Here he goes again...

For those living under a rock:  Wikileaks released nearly 400,000 documents this past weekend pertaining to the behaviour of US forces in Iraq of the past several years.  Much of it paints a fairly bleak picture of (as war resisters have already been saying) poor or non-existent practices concerning the safety of civilians, excessive unnecessary civilian deaths, and outright lying by the US military to cover these statistics up.

Of course, Minister Kenney cannot pass up an opportunity to publicly impugn Iraq war resisters.  As quoted from the Ottawa Citizen:

Immigration Minister Jason Kenney, who was in Toronto to announce an extension of an Iraqi refugee program, said Saturday that the document leak was not likely to have a significant impact on how this country deals with U.S. soldiers who are seeking refuge in Canada after deserting U.S. military service.

"With respect to the American military deserters, our position is clear that Canadian law proposes stiff penal sanctions on those who desert from their voluntary commitment to the Canadian Forces. It would be fundamentally unfair to create a double standard whereby deserters from Canadian voluntary service are imprisoned, whereas Americans would be treated as heroes," he said.

-Ottawa Citizen, pg A3, 24 Oct 2010

Really?  Let's ignore for a minute that this man is supposed to be a Minister of the Crown, and as such, should be seeking to ensure the balance and impartiality of Canada's immigration system instead of making public statements to bias cases currently under review by the same officers he hires and fires every year.  Let's ignore that this is only one of several such comments he's made in the public eye, and has hopelessly contaminated his own immigration review systems with statements like this one, along with Operational Bulletin 202, which essentially tells case officers to forward all war resister cases to his office, rather than simply follow impartial reviewing procedures in the field.  Let's put all that aside for a second.

Out of one side of his mouth, Minister Kenney espouses a special immigration measure needed for refugees from a nation torn apart by a war the US started.  His own Prime Minister has called this war, "...absolutely an error."  The government of Canada seems to recognize that what has happened there is wrong, and shameful.  But in the next sentence, Minister Kenney denounces soldiers who came to the very same conclusion, and declares that it is a criminal act to refuse to kill and maim the same Iraqis that need Canada's salvation.  Minister Kenney, I do not understand your line of thinking, and I don't believe you do, either.