The Commissioner of the RCMP should be fired. Zaccardelli must go and it shouldn't just be by resignation. If this government doesn't fire him it is just another reason why it is as big a disaster in progress than the Liberals were. And in just over 8 months time.

In fact, as Lawman writes above, the whole upper echelon of the force has been polilticized and should be replaced with civilian professionals. With outside oversight. Now. Arar is only the tip of a huge iceberg,

Bad syntax, sorry.
Should have written 'a bigger' disaster above rather than 'as big a' - I'm in a hurry this morning.

As commenter:Lawman stated, and I have been personal witness to on numerous occasions, both in business and in politics, If you screw up you get kicked up, not out. Why? quite simple if you out, your a threat to the system, if your tucked away in some neat little corner still on the company dime, then you are less likely to threaten any of the other hogs at the trough.

What thats not possible this is a democracy you say? well this is a democracy,but thats politics, and never in the history of the north american politic, has the ethical behavior of its politicians been so low.

Richard: great article. Thank you for letting the public know about the three versions. It will be interesting to see how long this issue remains a priority with Canada's major media monopoly. And how much scrutiny they give the Harper government. Keep up the great work.

Just as the Canadian Military became completely beholden to the PMO with the changes wrought in 1967, so too the same changes done to the RCMP in 1973 will cause the same kind of craven behaviours in the RCMP.

Firing the commissioner will do exactly nothing. Other than cowing the remaining senior officers even more.

The reversal of this situation can only come in hand with a breaking of the powers of the PMO, thru treasury board. The COS of the PMO must have no power over the head of Treasury Board, there must be oversight that is open to the house.

Otherwise expect more obfuscation of 'public reporting' of the actions of the "Queens Cowboys" and the expanded use of "Prime-Ministers Choice Pepper-Spray".

Giulani Zaccardelli Canada's own Dudley Do Wrong should be axed without compensation .
No severance and no pension .
This is the same goof who launched a so called inquiry at the behest of the perenial virgin Jason Kenney into the Liberal's handling of tax trusts right in the middle of an election campaign .
Where is the investigation now ?
That malfeasence cost the Liberal's the election.
As the neo-Nazi's try to disassociate themselves from this file it becomes laughable .
They were,after all, the ones screaming for all kinds of punitive responses to people of Arab dissuasion .
No,Zacardelli needs to get the boot.Now!

Remember RCMP Staff Sergeant John Ward, without whose clear warning to the people of British Columbia on 29 December 2003, we'd be cruising headlong for the precipice, not knowing what had pushed us over the edge.

Nobody else spoke for the public interest. Nobody else but the RCMP blew the whistle on Basi and Virk.

Remember our leaders? Campbell said "I know nothing." Martin said, "Gosh, the police haven't phoned me."

Everyone in the power group just had to, in their minds, prove somebody was guilty. Hey this guy fit the profile. It was just after 9/11 so let's hang someone.

The fact he was innocent didn't mean much. It was interesting this evening to see The Arar case being discussed, on a US TV Station. One guy fronting for the US government kept saying. Canada made the mistakes not us, it wasn't the CIA who tortured him it was somebody else. To watch Stock man Day in the house telling the opposition Mr. and Mrs. Ara were taken off the to watch list here was a bit pathetic.He had suggested in a nice way that the US could do the same with their list. Someone told Minister Day that Canada uses the American list and unless our short term PM gives his best buddy George a phone call to make sure they are off the US list, travel will still be a problem. Did it sink in? You got to be kidding besides Ms. Arar had ran for the Socialists in the last election. Canada sure gets some brains for politicians. What a wonderful country we are part of. Pick a person one or two of us figure is a bad guy and make it happen

Zacardelli-Cellucci.

tks,
rjm

The RCMP admitted recently that they "may not given Arar the most favourable characterization" or something to that effect - when passing info to the U.S.

Let's face it - this is just one more RCMP investigative screw-up.

The RCMP was characterized in a "Dudley Do-right" cartoon years ago - which I loved to watch. In fairly recent years starting with Mulroney's Airbus scandal (which cost the government big bucks in a counter suit) the institution has been an embarrassment and seems to have evolved into a bunch of Dudley Do-rights.

Where are the right-wing apologists? Aren't the Feds just trying to save capitalism?

Since God obviously picked us to be rich and free, why worry about anyone else?

G West:

While I agree that Zachardelli should go, the question of course, is, replace him with who or more appropriately, what?

Zachardelli was a Liberal appointed RCMP commissioner, as are others at the top of RCMP bureacracy. With the Cons in power, the replacement of Zachardelli would likely be with a Conservative appointee plus, which is exactly what Richard Warnica recommends we don't do. You remind us of a most excellent point.

I don't trust this government, never mind the last one, to make the needed changes, for obvious reasons. To hold power.

These clip quotes from a pro Con paper conern me even more than the fears of replacing Zachardelli with a Conservative appointment. The NCC (National Citizens Coalition), Harpers beloved tenure of presidency of five years to the U.S.'s most right wing group here in Canada, has made it quite clear what their mandate is in Harpers firewall letter to Klein where Harper tells Klein to "Let the RCMP contracts expire in 2009-2010 and replace them with provincial police" as well as set up provincial pension funds to replace Canada's pension fund".

Harper made his western separatist intentions clear back in 2001. His recommendations facilitate the breakup of the provinces from the rest of Canada and furthers Harpers initiative of decentralizing federal powers, from an elected senate, to the dismantling of the RCMP altogether as provincial contracts run out with the RCMP.

So while Harper is waiting for a majority government to secretly get rid of the RCMP in this country, along with public healthcare, the wheatboard, the CBC and any other corporation or board that is publicly run to why? Open up new markets to U.S. ownership. It is Harpers entire reason for being.

To many this may seem like a Dudley cartoon and if so I wonder who Pearl Pureheart is. For me it is more like a scene from Dave Broadfoots bafoon parody of Coprprol Renfrew of the Mounties. Giulani Zaccardelli should indeed be kicked to either the Yukon outpost or perhaps a stint in Afghanistan. One indeed must wonder about this person and his ablity to head our Nationial Police force. Frankly I wonder if he could even lead the local constabulary of Dildo Newfoundland.

After bing in such close proximity to the RCMP, Maher Arar is lucky to not have ended up like Ian Bush of Houston B.C. who will never come home.
the brain stated

If this statement is fact, then Harper has my vote.
I suggest we all treat the RCMP with the disrespect they have earned and shun them, there is nothing else the ordinary citizen can or has to do.

Under The Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes Act all the people that allowed Arar to be imprisoned and deported to be tortured are guilty and are subject to up to life in prison. How`s about the RCMP bringing the appropriate charges to all involved, Canadian as well as foreign, as is required under Canadian law. If they do not do this Canadian law is no longer applicable. Let anarchy be the rule if the people overseeing the justice system will not enforce the laws

These are the same clowns who 'lost' important evidence in the Air India bombing.Along with CSIS .
More and more I am reminded of Mad magazines Spy Vs.Spy cartoon .

So while Harper is waiting for a majority government to secretly get rid of the RCMP in this country, along with public healthcare, the wheatboard, the CBC and any other corporation or board that is publicly run to why? Open up new markets to U.S. ownership. It is Harpers entire reason for being. The brain

While there may indeed be questions swirling around the RCMP I think The brain is making a very important point.

This is a new Canada being created here...one with not much of the Canada left in it....as Amerika squeezes and bleeds Canada dry with the help of their man in Ottawa, Stephen Harper.

Read the "Reported Elsewhere" on the side bar of The Tyee about a scientist on Salt Spring Island who was fired because he refused to refer to the present government in his e-mail as "the New Government" of Canada. Instead he protested by saying it had always been called "the government of Canada" and he would continue that tradition.

He has since been re-instated, I think..... after all the kerfuffle, but supposedly he has been asked to apologize. Whether he will do this or not, I don't know.

So yes, The brain is right on, Harper has been put in place specifically to create a new Canada which means dismantling the Canada we and so much of the world have always respected and loved..dismantling it into more easily digestible bite size chunks for the USA to chew away on.

If you think the Saltspring Scientist Article is mere trivia...remember the devil is always in the details...details that must be put in place to facilitate the Big Spanking New Picture of Canamerika soon to be unveiled.

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20060919/geologist_reinstated_060919/20060919/
Link to the 'scientist fired'

The RCMP is above the law. They have total immunity and "close ranks" whenever they screw up. They have impressive discipline when it comes to covering their collective butt.

I can't believe heads have not rolled for these and more:
- Arar
- Air India (Canada's all-time worst crime and all-time worst bureaucratic screw-up)
- all those missing women in Coquitlam (apparently it was an RCMP detachment that had jurisdiction and ignored evidence....as much as VPD)
- Mulroney's Airbus kick-backs
- Gomery Report and Federal Liberal payola

The list goes on and on, the RCMP cover-ups continue. This organization must be rotten to the core. Perhaps the whole thing should be thrown out and recast just as was done with the Airborne Division.

I can't believe not one person has lost their job over the items listed above. Not one lousy token sacrificial lamb. They're so secure they won’t even offer up a symbolic scapegoat. On that note, perhaps what we require is better whistler-blower legislation. Let's try to get the inside story on what is happening in the RCMP from insiders who can’t stomach it anymore.

Read between the lines of what The Brain is saying. Though there is no question there is an urgent need for things to be answered for here...it's not so simple as the RCMP as good cop/ bad cop. It's always about the invisible powers....

thanks for posting the link, hannibal. Glad to hear it wasn't the scientist who had to make the apology.

Welcome Lynn :
I can think of nothing more that speaks so eloquently to the insane arrogance of this crew .
They are the most childish (monument to arrested development) crew I have ever had the displeasure of encountering .
Virtually every time they are caught screwing up they blame the Liberal's.
"Well the Liberal's did it first " or "That was Liberal policy for years "
The arrogance ! New governemtn(?)
Should also say' For now' as their shelf life is extremely limited .
Gilles Duceppe is nothing short of brilliant in his demand for 3.9 , billion dollars per year in extra payments .
Harpo is screwed either way .
If he pays up he will alienate his western base if he doesn't he can kiss Quebec goodbye forever .
Quebec support for this government(?) is probably less than 12 per cent .

In its demands, the Bloc said that an annual $3.9-billion of the transfers must go to Quebec by 2009-10.

"It has to be announced in the budget that over the next three years, the amount will reach $3.9-billion, and then that amount will have to be indexed," Bloc finance critic Pierre Paquette said. For all the provinces, the total amount must reach $12-billion, he said.

The Bloc's support has been critical to the survival of the Conservative minority this year, including crucial votes on the budget and the softwood lumber deal.

About time Gilles woke up and realized what a total jerk Harpo is .
Good luck with getting a minority Harpo a majority is out of the question .

Problem with all para-military organizations is they are taught to cover their butts at all costs .
Zaccardelli is a monument to the ' Peter Principle' that states that eventually everyone will be raised to the level whwre they become totally incompetent .
Zaccardelli proves the principle is true .
As well as everyone in Harpo's government(?)

Let's not get too hasty in firing the top cop. Better still an investigation as to just who was involved in the Arar case and the three other people mentioned elsewhere. The judge seemed to indicate some solutions. Dropping the Commissioner makes it all go away but proves not much. I don't know the guy, have never been a cop but like all of us, know a few of the force members. Some have served representing Canada in some pretty dangerous spots in the world.Hell I used to run into them in some god awful places trying to restore some sanity. It was bloody dangerous work and my hat is off to those women and men working in our behalf.

Sure there are some bad cops, like bad just about any type of trade including politician. And like everyone else we can laugh at the force members. Yes it's normal to chop the head guy but lets sort out who really screwed up and I sort of doubt it was him

That's a decent point DPL.

If Zaccardelli is prepared to open up (name names) and permit an independent investigator to get into the top echelons of headquarters division to find out who was behind the politicization of the force and the ARAR outrage then I have no problem with that.

I don't think he will though and his studied silence indicates that he probably won't wake up and do the right thing.

The ethos at the top levels of the RCMP is rotten. Although there are many good officers at lower levels, their superiors at 'A' Division are compromised and political - sometimes, as in this case, with clearer loyalties to the USA than their own country. It can't continue. Although, given the compromised nature of our current government it may well do.

The worst possibility, and what Harper will most likely do in my opinion, is to fire a couple of the top cops and tell the rest of them to cover their tracks more thoroughly.

The whole top down military heel-click style has to change or nothing will improve.

This is a new Canada being created here...one with not much of the Canada left in it....as Amerika squeezes and bleeds Canada dry with the help of their man in Ottawa, Stephen Harper.

I much agree with both Lynn and The Brain here. With this US Empire Loyalist government of Harper's ensconced in power, the situation has turned out to be even more dangerous than I thought a minority Neo-Conservative government would or could be, back at the start of this. (In large part because of the tolerant cooperation they have gotten from ALL the other parties in governance.) Links have been put up here over recent days, one especially good one posted by Nana I think, demonstrating that there is a kind of all party agreement of a type in place behind the scenes to take the country as early as next year, possibly 2010, into a formal North American Union with the United States and Mexico. (Of which even US citizens do not yet know.)

And if past practice is any indicator, the government may even lose an election over it, the Liberals assurimg the country that they will not honour the deal, and then sign the formal documents afterward anyway. As with NAFTA and the GST. The NDP as well, with its own internal pressures to move towards the Liberals, has shown no sign of wanting to strongly stand up to the US, over Afghanistan or any other issue, and defend the political, military, social or economic independance of the country.

So from a progressive nationalist position, there is no one about "official" politics that can be trusted even to deal with the RCMP, the national police, without having a quite other "privatizing" and weaken the nation and render it more vulnerable to the coming US takeover. This is how fearful nationalist opinion has to be in this time.

All roads from here lead to the manipulation creation of a deep integrated vassal Canadian state, legs spread and ready for conqueror Amerika.

There are major problems with all of the institutions of the Canadian state, that grow out of the official desire rooted in Ottawa and the corporate boardrooms of the nation, to serve the US Empire.

Canada has never been more at risk, less from terrorists abroad than from those US Empire Loyalists and political Benedict Arnolds amongst us.

Arar deserves justice, no doubt. But also what happened to him is more a demonstration of what is to come, of great danger to us all -, as a consequence of current official Neo-Conservative deep integration policies with the imperialistically aggressive US Empire, and the failure of the entire status quo party system to vigorously defend the independant national interests of the country. They are all servilely bowed down, like trees before the howling prevailing Washington Winds.

There has always been something rather pathetic about this country from the time of our similar position vis a vis the old British Empire, though hope glimmered for a brief while during the period of a rising egalitarian social policy in the immediate post WW2. We have never been more pathetic though, in my read of the country, than what we are right now, set upon this betrayal of the nation course under the Washington beholden Harper neo-conservatives.

All of which does not auger well for future justice either.

At the very least Zaccaedelli is incapable of leading the mounties as he has proven to be incompetent .
I don't give a fat rats azz who the miscreants were it was done on his watch .
He knew about the file . Knew that they were feeding the yankees false info.
So he has to go . Period .
That he was a Liberal appointment ,just,doesn't play into this at all .
How can he be trusted ?
This is the guy that launched a,so called,investigation into the Liberal's mid election handling of the tax credits file naming Ralph Goodale and Peter McKay among others .
This little gem cost the Liberal's the government .
Where is the investigation now ?
As well as losing crucial evidence in the Air India bombing case .
Nope,he has had ample opportunity to prove himself capable and he fails on all counts .

Coyote :
We already have NAFTA of which both the US and Mexico are signatories .
As the Americans continue to build fortress America by sealing all the borders I have a hard time grasping what the benefit would be .
Demanding passports and other documents does not appear to square with this theory .
Sure,we all occupy the same piece of real estate NA, but that is about all .
For years people have been speaking of a one world government(?) in one form or another .
Please explain .

hannibal
I don't disagree.

In fact I started out thinking exactly that too. But, if all that happens is that Harper dumps Zaccardelli - makes him the sacrificial lamb so to speak - will anything else change?

That's what worries me. The closed-lips response indicates that the red-coats have circled the wagons. Zaccardelli will just fall on his sword for the good of the force and that may be the end of it. This is a far more significant juncture in the country's history than most people realize and the whole future of a free and open society may be up for grabs.

I honestly don't know what's best but I do fear that Harper and his gang don't have the jam or the inclination to get to the bottom of it and that can't be good.

I wonder which of the current candidates for the leadership of the federal Liberals would have the balls to cut through all the crap and get to the bottom of this as well?

The RCMP can't be a political force and that's what it is now.

Either fix it or get rid of it - but just dumping the Z at the top won't turn things around. This culture has been breeding and growing for decades

Zaccardelli should be forced to name names (or go to jail) and not just waltz out of the back door as a hero to his colleagues.

Oops! Should say Scott Brison not Peter McKay .

Agreed Alci :
The entire culture of inner sanctum secrecy has to change .
I get your point and it is well taken .
I smell a cover up already with Stockboy Day leading the charge .
Dan McTeague has some info that Z-man offered up his resignation but it was rejected .
We have to get answers and move forward .
I believe that Bob Rae or Stephan Dion would do the utmost to get the needed answers .
It is horrible optics for Z to clam up after O'Conners report was released .

A possible/probable explanation for Zaccardelli's silence .
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1159048209043&call_page=TS_Canada&call_pageid=968332188774&call_pagepath=News/Canada&pubid=968163964505

hannibal
I saw the Delacourt column this morning. Have you read Chantal Hebert since she started writing again after the summer off (book writing I think)? I wish we had a paper like the Star based on the West Coast, or even, God help me, Alberta.

She says Harper is dead in the water in Quebec now and everything I've seem confirms this. If I were a Liberal I think I'd be supporting Dion. Rae will be too vulnerable in Ontario in my opinion...although Chantal doesn't seem to think it is turning out that way. He seems to have momentum at this point.

Speaking of compromises, did you read the long complimentary article about the safe injection site in Salon on the 22nd. I thought Harper would have dumped it by now but he appears to be holding off.

Waiting for a more opportune time I guess - the evidence of improvement is now so widely accepted that he is clearly having second thoughts.

Perhaps he's hoping for another huge 'victory' like operation Medusa in Afghanistan to take off the pressure on his obviously inadequate view of the world,

LOL

Yes,yes,yes :
Chantal is one of my favourite columnists .
I subsribe to the email edition of the Star, it's free .
Yea, landslide Tony Clement(won his riding bu one vote) made the Insite announcement on a long weekend Friday .
Traditionally a day the government likes to dump stories they don't want to respond to .
They only got another 16,months of amnesty for the clinic .
Chantal is very saavy about Quebec and she says that neo-con support is almost non existant and they will lose all 10,seats with nowhere to make up the difference .
Yea, same for me either Rae or Dion .
Rae is getting significant buzz in Ontario as the 'Common senese revolution is formost in Ontario's mind' and they hated Harris a whole lot more than Rae .
I think the feeling is "Hey, he is one of ours . Let's support him "
All the polls are indicating a third ballot win for Rae if I am reading things correctly .
Chantal says that Rae has the best chance of taking Harpo down and that the NDP will help out just to get rid of the not wit .

LOL

Yea, ROTFLMAO .
They claim to have wiped out half the Taliban in that operation .
I'm sure that'll come as news to them
More propaganda .
All Harpo's manouvering-speech at the UN ,Hamid Karzai-will amount to two thirds of five eighths of zero .
Everyday we are getting more good news.
I love it.
Great time to be alive .

World government under whose hegemony? What democratic, economic, social policy and political form or model?

Within the context of this North American Union for sure, I don't think there is any question about whose standards and interests will dominate, and who is being cut out of having a say in its own people's interests.

But then I have never been one who supported the concept of a One World Government, certainly not at the behest of US corporations. Just too Orwellian for me. And the ones the most likely to form it, indeed already in the process of attempting to pull that wool over everyone's eyes, being the major global corps and arbitrary, US controlled institutions such as the Security Council dominant UN and World Bank etc.

I think democracy is better served frankly, in relatively smaller "national" units, as evolved to their more or less modern form within capitalism. After that, serving the global peace and economic interest of all, a UN, truly democratically and equally constituted, probably removed from New York and US soil, getting rid of the current big power Security Council vetoe system that rides roughshod over and interferes with the internal affairs of everyone else, as called for by such as Chavez, Ahmadinejad and the non-aligned bloc, which "should" include Canada. This, I suggest, is the way to deal with the international level, better serving the "national interest" of most of the world's people: assuming an international legal standard of "non-interference" by all states in the internal affairs of other nations. (Nations and their people will just have to deal with their own problems.)

So, in short, I consider the globalized One World Government concept, as currently suggested certainly, to open the way to, too many potential pitfalls and abrogations or distortions of democracy. There may be a future time, but it is not anywhere near now, in the period of the predominance of the US Empire and its imperialist behaviours.

Rather I support separate and equal, free to conduct their own affairs and make their own international agreements, independant nation states... as being the form of regional entity formation, closest to and best subject to the democratic control of the people's of the world. And not residing say, in far off New York or Washington through layers and layers of bureaucracy.

Which includes, of course, in the case of the NAFTA example you present, that I think it was undemocratically imposed on the nation, and it is in the national interest "of the majority people" of this country to walk away from it as quickly as possible. Thereby returning full control over our economic activity, trading relations and independant political lives, back to ourselves and our own democratically determined institutions posthaste, before we are inhaled into Empire Amerika and its Manifest Destiny ambitions..

NAFTA has proven itself already to be no example of "equality" in economic or political relations. Neither NORAD or NATO etc. And World Government under the most likely prevailing current UN standard would in all greatest likelihood be an even greater boondoggle and disaster, certainly for countries of the power signature of Canada.

Good points as always Coyote!

hannibal:
If you have a minute some day soon when you're not busy herding elephants over the Alps drop me a line at:

Something you might find interesting has come up.

Yes, we must get out of NAFTA as soon as possible .
Funny thing about the SLA they are already been charged the top rate of 15%,mere weeks after the document was signed .
I know the EU was created in response to the US's economic and military might and it appears to be working . For now .
I cannot for the life of me figure out why we would want a closer relationship with USA Inc .
We are being dragged through the muck and filth that they spread globally .
Won't be long before the Maple Leaf is meaningless as a symbol of peace and inclusiveness and we will get the same treatment as the Yanks .
Canada is fighting above its weight class in Afghanistan to be sure .
Other NATO members refuse duty with the Canadians as they are more likely to die on a Canadian patrol than any other .
USA has reverted to a bunker mentality where all the Arabs are scary people and demonized .
I hope and wish that some of what you have written Coyote does come to pass .
It would be far,far better than what we have now .

Forgot to say thanks to Coyote for taking the time to explain .

I am pleased that you are pleased, Hannibal. :-)

Hannibal; for you to make a statement kike " Canada is fighting above its weight class " and NATO members refuse duty with Canadians as they are more likely to die on a Canadian patrol than any other." is a disgrace. You are a disgrace to all those brave men that died in order to give a loser like you the right to make such extraordinary statements. Try going on a website in Iran, you coward.
I surely hope you apologise for these extreme statements.

More insults.
Is not calling someone a 'disgrace' and a 'loser' in violation of the posting standards of this place? Not to mention 'coward'.

Some facts for the Clueless one:
"A Canadian soldier in Afghanistan is three times more likely to be killed than a British soldier and four and a half times more likely than an American," said Steven Staples, co-author of "Canada's Fallen," a report he co-wrote for the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.

"And a Canadian in Kandahar is six times more likely to die than an American soldier deployed to Iraq," he said.

The news and the new report jarred with official weekend pronouncements by the Canadian military that it had scored a key victory against the Taliban in a two-week battle in Panjwaii, west of Kandahar city.

Even military historian David Bercuson — a strong supporter of Canada's mission in Afghanistan — described himself as "skeptical" of the Canadian victory announcement, describing it as "possibly overly ambitious, overly optimistic."

"They can be for information purposes, for morale purposes and for propaganda (to rattle the enemy)." He was wary of them until life was demonstrably better on the ground, he said.

"Canada may reconsider how much more of this it wants," Pike said. He said he, too, was familiar with military pronouncements of victory with impressive numbers of enemy dead and low casualties for western forces.

"We spent years doing that in Vietnam," he said of the U.S. war there.

In Afghanistan, Pike envisions a near-endless scenario.

"It's not going to end," he said of the Afghan war. "And it may get worse before it gets better ... it's going to last for decades."

He said he could understand why Europeans in the NATO coalition are taking up the battle in Afghanistan: the country is the major supplier of poppies used to produce heroin sold throughout Europe. "(But) Canada doesn't have an Afghan heroin problem," he said.

Declarations of victory in Afghanistan will be difficult, he said. In Iraq there are metrics — measurable indices like electricity, oil supplies, security forces and cellphone use.

"There are no metrics in Afghanistan," he said. That will make progress — the basis of victory — difficult to measure.

Both he and Marina Ottaway, an Afghan expert and Middle East specialist at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, cautioned against predictions of overly optimistic outcomes.

"I don't think there are really very many people in the (Bush) administration who really believe that we can transform Afghanistan into a democracy, any more than we can transform Iraq into a democracy," said Ottaway. The respected Washington-based analyst added she does not even think Afghanistan can be transformed into a highly centralized state.

The best outcome is to prevent the Taliban from taking complete control of specific regions, she said.

"At this point the best that we can hope for is an emergence of a kind of feudal state where a lot of power is exercised locally ... where unity of the country is not called into question, but the central government does not exercise full control much outside of Kabul."

In England, statistician Sheila Bird did an earlier risk assessment study similar to that done in Ottawa. Yesterday, she said in a telephone interview that when the new fatalities are factored in, Canadian soldiers are now facing twice and possibly four times the risk of death that British soldiers faced in the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The British had 46,000 troops engaged in the 43-day invasion but lost only 33 soldiers.

Since May 1 this year — a period of 141 days — the Canadian force in Afghanistan, numbering about 2,200, has already lost 21 soldiers.

Relating the number of fatalities to the number of military personnel deployed is crucial, Bird said, because "this helps to accurately measure the real rate of risk on the ground for coalition forces."

She emphasized that the risk Canadians face in Kandahar is "absolutely" riskier than what Americans face in Iraq.

It is obvious by the statistics that Canada has bitten off more than it can chew in Afghanistan .
I support the military but wish that they would do more building than killing in Afghanistan .
As stated other countries refuse patrols with Canada as they are more likely to be attacked .
How many Dutch and French have died ?
This is entirely becaue our forces are acting and performing identical duty as the US .
Afghan's spit on our troops and throw rocks at military carriers .
The hearts and minds initiative has been a dismal failure .

OTTAWA—Public support for Canada's military role in Afghanistan has dropped "precipitously" as more and more Canadians thinks troops are fighting an impossible mission, a new poll shows.

"We're sending our best people over there with our best equipment. It's a real effort and you know what, the more we do the less we seem to be seeing success," said Frank Graves, president of EKOS Research.

"Maybe we have to be there but, my God, it's ... (an) ambivalent position because it doesn't seem we're going to make any difference."

Currently, 49 per cent of Canadians oppose the Afghanistan mission, 38 per cent support it and 12 per cent have no opinion, according to an EKOS poll done for the Toronto Star.

"There has been a precipitous decline. For the first time we see more Canadians opposed to the mission than in support of it," Graves said in an interview.

In December, 2001, support for Canadian participation in military action in Afghanistan was at 62 per cent, with only 18 per cent opposed. By December, 2002, 50 per cent supported the mission, with 30 per cent opposed. And support has dropped more than 10 percentage points since early this year, the same time that Canadian troops took on a more dangerous and high profile role in southern Afghanistan.

Surprisingly though, opposition isn't driven by concerns about mounting casualties — 16 soldiers have been killed in the last three months alone. Rather, opponents say the mission is unlikely to bring stability and democracy to Afghanistan and fear that it is bringing Canada uncomfortably close to American foreign policy, the poll indicates.

More broadly, Graves said pessimism is infecting Canadians' outlook on the world and fuelling an "incipient isolationism."

"There's a growing sense that problems in places like the Middle East, in Iraq, in Israel are things not tractable, not solvable, that our best interests will (not) achieve real progress in our lifetime," Graves said.

"That's a very depressing sense of futility and hopelessness that seems to infect our outlook."

Even among supporters, just 23 per cent think Canadian efforts will be able to bring stability and democracy to Afghanistan. Instead, 39 per cent of supporters cited the need to have troops in Afghanistan to root out terrorism "before it strikes us here at home."

They also said Canada has a moral and legal obligation to NATO allies and the government of Afghanistan.

The EKOS survey sampled 1,004 Canadians between Sept. 12 and 14 and is considered accurate within 3.1 per cent, 19 times out of 20.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper says the Canadian mission is making a difference.

"Afghanistan was really the launching pad for attacks on North American soil that killed Canadian citizens," Harper said in a weekend interview with CBC Radio One's The House.

"We're much safer as Canadians today because we've undertaken this mission and most Afghanis are also safer."

Not in the "double standards" regime that polices Tyee. :-)

Forgive the right. Control the left.

I'm away for a few days starting now, and regrettably won't be able to participate in that Mair thread on Quebec-, given the anti-Quebec, anti-Native, but one Anglo dominant Canada donnybrook it is likely to turn out to be.

But eh. This fight will be fought out again here, no doubt.

If Harper is so sure that being there is the right thing to do, he should pick up a rifle and physically lead the troops on the ground. He's young enough...

Yea, Rippon but he would need a set of testicles to do that and he doesn't have any .

"How is it that the US could uncover this mans bachground so quickly when the government's screening system failed to find his Al-Quida links .
Diane Ablonczy

Stockboy Day mused aloud
"I am calling for a Parliamentary enquiry as to how the Liberal's can defend this man when the US is accusing him of terrorism "
Stockwell Day

What a pair of bright lights these two morons are .
Screaming and braying for blood when the Liberal;s were trying to extract Arar from Syria .
Goofs!

I see Zaccardelli has made an 'abject' apology for the RCMP's role in Mr Arar's and his family's nightmare.

But he asks Canadians and Parliament to 'understand'!

Understand what? That the force was polishing apples with its American counterparts - what else is new.

The force should be completely overhauled and brought under 'independent' civilian oversight.

But don't expect much from Harper. The first task is to get rid of this government.

I don't.And I agree 100%.
First order of business is to toss these losers on the scrap heap of failed governments(?)

The followup to this report seems to ignore a critical questions: should Canada continue to provide the US with security information regarding Canadian citizens, and who bears the responsibility for continuing to release this information after Arrar's rendition was understood?

The US takes access to interligence information very seriously, and the witholding of such information might well have produced Arrar's speedy release. It was the Liberal government that refused to consider such a step, even when the US refused to provide information for the Arrar inquiry.
Bill Graham, as Minister responsible, accepted the RCMP report uncritically and declared that Arrar had not been tortured. Can we believe that sophisticated politicians could have that level of credulity? More believable is the hypothesis that the Liberals accepted a convenient lie to better accommodate the US, exactly what they accuse the Conservatives of doing. Only the NDP have taken a consistant position that puts legal protection of Canadian citizens first.

COMMENT Seaotter:

Re the RCMP - in responding to the disgraceful treatment ( of our entire Nation) in the Arar affair, we demonstrate a need for calm as Tyee commentators push the notion of seeking still more power to the Provincial Governments.

Our national (Federal Government) must administer and be accountable for Justice, Health Care, Education, The Military, and Finance. Yes, there are more areas where
Federal Control is a must, but the Arar affair seems to nudge us still further towards 12 distinct cultures in 12 independent nations. Some readers would see BC as part of the USA!

Please be careful of this hidden threat to unity in our truly great Nation.

Seaotter:
There are already Provincial police forces in Ontario, Quebec and Newfoundland and Labrador. The Federal Government does not administer Justice, education or Health care – although it does write some of the laws and provide some of the finances. Those are all provincial jurisdictions now. Check it out. The feds still do the military, Federal taxation and finance and foreign affairs.

The RCMP is incompetent at best and compromised at worst - continuing with things as they are is no solution. The RCMP is not supposed to be doing security and intelligence work anyway - that's the bailiwick of CSIS - remember? The red coats have been fumbling the ball for decades - at least since the Air India explosion and more likely since the ditry tricks episodes of the late 60s and early 70s.

DO you think Harper has the beans to reform the force? I don't.

It's not the RCMP that will hold this country together - in fact, as presently constituted and administered they are the biggest threat to continued unity in this country...about equal to Alberta's selfishness.