• Thanks for stopping by. Logging in to a registered account will remove all generic ads. Please reach out with any questions or concerns.

Unacceptable Political Advertising: Liberals Attacking the CF

Ads and slurs like this will certainly have the effect of politicising the Canadian Forces in ways which it never was before. Can you imagine what could happen if an Aid to the Civil Power or DOMOPS situation arises if a Liberal minorety is in power after the upcoming election?

On the one hand, there is a need to put "guns on the street", but on the other hand, the very people who slurred us and cast doubt on our professionalism and motives are now the ones telling us to perform the mission. It would certainly be in the back of everyone's mind that at some future point, these people may will turn around and use that against us. While there would not be mutiny or refusal to carry out orders, I could see a certain reluctence to go out, and an effort to keep the mission as limited as possible, not because of economy of force considerations, but to limit our exposure. The overall effect would be an ineffective mission and a further erosion of trust between the CF and the government.

The Liberals have only themselves to blame, by dragging the CF, a non political institution, into their political attack ads. A full appology should be given.
 
Arthur:

Further to your point, in a world where soldiers are being prosecuted for actions they take as a result of government orders, government condoned training and government decisions, how many soldiers are going to risk their personal freedom to support a government that patently does not support them?

Farewell the state.
 
As long as ads are attacking statements, policies, or the platform of the party/leader, I don't see a problem with them. Personal attack ads are another thing - IE "Mr. X earns 180 000 in a year, how sensitive do you think he is to the underprivileged?".

That Harper's being called on some of his more ignorant and revealing statements isn't a bad thing.
 
Mike Bobbitt said:
That was soldiers with shovels... far less intimidating. ;)

Heh heh touche-eh Mike.  But it got me thinking about the ramifications of these ads in Quebec.  I imagine there are a lot of Quebecers with memories of when Trudeau invoked the War Measures Act, and I wonder whether the ad will benefit or hurt the Liberals in Quebec.
 
Stephen Harper actually announced he wants to increase military presence in our cities. Canadian cities. Soldiers with guns. In our cities. In Canada. We did not make this up. Choose your Canada"

Soooo is this an increase and addition to the 149 militia units out there now? 
Geesh. No wonder they pulled it. I'm sure most Canadians don't see guys in green as a bad thing.

TM

 
When I was younger I was mad at the Conservatives and Mulroney for the debacle they made of the gov't. The insults and inuendo were flying everywhere.

Then there was the airbus scandle and countless other bunglings that came to light...a sure sign the boat was going down.

I felt a change was needed...and *regretably* I voted for the Liberals.

Jean and his cabinet seemed like a fresh change...mind you I wasn't in love with his proposed cancellation of the EH 101, I figured that after some careful deliberation he'd see the light and opt to keep it...for the future of the Forces. He'd lie like the rest, but in the long run, the people would understand.....

I was completly wrong and everyone knows the rest of the story.

The budget for the CF has been constantly been scrutinized and hacked apart by Paul Martin before he took over as PM. Yes, they've increased our budget now...mind you it's only because the forces can't operate on the level the gov't wants with the chump change they've been throwing at DND.

And that's what it's been....chump change, taken from behind the couch and given to us.

They've only restored our funding to where it was in the late 80s....nothing more, and don't delude yourself in thinking anything else either.

The only reason is because, unfortunatly, of the events of 911 and the increase of the operational tempo.

I've served for 17 years and have participated in Op Salon (Oka), Op Recuperation (Ice Storm),in Bosnia with NATO...

Now I'm in Afghanistan on Op Archer.

Paul Martin and the Liberals are now inferring that I'm a brownshirt wearing jack boots, goose stepping around the city.....thanks to the latest commercial mentioned above.

Congratulation Mr Prime Minister....you've alienated over 50,000 serving members of the CF and their families.

I'm going to the advance poll before heading back to Afghanistan.

I think it's time for a change again....

Regards
 
Glorified Ape said:
As long as ads are attacking statements, policies, or the platform of the party/leader, I don't see a problem with them. Personal attack ads are another thing - IE "Mr. X earns 180 000 in a year, how sensitive do you think he is to the underprivileged?".

That Harper's being called on some of his more ignorant and revealing statements isn't a bad thing.

However, they didn't attack Mr. Harper's statements, they totally misrepresented his statements.

The pulled ad will question the credibility of the other 11 ads.
 
Ridings...with soldiers...with Liberal MPs...

http://www.catprint.ca/blog/blog/politics
 
RangerRay said:
However, they didn't attack Mr. Harper's statements, they totally misrepresented his statements.

The pulled ad will question the credibility of the other 11 ads.

After reading the link posted, which discussed the ads and their claims, it doesn't seem they really misrepresented anything with the exception of the military ad. One quoted a WP editorial, not Harper himself, another quoted Harper's attitude towards US conservatism (the Cons can claim it's tongue in cheek all they want but when a conservative politician is addressing a conservative audience, he generally doesn't speak sarcastically of the ideology they all follow, especially when discussing the particular brand of ideology of his host nation - to do so would be insulting and I think the last thing Harper wants would be to insult the US politicians he looks up to so much). There was one add quoting Harper's statements on healthcare and they really require little in the way of contextualization. His comments on the maritimes are no secret, he's even had to apologize over them.

The military ad was stupid and ignorant, no doubt about it. The others are perfectly legitimate, from what I've seen. The fact that they don't paint Harper in a very positive light (depending on your viewpoint) isn't wrong, it's just presenting things the way the Libs see them.
 
Wouldn't it be fun if someone could arrange an urban patrolling exercise in Ottawa in the next few days?  The E&K Scotts down here did a fully kitted up ex and you should have seen the calls rolling in.  However, once the worried citizens knew what was going on, they unanimously supported the drills.  And they weren't even being told that the patrol exercise was for use not in Canada.

The citizens support the military and I think that this add will bite them.  The add is also still available on this site:

http://www.proudtobecanadian.ca/audio/ProudToBeCanadian.ca_CTV_Liberal_ad_Cancelled.wmv
 
Glorified Ape said:
After reading the link posted, which discussed the ads and their claims, it doesn't seem they really misrepresented anything with the exception of the military ad. .........................

The military ad was stupid and ignorant, no doubt about it. The others are perfectly legitimate, from what I've seen. The fact that they don't paint Harper in a very positive light (depending on your viewpoint) isn't wrong, it's just presenting things the way the Libs see them.
So you see nothing wrong with the insinuations that Harper was receiving under the table funding from sources in the USA?

'Liberal attack ad about Harper and his contributions', 'CTVNews'

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20060103/ELXN_liberal_attackads_060110/20060111?s_name=election2006&no_ads=
 
Liberal attack ad angers military
Jan. 11, 2006. 02:32 PM
CANADIAN PRESS


OTTAWA — Soldiers past and present say they are insulted and outraged by a "despicable" and "incredibly stupid" Liberal campaign ad suggesting Canadian cities would be subject to military occupation under a Conservative government.

"It's pretty dumb to use soldiers as a wedge issue," said retired general Lewis MacKenzie, who ran for the Tories and lost in 1997. "It took my breath away; I just couldn't believe anybody could be that dumb."

The ad, which Liberals say was pulled before it ever ran on television (although it's been seen on news programs), opens with the ominous sound of a military drumbeat and the Conservative leader's blurred face in the background.

As the face comes slowly into focus, a concerned, measured voice speaks behind the words on the screen: "Stephen Harper actually announced he wants to increase military presence in our cities.

"Canadian cities. Soldiers with guns. In our cities. In Canada.

"We did not make this up. Choose your Canada."

The ad was pulled from the Liberal party's English website but was still playing this afternoon on the party's French website.

Liberal spokesman Steve McKinnon said the ad was never approved and was included on a DVD distributed to the media and on the Liberal website in error. He said it was not run as a paid commercial and will not be run.

The Tories, who have proposed a permanent military presence in major Canadian cities as a ready aid in emergencies, said the ad implies that they are advocating some form of martial law.

The issue is particularly sensitive in Quebec, where long-held mistrust and resentment of the military was exacerbated in 1970 when the Liberal government of the day ordered martial law amid the FLQ crisis.

Soldiers, sailors and aircrew are formally prohibited from making public political comment or responding to political policy. But that didn't stop some from e-mailing expressions of outrage to advocacy and veterans' groups.

"People I work with echo my disgust that Canadian politicians are now using Canadian Forces personnel, past and present, to threaten people into voting Liberal," said one airman from Cold Lake, Alta.

The airman, who has served for 26 years, wrote in the e-mail to a national veterans' group that the ad appears directed at least partly at immigrants whose experience with militaries are almost invariably negative.

"We can only see this as a desperate attempt to win a few votes from what some would call the ethnic minority," he said.

"We have been honoured to walk Canadian streets. We have gone to the aid of municipalities in ice storms and the odd snow flurry in Toronto. If a city asked us for armed help during a crisis (as in the Oka or FLQ incidents, both a Quebec problem), I hope we would serve Canada well."

Retired colonel Alain Pellerin called the ad an act of desperation that is particularly "despicable" since CF members — even the chief of defence staff — are muzzled and cannot publicly respond.

"To use the Armed Forces for a purely crass political aim, to me is despicable," said Pellerin, a former infantryman who heads the Conference of Defence Associations, a lobby group and think tank.

He said it's even more offensive given that it's virtually the only reference the Liberals have made to the military in the entire campaign.

The Conservatives are not proposing anything new, Pellerin added.

"The army with guns in the city — we've been there since the foundation of the colony. Most of the time they were there to help . . . like the Winnipeg floods, the floods in the Saguenay, the ice storm in Ontario."

In an online blog, former navy seaman Lance Levsen of Delisle, Sask., said he was angered by the ad.

"That ad doesn't attack Harper and the (Conservatives). It attacks me," Levsen wrote. "The group of people that this ad targets are suggested to be a threat to peace in our Home and Native Land. That was me. ME!

"That ad targets my comrades who had the courage to join a profession whose job description includes death. That ad targets the heroic people of the UN peacekeeping missions who stand between warring factions defending peace."
 
Bravo to you North Star, Bravo. My thoughts exactly. I am going to express similar sentiments to the local Liberal hopeful here. IMHO, this hideously melodramatic ad (which as of this afternoon was still running in Quebec) shows the true colours of those at the heart of the Liberal party. Just as in the last election, when they raised the military "spectre" with nonsense about the PCs buying "aircraft carriers", they reveal that we who serve this country are to be used as bogeyman to frighten an electorate that they hope in their splendid arrogance is ignorant enough to be stampeded by this BS. Sickening. At least they have "outed" themselves. And to think that, for a moment, I was considering voting Liberal for the first time in my life. Stupid me. Not now.

Cheers
 
OK. The anger has now subsided. I can now view the anti-military ad and others in the series for what they are: The last desperate attempts of a morally corrupt political party desperate to remain in power. Imagine the skeletons that are about to be unearthed!

Anyhow, now it's time for the humour. Try these links for parodies to the new ad campaign:

http://www.damianpenny.com/archived/005519.html

http://www.pomochristian.ca/negativity.wmv
 
So you feel "stabbed in the back" as a serviceman?  Hey, imagine what it feels like to be one of 3,000,000 gun owners!

:rage:

Tom
 
This latest ad reflects a blundering, barely thought out campaign that I've been pretty surprised by. I mean, there are MANY different things on which to pick on Harper for....but too try and scare the public with its *own* military? Please. 

In general, I'm sick of *all* the political ads and smear campaigns. The conservatives have quite a few nasty ads also. And I certainly don't agree with Harper politicizing the 4 RCMP deaths during the latest debate. I don't believe for a second that the conservative government would have pro-actively increased mandatory sentences *before* all the media hoopla about gun violence this year.
 
All I can say is that when I deploy to Afghanistan on the 23rd of January we had better have a change of Government in this great nation. I feel personally insulted by this deplorable ad.

TOW TRIPOD
 
Actually, this is pretty easy:

Stephen Harper is a man.

Almost all Domestic Assault is committed by men.

Men, just like Stephen Harper.

Does Stephen Harper beat his wife?

He won't admit to it.

But he was photographed punching a punching bag earlier in this campaign

In Canada.

We're not making this up.

Choose your Canada

Vote Liberal
 
"actively increased mandatory sentences *before* all the media hoopla about gun violence this year."

Good point.  They still have lots of lawyers in their ranks, and those guys stick togather like cow pies when they perceive a threat to their rice bowls.

Tom
 
George Wallace said:
So you see nothing wrong with the insinuations that Harper was receiving under the table funding from sources in the USA?

'Liberal attack ad about Harper and his contributions', 'CTVNews'

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20060103/ELXN_liberal_attackads_060110/20060111?s_name=election2006&no_ads=

The wording of the ad was:

"Who paid for Stephen Harper's rise to the head of the party? We don't know. He refuses to reveal his donors. What do you suppose he's hiding? We do know he's very popular with right-wingers in the U.S. They have money. Maybe they helped? We just don't know. He just won't say. Choose your Canada."

No accusation is made therein. Any contributions made to Harper from US sources need not be under the table, as Canadian election law holds that a candidate or individual may receive contributions from "a corporation that carries on business in Canada, other than a Crown corporation or a corporation that receives more than 50% of its funding from the federal government".
 
Back
Top