Today, the mayor of Canada’s largest city is renaming parts of a major highway to honor fallen Canadian soldiers – their bodies are brought back home on these parts of the road.
Toronto Mayor David Miller will officially rename parts of the Don Valley Parkway and some local connecting side streets the “Route of Heroes.”
Previously, the province of Ontario renamed a section of Highway 401 from Trenton to the Don Valley Parkway the “Highway of Heroes.”
Both are part of the route the Canadian flag-draped caskets containing the bodies of Canadian soldiers killed in Afghanistan take, to the coroner’s office, before being released to their families for burial.
The sacrifices men and women make for their country at times of war should be honored, respected, and as many a war memorial says “never forgotten.”
However, Canada is not at war.
SO, why are so many bodies traveling down Canadian roads – enough to prompt petty politicians to use the highways as a promotional vehicle for their own slimy images, by cutting ribbons and making declarations about heroic routes?
As of today, 147 Canadian Forces personal have been killed since their first deployment to Afghanistan in 2002 – just over the weekend another solider had died, which was not even two-weeks after the last solider was killed in the line of duty.
Yet, again – we aren’t at war.
Originally, when then-American President George W. Bush announced his shock and awe bomb attack, in response to the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the United Nations Security Council didn’t agree.
The UN wanted to find a peaceful solution first, and barring that, a planned and well-thought out approach to using military muscle.
But in keeping with his “you are either with us, or you are with the terrorists,” narrow-minded approach, President Bush went ahead and destroyed most of the infrastructure of Afghanistan and Iraq, all under the guise of getting their alleged ring leader – Bin Ladden.
Whatever happened to Bin Ladden? We never hear about him, other than the occasional poorly recorded audio or video of him ranting like a crazed lunatic.
You’d probably go crazy too if you had a redneck American president making threatening statements about having your head on a platter.
Not that Bin Ladden wasn’t crazy before all this – he may have been – we’ll never know.
President Bush failed in his attempts to nail the blame squarely on Bin Ladden, so he went after Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, and eventually did get his head on a platter – sort of. Hussein was hung quite publicly for the world to see on YouTube – probably the first world leader to be executed live, on the Internet.
Regardless of whether or not Bin Ladden, Saddam Hussein, or anyone else the Americans have labeled “terrorists” – Canada really has no part in their so-called “war on terror.”
Yes, we are allies of the States, and should support them in peace and in war.
But in typically Canadian fashion, our politicians have sat directly in the middle of the fence on the issue and that is what is killing our soldiers.
Canada isn’t officially at war, and being the backbone of the United Nations peace keeping forces for so long, we have a reputation of supporting the UN at all costs.
Yet the UN hasn’t stepped into the American’s so-called “war on terror” because they never supported the poorly planned vengeful attacks by their redneck leader, President Bush.
So our government sends thousands of Canadian soldiers to bolster up the Americans war efforts, with little planning – because the Canadian politicians don’t want to alienate the UN – and we end up with a never-ending parade of flag-draped caskets traveling our renamed highways.
Maybe our politicians should spend more time planning military strategies and tactics, instead of how to creatively rename a highway to get a photo op.
Toronto Mayor David Miller will officially rename parts of the Don Valley Parkway and some local connecting side streets the “Route of Heroes.”
Previously, the province of Ontario renamed a section of Highway 401 from Trenton to the Don Valley Parkway the “Highway of Heroes.”
Both are part of the route the Canadian flag-draped caskets containing the bodies of Canadian soldiers killed in Afghanistan take, to the coroner’s office, before being released to their families for burial.
The sacrifices men and women make for their country at times of war should be honored, respected, and as many a war memorial says “never forgotten.”
However, Canada is not at war.
SO, why are so many bodies traveling down Canadian roads – enough to prompt petty politicians to use the highways as a promotional vehicle for their own slimy images, by cutting ribbons and making declarations about heroic routes?
As of today, 147 Canadian Forces personal have been killed since their first deployment to Afghanistan in 2002 – just over the weekend another solider had died, which was not even two-weeks after the last solider was killed in the line of duty.
Yet, again – we aren’t at war.
Originally, when then-American President George W. Bush announced his shock and awe bomb attack, in response to the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the United Nations Security Council didn’t agree.
The UN wanted to find a peaceful solution first, and barring that, a planned and well-thought out approach to using military muscle.
But in keeping with his “you are either with us, or you are with the terrorists,” narrow-minded approach, President Bush went ahead and destroyed most of the infrastructure of Afghanistan and Iraq, all under the guise of getting their alleged ring leader – Bin Ladden.
Whatever happened to Bin Ladden? We never hear about him, other than the occasional poorly recorded audio or video of him ranting like a crazed lunatic.
You’d probably go crazy too if you had a redneck American president making threatening statements about having your head on a platter.
Not that Bin Ladden wasn’t crazy before all this – he may have been – we’ll never know.
President Bush failed in his attempts to nail the blame squarely on Bin Ladden, so he went after Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, and eventually did get his head on a platter – sort of. Hussein was hung quite publicly for the world to see on YouTube – probably the first world leader to be executed live, on the Internet.
Regardless of whether or not Bin Ladden, Saddam Hussein, or anyone else the Americans have labeled “terrorists” – Canada really has no part in their so-called “war on terror.”
Yes, we are allies of the States, and should support them in peace and in war.
But in typically Canadian fashion, our politicians have sat directly in the middle of the fence on the issue and that is what is killing our soldiers.
Canada isn’t officially at war, and being the backbone of the United Nations peace keeping forces for so long, we have a reputation of supporting the UN at all costs.
Yet the UN hasn’t stepped into the American’s so-called “war on terror” because they never supported the poorly planned vengeful attacks by their redneck leader, President Bush.
So our government sends thousands of Canadian soldiers to bolster up the Americans war efforts, with little planning – because the Canadian politicians don’t want to alienate the UN – and we end up with a never-ending parade of flag-draped caskets traveling our renamed highways.
Maybe our politicians should spend more time planning military strategies and tactics, instead of how to creatively rename a highway to get a photo op.
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