers more than their president and I do when we watch this, and certainly the commander in chief, who has asked our military to go into harm's way."

Curry then asked, "What do you think the American public need to know about your husband?"

"Well, I hope they do know the burden, the worry that's on his shoulders every single day for our troops," Bush said. "And I think they do. I mean, I think if they don't, they're not seeing what the real responsibilities of our president are."

Pity the warmongers!

As Radwanski asked upon hearing the same kind of mush from Harper: "Who is this guy"?

Exactly.

When all else fails, channel Bush and hope it works. (You'd think Harper would take a look at Bush's approval numbers to see how effective that particular strategy is.) What's next? Dressing up like Commander Codpiece?

According to a new poll, it looks like the Conservatives might not even manage to keep the pathetic numbers they currently have if they continue to spin this issue the way they've been doing. One thing is certain: Harper's restrictive communications strategy, in which you couldn't pull the truth out of his ass with a tractor, is failing.

Photo credit: Canadian Press
 

Tories Filibuster Human Rights Testimony

What are these tories trying to hide?

OTTAWA — A House of Commons committee probe into the events surrounding the release of a highly-censored report on human rights in Afghanistan was held up Thursday by Conservative MPs, who for talked out the clock for hours.

The Tory filibuster finally broke after five hours and the witnesses were allowed to speak around 2 p.m.

The meeting of the House of Commons access to information and ethics committee was the second in a row to feature Tory MPs talking at length about procedural minutia to avoid delving into the committee's scheduled work.

The Conservatives were arguing that the opposition failed to give them enough notice for the study and that such a review raises concerns about revealing official secrets.

The opposition pushed for the probe following a recent Globe and Mail report showing how the government initially denied the existence of a report on Afghan human rights conditions, then released a heavily censored version. The Globe then obtained an uncensored version of the report which showed the government had blacked out sections that could be politically embarrassing to the government.

When confronted by NDP MP Dawn Black during question period about this filibuster - along with the fact that reports from corrections officers in Afghanistan had been completely censored, foreign affairs minister Mackay actually had the audacity to say that his government was the most "transparent, open and forthright government that this country has seen in a long, long time" (go ahead and laugh...I'll wait...). Mackay then resorted to the childish tactic of justifying his government's behaviour by using the handy well, the Liberals did it too excuse. Are there no statesmen among this bunch of tories? (Rhetorical question.)

The 2 witnesses whose testimony was delayed are University of Ottawa law professor Amir Attaran, who has been a very vocal critic of the way this government has mishandled the abuse claims by Afghan detainees, and journalist/researcher Jeff Esau. No wonder the tories tried to delay his testimony:

April 25, 2007

The Globe first asked Foreign Affairs on March 7 if Canadian diplomats compiled and wrote similar reports on Afghan human-rights conditions. "No" was the answer.

On March 22, in response to an Access to Information Act request, Jeff Esau, a journalist and researcher working for The Globe, received the following response to his request for the report:

"Please be advised that Canada does not produce an annual human rights report analogous to the reports produced by, for example, the United States or the United Kingdom. Therefore no such report on human rights performance in other countries exists," wrote Jocelyne Sabourin, Director of the Access to Information division at Foreign Affairs.

An earlier access request, filed Jan. 29 by Amir Attaran, a University of Ottawa law professor, asked specifically for the human-rights report on Afghanistan and noted that Foreign Affairs had, in the past, made such reports available to non-governmental organizations. It also noted that the report on Syria had been referenced in the report on the Maher Arar case.

It was only after the 30-day deadline for a response had long passed and Mr. Attaran complained to Information Commissioner Dan Dupuis, that the edited version was delivered this week, eradicating all reporting of torture and abuse beneath the censor's black pen.

Lies, coverups, distortions, censorship and attempts to silence witnesses. Yes, this certainly is the "most transparent" government ever, isn't it?
 

Defence Dept Tries to 'Clarify' Detainee Abuse Incident

So, first the Conservative government, from Harper on down, denied allegations of detainee abuse in Afghanistan.

Then, this past week:

Federal opposition parties continued to hammer the Harper government yesterday over the treatment of prisoners in Afghanistan after revelations that the Afghan police beat up a detainee given to them by the Canadian Forces.

Colonel Steven Noonan, a former task-force commander in Afghanistan, disclosed the incident in a Federal Court affidavit that forms part of the government's response to a legal challenge by Amnesty International Canada and the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association to stop all further detainee transfers.

Col. Noonan's sworn evidence was cited by the opposition in Question Period to demonstrate that the Conservative government was far from telling the truth when its members repeatedly denied that they had no specific examples that any detainee transferred by Canadian troops to Afghan authorities was later subject to abuse or torture.

And the delayed response from the Defence department?

Lieutenant-General Walter Natynczyk, the Vice-Chief of the Defence Staff, said Saturday that the way the incident has been portrayed is inaccurate.

In cross-examination involving a lawsuit by Amnesty International, Colonel Mike Noonan described an incident in which Canadian soldiers had to take custody of an Afghan man whom they suspected of being beaten by Afghan National Police officers. It was initially suggested the man had been captured by Canadian soldiers.

But Lt.-Gen. Natynczyk said that's not the case and the individual had simply been questioned by soldiers in the village of Zangabad, 50 kilometres southwest of Kandahar.
[...]
Lt.-Gen. Natynczyk said the Afghan man was later picked up by police, and Canadian soldiers, who later came across him, noticed he had been injured.

The troops arranged to have the man handed over to another police unit.

In a statement released late Saturday, Lt.-Gen. Natynczyk said there was no indication of torture.

It is the first time the military has provided this kind of clarification about the controversy involving detainees.

A government lawyer had initially blocked release of the information in Saturday's statement, saying it might violate national security. There was no explanation for the change of heart.

Yes. Why the change of heart? Especially since it now appears that Natynczyk is accusing Colonel Steven Noonan of lying under oath. Is that what this so-called "new" government means when it says it "respects the troops"? It pulls out the second-in-command to sling defamatory allegations against one of Canada's soldiers? That certainly what it looks like.

Check out Peter Mackay's statement following the revelations about this incident. They contradict what Natynczyk attempted to "clarify":

Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay acknowledged that Canadian troops were forced to step in after the "abuse" of a prisoner they had just transferred to Afghan custody.

"They saw something happening, they acted decisively, and they ensured that the abuse ended right there," MacKay said in the Commons.

Is it too much to ask that these government shills get their stories straight? No one seems to know what anyone else knows or what they're doing about it.

Who's lying now and how are we supposed to figure that out?

Furthermore, when will Canadians say enough is enough and kick these incompetent bastards out of office?
 

Van Loan Calls Detainee Abuse 'Roughhousing'

Just when you thought the Conservative government's mishandling of the Afghan detainee abuse scandal couldn't possibly get any worse, someone like Van Loan decides to pull a Rush Limbaugh and refers to charges of abuse as 'roughhousing'.

The federal opposition continued to hammer the Harper government Friday over the treatment of prisoners in Afghanistan following revelations that the Afghan police beat up a detainee given to them by the Canadian Forces.

Col. Steven P. Noonan, a former task-force commander in Afghanistan, disclosed the incident in Federal Court affidavit that forms part of the government's response to a legal challenge by Amnesty International Canada and the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association to stop all further detainee transfers.

Col. Noonan's sworn evidence was cited by the opposition in Question Period to demonstrate that the Conservative government was far from telling the truth when its members repeatedly denied that they had no specific examples that any detainee transferred by Canadian troops to Afghan authorities was later subject to abuse or torture.

Liberal Geoff Regan accused the government of deception.

“The government knew about the abuse. It knew and yet it did nothing. Worse, the government denied the facts, distorted the truth and deceived Canadians, day after day, week after week,” he said.

But Government House leader Peter Van Loan said the case cited by Col. Noonan is actually a good story for the Canadian military.

“ It is a case where they saw some treatment, some roughhousing of an individual and they stepped in immediately to put an end to it. That is how things should work. That shows that things were working well in the field.”

The hypocrisy is absolutely stunning.

As recently as Thursday, Mr. Harper dismissed allegations of prisoner abuse and blamed the opposition parties for making it an issue.

“This is based on nothing more than a handful of unsubstantiated allegations from Taliban prisoners and I think, quite frankly, it has detracted unnecessarily from the good work Canadian men and women are doing in the field in Afghanistan under dangerous circumstances,” the prime minister told a news conference in Mission, B.C.

Harper et al have been pushing these allegations as being false because they don't believe the sources. Well now they have a member of the Canadian military providing a statement to a federal court. Is he in league with the Taliban too? According to the tories' so-called logic, apparently he is.

...court documents, including a transcript of Col. Noonan's cross-examination earlier this week, filed in Federal Court, reveal that a prisoner captured by Canadian troops was abused by the Afghans.

Col. Noonan swore in his affidavit that the Canadian military learned that the detainee had been beaten by the local ANP, the Afghan national police. “When we learned of this, they approached the local ANP and requested that the detainee be given to them.”

The Afghans turned the prisoner over to the Canadians who then gave him to provincial Afghan police authorities.

The Ottawa Citizen reported that when Amnesty lawyer Paul Champ tried to get more details on the incident when it happened, what injuries were sustained, whether the Afghan police were charged federal lawyer J. Sanderson Graham curtailed questioning of the incident citing national security interests.

“It threatens Canada's national security to know when the Canadian Forces observed local Afghan national police beating a detainee that they transferred to that unit?” Mr. Champ asked.

“We object to any questions on this incident generally,” Mr. Graham replied.

Yeah, I'll bet you object to questions.

There is absolutely no way these Conservatives can wiggle their way out of this one. Every time one of them opens their mouths, they show just how horribly inept they are and their disrespect for human rights is so glaringly obvious that only a fool would believe they actually care about these charges. They're so incompetent that they can't even get their stories straight and now we have Van Loan minimizing the abusive treatemnt of a detainee much as Limbaugh did when he said that torture at Abu Ghraib was equivalent to frat boy pranks. That kind of flip indifference is staggering.

Not only that, the more this government dismisses these allegations, the more they place our troops at risk because they are then seen by local Afghanis as representing a country that doesn't care what happens to them. Human rights be damned. So, while these tories keep slamming members of the opposition parties as being "disloyal" to our troops when they simply raise these allegations and ask for the truth, it's their posturing that has the potential to cause serious repercussions in the end. Who's really being disrespectful here? It certainly isn't those in opposition to this government's continued malfeasance and lies.
 

Harper Gov't Pulls a Fast One on the Afghan File

So, now that the Harper cronies have been caught with their political pants down on the Afghan detainee transfer file, they've decided that springing a new agreement the same morning as the legal case hits the courts is the appropriate way to deal with the situation?

OTTAWA — The Harper government has struck a new detainee transfer agreement with Afghanistan that includes stringent safeguards for follow-up monitoring to prevent torture and abuse that were previously absent, it was revealed in federal court today.

The new deal signed this morning in Kabul by Canada's new ambassador to Afghanistan, closes the gaping holes that rights groups claim existed in the original agreement signed by chief of defence staff Lieutenant-General Rick Hillier in Dec 2005.

The announcement stunned a packed federal court hearing in Ottawa where a call for an immediate halt to transfers was about to being when lawyers for the federal government brought the new agreement to court.

Federal Court Judge Michael Kelen told the court the deal was a major development that took the urgency out of deciding whether to block future transfers.

“It probably wouldn't have happened if this court hadn't been happening,” he said as he announced a postponement of proceedings.

Well, that's convenient, isn't it?

More via CP:

The new arrangement allows Canadian officials greater access to insurgents turned over to the Afghans by Canadian soldiers. Among its provisions is a guarantee that captured fighters can be interviewed in private without the intimidating presence of their Afghan jailers.

The government negotiated the deal despite insisting that the allegations of torture are false. The Conservatives hope it will put an end to two weeks of bad press over their confusing and contradictory statements on the detainee issue.

"What we have done is enhance the 2005 agreement - that is exactly what people were calling for," said Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay.

But Amnesty International, which launched the Federal Court challenge on behalf of detainees, said the new deal isn't good enough.

"Canada is still not complying with its international obligations," said spokesman Alex Neve.

"This agreement does not sufficiently protect people from the risk of torture after being transferred and that's the bottom line."

Human rights groups note that prisoners often don't admit to having been tortured - especially when they're still in jail - out of fear of more torture.

The only solution, Neve said, is for Canada or NATO to establish a detention facility where Afghan guards can be properly trained to respect human rights.

The Federal Court case has been put on hold pending further examination of the transfer agreement.
[...]
Prime Minister Stephen Harper said the new deal merely formalizes commitments the government already has from the Afghans.

"We have access (to prisons) and can get information whenever we want it," he said in Vancouver.

He also repeated that the allegations of torture are "unsubstantiated" - but there has been no investigation into the claims.

They still don't get it.

And round and round it goes:

The agreement comes despite the fact that Harper has assured the House of Commons that the old deal was working well.

The Conservative government has also insisted that allegations of abuse are false even though no investigation has been conducted.

Since allegations surfaced that at least 30 detainees - captured by Canadians and turned over to Afghan authorities - might have been abused, the Conservatives have offered varying explanations.

After days of denying knowledge of any "specific" allegations of torture, Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day revealed Monday that Canadian correctional officers in Kandahar had indeed reported torture claims by two detainees.

Despite that admission, the government's submission in the Federal Court hearing states that: "Canadian officials have not received any notification of mistreatment or torture of detainees transferred from Canada to Afghan authorities."

Amnesty lawyers asked for a copy of the written report submitted by the officers, but was denied on the grounds that it violated national security.

And the kicker?

The government submission also reveals that the Canadian Forces have two procedures for handling Afghan detainees, including one that does not involve any oversight by human rights groups.

The documents show that Canadian troops are authorized to hand some detainees directly to Afghan authorities, rather than take them prisoner. That would appear to circumvent rules that require Canadian soldiers to notify human rights monitors when they detain Afghan militants.

You'd think that the judge in this case, armed with that knowledge, would have granted the injunction to temporarily halt the transfer of detainees.

The more that's revealed about this file, the murkier it gets.

Related: Liberal party statement on the latest tory maneuverings.
The NDP declares O'Connor is Unfit for Duty
The Galloping Beaver has a post about General Rick Hillier's political grandstanding.
The BC Civil Liberties Association site.
Amnesty International Canada
Human Rights Watch Afghanistan page. Are we going the way of the US military with these cases?
 

Random News & Views Roundup

Busy day here so just enough time for a quick roundup...

- It may just be a bit easier for ET to phone home in 2009. Introducing Iris.

- The DND has missed a court deadline and has asked for a 3 month extension in the lawsuit filed by the BC Civil Liberties Association and Amnesty International about the plight of detainees in Afghanistan.

Mr. Champ said the government's letter asked the groups to support the request for an extension. The letter says the Defence Department is currently busy with multiple investigations into allegations of detainee abuse, and that it is difficult to get documents from Kandahar, where the Canadian army is waging counterinsurgency operations against Taliban militants.

How difficult can it be? They have fax machines, don't they?

- It's a conspiracy:

The Liberals and the Green party on Friday confirmed they have agreed to work together to try to oust Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay from his riding in the next federal election.
[...]
Dion, who said the move shows his party is serious about addressing climate change, said the Liberals will not run a candidate in the riding where May intends to seek her party's first federal seat.

In exchange, the Greens have agreed not to run a candidate in Dion's Montreal riding.

Layton had to chime in, of course:

Earlier Friday, NDP Leader Jack Layton said the deal was undemocratic and denied Canadians the right to choose who will represent them in Parliament.

Get over it, Jack. Do you want Mackay gone or not? This is politics. Deals happen - all the time. You, of all people, should know that. Predictably, the tories are whining as well because they never ever ever make such deals, as we all know.

- This is interesting: Females outnumber males online in U.S., study finds

An estimated 97.2 million females aged 3 and older will be online in 2007, or 51.7 per cent of the total online population in the U.S., according to a report by eMarketer.
[...]
A Statistics Canada study of adults conducted in 2005 found a minuscule difference in usage between the sexes, with 68 per cent of men versus 67.8 per cent of women counting as internet users.

By the way, we online women are not "geeks". I prefer to think of myself as "technologically-enlightened".

- When you read stories about prison abuse in the US like this one, you can't help but remember that convicted Abu Ghraib torturer Charles Graner was a former US prison guard as well - perfect for the job in Iraq, obviously.

- Bombings, gunbattles on rise in Afghanistan. Meanwhile, the German defence minister declares No signs of Taliban "spring offensive". Maybe he doesn't follow the news...

- Let's just broaden the Iraq war, shall we? Turkish Army Seeks OK for Iraq Raids:

ANKARA, Turkey -- Turkey's military asked the government Thursday to approve attacks on Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq, signaling growing frustration over a lack of action against the guerrillas by Iraqi and U.S. forces.

Such action could put an overstretched U.S. military in the middle of a fight between two crucial partners, the Turks and the Iraqi Kurds, and Washington urged Turkish restraint. A recent surge in Kurdish attacks in southeastern Turkey has increased the pressure on Turkey's military to act.

When WH press briefing sockpuppet Dana Perino was asked about this development on Thursday, she said she would have to brush up on the happenings in the region. I suggest she do that PDQ.
 

Tories Behaving Badly - Again

I should actually turn this into a weekly column since new content is virtually guaranteed.

First of all, we have Prime Minister Pompous Ass pissing off the Liberals. (Let's hope he eventually leaves Canada so he can become a lord in Britain too.)

Prime Minister Stephen Harper went into attack mode in the House of Commons on Wednesday, accusing the Liberals of caring more about Taliban prisoners than Canadian troops.

The attack came during Question Period, as the Liberals called for the resignation of Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor over the erroneous information he provided to the government two weeks ago.
[...]
"I can understand the passion that the leader of the Opposition and members of his party feel for the Taliban prisoners," Harper said. "I just wish occasionally they would show the same passion for Canadian soldiers."

His comments were quickly followed by boos and jeers from Liberals in the House. Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion said he was shocked by Harper's suggestion and demanded an apology.

Harper continued with his barrage.

"I would like to see more support in the House of Commons from all sides for Canadian men and women in uniform," he said. "I think Canadians expect that from parliamentarians in every party. They have not been getting it, and they deserve it.

That attack made Dave swear (a rare event).

And because that wasn't enough of a display of Conservative self-righteousness for one day, a tory MP decided to call Saskatchewan premier Lorne Calvert a "liar":

OTTAWA – A Tory MP called Saskatchewan Premier Lorne Calvert a liar today as the Harper government defended its budget against howls of outrage in some provinces.

"The premier's lying through his teeth," outspoken Saskatoon MP Maurice Vellacott said in an interview.

Moreover, Vellacott said the NDP premier is a "socialist" who can't handle economic prosperity and would be more comfortable keeping Saskatchewan "on the federal dole."

Calvert retorted that Vellacott's broadside is indicative of a government that has betrayed the provinces and has no other defence but name-calling.

"They're caught and they know it," the premier said in an interview with The Canadian Press.

You remember Maurice, right?

Yes, once again, that's the very predicatble new government of accountability in action.