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November 02, 2006
All That Glitters
If anyone thinks that a veteran, someone like me, who's been fighting my entire career to provide for veterans, to fight for their benefits, to help honor what their service is -- if anybody thinks that a veteran would somehow criticize more than 140,000 troops serving in Iraq, and not the president and his people who put them there, they're crazy. It's just wrong.This is a classic GOP textbook Republican campaign tactic. I'm sick and tired of a bunch of despicable Republicans who will not debate real policy, who won't take responsibility for their own mistakes, standing up and trying to make other people the butt of those mistakes.
I'm sick and tired of a whole bunch of Republican attacks, the most of which come from people who never wore the uniform and never had the courage to stand up and go to war themselves.
Right.
Crazy people. Despicable, cowardly Republicans like the ones in that picture. People who never wore the unifore and never had the courage to go to war themselves. People, perhaps, like John McCain?
Mr. Kerry went on. “It disgusts me that these Republican hacks, who have never worn the uniform of our country lie and distort so blatantly and carelessly about those who have.”Earlier today, Mr. Kerry’s remarks were denounced by Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona and, like Mr. Kerry, a veteran of the Vietnam conflict, as well as by a group of House Republicans.
“Senator Kerry owes an apology to the many thousands of Americans serving in Iraq, who answered their country’s call because they are patriots and not because of any deficiencies in their education,” Mr. McCain said.
Mr. McCain said any suggestion that only the poorly educated would agree to serve in Iraq is “an insult to every soldier serving in combat.”
Which is Senator McCain? Despicable, cowardly, or just plain crazy?
How about Mac Owens?
Which are those troops in Iraq holding that banner?
And these vocal critics of John Kerry? Are they cowards, or just plain liars?
Over three decades after the fall of Saigon, over thirty years after hundreds of thousands of innocent Vietnamese men, women, and children were massacred by the invading Communists and a wave of desperate refugees piled into leaky vessels, desperate to live under any form of government but the one John Kerry swore on the Senate floor the South Vietnamese were incapable from distinguishing from democracy, he has yet to admit that he was wrong about the North Vietnamese.
Vietnam now has one of the worst human rights records on the planet. John Kerry, asked just before we pulled the rug out from under our former allies the South Vietnamese how many he thought would be killed when Saigon fell replied, "5500".
The most commonly cited figure exceeds three-quarters of a million. Hey, everyone makes mistakes. Some even admit them. Not John Kerry.
Jules Crittendon, however, hits the bulls eye on why so many in the military community hold no brief for John Kerry. It is axiomatic that in wartime politics soon disappear. There is no room for such esoteric matters on the battlefield. Once the bullets start flying, what men fight for, what keeps them coming back, past fear, past sickness, past a weariness and growing horror that would freeze most of us dead in our tracks, is each other:
As we prepared on the evening of April 6, 2003, to attack Baghdad at dawn, my friend Smitty, a young soldier, was taken out of our armored vehicle to make way for a special ops soldier. We expected it to be very bad in the morning, and the mood was somber. Smitty was angry and depressed that he was being taken out of it. I told him, "Smitty, we’re all going to get (expletive) killed. You get to live. Be happy."Smitty said, "If y’all gonna get killed, I want to get killed with you."
It was touching, because I felt the same way, and I had barely known him a month. Smitty wasn’t stuck, either.
Four decades ago, John Kerry found himself stuck in Vietnam. He was a naval officer, and had volunteered for duty in small patrol boats that were out in relatively safe duty on the coast of Vietnam. Then they were sent up the rivers, and it got hotter. He appears to have acquitted himself well enough, earning a Silver Star, though there has been some debate about that. Then, he had his third of three minor wounds, none of which required hospitalization, by his own account. Kerry’s three Purple Hearts satisfied a regulation that said three combat wounds can get you out of combat. Four months into a yearlong combat tour, he applied to be taken out. He walked away from the boat crew he commanded. Men who relied on his leadership.
Stuck no more.
There’s something else. A number of the people I know who voluntarily went to Iraq are in fact stuck there, even though they are back here. Reporters as well as soldiers. I exchanged emails with one last week, a highly educated enlisted man, an Auburn University graduate who enlisted after Sept. 11, back home a year now. He can’t stop thinking about Ramadi. It’s hard, he said. He felt like he was doing something good there. Something that mattered. You don’t leave a place like that behind, a place where your friends died, a place where you expected to die. You carry it with you.
Only John Kerry doesn't carry it with him. Four months into a yearlong tour, he shrugged it off like an old backpack and came home to Washington DC, to a cushy aide's job.
And then there are the ones you see here with bodies hard and lean, but chewed up. With eyes far too old for their chronological age, that seem to gaze off into the distance at something we can't see, can't even imagine. They have earned their rest, and our gratitude.
This nation needs them to rest, and recuperate, and maybe find a nice girl and a house with a white picket fence and a yard made for filling up with toys. And if they still feel the need to do their duty by their comrades, by their country, let them breed more like themselves. For someday our nation will need sheepdogs. And who will protect them, if not saplings from that ancient stock?
I worry about these young men. Because they are dying to get back into the fight.
Not because they like war.
But because to them, it is unthinkable to leave their comrades behind.
This is what the media will never understand, not in a million lifetimes, and so they will never learn to spot the counterfeit coin.
Pity.
Posted by Cassandra at November 2, 2006 12:40 PM
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Comments
Johnnie has done more to put a face on liberalism, no make that secular progessives, than anyone else in some time. Even some dems cussed him. If he had violated little boys, his party would not cuss him like that. Amazing.
What concerns me more that John, is the voters of his state that continue to send him and "a blonde in every pond" Kennedy back to the US Senate time after time.
Posted by: jim b at November 2, 2006 02:54 PM
I would take it further.
True, no-one loves war, but as Robert E. Lee said, "It is well that war is so terrible, or we should grow fond of it."
We need our warriors. The rest of us comfortable, self-seeking, freedom-enjoying, blogging folks count on those guys, and we all feel a private, secret guilt that we are not among them.
As we should.
Posted by: bird dog at November 2, 2006 03:52 PM
I want to post a review of my book, "Marines in the Garden of Eden" that is on Amazon.com. I want to post this review, not because I wish to show off a good review, but, because I want you all to get a feel for the dedication of our young men and women in uniform.
Here is the review:
Richard, thank you for finally getting our story right...
This story that you have told shows the world what U.S. Marines are about and how we will always prevail no matter how bad the situation is and what the odds are. Every Marine from Private through General knows that the people of the United States depends on them to do their jobs no matter what the cost. These Marines will sacrifice their lives to make sure their brothers survive to complete the mission so the people of the United States are safe and that the American way of life is preserved. Again, thank you Mr. Lowry for telling our story and the story of the Marine Corps spirit. The spirit is alive and strong. Every Marine that gives his life for our country makes the spirit stronger. That spirit is in every Marine past and present and getting stronger every day. That is why we will never fail.
Always Faithful
SSgt William Schaefer
1/2 Cco
Sergeant Schaefer was at the point of the spear during the invasion of Iraq. His AMTRAC led the charge through Ambush Alley and was the first to cross the Saddam Canal. Staff Sergeant Schaefer is currently on his third tour in Iraq, leaving his new wife and baby to wait for his safe return.
Posted by: Richard Lowry at November 2, 2006 05:18 PM
Thanks. That's a great testimonial, not only to your book (which I need to get a notice up about, by the way) but to the Marine spirit!
Posted by: Cassandra at November 2, 2006 05:31 PM
Cass: Thanks for your wonderful posts and the tremendous effort on project Valour IT. My finicky accountant insists that she have a cancelled check for the records, so I'm sending $200 through the mail credited to MARINES.
My Dad served in the South Pacific theater, narrowly missing assignment to Iwo, and it haunted him for the rest of his life. "Why was I spared?" His tombstone features the proud Marine emblem and I know he would approve of this project.
Posted by: Mark at November 3, 2006 09:35 AM