Letters | Canada is following the Americans by staying put in Afghanistan
This is in response to your "What do you think? Send us a letter," in connection with Michael Staples' column of March 19, about the Canadian troops being in Afghanistan.
He thinks that it is "pointless" to set deadlines and not keep them.
He says: "What's the point in letting Canadians believe we'll be out of the area on a certain date, if the intention all along is to remain?"
I think that Canada and the European Union have simply followed in the footsteps of the Americans. And, by Americans I mean those in positions of power and prestige, not each and every American citizen.
Their apparent argument for attacking Afghanistan was that the followers of Osama bin Laden who attacked the World Trade Center in New York on 9/11, had been trained somewhere in Afghanistan. The Taliban government of Afghanistan was not directly responsible for the attack, but they were guilty of not co-operating with some American oil tycoons who wanted to build pipelines through Afghanistan to the Arabian Sea. I understand that Bush and Cheney both have had some interest in the oil business.
It is ridiculous to suggest that the prime reason for the presence of foreign troops in Afghanistan is to improve the living standard of Afghans, and to make them "Democratic."
When in the 1980s, the Soviet Union tried to improve the lives of Afghans and make them "Communistic," the United States helped the likes of Taliban and their friends in Pakistan to fight the forces of the Soviet Union. They are now referred to as the extremists and fundamentalists.
I think that the fundamental mistake is not to determine as to what motivated the followers of Osama bin Laden to attack on 9/11.
Did they wish to conquer the United States of America?
Did they want to convert all Americans to their religion of Islam?
What do Taliban wish to accomplish?
Only this morning on March 21, CBC quoted a young Afghan saying that he was willing to die for Islam. Most of the suicide bombers honestly believe that their early death on this earth will ensure "eternal life" for them in heaven.
Apparently, the Taliban leaders also feel the same way. They want all Afghan men and women to live by what they believe is dictated by God. They did not want Godless Communism to dominate their lives, and they do not wish to follow the concept of "Democracy," under which human beings can enact laws that violate their God-given laws.
It is, therefore, a kind of religious war that Canada is involved in Afghanistan.
I think there is a need for intellectual debates and discussions among informed human beings about different religious beliefs and the scientific knowledge that has been gained during the last few hundred years.
No one chooses his or her parents or the place of birth.
Matin Yaqzan
Fredericton
Universal immersion
With respect to the proposal to change the French language program in New Brunswick, the main advantage stressed for the current system is that early immersion seems to be the best time for children to learn a second language.
The disadvantage is that promotes streaming, for the 70 per cent of children not in immersion who do not learn much French in the English core program.
It also limits opportunities for a school-wide French culture.
The main advantage of the proposed system is that it might eliminate streaming by having all children take immersion French starting in Grade 5. It would also facilitate a school-wide French cultural experience. The major disadvantage is that it eliminates the very popular and successful early immersion learning experience.
An alternative might be universal French immersion for Grades 1 through 4, with the option of English core or continuing in French immersion after Grade 5.
This alternative would keep the early immersion learning experience, remove streaming during these early years, and facilitate a school-wide French cultural experience for all children in elementary grades. It would also entail relatively smaller overall administrative changes in current school programs.
Dr. Sylvia Hale
Dept. of Sociology
St. Thomas University
Fredericton
Snice and snuds
I was cleaning the snice (snow compacted into the density of ice by freezing rain) off my car recently, and it occurred to me to calculate just how much the layer added to the weight and the cost of running the car.
Volume was easy, length times, breadth times, thickness, times density of ice gave weight - calculate fraction of weight of car and use that fraction of the price of gas.
It works out to nearly one-half a cent per litre for each inch of snice, or two-tenths of a cent per litre for each centimetre of thickness. Factor in the effect on your streamlining, and you are too close to care about the difference.
I thought you might like to know.
Here's another handy linguistic coinage for this time of year. A snud is that hard mass of snow and mud that clings to the wheel well behind your tire. I got this word a few years ago from a newspaper columnist, in The Daily Gleaner, I believe.
Snice fits for the hard, heavy crust on the snow.
Stuart Mills
Fredericton
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