Ok, I'm getting sick of this. To those of you reading, regardless of your political persuasion, please try to understand where we troops are coming from.
Rep. Dick Durbin has called us Nazis.
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (a leader of the Democrats) has said:
"I assume that the war in Afghanistan is over, or is the contention that you have that it continues?" she said to a reporter.
A few moments later, she said: "This isn't about the duration of the war. The war in Afghanistan is over."
The war is over. Right. I've watched mission after mission launch from here as we battle the Taliban and al-Qaeda here. In church, each Sunday, we get our "brief" of the Soldiers who aren't going home as planned.
We're Nazis... the war is over.
Gee folks, thanks for the support. Please, please remember these statements when you see them up for election next time.
("Support the Troops" - It's more than just a bumper sticker.)
6 comments:
I'm glad you're putting your experiences and point of view out there to better educate us all. But since you obviously have internet access, you should have done some research. First, he's a Senator, not a Representative. Second, he read from a report on Guantanamo by an FBI agent, which, true or not, describes genuinely terrible conditions. (Anyone who wants to call him a fool for believing that report also has to call Bush a fool for believing the WMD reports, or be a hypocrite.) Then he said, "If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime--Pol Pot or others--that had no concern for human beings."
You and all the neocons baying about how he called all American servicemen and servicewomen Nazis ought to check your feet-- you've been caught off base and picked off.
Finally, Pelosi's ignorance is understandable, since are few or no news reports any more of fighting in Afghanistan. This is not surprising, given not only the government-permitted conglomeration of U.S. media outlets, but also the fact that there are eighteen times as many NATO soldiers in Iraq as there are in Afghanistan. Hell, even the NYC Police Department is about four times larger than the deployment in Afghanistan.
Get off your high horse about how obvious it is what action you're seeing over there. If you want to make it obvious by better news reporting, write your representatives in Congress saying you want them to break up media monopolies. We'd make it a genuinely bipartisan bill.
While Mr. Durbin states he had a report on Guantanamo written by an FBI agent, what the agent failed to mention is that the US has handed out Korans to all the detainees at "Gitmo." I suspect Hitler did not hand out Torahs to his prisoners (they weren't detainees); nor did Ho Chi Minh hand out Bibles to those incarcerated at the Hanoi Hilton.
So the AC at Gitmo failed. This would bother Americans, but it hardly would bother Middle Easterners. As this blog states the walking-around temp at last possible reading was 147 (the thermometers are now maxed out, so who knows what the temp is?). They are used to heat. It was too cold, huh, when the AC was working? These people are fully clothed. Have you ever seen pictures of the prisoners in the concentration camps? AC and heat? What those people would have given for some of either! I've been to Dachau--there wasn't any.
Health? The detainees are well fed. Look again at prisoners from Auschwitz or those crammed into cattle cars or those on the death march of Bataan. Talk to a Korean or Vietnam era POW; food of any sort was a luxury. The people at Gitmo have all had access to American doctors and dentists--no doubt the first many of these have ever been to in their lives. If you got sick while under the care of the Nazis, you were shot; if you were sick while marching through the Phillipines, you were left to die.
Get a grip, people! I'm tired of hearing what rotten treatment those at G. Bay are receiving! They are alive; they are healthy. And if given half the opportunity, they'd shoot you or blow up some other set of our buildings in a heartbeat. That is why we are detaining them. And no, Mrs. Pelosi may not be forgiven her ignorance: As a senator, she has access to far more news and information than does the general populace. She should fully inform herself before she makes a blanket statement that the war anywhere is over. Check it out with the people who are actually there doing the work.
Jen is right, I don't really give a shit (pun intended) what happens to people who will throw feces on our soldiers and if given the opportunity would kill them. (And all of us) Everyone else has made the point that comparing what was supposed to have happened at Gitmo and what absolutely DID happen in Auschwitz, the gulags and Cambodia much better than I can.
If you read a little bit of history you will find we had POW's in places like Wisconsin and George for the duration of WWII. So again, I really don't care how long they are held. Except that it irks me that they get better food than our Soldiers out in the field.
As for the whole Koran thing, who gave them those Korans? And the prayer rugs, and the oils, and the arrows so they'd know which direction to pray? Ever read any thing about the Vietnam POW's, they were punished if they even looked like they were praying. (Good point about the Torahs and Hitler Calico's Mom!)
The bottom line for me is WE ARE AT WAR. Whether you like it or not, we are. And they started it. People of a certain mindset that want us dead. No matter their country of origin. And just in case anyone missed it WE ARE THE GOOD GUYS. And whether you agree or disagree with how we got into this, we need to present a united front to those that wish us more than just ill. It is the perception of what many on the left say that gives "comfort" to the enemy.
I have to laugh at the explanation given by "Particular" as to why Pelosi is ignorant about the existance of an ongoing war in Afghanistan. That's like excusing me for saying there is no AIDS epidemic in Africa now, because there are few or no news reports about it now. Except I am not a public figure and my words don't resonate around the world, so that wouldn't be quite so grave.
I can remember when Bush made some comment about not reading the newspapers, just getting briefed by his aides about what was going on in the world. And he was criticized for that. Well, at least he is informed, and he doesn't use the excuse: well, it's not in the newspaper, so I didn't know it was happening.
There is no excuse for a US Congresswoman or -man to be uninformed about the war in Afghanistan. To quote you: "But since you obviously have internet access, you should have done some research," Pelosi could have just gone online and let her fingers do the walking and then she could have saved herself the embarassment.
Funny...you hold a US soldier in combat to a higher level of research responsibility for his private blog site than you do Representative Pelosi for her public comments.
And you think SC Eagle is on a high horse? I think the air must be so thin up there you aren't thinking clearly.
As the other commenters said, I really don't give a flip about what happens to the detainees at GTMO, or anywhere else. I'll bet they've never had it so good in their sorry lives - and We ARE at WAR! As for Pelosi & Durbin, they're just showing their ignorance and saying anything to get on camera. Most Americans know more about what's really going on than they profess to do. Shameful!
Happy 4th of July to you & your buds! I'm very grateful to y'all for the work you do daily, even if it does permit people like Anonymous to come on a soldier's blog & make asinine comments. Thank you!
Jen:
First, as to my having a place "where there isn't a fear of some radical Islamist blowing you up with a suicide bomb": you don't know that I'm not in London, and at the time you made the comment, I believe that it wouldn't have mattered to you if I were there. Wrongly.
Second, where in my post do you imagine I say that I don't think they are risking their lives in Afghanistan? Reread the first sentence.
Third, 130 degrees when one is free to walk around in the breeze and be supplied with Gatorade from the PX is not the same as being in a tiny cell where it's that hot. It seems pretty clear that you did not try to find the text of the FBI agent's report. Read it. It says nothing about beheading, and substantially more than the hangnail equivalent, which is what your tone suggests to me.
You can't hold someone by saying what they would do if free; making laws against what's in people's heads is the beginning of the end. That's assuming you actually know what's there. It's also hideous that you unquestioningly assume the people held there were correctly identified as terrorists, supporters of terrorists, or extremists of any kind. Maybe they were; maybe they weren't, but I see no sign that you care. That's immoral.
Finally, we are not at war. That word has a specific, legal, Constitutional meaning. Congress has not declared war; therefore we are not at war. Should we be? Sure. Declare war on Afghanistan; declare war on Iraq. But declare it. The Constitution was deliberately written to require a certain level of unanimity for something that serious. Should the Constitution be amended to reflect the realities of modern international conflict? Yes. I'd tell my Democratic legislators to vote to ratify such an amendment. But it hasn't been. You cannot, cannot, cannot get around the Geneva convention by simply not bothering to declare war.
We're the U.S.; our greatness comes in part from our having better standards than "better than Hitler."
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