An unexpected voice of reason (en francais)

I usually don't care for most of what Douglas Fischer writes, but I have to admit this article hits the nail on the head.

Hypocrisy dogs military debate
Sadly, the tradition of the Commons on military matters is for woolly talk and unctuous piety, not for clarification. Perhaps we will be pleasantly surprised — but don’t bet on it.

The sorry state of our military today rests largely on the shoulders of successive Liberal governments, with the all to happy support of the NDP. Swords into plowshares - problem was all we had was a boy scout knife.

On the other hand, by no means are the Conservatives innocent in this regard. Other than the EH-101s (cancelled by Chretien) and some new uniforms, Brian Mulroney's Conservatives did little or nothing for the military. His much vaunted White Paper was full of grand plans but went absolutely no where. Perrin Beatty was shuffled out of the the Defence portfolio shortly after publishing the paper, in order to save face. The government knew they weren't going to do anything with it. The best pay raises I ever received in the military were in my first two years under Pierre Trudeau's wage and price controls. Subsequent increases under the Conservatives were a joke, most often falling well below the rate of inflation.

The years of abuse, misuse and general neglect heaped on the military are a national shame.

If we're going to have a debate on the military, let's make it a real debate, otherwise, save the rhetoric and chest pounding. I've got the record, cassette tape, CD and DVD on this one and unfortunatley none of them are broken yet, just well worn.

Without real and immediate action we might as well transfer everyone to the RCMP and go shove our collective heads deeper in the sand or further up our ass, whichever you feel is more appropriate.