"People holding a sign 'To: America. From: the Egyptian People. Stop supporting Mubarak. It's over!" so tweeted my brave colleague, Democracy Now! senior producer Sharif Abdel Kouddous, from the streets of Cairo.

White poppies. Sometimes something rings a little bell amid the gloom, like a bird singing after a catastrophe, or a light in a raging storm. It's a symbol of peace, first introduced in Britain by the Co-operative Women's Guild in 1936. The notion that hope for peace might live, however, is apparently so outlandish that the symbol is little known and only makes rare appearances, as it did in P.E.I. this Remembrance Day, and always seems to upset someone.

Of all the things Canadians want from their government, my guess is that new military fighter jets would probably rank close to last.

But new fighter jets are what we're getting. Despite the enduring popularity of peacekeeping among Canadians, the Harper government continues to ramp up war-oriented military spending, most recently with its announcement of plans to buy 65 F-35 fighter jets from Lockheed Martin.

At $16 billion -- and that's a conservative estimate; cost overruns are rampant with military contracts -- the jets promise to be the most expensive military acquisition in Canadian history.

What makes this purchase bizarre is how little use the jets will be, unless we're waging all-out war.