Category: News and Views
Well, with that unauspicious beginning, I would like to reprint something I found on the blogs this morning. When I think about it it really really makes me angry, and I wondered if it effected my fellow zoners the same way, or am I getting angry needlessly?
If you are a George Bush supporter, you may want to skip this one, because it is very unflattering to him and his ilk.
When I think of the fact that my Grandfather fought in world war i and my father fought in world war ii, and my uncle fought in Korea, and I lost a cousin in Vietnam, then I get really angry about people playing on our desire for peace, and having us fight for very unamerican ideas like corporate greed and corporate and religious eliteism. Okay, on to the blog: this will probably take two posts as it's rather long. I really would be interested in what you think about it. The blog can be found at
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/5/28/966/14833
Requiem for a Nightmare part one
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/5/28/966/14833
Requiem for a Nightmare
by
DarkSyde
Sun May 28, 2006 at 06:06:06 AM PDT
Tomorrow is the day we honor the fallen American heroes of so many wars. To avoid staining our national day of mourning, I felt it more appropriate to dedicate
this post at this time to a very different kind of American. They may be clueless neocons, erroneous White House talking heads, or smear artists and their
self-appointed town criers. But what they all have in common is that each one bravely
ducked
when called and later took part directly or indirectly in assaulting the reputation of those who stood in harm's way. They are known, affectionately, as
Chicken-hawks:
• President George W. Bush - served four years of a six years Nat'l Guard commitment, some say after daddy's friends pulled some strings to keep him out
of Vietnam. The circumstances of his early separation from state-side service are still controversial
• Karl Rove, occasional Deputy Chief of Staff and alleged full time smear artist,
escaped the draft
and did not serve
• VP Dick Cheney -
several deferments,
by marriage and timely fatherhood
• Former VP Chief of Staff I. Lewis Scooter Libby - did not serve
• Secretary of State and former NSA Condaleeza Rice - did not serve
• Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist - did not serve.
• Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert - did not serve.
• Former House Majority Leader Tom Delay - did not serve
• House Majority Whip Roy Blunt - did not serve
• Majority Whip Mitch McConnell - did not serve
• Rick Santorum, third ranking Republican in the Senate - did not serve.
• Former Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott - did not serve
Recently while stammering out a convoluted apology for avoiding service, one budding Yellow Elephant mentioned in part that he 'can support the Yankees
without wearing their uniform.' Not too far off: Your average Chicken-hawk does not play for the Yankees because they lack the physical skill required
to walk out on that field and compete; likewise, maybe they do not serve in Iraq because they lack the simple courage required to walk into a recruiting
office and sign up. But how about his role models?
• Rush Limbaugh - did not serve
• Sean Hannity - did not serve
• Pat Buchanan - did not serve
• Ann Coulter - did not serve
• Ralph Reed - did not serve
• Bill O'Reilly - did not serve
• Michael Savage - did not serve
• Bill Kristol - did not serve
Continued in next post.
Requieum for a Nightmare Part Two
The 101st Fighting Chicken-shit Keyboardists and assorted neocon shills may be conspicuously absent when their country is in need, but they're always at
the ready to order other people's sons and daughters into the meat grinder. They sure seem to pop up on the Quad when the battle is over and the band is
a'playin. And they're always on duty, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, to smear any survivors with vicious accusations of cowardice or worse when Neoconia
calls. Just a couple of examples of their bipartisan handiwork include
smearing
Democrat Max Cleland, triple amputee, awarded both the Silver and Bronze Stars for valorous action in combat. The same
treatment
was shown to Republican John McCain who won the Silver & Bronze Star, Legion of Merit, Purple Heart and Distinguished Flying Cross and spent over five years
being tortured in the Hanoi Hilton.
In another time and place, some of today's not-so-brave might have elbowed little old ladies and children out of the way to secure a berth on the last lifeboat
on the Titanic, or maybe they''d have ratted out resistance fighters to the Gestapo in WW2 France. But today is the eve of Memorial Day and this is America,
2006. Ergo, present day Chicken-hawks will pay their respects by milking the courage of war heroes. They will then churn it into buttery lubrication to
help coat their lies and incompetence, so as to slip more easily down the collective gullet and penetrate deep into our national psyche.
To a Chicken-hawk on Memorial Day, a bronze plaque inscribed with the names of the fallen is more than an earnest reminder of ultimate sacrifice. It is
a convenient shield to protect the latest revelation of bloody negligence or deadly deceit. It matters not if the entombed accept the wisdom of a specific
conflict or respect those that dispatched them: After all, dead men tell no tales and thus cannot voice dissent, or refuse to enable neocon affectations.
The current crop of chicken-shits are by no means the first to brandish ideological armor made of hastily fashioned flesh and bone taken from their needless
war victims. They did not invent the vicarious pose, wreath in one hand and flag in the other, or write the first poetic speech spoken in the safety provided
by such profound tragedy. They're not the first to conflate questions over a massive cluster-fuck with attacks upon those who's shattered remains lay beneath
the brass and marble props making up the background of each shameless photo-op. Today's Republican Chicken-hawks are not the pioneers of bloody combat
blunder.
"Forward, the Light Brigade!" Was there a man dismay'd? Not tho' the soldier knew, Someone had blunder'd: Their's not to make reply, Their's not to reason
why, Their's but to do and die: Into the valley of Death Rode the six hundred. --
Charge of the Light Brigade
But in my opinion, what makes this latest craven breed of prestige parasites particularly loathsome is that once off stage and out of frame, they will insidiously
cut VA benefits
in favor of corporate welfare and tax cuts for billionaires. The case for contempt rests on the undeniable fact that they spooked us into war against the
wrong country. In plush ideological laboratories, senior slime artists will sink their fangs into the broken bodies of war dead, drain the unwitting corpses
of the last drops of dignity, and then parade around glowing with the stolen glory. The final exhibit in this disgusting series is that with distended
yellow-bellies now camouflaged red, white, and blue by that theft, they will commence to discredit and destroy any veteran, living or dead, who won't expedite
the revolting neocon-authored actions hurting the very soldiers the Chicken-hawks honor in pretense. It's enough to make one vomit.
I reserve tomorrow for those who served with honor. But today, I recognize the puppet masters and their fleshy mannequins, who will shortly swagger over
sacred
And now the good ol boys of the USA Marine Corps, have massacred an entire family in revenge for a road side bombing,it should be left to the insurgents to punish with their cowardice.
Absolutely Goblin, i think it's gone far enough, and i'm sick of being involved in all of it, I'm just glad that our army haven't yet been implicated in all the horrors of torture and crime as the americans and the english.