Canadian Support For Taliban Not Surprising

We won't take action against homegrown terrorists so why would anyone expect us fight terrorism overseas. What an appropriate memorial for those who died in Afghanistan.

Canadians support talks with Taliban: poll
Updated Sun. May. 20 2007 11:00 PM ET
CTV.ca News Staff

Canadians still think it's a good idea to negotiate with Afghanistan's Taliban insurgents as a way to end the violence there, a poll finds.

In The Strategic Counsel poll conducted for CTV and The Globe and Mail, there was almost two-to-one support for the notion:

* Net good idea: 63 per cent
* Net bad idea: 32 per cent

The proportion of respondents saying it was a bad idea dropped by four percentage points when the same question was asked in October.

"In a way, it's a very Canadian thing to believe that nothing can't be solved by sitting across a table and talking," Peter Donolo of The Strategic Counsel told CTV.ca on Sunday.

However, Canadians might also think the mission is a morass, with no real end point in sight, he said.

Donolo said 57 per cent of Conservative Party members supported the idea of negotiations.

When NDP Leader Jack Layton called for peace talks with the Taliban last fall, Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay later called the approach "naive." Some wags started calling Layton "Taliban Jack."

Afghanistan's Senate has recently called on the government of President Hamid Karzai to open talks with homegrown Taliban militants, in part as a response to civilian casualties caused by combat between the militants and NATO and U.S.-led troops.

Shame......