I thought I'd seen it all but Stephen Harper dug himself a new low Monday, hiding behind our armed forces while launching his partisan missiles.

Let me just say this: Living as we do, in a time when some in the political arena do not hesitate before throwing the most serious of allegations at our men and women in uniform, based on the most flimsy of evidence, remember that Canadians from coast to coast to coast are proud of you and stand behind you, and I am proud of you, and I stand beside you. prime minister Stephen Harper

Andrew Coyne, a nominally Harper-friendly journalist, summed up the appropriate reaction to Harper's calculated move as this is just trash.

The truth, as is often the case when parsing Harper's words, is the polar opposite of what he said. No one leading the investigations into the truth are lobbing accusations at the military. Indeed the questions we all want answers to are mostly being directed at the Prime Minister's Office and Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada (DFAIT). Harper stonewalls, and Foreign Affairs minister Lawrence Cannon refuses to stand give his account.

What is at issue are policies and orders of three federal governments as it pertains to our war in Afghanistan. Canadians want to know who knew what and when, and what policies were put or kept in place by who. We just want the truth.

A collection of reactions in the media:

Harper using soldiers as his shield (James Travers, The Star, Tuesday December 1 2009)

Stephen Harper isn't standing behind the troops; he's ducking behind them in an attempt to shift attention away from what politicians knew - and didn't do - about Afghanistan prisoner abuse.

Conservatives are now suffering from bad decisions, worse luck and an irrepressible instinct to put a bullet in the messenger. They are mired in the consequences of ignoring Afghanistan interrogation realities, failing to act when abuse became obvious and rushing to dump blame on scapegoats.

None of this faintly resembles standing up for the troops. That would require the simple, if highly unusual, declaration that politicians in Ottawa are ultimately accountable for what happened to prisoners in Afghanistan and that the loonie stops here.

Mission accomplished (Aaron Wherry, Macleans, Monday, November 30, 2009)

It is tempting to point out that the military does not act independently. That it acts, effectively, at the command of the government. That that government is presently led by Mr. Harper. And that whatever the Canadian Forces are presently accused of doing, they are said to have done so only at the direction of their superiors. But, of course, the Prime Minister was not attempting to posit an alternative understanding of government authority and the military. The Prime Minister was most likely doing here what the Prime Minister does when the questions prove too persistent or the accusations too uncomfortable.

Trash (Andrew Coyne, Macleans, Monday, November 30, 2009)

That's your prime minister talking, folks, accusing members of Parliament who raise legitimate questions about Canada's policy on the transfer of prisoners in Afghanistan of smearing "our men and women in uniform." There is no sense in which this is true. There is no interpretation you can give it that draws it near to the truth. It is not even close. No one that I am aware of has made any criticism of the soldiers who handed over the prisoners to the Afghan security services --only of those who issued the orders to do so.

• Using the troops as props (Jane Taber, The Globe and Mail, Monday November 30 2009)

• PM taking 'low road' in torture debate (The Star, Tuesday December 1 2009)