don't know where
don't know when
but I know we'll meet again
some sunny day-- vera lynn
Three items, somewhat related:
OTTAWA -- Veterans Affairs Minister John McCallum and his department refused an offer from Air Canada to fly 100 veterans for free to France for this weekend's D-Day commemoration ceremonies, saying it was too complicated, sources said.The airline quietly made the offer in May during the controversy over the limited number of veterans the government was taking to France.
Sources said that the Department of Veterans Affairs told the airline it couldn't accept the offer because privacy reasons prevented it from confirming whether someone was a D-Day veteran.
Riiiiiight. Like they would be . . . ashamed of that. Or something.
ROME -- While Italian riot police stood vigil Friday, George W. Bush met here with a group of Second World War veterans, including eight Canadians who had fought in the bloody and costly campaign to liberate Italy, and thanked them for their contribution in bringing peace to Europe.The Canadian vets were members of the First Special Service Force (FSSF), a joint Canadian-American commando unit whose members numbered among the first to liberate Rome exactly 60 years ago on Friday.
Ironies abound when the liberators of Italy must be spared the fury of the new proto-fascist mob. You might recall The Devil's Brigade (1968), an entertaining if formulaic movie about the FSSF's (genesis of the Canadian Airborne Regiment and the US Green Berets) exploits.
To say we are honoured to have played a small part in this historic project is an under-statement," said Mario Pilozzi, President and CEO of Wal- Mart Canada. "The Canadians who served our great country during World War II made the freedoms we all enjoy today a reality. And I would personally like to thank the 57,000 associates of Wal-Mart Canada for the fundraising they undertook in their own communities, and the many thousands of Wal-Mart customers from coast to coast who made donations that helped make The Juno Beach Centre happen.
This last item is from 1994, the 50th anniversary of D-Day. Wal-Mart was instrumental in raising money to fund the Juno Beach Centre. The Canadian government wasn't too terribly interested in the matter.
Nevertheless, the Heritage Minister at the time, Sheila Copps, made sure that she was front and centre at the inauguration. Let's remember who the star of the show is, folks
The whole flavour of the moment was captured by a C-PAC (the Canadian equivalent of C-SPAN) documentary crew. It was at turns poignant -- old men, lost in their memories, wandering along the beach -- and ludicrous: Off in the distance you'd see Copps and her entourage -- a clot of department flacks, hangers-on, media types with their boom mikes and TV cameras marching aimlessly to and fro. It was worthy of a Fellini movie, or at least a Monty Python sketch.
The high or low point of the entire thing was Copps hectoring a couple of vets, who were avidly studying a map. She was in a tizzy to get on the road and was saying things like, "C'mon, guys, isn't it time to go, we'll have some lunch, huhh? We should get going, hmmm?" I swear to God she was almost stamping her foot in frustration.
The men had the good manners to ignore her, which was far more chivalry than I would have displayed. Me, I would have frog-marched the stupid twat back to the Channel and chucked her in.
The reason for Copps' rush? She had to give a speech at the War Memorial at Ypres, where 1,000 Canadian troops died while holding the line against the second major German poison gas attack of WWI.
And no, nobody could figure out what the fuck she was doing there, either.
It says something about a culture when we can count on an American president, an American filmmaker, and an American corporation to be more considerate of Canadian martial history than the self-important fools that we keep electing to office.
I wonder, too, if those young men, vomiting with seasickness and fear in those landing craft off Normandy; if they could have seen this far into the future of a once-proud nation -- I wonder whether they'd have continued their mission, or instead tossed their rifles into the sea and set sail for home.