Social-media snoops
Scouring social media as a means of improving government programs has about as much validity as using Kijiji postings to enhance the accuracy of employment figures (Ottawa Launches Data Collection Review – May 9).
Interim privacy commissioner Chantal Bernier's contention that the public availability of personal information on the Internet "does not render personal information non-personal" is valid. The information gleaned can be manipulated to support government policy or to punish communities or individuals who do not subscribe to government ideology.
Anyone opposed to warrantless government snooping can contact the privacy manager at their telecommunication provider and ask them to provide the kind of personal information that they maintain and retain about you. They are obliged to respond within 30 days under the Personal Information Protection and Electronics Documents Act.
If providers are flooded with requests, it might put a stop to this kind of nonsense, in which they are complicit.
Dennis Casaccio, Clementsport, N.S.
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Stephen Harper, we are told, cancelled the long-form census on a matter of principle. He did not believe that people should be obliged by the state to disclose private information.
Now it comes to light that his government is surreptitiously collecting private information from people's social media accounts.
Where are his principles now?
Douglas Campbell, Vancouver
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In their honour
Re Flag Flap (May 9): With the Day of Honour having been held on the eve of Mother's Day weekend, it would have been most fitting and decent to have presented the Canadian flag to a mother of one of the 158 fallen Canadian soldiers, avoiding unseemly controversy and suspicions of personal vanity or politics intruding on this solemn ceremony.
Stanley Greenspoon, North Vancouver
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Legion President Gordon Moore is likely correct about the protocol of who should have received the Maple Leaf flown in Kabul – the Governor-General, not the Prime Minister – on the Day of Honour. He is mistaken if he thinks the event was not already politicized.
While Jean Chrétien's Liberals may have brought Canada into the conflict, this has really been the Conservatives' war.
The rhetoric of "supreme sacrifice," heroism and honour are part of a political narrative which imagines that overwhelming violence is the way to peace, that military might gains us "respect" and international profile, that armed intervention is the best way to ensure democracy and development. This is a government that has vilified critics of the war and questioned their patriotism.
A "Day of Honour" does nothing to advance genuine criticism or evaluation of their policy and the terrible cost borne not only by our soldiers but Afghans as well.
Kevin Flynn, Ottawa
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A different mission
Re 158 (folio, May 9): A cursory analysis of the cause of death of the 158 men and women who lost their lives in Afghanistan reveals how this assignment differed from any previous assignment: 109 killed by IEDs, land mines and suicide bombers, while just 27 appear to have died in actual "combat."
Not only did our troops not know who the "enemy" was, they had no way of defending against concealed explosives, either in the ground or carried by persons.
It's no wonder returning service personnel are experiencing mental problems to a degree un-known in previous engagements.
J. T. Reid, Oakville, Ont.
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At Farley's best
Perhaps it was inevitable, but Farley Mowat has been deemed Canada's "beloved storyteller," the tone denoting a cuddly stuffed animal. Americans did more or less the same thing to Mark Twain after he died. The animals Farley admired had real teeth and real claws. At his best, Farley did, too.
Richard Bachmann, Burlington, Ont.
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Democracy, Ukraine
Four years ago, a democratic election was held in Ukraine: The government so recently ousted in a coup was supported by most of the voters in the east and southern parts of the country.
If a coup had cancelled my vote, I'd be really, really upset. Vladimir Putin aside, can't we at least sympathize with these voters instead of calling them rebels?
It could be said that the rebels are those who have formed the new government. It's also a problem for me that this new government was recognized by the West without due consideration, in a knee-jerk reaction because we don't like Mr. Putin. With good cause – Mr. Putin is a thug.
But who are we to deny the results of an election because the result is not to our liking?
It's a real disappointment that our democratic, freedom-loving leaders don't love freedom enough to respect a choice we disagree with, and readily support a government takeover that has so little legitimacy.
Alice Mawhinney, Toronto
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In 1992, 12 Canadian colleagues and I, upon invitation from over 15 Ukrainian political parties, representing all segments of the then-evolving political landscape, conducted a two-week Campaign College seminar called The Pragmatics of Democratic Society. They wanted to know how Canada organized, supervised and monitored national elections.
I was in the chair for the concluding session, when a woman, representing the Green Party, asked the question, "Sir, my colleagues and I wish to know how do you go about making a decision?" Stunned, we realized Ukrainians had not had to make any kind of real political decision since 1922, the year Ukraine came under Russia's fiefdom as one of the 15 constituent socialist republics of the Soviet Union.
We quickly realized this important question should have been explored on the first day of the seminar. Now, over 20 years later, Ukrainians wish to hold free elections, and to finally make a decision on the future of their nation, an election free from Western and former Soviet Union influence. Canada should do everything it can to support this decision.
Edgar Cowan, Toronto
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Define 'liberal'
Letter writer Maureen Faour provides a good definition of "liberal" with "freedom of the individual" (Liberal MPs' Choice – May 9). Pro-choice is not pro-abortion, it is pro the individual's right to choose something that deeply affects the chooser. Pro-life compels the individual to do something against their wishes. That is closer to the definition of dictatorship.
Tony Burt, Vancouver
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A mother's day
Sarah Hampson differentiates between a "stay-at-home" mom and a "working mom" (Be You – Life, May 9).
Newsflash: All mothers work.
Mary-Ellen Bieth, Toronto