I just got done watching CBC coverage on the Ottawa shootings including speeches from Prime Minster Stephen Harper and opposition leader Tom Mulcair. Harper chalked today's attacks and the attack killing a soldier in Quebec on Monday as terrorism and vowed to keep fighting terrorists at home and abroad. Mulcair didn't utter the t-word in his speech, but showed solidarity with the government and was steadfast in not letting the haters turn Canadians into haters themselves.
That might prove to be a difference-making point, where Mulcair's description (..."hatred and brutality. A cowardly act...") didn't talk about terrorism or ISIS and positions the NDP to be the party of cultural sensitivity if the Tories edge into Islam-bashing as part of their anti-terror moves. They're not critical of the government, but he's putting on a more genteel tone.
I was moved by two aspects of the story that I'm just now getting a grasp on.
The first was the shooting at the War Memorial. This would be the analog of someone shooting up the honor guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington National Cemetery, except that it is in downtown Ottawa rather than across the river from Washington proper. Nathan Cirillo was the name of the Hamilton reservist who was part of the honor guard who died this morning; he deserves more air time than the man who killed him.
The second was the nature of where the parliament building shootout took place. The hallway was right between the caucus rooms on caucus day. The ruling Conservatives were meeting on one side of the hallway, while the opposition New Democrats and Liberals were meeting on the other side. On a normal caucus Wednesday, the hallway would be swarming with MPs talking to reporters after the caucus meetings let out about 11AM or so.
The shooting happened just before 10 while everyone was still in the meetings. Thus, the folks in the hall were mostly a security detail rather than a bunch of unarmed civilians. The shooter was an hour too early to create a slew of by-elections.
Also, since this is a parliamentary system, you have all the leaders in one spot, so that you have the cabinet members there. To get the same effect in the US, you'd have to have the White House and the Capital Building merged and have an armed gunman waltz right to the door where the cabinet was meeting along with all of Congress.
Kevin Vickers is the Sergeant at Arms for parliament, and was the man of the match (to go British), leading from the front, as they would say of a wartime general. The role that we normally see as merely ceremonial (his analogue on Capital Hill gets camera time introducing the president as he comes in for the State of the Union) was a combat position this morning.
He's also the guy who oversaw the security that let the shooter get as far as he did, so he'll have some 'splainin' to do about what should have been done better along side his heroism of the morning. That being said, he likely was following orders on what the powers that be wanted in security, so anyone looking to hang a veteran former Mountie out to dry for this would be doing a bad case of scapegoating.
I've never been to Ottawa, but I have been to Capital Hill and Arlington as a teen. This story has hit me strangly hard, where a youngish man (32) kills a honor guard and puts Canada's government on hold for a day. We're finding out more about the shooter and his track record; it gives one pause to think of the chaos that one "lone wolf" can do.
We also need to count our blessings that he didn't do more damage. He was an hour away from shooting up a large block of MPs.
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