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Vimy Ridge

Wednesday April 18, 2012

April 18, 2012 by Graeme MacKay

By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator, Wednesday April 18, 2012

Canada’s last great step forward

There was no sunshine in Ottawa when they signed the Constitution Act on April 17, 1982. While the gunmetal grey skies above Parliament Hill opened with a deluge, demonstrators in Quebec City wore black armbands, waved the fleur-de-lis, and denounced their brethren as “vendus.”

No matter. In the shadow of the Peace Tower, the federal government had arranged a spray of flags, a fusillade of cannon, a flock of birds and a flight of fighter jets. Thirty thousand spectators cheered.

The Queen, seated on a canopied stage, gave the new Constitution legitimacy. Pierre Elliott Trudeau, in a morning suit and a top hat, gave it eloquence. Both gave it their signatures, and a sense of occasion, too.

To reporters who had spent some two years covering parliamentary debates, intergovernmental conferences, committee hearings and court challenges, all played out in the shrillest of tones, the ceremony on April 17 marked the end of a political season for the ages.

Surely, we thought, this was the last of the wasting battles over rights and powers between the federal government and the provinces, which had flared episodically since the mid-1960s.

Surely, we thought, this was the war to end all of Canada’s Constitutional Wars, “The Last Act,” as Ron Graham, the mellifluous chronicler, called his account of the feverish events that unfolded in November 1981.

Before Canada’s Thirty Years War did come to end, there would still be disastrous agreements at Meech Lake and Charlottetown, both intended to fix a Constitution that needed no fixing.(Source: Ottawa Citizen)

 

Posted in: Canada Tagged: anniversaries, anniversary, Canada, commemoration, Constitution, nostalgia, titanic, Vimy Ridge

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

April 10, 2007 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, Editorial Cartoonist, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday, April 10, 2007

Afghanistan deaths hang over Vimy commemoration

A day in Ottawa and France to mark sacrifices by Canadian soldiers 90 years ago at Vimy Ridge was overshadowed by the deaths of six soldiers in Afghanistan.

“We’re celebrating a victory of 90 years ago, but we also remember the six soldiers who continued to serve our country,” said Gen. Rick Hillier, Canada’s top soldier, in France on Monday.

“We also remember their peers and colleagues, who are still on that mission and do the great work we ask of them.”

The Easter Sunday blast in the western part of Kandahar province caused the worst single-day loss of life for Canadian soldiers in more than 50 years.

Gov. Gen. Michaelle Jean said Monday at the National War Memorial in Ottawa that she was in Afghanistan just a few months ago.

“I was with them and I’m terribly sad, saddened by the news and I’ll be with the families,” said the commander-in-chief of the armed forces.

“My heart breaks. I cry every time a soldier goes. I think it’s hard for any mother to lose a child,” said Wilhelmina Beerenfenger-Kohler, this year’s Silver Cross mother. (Source: CTV News)

 

Posted in: Canada Tagged: 2007, Afghanistan, Canada, Editorial Cartoon, memorial, military, monument, Remembrance, soldiers, Vimy Ridge, war

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Please note…

This website contains satirical commentaries of current events going back several decades. Some readers may not share this sense of humour nor the opinions expressed by the artist. To understand editorial cartoons it is important to understand their effectiveness as a counterweight to power. It is presumed readers approach satire with a broad minded foundation and healthy knowledge of objective facts of the subjects depicted.

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