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Dear Canadian Media,

Those of us in the Canadian military, full and part-time, appreciate your greater coverage of the past few years.  We really do.  However, allow me to correct a few inaccuracies, and if you would pass these onto the Canadian public, that’d be great!  First, we are NOT all soldiers.  We are sailors, airmen and airwomen as well!  So for the whining professors at the University of Regina who are bitching that the ‘Heros’ programme – to help offspring of fallen military members with university tuition and expenses – is an ‘aggrandizement’ of the Afghan war, be it known that this programme is NOT just for children of fallen soldiers.

I understand that when it comes to things military in Canada, we are currently ‘Afghan-centric’.  This is rather sad, as it slights all the other many thousands of CF members serving across Canada and around the world.  So when you discuss the parental natal programme that allows parents to take 52 weeks from work to raise their newborns and how it will apply to the military after it’s adjustment, AGAIN, I say to you, this is for Canadian MILITARY members, not just soldiers!  Please stop using the term ‘soldier’ in the generic sense, as doing so belittles the service of the other branches of the military.  Canadians have enough emotion wrapped-up already in the Afghanistan issue, without you the media, confusing things further by incorrectly putting  everything we do under the ‘army’ and ‘soldier’ umbrella.

Finally, as a good navy man, I would be remiss if I did not correct you on the proper use of ‘HMCS’.  Did you even know that these four letters stand for ‘HER MAJESTY’S CANADIAN SHIP’??  So when you refer to a Canadian naval vessel, PLEASE refrain from calling her ‘the’ HMCS REGINA!  This would be the same as saying, “He/she served aboard the Her Majesty’s Canadian Ship Regina.”  Get it?  GET IT??

There.  I fell SO much better.  Now if somebody from the media would just read this . . .   Bueller?  Bueller? . . . .. .