Memorial Day Words
Right-wing columnist Mark Steyn could not honor our troops who have sacrificed their lives for this country without smearing Al Gore and John Kerry.
In his Memorial Day column he compared the number of troop deaths with those in the Civil War, and wrote about “the difference between then and now: the loss of proportion. They had victims galore back in 1863, but they weren't a victim culture. They had a lot of crummy decisions and bureaucratic screwups worth re-examining, but they weren't a nation that prioritized retroactive pseudo-legalistic self-flagellating vaudeville over all else. They had hellish setbacks but they didn't lose sight of the forest in order to obsess week after week on one tiny twig of one weedy little tree.”
So, in effect the soldiers we lost in Iraq are insignificant a “tiny twig of one weedy little tree.” I bet those words did not give much comfort to the family of Pat Tillman and the many other families who have lost their love ones recently.”
He then goes on to dismiss the importance of US troops being caught torturing Iraqis, and incident which at least should have brought shame to our country, but certainly doesn’t concern people like Mark Steyn who writes, “There is something not just ridiculous but unbecoming about a hyperpower 300 million strong whose elites -- from the deranged former vice president down -- want the outcome of a war, and the fate of a nation, to hinge on one freaky jailhouse; elites who are willing to pay any price, bear any burden, as long as it's pain-free, squeaky clean and over in a week. The sheer silliness dishonors the memory of all those we're supposed to be remembering this Memorial Day.”
Steyn has it exactly backwards, it is troops who engaged in torture who dishonor the memory of our lost troops, not the ones who criticized their behavior.
He concludes, “Playing by Gore-Kennedy rules, the Union would have lost the Civil War, the rebels the Revolutionary War, and the colonists the French and Indian Wars. There would, in other words, be no America. Even in its grief, my part of New Hampshire understood that 141 years ago. We should, too.”
Steyn should read the comments of WWII veterans who have been outraged by the behavior in Iraqi prisons and point out how differently they treated prisoners. The troops that exposed these atrocities our heroes, and the people like Steyn who try to minimize the import of what happen do a great disservice to those troops who are serving honorably in Iraq.
Here is a far more eloquent Memorial Day statement.
In his Memorial Day column he compared the number of troop deaths with those in the Civil War, and wrote about “the difference between then and now: the loss of proportion. They had victims galore back in 1863, but they weren't a victim culture. They had a lot of crummy decisions and bureaucratic screwups worth re-examining, but they weren't a nation that prioritized retroactive pseudo-legalistic self-flagellating vaudeville over all else. They had hellish setbacks but they didn't lose sight of the forest in order to obsess week after week on one tiny twig of one weedy little tree.”
So, in effect the soldiers we lost in Iraq are insignificant a “tiny twig of one weedy little tree.” I bet those words did not give much comfort to the family of Pat Tillman and the many other families who have lost their love ones recently.”
He then goes on to dismiss the importance of US troops being caught torturing Iraqis, and incident which at least should have brought shame to our country, but certainly doesn’t concern people like Mark Steyn who writes, “There is something not just ridiculous but unbecoming about a hyperpower 300 million strong whose elites -- from the deranged former vice president down -- want the outcome of a war, and the fate of a nation, to hinge on one freaky jailhouse; elites who are willing to pay any price, bear any burden, as long as it's pain-free, squeaky clean and over in a week. The sheer silliness dishonors the memory of all those we're supposed to be remembering this Memorial Day.”
Steyn has it exactly backwards, it is troops who engaged in torture who dishonor the memory of our lost troops, not the ones who criticized their behavior.
He concludes, “Playing by Gore-Kennedy rules, the Union would have lost the Civil War, the rebels the Revolutionary War, and the colonists the French and Indian Wars. There would, in other words, be no America. Even in its grief, my part of New Hampshire understood that 141 years ago. We should, too.”
Steyn should read the comments of WWII veterans who have been outraged by the behavior in Iraqi prisons and point out how differently they treated prisoners. The troops that exposed these atrocities our heroes, and the people like Steyn who try to minimize the import of what happen do a great disservice to those troops who are serving honorably in Iraq.
Here is a far more eloquent Memorial Day statement.
posted by Zack at 7:36 AM
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