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FLOWERS-IN-GUNBARRELS WATCH Canada's unilateral conventional

FLOWERS-IN-GUNBARRELS WATCH

Canada's unilateral conventional disarmament takes another big step forward this coming Tuesday, the rumour mill has it. Flush from the 29-4 Toronto City Council vote to expropriate Fort York for homeless housing (see previous entries), a group called Build Not Bomb, or something like that anyway, is demanding the federal government surrender the other 50 per cent of its downtown Toronto property, Moss Park Armoury. Unlike the previous group, which put their appeal solely in terms of the supposedly dire needs of Toronto's indigent, this group is much more radically pacifist, saying that training for war and killing besmirches Canada's reputation, and that its soldiers really need to be re-educated in the teachings of Gandhi, King, etc., be forced to do socially constructive things like building low-cost housing, etc., etc., until they agree that war really doesn't solve anything. The group has promised a demonstration every Tuesday night until the armed forces are kicked out of Canada's largest city, starting next week. Given the armed forces' general preference to surrender facilities rather than risk unpopularity (Ipperwash, anyone?) one suspects they might even succeed. I guess I'm glad I have other employers besides National Defence, now...

In other news, Canada's new defence minister, John McCallum, may be on hand to celebrate the first ever Canadian Forces Day, a new unofficial holiday proclaimed by the Canadian government last April, in Toronto this Sunday. He and Toronto's mayor will be reviewing troops from... wait for it... the facilities the anti-military activists and the City Council are moving to close down. Where? At City Hall, of course.