Thursday Afternoon Links

This and that for your afternoon reading.

- Thomas Walkom notes the absurdity of the Cons' explanation for wanting to keep troops in Afghanistan:

Perhaps the most illogical element of the training argument is the premise. Afghans hardly need to be trained for battle. Since 1979, this has been a country consumed by war, where every male over the age of puberty is a potential fighter and where Kalashnikovs are common household items.

The problem with the Afghan army and police is not that they don’t know how to fight. It is that a good many don’t want to fight for a corrupt government propped up by foreigners. Condemning more of our own soldiers to death won’t solve that.

- But then, paying attention to the obvious consequences of war has apparently never been a strong point for the Cons.

- A question to ponder: exactly how far down the road toward outright cancelling all or part of the F-35 development program will the U.S. have to go before the Cons admit that staking Canada's ability to patrol its territory on the planes? I ask only because at this rate, we may soon get the answer.

- Finally, the Citizen reports on an effort to work across party lines to establish a set of "out of bounds" targets for the province's next election campaign. Which leads me to wonder: if the parties in Canada's most populous province are apparently able to discuss such an agreement for no reason beyond wanting to improve the level of debate, doesn't that tend to suggest it should be possible for federal parties to do the same with some more self-interested goals in mind?