Inkless Wells

Inkless Wells

Inkless Wells

Paul Wells on all the latest out of Ottawa—along with the occasional post about jazz. Follow Paul on Twitter: @InklessPW

Irregulars assemble! It's time for an Inkless Research Quiz!

by Paul Wells on Thursday, September 11, 2008 2:08pm - 26 Comments

And there’s only one question:

Who can find the best quote from a senior political leader in Canada, the United States, the UK or Australia on the danger of setting a fixed date (to coin a phrase) in the future for military withdrawal from the current conflicts in Iraq or Afghanistan?

Ground rules:

1. Canadian political leaders will be scored higher than U.S., UK or Australian leaders, but we are Anglosphere-friendly here at Inkless so we’ll take ‘em all.

2. Afghanistan scores more highly than Iraq.

3. The more recent, categorical, chest-thumping and dismissive of timetablists and deadline-setters, the better.

If you’re wondering what inspired this quiz, then darling, you just haven’t been paying attention.

Winner will receive a set of virtual steak knives from Bob’s House of You Weren’t Expecting Real Steak Knives, Were You?

Post answers below. I’m afraid I have to ask you not to post links, as our software doesn’t like links and it will wish your post into the cornfield where it will have to sit next to Ryan Sparrow for a while. But be prepared to cough up a link if asked.

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  • LDL

    “I went in for one year. But I knew at the end of the first year we probably wouldn’t be able to get out. It would likely take a second year to get out. And that after a period of time we might rotate back in. By committing to two years, Harper has taken the pressure off others to replace us.” A quote from an interview with Paul Martin, February 7, 2007, cited in The Unexpected War: Canada in Kandahar by Janice Gross Stein and Eugene Lang. (A book I happen to be reading in an effort to understand how we got into this situation in the first place.)

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