On positions of convenience

With Gordon O'Connor now trying to claim that Canada's mission in Afghanistan doesn't involve a war, and the Cons arguing that the Geneva Convention is thus of no application, it's worth taking a look at whether that's been a consistent position for the Cons. And to nobody's surprise, the answer is...not so much.

For example, here's Stephen Harper a couple of months back:

When it was suggested that people oppose the mission because it's not Canada's war, Harper quickly interjected.

"But it is our war."

And lest this appear to be another difference of perspective between Harper and O'Connor, O'Connor himself has argued that Afghanistan is a "war" for the purposes of the Geneva Conventions:

We are quite satisfied with the agreement. It protects prisoners under the Geneva agreement and all other war agreements.

And for good measure:

I would imagine that we also keep track of the prisoners that we capture, that is, we know whom we captured by name, et cetera, and that there would be a way for us to check on where these prisoners are and how they are treated. Also the Red Cross can be sent in to check on prisoners in war zones.

In other words, in addition to being wrong on their face, the current word games don't reflect anything approaching a consistent Con position either. Which means that if the readily foreseeable results of trying to deny that a war is a war come to pass, the Cons won't even be able to claim to have stuck to any consistent principle other than a desire to maximize their own power.

Update: According to the latest O'Connor spin, the Geneva Convention is being applied in Afghanistan, even though it doesn't technically apply and Canada won't hold anybody to it. I'm sure there's no way that sort of confusion could go wrong.