Cheers for a Canadian medium and Canadian Tire
CTV's Canada AM devoted its whole program today, "Saluting our Soldiers" (video at link), to the Canadian Forces in Afghanistan. Seamus O'Regan was with a large group of troops in Kandahar, Beverly Thomson (all in Friday Red) with many family members and soldiers at CFB Petawawa, and Jeff Hutcheson with hordes of schoolkids (most in red) at St. Thomas Aquinas school in Oshawa.
The show gave a positive and very human face to our troops and their families and, by extension, to the mission itself. Medical facilties at Kandahar were toured (we were told most patients in fact were Afghan army and police personnel) and the commander of the Provincial Reconstruction Team detailed the work they were doing.
Soldiers were linked to family members in Canada, "Wear Red Fridays" were explained by a lady in Petawawa who had helped start the movement. The troops themselves were engaging, cheerful, obviously committed to the mission and with good morale.
A great effort by Canada AM; what a breath of fresh media air. At the same time CTV Newsnet was running a story by David Akin questioning the expense of precision-guided artillery shells the army is buying for Afstan, in part to reduce civilian casualties. As is de rigeur for such pieces the noted military experts Steve Staples of the Polaris Institute and NDP defence critic Dawn ("Cream of the Crap") Black were shown opposing the purchase. Lovely. Comment thread here at Army.ca.
Meanwhile, Canadian Tire stores in Ottawa are now selling Red Friday t-shirts for $10, with all profits going to the Petawawa Military Family Resource Centre. Apparently Canadian Tires stores in Victoria will be doing something similar. Good for them.
The show gave a positive and very human face to our troops and their families and, by extension, to the mission itself. Medical facilties at Kandahar were toured (we were told most patients in fact were Afghan army and police personnel) and the commander of the Provincial Reconstruction Team detailed the work they were doing.
Soldiers were linked to family members in Canada, "Wear Red Fridays" were explained by a lady in Petawawa who had helped start the movement. The troops themselves were engaging, cheerful, obviously committed to the mission and with good morale.
A great effort by Canada AM; what a breath of fresh media air. At the same time CTV Newsnet was running a story by David Akin questioning the expense of precision-guided artillery shells the army is buying for Afstan, in part to reduce civilian casualties. As is de rigeur for such pieces the noted military experts Steve Staples of the Polaris Institute and NDP defence critic Dawn ("Cream of the Crap") Black were shown opposing the purchase. Lovely. Comment thread here at Army.ca.
Meanwhile, Canadian Tire stores in Ottawa are now selling Red Friday t-shirts for $10, with all profits going to the Petawawa Military Family Resource Centre. Apparently Canadian Tires stores in Victoria will be doing something similar. Good for them.
posted by Mark, Ottawa at 11:28 a.m.
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