Mutterings over the graves of soldiers by Garrison Keillor

On Memorial Day we'll hear about men who gave their lives for their country, but many lives were not given, they were taken, and taken stupidly and carelessly.

May 21, 2008 | The Current Occupant tossed Nazis into a speech last week, something he rarely does since it only reminds people of Dick Cheney. He likened those who would negotiate with terrorists to those who tried to appease the Nazis, an awkward comparison, since Nazis were self-defined and wore the swastika proudly, and terrorists are anybody we nominate to be terrorists, who may include terrorists, people who know terrorists, people named Terry, or people with wrists. One reason Guantánamo is kept top-secret is so you and I won't know how many innocent people have been locked up there and how little the bureaucracy cares about innocence, which might remind people of the Nazis.

http://www.salon.com/opinion/keillor/2008/05/21/memorial_day/

snip...

I got a letter from a U.S. Marine in Fallujah ("trapped in this heat and smoke ... running in circles that won't change anything") who, though a "right-wing social conservative," asks, "Where are the protests from my contemporaries in America's colleges? Why do I not detect an appropriate sense of urgency from our citizens and elected officials?"

It's only May. You will see more urgency from elected officials as November nears. Sen. McCain is now talking about withdrawal except of course he wants to call it "victory," and Republicans up for reelection are learning to sound a little more thoughtful and even skeptical about the war. In Minnesota, a man is up for reelection who sat on a Senate committee with oversight responsibility for the rebuilding effort in Iraq and who showed no keen interest in the billions of dollars disappearing down rat holes. He is now starting to recover some memory.

Meanwhile it's almost Memorial Day and here is a vet on television talking hopefully about his dream of making a good life who has been horribly burned and grafted back together, his head looks like a candle stub with a mouth and blinking eyes. Your heart goes out to the brave young man. And what choice does he have other than to be brave? It's either that or the life of a potato. But who did this to him?

On Memorial Day we'll hear about men who gave their lives for their country, but many lives were not given, they were taken, and taken stupidly and carelessly. And there has been great public piety about those men and their "sacrifice" on the part of politicians who blithely sacrificed them.

Back in 2001, McCain said that a person couldn't talk policy to the Current Occupant for more than 10 minutes and then his mind wandered and he was anxious to talk about baseball. His impatience with detail was apparently a factor in the disastrous move to disband the Iraqi army. I hope he gets to spend some time in his presidential library in Dallas and catch up on what he missed out on.

Thanks for adding it.

Kerry and Hagel, VN Vets, have a different opinion of VN.
Because McCain was a POW, instead of trying to fight the fight outside, he was fighting the fight inside without any realization of what was going on.
It made sense to me; his perception is not theirs. But try relaying that.

Kerry and Hagel KNOW the hell that is wrought by war, by orders to go into the breach. McCain knows the hell that was wrought by his occupiers. Big difference.

And Mr. SandMan is attacking me!

Thanks for posting.

Recommended.

Thanks for the kick.

I'm glad he came back to his Salon column. He can go only so far on PHC.

Thanks for the kick.

No appeasement for Guy Noir. The Powdermilk Biscuit factory will be nuked.

:beer:

Those two can kick some ass.

how many DUers know what the fuck we're talking about?

If they don't, they're missing out.

"I hope he gets to spend some time in his presidential library in Dallas and catch up on what he missed out on."