blevkog

I'll agree - for better or worse, whether or not we should have gone there in the first place - we're committed, and pulling out now will solve nothing, and just make the situation worse in Afghanistan

I'll say up front that I agree with our being in Afghanistan. To me, it looks like the Liberals having seen the latest polls on the subject, see a chance to score some points with the electorate. I've always detested those who use the military to further their own ends and thats pretty much what this looks like to me.

What puzzles me is what Dosanjh actually hopes to accomplish by this. The only way the Liberals could score points with the electorate in a Parliamentary debate would be to stand up in Parliament and repudiate a policy that they themselves put in place.

I was under the impression that they wanted a debate to help resell this mission to Canadians, not to take the view that we need to pull out. If nothing else if the Liberals start making that argument right now it can be portrayed as political opportunism of the crassest sort since it was a Liberal majority government that deployed the troops on this mission to begin with.

If what they wan to do is help Canadians understand why Afghanistan is not Iraq and why it is important for Canada to continue its mission there then I am all for it. Given that there seems to be more than a little poisoning of the well thanks to the Iraq debacle where perception of what we are doing in Afghanistan and why we are there this makes sense.

This was what Dosanjh stated on Don Newman's Politics the other day, and that makes sense, especially after that poll that made it look like over 2/3rds of the public were against Afghanistan.

If that was the case, then there are other avenues - doesn't Dosanjh talk to the press? Of course he does - that's how this story broke in the first place. And anyway, they'll get their chance to debate this next year when the committment comes up for renewal - the fact that they're doing this just as the poll was released looks suspicious at best and political opportunism at worst. As for the poll, it would seem to be contradicted by this Ipso-Reid poll which leads me to wonder how the respective questions were worded - it's all too easy to phrase a poll question to get the result you want.

You're right about the vagaries of polling, which is exactly why you should be wary of anyone who wants to govern by polls. I seem to remember a PM not long ago that got hung on that very pike...

As for opening up the debate, we can do that outside of parliament without having to risk the debate turning to withdrawing troops. That is something that we should avoid, at least until there is consensus among all involved NATO partners that all is won or lost.

Or both.

Dan:

The day I saw Dosanjh on Politics was right before that second poll that came out that contradicted the first one. So given the argument was being made in that context without the second poll yet in the mix it makes sense and is reasonable, if a bit politically opportunistic. Then again, that is generally the case within politics from all sides when you get right down to it, so it is not so much whether it is opportunistic politically that I mind but rather to what extent/degree it is so. That is for me the determining point.

As for the vagaries of polling I know that all too well. That was why I phrased it as "...poll that made it look like...", because without the questions being asked also included then it is hard for me to take any such poll result seriously. I am well aware of the multitude of ways in which polls and their questions indeed their sequencing alone can impact (be made to impact as well) the outcome/results. Still though it is never a bad thing to make sure others recognize the inherent limitations and weaknesses of polls and polling when discussing them, especially in political focused discussions.

Okay, I didn't know about the appearance being between the two polls, but that that really just goes to prove Kev's point about governing by polls - Dosanjh wasn't saying this as a matter of principle, but he was just taking advantage of the previous poll numbers to score points off of the Conservatives. It's still a moot point, we're already committed to sending the next rotation in, up to the end of the year, so unless we want to steal a page from George Bush's book and tear up International Agreements whenever they're inconvenienced, that's not gonna change. If Dosanjh had acknowledged that (maybe he did, do you have a link to a transcript of what he said?) and said "We want to debate any further commitment beyond our original mandate' then I'd accept that he's talking from at least some base of principles, otherwise it's just a ploy to score points of the Government by seeming to attack a policy that his own Party put in place.

Dan:

Unfortunately no I do not have a link to that interview. As to your point about Dosanjh doing this because of a poll to score points off the Conservatives, I am not sure I get this. If Dosanjh had made the argument that it was needful to discuss altering our current mission in Afghanistan then I could see what you mean, but he was explicit in his stating that both the Liberals and the Conservatives are on the same page regarding the deployment. That his fear/worry was that Canadians were losing their interest/support for it and that discussion/debate could help refocus that support. If anyone was having points scored off of them it was the NDP and to a lesser extent the Bloc since it is there that there is clear opposition to the Afghanistan mission.

Whether we like it or not polls are a part of politics, and they will inevitably impact what topics/issues are discussed on any given day. Any time any politician says anything critical of their opponents, no matter how accurate it may be, one is seeing political opportunism in action. Indeed, one could probably make the argument that anytime any politician says anything publicly that there is some element of political opportunism involved somewhere within the statement and/or motives for it.

I know I saw Dosanjh make the same argument again today on Newsworld, so this seems to be a consistent message the Liberals are making. They are not interested in undercutting the soldiers, but they are concerned that this is the most dangerous phase of this mission to date and that the likelihood of significant casualties is not small. That the general public has not been braced for such nor shown why it is a necessary sacrifice of Canadian lives, and without such a debate/discussion those deaths could well cause the public to turn sharply against this war.

This is especially possible if most Canadians do not recognize that this mission is significantly different than the peacekeeping missions we have mostly done since Korea. I think the discussion is needful, and I think Dosanjh is right to do this, the question is will Harper understand this argument and see the merits in it. We shall see.