Thursday, September 30, 2004
"So We Don't Have to Face Them At Home"
I keep hearing this same line from President Bush over and over again. The line goes something like, "We are taking the battle to the enemy overseas, so we don't have to face them on our own soil" or "we have to defeat them on foreign lands, so we don't have to face them at home." This is probably taken by many people as meaning that the best defense is a good offense. They might even consider the fact that we have not been hit with another catastrophic attack at home as proof that Bush's "plan" is working.
My problem is the way he delivers this line and the fact that he has been throwing this line around for the last month nearly every day. Increasingly he uses it when he is painted into a corner as the final justification and logic for the ongoing fight in Iraq. When questioned why Iraq should be considered part of the war on terror this is his favorite response. He used it in this manner in tonight's debate.
Think I am over reacting? Copy "face them at home" to your clipboard, with the quotes, paste it into Google and see how many hits you get, the vast majority being quotes from Bush's various speeches.
A good friend and colleague of my wife has a son in Iraq who we are very concerned about. After hearing Bush's new mantra delivered in increasingly desperate tones it has gotten to the point that I think he is saying that the role our troops, and this young man, are actually playing in Iraq is that of fly paper to flies. The flies being every disgruntled Islamacist bent on attacking America.
There is a certain dark logic to what Bush seems to be saying. If one is hell bent on attacking the US why go to the expense and risk of traveling all the way there when you can cross an unprotected border and blow yourself up along with a few marines and be welcomed by adoring virgins in paradise. With this logic you start to understand what Bush means when he responds with optimism when attacks on Americans increase in Iraq. His answer has consistently been along the lines of, "that's good, that just shows they are getting desperate." It's as if he sees the enemy as the Scottish kamikazes in the old Monty Python skit that were so eager to kill themselves that they could never actually reach their targets on the front!
What Bush increasingly seems to be saying is that he does not expect our troops to "win" in the sense of freeing Iraq from bloodshed and tyranny, rather, in the words of Doctor Evil, he expects them to die!
Rumsfeld seems to agree. A while back he reminded a journalist who pointed out the rising casualties in Iraq, around 800 at the time, that America lost 900,000 guys in WWII. He said it in his now classic, "stop whining!" voice.
I guess when you take into account Bush's total disregard for military service when it was his time to serve maybe he just has trouble relating to the soldier in the field. Maybe this is why every WWII veteran I have spoken to so far this Summer as I went door to door told me, without exception, they were voting for Kerry. Greatest generation indeed.
It troubles me deeply that I have these thoughts and I am sure that many people, convinced of Bush's devotion to Christ, will think I have lost my marbles. But I promise you, the next time you hear him deliver this line, which will probably be tomorrow, you will see what I mean.
Our friend's son has two young children, the youngest of whom was born during this war. He recently was granted a two week leave to go to Germany where he could be briefly reunited with his wife and young family. He was very reluctant to take the leave, though he misses his family very much, because it is believed by many troops that this is how they will get killed. They fear being shot down as they helicopter out. He told his mom that many guys have been killed in this way. They only leave at night for this reason.
Does this sound like we are taking the fight to the enemy or that the enemy is in control and our brave young men and women are sitting ducks surrounded by enemies that they cannot see or openly confront? This is the very situation "on the ground" that led Daniel Ellsburg, a former hawk on the Vietnam war, to conclude that we could not "win" in Indochina. He found many experts at the Pentagon and State Department who admitted in 1967 to him that he was absolutely right. The war dragged on for 7 more years anyway because our leaders could not muster the courage to admit the truth out loud. Tonight at the debate Bush told Kerry that the commander in chief should never upset the troops by telling them that their country made a mistake sending them into combat. I am sure our friend's son would prefer to be told this and then brought home then to be left to die or be severely wounded for a mistake. It is Bush who lacks courage not our troops.
We need a new president. January 20th cannot come soon enough. We need to stop this senseless madness. Does anyone even know what the hell we are even doing and what it means to "win"?
I keep hearing this same line from President Bush over and over again. The line goes something like, "We are taking the battle to the enemy overseas, so we don't have to face them on our own soil" or "we have to defeat them on foreign lands, so we don't have to face them at home." This is probably taken by many people as meaning that the best defense is a good offense. They might even consider the fact that we have not been hit with another catastrophic attack at home as proof that Bush's "plan" is working.
My problem is the way he delivers this line and the fact that he has been throwing this line around for the last month nearly every day. Increasingly he uses it when he is painted into a corner as the final justification and logic for the ongoing fight in Iraq. When questioned why Iraq should be considered part of the war on terror this is his favorite response. He used it in this manner in tonight's debate.
Think I am over reacting? Copy "face them at home" to your clipboard, with the quotes, paste it into Google and see how many hits you get, the vast majority being quotes from Bush's various speeches.
A good friend and colleague of my wife has a son in Iraq who we are very concerned about. After hearing Bush's new mantra delivered in increasingly desperate tones it has gotten to the point that I think he is saying that the role our troops, and this young man, are actually playing in Iraq is that of fly paper to flies. The flies being every disgruntled Islamacist bent on attacking America.
There is a certain dark logic to what Bush seems to be saying. If one is hell bent on attacking the US why go to the expense and risk of traveling all the way there when you can cross an unprotected border and blow yourself up along with a few marines and be welcomed by adoring virgins in paradise. With this logic you start to understand what Bush means when he responds with optimism when attacks on Americans increase in Iraq. His answer has consistently been along the lines of, "that's good, that just shows they are getting desperate." It's as if he sees the enemy as the Scottish kamikazes in the old Monty Python skit that were so eager to kill themselves that they could never actually reach their targets on the front!
What Bush increasingly seems to be saying is that he does not expect our troops to "win" in the sense of freeing Iraq from bloodshed and tyranny, rather, in the words of Doctor Evil, he expects them to die!
Rumsfeld seems to agree. A while back he reminded a journalist who pointed out the rising casualties in Iraq, around 800 at the time, that America lost 900,000 guys in WWII. He said it in his now classic, "stop whining!" voice.
I guess when you take into account Bush's total disregard for military service when it was his time to serve maybe he just has trouble relating to the soldier in the field. Maybe this is why every WWII veteran I have spoken to so far this Summer as I went door to door told me, without exception, they were voting for Kerry. Greatest generation indeed.
It troubles me deeply that I have these thoughts and I am sure that many people, convinced of Bush's devotion to Christ, will think I have lost my marbles. But I promise you, the next time you hear him deliver this line, which will probably be tomorrow, you will see what I mean.
Our friend's son has two young children, the youngest of whom was born during this war. He recently was granted a two week leave to go to Germany where he could be briefly reunited with his wife and young family. He was very reluctant to take the leave, though he misses his family very much, because it is believed by many troops that this is how they will get killed. They fear being shot down as they helicopter out. He told his mom that many guys have been killed in this way. They only leave at night for this reason.
Does this sound like we are taking the fight to the enemy or that the enemy is in control and our brave young men and women are sitting ducks surrounded by enemies that they cannot see or openly confront? This is the very situation "on the ground" that led Daniel Ellsburg, a former hawk on the Vietnam war, to conclude that we could not "win" in Indochina. He found many experts at the Pentagon and State Department who admitted in 1967 to him that he was absolutely right. The war dragged on for 7 more years anyway because our leaders could not muster the courage to admit the truth out loud. Tonight at the debate Bush told Kerry that the commander in chief should never upset the troops by telling them that their country made a mistake sending them into combat. I am sure our friend's son would prefer to be told this and then brought home then to be left to die or be severely wounded for a mistake. It is Bush who lacks courage not our troops.
We need a new president. January 20th cannot come soon enough. We need to stop this senseless madness. Does anyone even know what the hell we are even doing and what it means to "win"?
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