Three weeks ago, on October 3rd, Canadian PM Stephen Harper's Conservative party narrowly passed a motion to "launch combat missions" in Iraq alongside other Western warmongering nations and their clients in the Middle East. The motion was passed (157 for to134 against) despite stiff opposition from the NDP and Liberal opposition parties and a Canadian public traditionally averse to any kind of foreign military campaigns. On the day of the vote, an online poll showed almost 60% of respondents were against Canada joining the 'coalition'.
NDP opposition leader Tom Mulcair said that the Harper government was "plunging Canada into a prolonged war without a credible plan" and that bombing ISIS "will only create more recruits for ISIS and can, in fact, prove to be disastrously counterproductive". On Monday, former prime minister Jean Chretien again criticized Canada's military involvement in Iraq saying that it was "just the latest in a long history of interventions by western countries that have left "scars" on the Middle East" and that "Canada should be putting its emphasis on humanitarian assistance for the refugees in the region."
The pusillanimous PM Harper responded by reading a gospel from the Neocon book of public scaremongering:
"It is imperative that we act with our allies to halt ISIL's spread in the region and reduce its capacity to launch terrorist attacks outside the region, including against Canada. As a Government, we know our ultimate responsibility is to protect Canadians, and to defend our citizens from those who would do harm to us and to our families.In urging all parliament members to support the motion, Harper admitted that involving Canada in another war was not only unpopular but politically risky in the run up to next year's general election. Then again, given the widespread allegations of vote fraud leveled against Harper's Conservative party during the last general election, Harper may not have much to worry about.
Have the thought crimes laws been passed? Can I come out now?
Two days ago, having finally emerged from the broom closet into which he bolted during the gunfire in the Parliament building, Harper responded to the two "terror attacks" saying that the events were "a grim reminder that Canada is not immune to the types of terrorist attacks we have seen elsewhere around the world, and that the attack(s) would only strengthen Canada's response to terrorist organizations". Harper also pledged to speed up a plan already under way to bolster Canadian laws and police powers in the areas of "surveillance, detention and arrest. We will not be intimidated. Canada will never be intimidated."
But of course, as a result of two very well timed 'terror attacks', Canada, or rather Canada's public, its military and its political class, have been intimidated (or rather manipulated) into backing down in the face of Harper's warmongering and becoming accomplices in more corporate war-for-profit and the destruction of their civil liberties.
Comment: Let's remember all these reporters that were journalists in the true sense of the word, like Serena Shim, Andrey Stenin, Anatola Klyan, Maya Nasser and others. They reported the facts on the ground, the Truth and had to pay with their lives:
Western intel op? Press TV reporter killed after reporting that ISIS terrorists are entering Syria from Turkey as 'undercover NGO activists'
Russian war photographer Andrei Stenin was killed in Ukraine one month ago, Kiev lied