Just like so many other taxpayers, I am fed up with the complaints emerging from the ungrateful mouths of some of the 'Canadian' evacuees. And, as I mentioned yesterday, I'm sure that the media is focusing on these negative comments in gleeful retaliation as they engage in their own little unending war with the PMO.
However, I have a few questions. First of all, what were 40 - 50,000 Canadians doing in Lebanon in the first place? The Toronto Sun's Peter Worthington has a few ideas:
...Most are dual-citizenship Canadians who've chosen to return to the motherland to live as Lebanese -- until trouble strikes and then they want the Canadian government to rescue them, not the Lebanese government...
...Now Canada is chartering seven ships and a bunch of aircraft to rescue these citizens, many of whom have chosen not to live in Canada. Does Canada have an obligation to be responsible for them? The cost to taxpayers of removing tens of thousands from Lebanon is enormous.
How many, one wonders, of these people will move back to Lebanon when the crisis is over and security is restored -- assuming it ever will be in Lebanon?
The view that "a Canadian is a Canadian" and all should be treated equally may need revising.
Why should the government be responsible for naturalized citizens who return to live in a dangerous country in which they are also citizens?
Tourists or short-term visitors are in a different category...
M.P. Garth Turner is also asking some questions, and it looks like he is taking a lambasting over it. He has even been called a racist for daring to say out loud what others are thinking (but of course, that's nothing new for Garth!).
Earl McRae of the Ottawa Sun has some questions too (H/T to Right in Canada):
Some Lebanese-Canadians demanded Harper "apologize" for the Lebanese-Canadian family killed in the Israeli bombing. Tragic? Of course.
Harper apologize? No bloody way. Why should he apologize? Get real, for God's sake.
(Sounds a bit like Dr. Phil there, doesn't he?)
The situation itself is tragic and desperate. However, a simple thanks would be nice. When we instead hear things like:
..."It was insulting,” said Woodbridge’s Omran, as she remembered the fainting and vomiting on a crowded boat from Beirut...
we feel insulted ourselves. But apparently we are not allowed to express those thoughts because that would be politically incorrect. Thank you Mr. Trudeau and all those years of Liberal indoctrination.
Ha! I got my mojo back!!!
* * * * *
UPDATE: Think about this next time you have to pay your taxes:
Another evacuee said she was "ashamed to be Canadian" and regretted the apparently arduous journey.
"If I knew that it was going to be like this, I would have stayed in Lebanon under the bombs," said Roula Karbash. "It would be easier."
Doesn't that just make you feel warm all over?
18 comments:
Joanne, I hope to have a recording of the head of the Maronite church of Ottawa soon. he called in to Lowell Green earlier in the week and he was just interviewed on CTV. He scolded the press for only interviewing one or two people. That those on the boats with a rosary or a Koran wouldn't speak much and that 99% of those being evacuated are ecstatic and grateful.
This man should be sainted.
Looking forward to hearing more, Mulder!
I wish people would stop piling on these poor Canadians. They're fleeing a war zone where there have been bombs going off and gunfire everyday for days, they just spent 10 hours (mostly in the hot sun) waiting with their families to get on a boat, and then another 13 hours on the boat, with no air conditioning, cramped quarters, sick people but no first aid, little to no food or water, and apparently no Canadian officials on board.
If I just spent 24+ hours awake while trying to flee a war zone I wouldn't have anything nice to say, no matter what.
Plus, I'm certian the press is focusing on the negative comments of these poor people who have been through so much and can't possibly have their wits about them. I'm sure there are many more, even in that situation, who said they were glad and relieved and thankful to be safe again (I've read some of those comments too, although all these poor people have been painted with one brush, on a number of fronts). I'd also bet we'll hear a lot of gratitude from those who have been quoted complaining, once they're not being interviewed immediately after deboarding from a ship after a twenty-four hour non-stop evacuation from an active war zone.
Give these people a break. They've been through worse than most of us will ever see.
If one was to read between the lines on some of the comments of the evacuees, "We were treated like animals", would translate to "We were treated like poor people".
Convenient Canadians or not, they were evacuated to safety, but not in the style they were accuxtomed to. Next time holiday in Florida.
If "Everybody was vomiting on everybody," as Caroline Nohra of Montreal told the Toronto Sun, why didn't I see anyone with vomit on their clothes on the CBC last night?
But seriously, this incident has awakened Canadians, as the Dutch have been awakened, to the fact that many of our so-called citizens regard citizenship as a list of entitlements, not a matter of fealty, values or obligations.
Tango, thanks. Your list is a good start for the government to review. I'm sure they will be doing a post-game analysis in depth, when they can catch their breath.
Lord Kitchener, good points. Perhaps some of them were worrying about dying from dehydration, which would be a valid concern; especially with the children. Where was the Red Cross in all of this???
Of course the media wanted to make hay with the negative comments. If it bleeds, it leads, right?
Silverwinger, yeah. If your destination is the Middle East, you know there is a level of inherent danger, just like going to Mexico during the hurricane season.
Joan, excellent points! With rights come responsibilities. Too many people in this country only want the good stuff; like a bunch of kids.
Yet another case of media desperate to find a way to make PM Harper and the Conservatives look bad. I wonder how many people the reporters had to interview before they found someone willing to complain?
Yes, for all of you leftie moonbats, it's that tired old accusation of media bias. Don't feel constrained to remark on it... I already have for you. Go back to sleep and have a nice socialist dream.
Was anyone being forced to accept this "free" emergency evacuation provided by the Canadian taxpayers?
Why were some people packing a suitcase or five? It was, after all, an emergency evacuation; not a vacation cruise. At most, they should have a carry-on bag with essentials. Why are they expecting someone to help them with all this luggage they shouldn't be bringing in the first place??
No-one forced the evacuees to stand in line in the sun for 10 hours. They chose to do so in order to access the free and safe passage.
Did someone take away the bottled water any prudent person who be carrying in that carry-on bag of essentials or did the evacuees simply turn over all responsibility for their well-being to our benevolent Canadian government which is based some 8800+ km away?
Isn't that the truth?
Good post and comments too............
Why do the MSM like to play up the exagerations of such self described victims?
I have seldom been as thoroughly disgusted as this week. Whiners and exploitation of whining idiots at the expense of a nation.
Grumpy
Wow 50,000 standed Canadian in Lebanon. This must be the vacation capital of Canada. Just can't figure out why I've never considered going there??? It's amazing as well because they don't seem to have to advertise to get us to go???
I just hope they all have legit Passports and if they do haven't been collecting CPP and even UIC while there getting their R&R (poor Joanne can only afford to go to Port Elgin)..
And what's wrong with Port Elgin?....
never mind...don't start that list
(just kidding)
lol! Well, there wasn't any air conditioning where I was staying in Port Elgin either, but I toughed it out.
I think we should take up a collection for Roula Karbash, who is 'ashamed' to be a Canadian. We should offer her a one-way ticket back to Lebanon; luxury class, on the condition that she revoke her Canadian citizenship.
«I think we should take up a collection ...»
I second that (e)motion.
There should be plenty of room for Roula on the planes and ships going *to* Beirut...
Gabby and L.S. Yes, I feel terrible about her having to stay in a country that she so clearly disdains. As a humanitarian gesture, we should do everything possible to help her escape this horrible abyss of shameful inadequacies.
I wrote the following, then scrolled back and I see that tangojuliette has said essentially the same thing, only better...
After reading Peter Worthington's column today, I have a more sympathy for the complainers. He wrote of a soldier who was killed who is now being smeared as though "he didn't know what he was getting into" because he was complaining about military life to his sweetheart. Peter writes that soldiers bellyache about conditions all the time, but still do their duty as best they can.
Not much of a comparison here, because we can't see if these people would later show that their complaining is just superficial and for that moment.
I wrote the following, then scrolled back and I see that tangojuliette has said essentially the same thing, only better...
Wow, I'll bet you just made Tango's day! Now there is one passionate dude.
But L.S., you make a good point. Sometimes people say things when they're stressed out that they would never say under normal conditions. We must give them the benefit of the doubt, I guess.
ls&jtb:
aw shucks folks, you're making me blush.
It's not that I harbour much passion on this issue, as much as I harbour much empathy and a whole lot of ignorance and misunderstanding.
No doubt, some evacuees will prove to be flakes ( like the guy who flew back with his wife and kids on PMSH's plane, only to get arrested for oustanding warrants, the minute he stepped off the plane in Ottawa.) Some others may prove to be sympathetic hezBOLA supporters and avowed anti-Israel agitators.
The remainder are, more than likely, just like any of us, the key difference being most of us have never experienced witnessing the devastation and destruction of our respective ancestral homelands, nor have we quaked in fearful anxiety, deep in the earth,in dark dank shelters, thinking,hoping and praying that we shall be safe from harm, safe to yet once again enjoy the kiss of the warming sun, or the embrace of a warmer lover. Not many of us having been forced to, mole-like seek succor from the fury of aerial bombardment, as G.M. Hopkins wrote.
Tango - Almost poetic!
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