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T_ID
Joined: 16 Aug 2004
Posts: 1207
Location: Holland
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 Posted: Wed Sep 29, 2004 8:55 pm Post subject: Families of Iraq War Dead Target Bush in Ads |
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if only thing whole place wouldn't collapse into a second Iran if the US steps out now.
I wonder, if everyone is so eager to let muslims 'sort their own problems', why remove Saddam in the first place? after all, he only was Iraq's problem.
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brave_soul
Joined: 18 Feb 2004
Posts: 876
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| Posted: Thu Sep 30, 2004 1:06 am Post subject: |
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| T_ID wrote: |
if only thing whole place wouldn't collapse into a second Iran if the US steps out now.
I wonder, if everyone is so eager to let muslims 'sort their own problems', why remove Saddam in the first place? after all, he only was Iraq's problem. |
Yes, America must clear the mess it has created. Those families should take the deaths of their loved one(s) a sacrifice (or potential sacrifice) and stop whining.
Clear the mess you have created, yanks! No running away! |
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jack
Joined: 19 Feb 2004
Posts: 674
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| Posted: Thu Sep 30, 2004 1:30 am Post subject: |
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A little bit more.
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As the U.S. war in Iraq passed a grim milestone this week — 1,000 American soldiers killed in action — The Chronicle brought together family members from Northern California whose loved ones are among the dead. Their thoughts and experiences are featured here and in an electronic “town hall’’ broadcast this evening from 7 to 8 p.m. on CBS 5-TV and KCBS radio (740 AM)..
There is a bond among families who have lost loved ones in war. A bond of pain that can seem absolute and unremitting. They may differ, as other Americans do, over the rights or wrongs of the Iraq war or whom they are going to vote for come November. But as the sister of one lost soldier says at a town hall-style meeting to be broadcast on Bay Area television tonight: "We are all on the same side when it comes to our grief."
The community of American families of the Iraq war dead continued to grow this week as the toll of U.S. troops passed 1,000.
That community includes at least 38 Northern California families -- most recently the Concord family of Marine Cpl. Mick Bekowsky, who received his final letter from Iraq on Tuesday, the same day the Pentagon announced the 1,000th U.S. military death in the war.
That evening, the families of 18 Northern California service members who finished their lives in Iraq gathered in San Francisco for an open forum sponsored by The Chronicle, CBS 5-TV and KCBS radio (740 AM). It was an evening of tears, questions, opinions and, occasionally, some laughter. It was also a chance to meet others coping with the same, very particular kind of loss.
Acquaintances from past military funerals and memorial services greeted each other with hugs. Others sought out names familiar from news reports and Pentagon dispatches. A few, realizing that every person they saw was there for a lost loved one, slipped into tears.
In the studio, they became an audience whose faces were etched with grief, seated in rows where reassuring touches and boxes of tissue passed from neighbor to neighbor.
But during the hours of conversation -- boiled down to a one-hour broadcast tonight on CBS 5 and KCBS -- and in a survey of the participants conducted by The Chronicle, it became clear that the community of survivors has much in common with Americans not so directly touched by the war.
As with other American families, differences over the conflict surfaced between father and mother, widow and parents, even between the living and the dead.
But in that, those present took comfort and found strength.
"We have a mix of feelings and opinions," said Tom Ballard, whose son, Lt. Ken Ballard of Mountain View, died in Najaf in May. "That's what makes America great. That's what our sons and daughters and cousins have all died for. They died to give us the right to speak our piece."
But first they spoke of that which bound them -- the pain of loss they sense may never go away.
"He was killed 100 days ago today," said Karen Meredith, Lt. Ballard's mother. "You just miss their voice. You miss every single day. And it isn't 100 days ago, it's one day 100 times over. ... When's it going to stop hurting? And when do you stop missing them?"
"It's harder every day," said Nadia McCaffrey, whose son, Sgt. Patrick Ryan McCaffrey of Tracy, was killed three months ago. "It's one day at a time, and frankly I don't think this is going to end until I die."
In the survey, almost all the families said they felt that people appreciated the sacrifice made, and most said they felt the deaths of their loved ones served a greater purpose -- things they took comfort in.
"The Bible says, 'Greater love has no man that this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.' And I believe that's what your son did, and that's what our sons have done," said Marc Unger, whose son, Spc. Daniel Unger, died in May.
"We weren't really too for going to war," said Loretta Bridges, whose son, Staff Sgt. Steven Bridges, died last December. "But even with that, we supported what our son believed in, and he believed in his president and his job, and his job was to protect, to free the Iraqi people."
In some areas of the survey, the families differed sharply. Thirty-eight percent said the decision to invade Iraq was the right one, but more than half said it was not. More than a third said they would vote for Sen. John Kerry for president, and a quarter supported President Bush. The rest either declined to answer, saying they had not decided or that they wished a better candidate were available.
"Right after the twin towers fell ... I think I've never felt such camaraderie with Americans my whole 47 years of life," said John Layfield, whose son, Lance Cpl. Travis Layfield of Fremont, was killed in April. "I think (Bush) used that to go into Iraq, where nothing was found. ... Yes, Hussein was a butcher to his people, and something needed to be done about him. He used weapons of mass destruction. Where are they? Show me. Why did my son have to -- why did our sons have to die?"
"We're doing the right thing. This is all part of the war on terror," countered Joseph Williams, whose son, Lance Cpl. Michael Williams, died in the first days of the war in 2003.
"People just don't realize, they kind of forgot: 3,000 people were killed in the twin towers. That's more than were killed in Pearl Harbor," he said. "What just happened in Russia? Do you want to go to your school and have your kids blown up or something like that? People need to wake up. Wake up: This is not a joke; this is the real deal. And these people hate us."
And for them, the war wasn't just a spectacle to be watched on CNN.
"I saw my son on TV, over a steering wheel laying on the ground in Iraq," said Lyne Clark, whose son, Spc. Arron Clark of Chico, was killed in Baghdad in December. "It showed the morning before I was notified -- I didn't know it was my son -- and when they came home it showed that humvee blowing up and him laying there on the side of the road. That showed over and over and over.
"I don't think any mother or father should see their dead child on national TV. That scarred me very much."
But several families found another controversial image reassuring -- the pictures of the flag-draped coffins coming home that leaked out in April despite a Pentagon ban.
"We found out subsequently that my son was one of the coffins in that picture," said Cindy Sheehan, whose son, Spc. Casey Sheehan, was killed in April. "Even when we didn't know it was Casey, it comforted us to see what respect and care that they are held with."
Most wanted better coverage of the dead, especially as the toll threatens to become just a number instead of names.
"Today, they will know that there's 1,000 soldiers that have been killed, but if you ask them tomorrow and for the next few weeks, nobody will know," Meredith said. "We have Scott Peterson on the front page, but when our children are dying, we don't see that."
On occasion, anger was directed at those for whom the war is largely a matter of seeing it on television.
"People need to wake up and recognize the sacrifices our men and women are making for you," said Tiffany Hicks, Lance Cpl. Travis Layfield's sister. "People just don't get it. If they don't have someone in the military, they go about their life. They forget, unless you're in our shoes."
But even when they were talking about the rights and wrongs of the war and the media and whether the military brass was doing right by the troops in the field, family members could suddenly, without warning, switch to the deeply personal, as when Cindy Sheehan held up a threadbare doll.
"This is his teddy bear. He ate all the fuzz off of it while he was a baby, but he wouldn't go to bed without it. He would cry, 'Bear, bear, mama, bear.' He was my oldest," she said. "I know how worried their moms are ... I know the mom of the 1,000th soldier was praying all day, 'Please don't let it be my child.' "
Two hours later, the families filtered out of the studio and into the night, some heading home alone, others returning to their hotels in San Francisco for an evening of talking and telling stories of young men in uniform, little boys playing soldier.
Some said later they were glad for a chance to tell their part; other said they were glad just to sit and talk with people without feeling like an outsider, shunted aside by a barrier of grief that outsiders can be reluctant to face.
"Don't be afraid to talk to us," Loretta Bridges said. "You're not invading. Talk to me. I may cry, but it's OK. Talk to me about him. I'm very proud of what my son did." |
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Sorge
Joined: 13 Mar 2004
Posts: 6808
Location: Against the Tide
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| Posted: Thu Sep 30, 2004 4:21 am Post subject: |
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We are not a serious Country.
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"[Civilization] ... becomes a partnership not only between those who are living, but between those who are living, those who are dead, and those yet to be born." --Edmund Burke, Reflections [1791] |
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TheOtherWhiteMeat
Joined: 23 Sep 2004
Posts: 1741
Location: Dar Al-Harb
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| Posted: Thu Sep 30, 2004 6:50 am Post subject: |
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A father who lost his son damned me to hell once for saying this but:
The Military is the not the boy scouts! Its not a student loan center! Its not the neighborhood watch! Its a group of well armed young men and women who dedicate their very lives to killing bad bad men with extreme prejudice. No one is holding a gun to your head to join.
My perspective? All my friends are in the military. Two of their brothers died in the gulf. I tried to join and couldn't get in because I took Paxil at one point as a teenager (you know how the US military is, just letting anyone in).
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A voice from heaven should be ignored if it is not on the side of justice. ~ Isaac Bashevis Singer
It wasn't you who killed them, it was Allah. ~ 8:17 |
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nomad
Joined: 01 Apr 2004
Posts: 6320
Location: Allahpalooza
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| Posted: Thu Sep 30, 2004 7:10 am Post subject: |
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| T_ID wrote: |
if only thing whole place wouldn't collapse into a second Iran if the US steps out now.
I wonder, if everyone is so eager to let muslims 'sort their own problems', why remove Saddam in the first place? after all, he only was Iraq's problem. |
Yeah....Hitler was only Germany's problem....Stalin was only Russia's problem...
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"We do not differentiate between those dressed in military uniforms and civilians; they are all targets in this fatwah," Osama bin Laden 1998
"I consider every American my enemy." Zacarias Moussaoui 2006 |
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T_ID
Joined: 16 Aug 2004
Posts: 1207
Location: Holland
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| Posted: Thu Sep 30, 2004 7:32 am Post subject: |
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...and both weren't fought against, or in hitler's case, not untill american interests were hurt.
how would it look if somewhere in july or august 1944 Roosevelt would have made a speech saying "well people, fighting the nazi's is nice and everything, bit I think it costs us too much, we're leaving."
that's a rather cowardly behaviour, getting into anything, but pulling out if things get nasty.
then either don't get into something in the first place, or finish what you started in a proper fashion.
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nomad
Joined: 01 Apr 2004
Posts: 6320
Location: Allahpalooza
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| Posted: Thu Sep 30, 2004 8:17 am Post subject: |
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| T_ID wrote: |
...and both weren't fought against, or in hitler's case, not untill american interests were hurt.
how would it look if somewhere in july or august 1944 Roosevelt would have made a speech saying "well people, fighting the nazi's is nice and everything, bit I think it costs us too much, we're leaving."
that's a rather cowardly behaviour, getting into anything, but pulling out if things get nasty.
then either don't get into something in the first place, or finish what you started in a proper fashion. |
Interests? You seriously believe that Hitler would stop at Poland, or Czech, or England if he knew that it would piss off America if our interests were 'hurt'? Now you're sounding like a typical irrational anti-American European. If we don't pull out of Iraq, we're 'imperialist'. If we pull out we're coward. Make up your mind.
_________________
"We do not differentiate between those dressed in military uniforms and civilians; they are all targets in this fatwah," Osama bin Laden 1998
"I consider every American my enemy." Zacarias Moussaoui 2006 |
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T_ID
Joined: 16 Aug 2004
Posts: 1207
Location: Holland
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| Posted: Thu Sep 30, 2004 8:48 am Post subject: |
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| nomad wrote: |
| If we don't pull out of Iraq, we're 'imperialist'. |
where did I say that?
or wait a second, I didn't, so you're twisting my words.
It's doubtful that America would have joined WW2 if it weren't for the Japanese attacking Pearl Harbor, after all, there were a lot of people with isolationist ideals.
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nomad
Joined: 01 Apr 2004
Posts: 6320
Location: Allahpalooza
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| Posted: Sat Oct 02, 2004 12:50 pm Post subject: |
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| T_ID wrote: |
| nomad wrote: |
| If we don't pull out of Iraq, we're 'imperialist'. |
where did I say that?
or wait a second, I didn't, so you're twisting my words.
It's doubtful that America would have joined WW2 if it weren't for the Japanese attacking Pearl Harbor, after all, there were a lot of people with isolationist ideals. |
No, I didn't say that YOU said that. I was merely repeating the observations many before me have noted of most anti-America Europeans. The best and funniest observer of this irrationality is the French writer Jean-Francois Revel in his bestseller, Anti Americanism.
| Jean-Francois Revel, Anti Americanism, chapter 1, Contradictions wrote: |
| Consider, for example, the perplexity of a citizen of Montana or Tenessee upon learning of his nation's intervention in the former Yugoslavia. He might with good reason have asked himself what interest the United States could have in plunging into the bloody quagmire of the Balkans, that centuries-old masterpiece of Europe's matchhless ingenuity. But Europe found herself incapable of bringing order to this murderous chaos of her own making. So, in order to stop or at least diminish the massacres, it devolved upon the United States to take charge of the operations in Bosnia, Kosovo and Macedonia. The Europeans afterwards offered thanks by calling them imperialists---although they quake with fright and accuse the Americans of being cowardly isolationists the moment they make the slightest mention of bringing their soldiers home. |
There you go, bud. My Fraunsez is mightly rusty from yrs of non-use, so I had to settle for the Angleterre version of this witty observer of cultures and politics. Gave you the name and chapter so you can check it up yourself. Enjoy.
_________________
"We do not differentiate between those dressed in military uniforms and civilians; they are all targets in this fatwah," Osama bin Laden 1998
"I consider every American my enemy." Zacarias Moussaoui 2006 |
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Dan-Cannon
Joined: 19 Feb 2004
Posts: 3144
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| Posted: Sat Oct 02, 2004 1:34 pm Post subject: |
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| T_ID wrote: |
that's a rather cowardly behaviour, getting into anything, but pulling out if things get nasty.
then either don't get into something in the first place, or finish what you started in a proper fashion. |
And yet you would vote for Kerry instead of Bush if you could.
How do those 'double morals' taste that you talked about elsewhere?
P.S. Cyberite is for pulling out, so are many socialists in Europe whose leadership sent troops (remember Spain?).
So why don't you call them cowards? Double morals, ehmm?
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Islam is anti-infidel, therefor i am anti-Islam. - Dan Cannon.
I am the greatest minority in the world: an individual. - David Gulbraa. |
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marky
Joined: 11 Mar 2004
Posts: 2947
Location: England - the world's oldest democracy
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| Posted: Sat Oct 02, 2004 11:51 pm Post subject: |
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T_ID wrote:
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| It's doubtful that America would have joined WW2 if it weren't for the Japanese attacking Pearl Harbor, after all, there were a lot of people with isolationist ideals. |
US was already involved before Pearl helping us Brits with our merchant convoys doing protection duties from U-boats. The only difference is that they did not openly declare war with Japan until after Pearl, and then Germany declared war with the US.
We cannot pull out of Iraq now. When you commit to a job, you get it done. Failure is not an option! (A bit American that phrase, but applies with most importance here).
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No need to hide behind slogans of deceit, Claiming that you're a religion of peace, We just don't believe you, We can clearly see through, The madness that you're feeding your people, Jihad ... (Stuck Mojo - Open Season) |
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