Casualties Of War
I’ve never commented in this blog about Cindy Sheehan. Now that she’s announced that she’s quitting the peace movement, I’ll have my say. (Oops, yes I did, some time back I got on her about just wanting attention. Now I see she was just used by the Left. Ok, read on…)
I was one of those who were outspoken against the pointless Vietnam war. I’d already long since done my service, so I could only cheer on those who burned their draft cards and emigrated to Canada. The war claimed 58,000 U.S. combat dead and the lives of between 2 and 5.1 million Vietnamese. No one knows for sure how many Vietnamese died. Think of that. So very many dead, and not one thing accomplished. So much terrible loss, so much pain and grief, so much destruction, all for nothing. This is what happens when our government gets out of control. As it is now.
During the Korean War, it was easy for us to see the rightness of it and no one was burning their draft cards. The wrongness of the Vietnamese War was obvious to all of us and it was that wrongness that finally became too much for the American public to tolerate any longer. Unfortunately the wrongness of the Iraq War doesn’t seem to hit us as hard or affect us as much.
Anyone who reads this blog knows that I am against the Iraq War and have been, yet no one has ever posted a comment assailing me for that view. I like to think that this is because, in America, we have respect for Freedom of Speech. The truth of that is “not entirely”. I was never attacked for that because I never went after the Republican Party more than to damn Bush, Cheney and Rove, none of whom are liked even by Republicans.
Cindy Sheehan joined the Left. When she spoke against the Iraq War, she did so under the auspices of the Left and was promoted by the Left. It was Left-Wing organizations and media who gave her fame. So she was reviled and denounced by the Right and at the end, when she spoke out against the Democratic Party, which has certainly gone too far Left, they reviled her too.
I have nothing but respect for this woman. I disagree with some of her views but her sincerity can’t be denied. Dick Cheney and George Bush took her sons life. That’s how it is, like it or not. They want Iraqs oil and don’t care how many die for it, as I have said many times. She saw this and spoke out from her grief rather than suffer in silence, as was her right as an American. If she’d been politically independent she would never have been heard at all, and that’s another ugly truth that maybe we should think about.
Stifling dissent is the activity of dictatorships. It has no place in America and every smear on her that came down from The Hill embarassed me as an American. It is dissent that created this country and without it we would still be the Colonies. We have the right to boo and hiss and show our own dissent with anyone who speaks against what we believe but we do NOT have the right to stifle anyone, nor anyone us. The whole point of our Constitution is that as long as we adhere strictly to our values and our laws, neither the Right nor the Left can ever take our country away from us.
This is why it’s so very important that our elected leaders put our Freedoms and our Constitution ahead of any other consideration, and when they don’t, we need our Cindy Sheehans to stand up for what they believe in. It took a lot of courage for her to face the ridicule of half a nation and speak out, whether we liked what she had to say or not.
May 29th, 2007 at 4:44 pm
I think she was a sad woman who was pushed and used by the far left. I don’t believe she truly had time to grieve properly, because she was out in the media non-stop. I hope she will take time to rest, take care of herself and what’s left of her family and truly reflect on her son, his contribution and that she can respect his decision to go to war. Remember, no one forced him into the military, it was his choice. But good article, and I always respect your views. You express them in a rational way, unlike some of the weirdos on the far left.
May 29th, 2007 at 4:44 pm
Dissent, like any speech, must be judged qualitatively, not quantitatively. The deeply reasonable dissent created by our Founding Fathers and today’s militant mindless dissenting prattle have little in common.
We don’t have the right to silence anyone in this country (within adjudicated limits,) however, we have every right, and perhaps even a duty, to ignore stupidity.
May 29th, 2007 at 5:59 pm
Debbie, the Far Left and I are a long way apart. Likewise me and the Far Right. I don’t give a silent fart in Hell for either or for politics. All I care about is the Truth. Once emotions and loyalties come into play, the Truth is lost.
I’ve said this before. Let me say it again now. Party loyalties makes traitors out of patriots. We are either loyal to America First, or we are loyal to a party. One or the other. You can’t have both. By taking a side, we lose objectivity.
Yes, it was her sons choice to believe the blatant lies told by our President and Vice President, and go fight for his country. So he thought. He was wrong.
No one forced him to go. This is true. He went because Bush lied to us and this boy believed him. Ms. Sheehan felt that the responsibility for his death utimately lies with George Bush and I agree. If Bush were to admit to the American public that control of Iraqs resources is the purpose of this war, how many young soldiers might turn away? How many parents would say: “You can’t have my child”?
I don’t know where her son died but if he died in Afghanistan then I would have to say he died fighting for freedom and against terrorism. Not if he died in Iraq, though. Those who want that oil ought to go fight for it themselves and leave our kids alone.
And Brooks, “mindless prattle” is a personal opinion and ignoring stupidity is a far cry from stifling dissent, which is what I’m talking about. Personally, I also mostly ignored Sheehan simply because of who was backing her, and recall little of what she had to say other than that I disagreed with some of her remarks. In any case, I’m not defending stupidity. I’m defending courage and her right to speak, stupidly or otherwise.
May 29th, 2007 at 7:04 pm
Opinions are not created equal. Few are correct, most are crap, and some are plainly malicious. In a free society, only those with a mental defect have a right to hold stupid ones. The rest have no excuse and that’s where Ms. Sheehan stands. I ignore Sheehan because she’s a prejudging pre-programmed mouthpiece for hard left slogans. As for the ethics of controlling Iraq’s resources, better us than Iran. There is an antiwar segment of this country who will say and do anything to discredit, defame, and destroy anyone who concludes that engaging in war is in our national interest. Their mantras are not persuasive, and they won’t convince average Americans to set aside their security interests after 9/11. There’s an abundance of objective evidence available to substantiate the legitimacy of our fight to destroy jihadis where ever we can find them. The war is on and it will stay on until the jihadis give up. Don’t hold your breath waiting for that to happen.
May 29th, 2007 at 8:18 pm
Brooks, you sound a bit combative. All we need is to be fighting each other instead of the enemy.
Excuse me but in a free society even brilliant people have a right to hold stupid opinions, which is proven by the fact that so many do.
If you are laboring under the false impression that I side with the Left because of my remarks about Cindy Sheehan, kindly disabuse yourself. It should be glaringly apparent to even the nastiest name-caller that she was acting out of grief and anger. Brooks, we have prisons filled with people who did the same. I understand that and I know you do too, the difference between us is that I admire her courage and the depth of her conviction even though I disagreed with a lot of what she had to say. You don’t appear to see the sources within the person.
A lot of people spout crap and a lot of others take that crap as sincerity. A lot of others spout sincere crap. The difference matters. Those correct opinions you speak of are formed by peering into the depths, not by observing the reflections off the surface.
We need the Left as much as we need the Right. Otherwise, kindly tell me how we find the Center? That’s what checks and balances in government are for.
The war will stay on regardless of who is President simply because we aren’t running it. The muslims are. When Islam subsides again, as it has done repeatedly in the past after attempts at global domination, only then will the world enjoy some peace again. For awhile.
May 29th, 2007 at 9:35 pm
I doubt we need the left. We don’t need a bundle of hack philosophies responsible for the democide of 120 million souls in the 20th century alone. We don’t need historicism and dialectics. We don’t need polarity without reason. Cancers do not make a healthy body stronger. I see the sources within these people just fine. No amount of good intentions can overcome the fatality-inducing flaws in the left’s world view. And sharing a podium with Hugo Chavez is no act of grief. Looks like we’re going to have to agree to disagree.
May 29th, 2007 at 10:33 pm
I disagree.
May 30th, 2007 at 12:12 am
I am a 2 tour Vietnam Veteran who recently retired after 36 years of working in the Defense Industrial Complex on many of the weapons systems being used by our forces as we speak.
Politicians make no difference.
We have bought into the Military Industrial Complex (MIC). If you would like to read how this happens please see:
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2007/03/spyagency200703
Through a combination of public apathy and threats by the MIC we have let the SYSTEM get too large. It is now a SYSTEMIC problem and the SYSTEM is out of control. Government and industry are merging and that is very dangerous.
There is no conspiracy. The SYSTEM has gotten so big that those who make it up and run it day to day in industry and government simply are perpetuating their existance.
The politicians rely on them for details and recommendations because they cannot possibly grasp the nuances of the environment and the BIG SYSTEM.
So, the system has to go bust and then be re-scaled, fixed and re-designed to run efficiently and prudently, just like any other big machine that runs poorly or becomes obsolete or dangerous.
This situation will right itself through trauma. I see a government ENRON on the horizon, with an associated house cleaning.
The next president will come and go along with his appointees and politicos. The event to watch is the collapse of the MIC.
For more details see:
http://rosecoveredglasses.blogspot.com/2006/11/inside-pentagon-procurement-from.html
May 30th, 2007 at 4:03 am
What I think we might see first is the collapse of the oil economy, through war. Then the MIC would follow.
I agree, the politicians are too involved with their own precious careers to see much beyond them. Industry is now running our governments and industry is profit oriented. “What’s good for our company is good for America”. With the result that countries get emptied out and discarded like an old banana skin, and then America is hated for it.
This is why our wars are no longer fought to win. Wars are for profit. The profit is in maintaining the war, supplying it. No war, no arms sales.
June 6th, 2007 at 11:54 pm
Great post Rasta and food for thought in the thread also.
June 7th, 2007 at 12:00 am
Check this out & let me know what you think. I have mixed feelings. On the one hand i agree that corps are using the internet cynically and screwing it all up – on the other hand i think the guy is a patronising and dangerous moron:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/2007/06/the_cult_of_the_amateur_by_andrew_keen.html
June 7th, 2007 at 1:24 am
Alison, good to hear from you again.
I agree with the majority of follow-up comments that Keen has missed the point. The Internet has opened up global communication like never before. Now we can all access the ideas and opinions of people worldwide on a personal basis instead of just relying on the second-hand, bias newsfeed of the MSM. I give you the BBC as a gross example.
Granted that the level of bias stays the same, it’s the VARIETY on the Internet that makes the difference, and people have always had to sort out the truth from the lies so nothing has changed there. If anything, there is more opportunity now to dig out the truth of things than ever before.
He cites blogs as being a source of misinformation. Certainly, many are just as misinforming as the Media. Many others are pointing out the misinformation of both. When was THAT available to us before?
June 7th, 2007 at 9:43 pm
Exactly!