"A Day in the Bar Ditch of Democracy USA" and why it matters ....

[understandinglife]

"Once you've been to war and you're a vet," says Young, "and you're sworn to uphold the Constitution and protect it from enemies BOTH foreign and domestic - that never leaves. I fought in an illegal war. These young guys in Iraq are fighting in an illegal war. If I can save one life I'll do whatever it takes." In the bar ditch outside the President's Crawford Ranch, Young is fighting a better war than he fought in Vietnam.

"This is a war for our country," says Young. "They are taking our country away from us and turning it into a fascist state. What has Bush done for the people? Everything he's done has been for the corporations." He talks about news reports of record earnings at Halliburton and jobs going overseas.

"Here's what they need," says Young. "They need a state of constant war. They need an ignorant population to fight it. They need people to provide the services and materials for war. And they need an ignorant population to do that work. But it will definitely be a country of rich and poor if this is not stopped."

"I don't know if I can stop it," says Young. "But I'll be doing it until the day I die. And the Vietnam vets? I'll tell you for sure, we're not going to back down. They can't do any more to us."

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From A Day in the Bar Ditch of Democracy USA by Greg Moses on August 6, 2005

More at the link:

http://peacefile.org/wordpress/?p=217

Those are the words of Vietnam Veteran Michael Young.

James Moore has written, today, about Johnny Matta from Pecos, Texas.

It seems fitting to link that story to Michael Young's -- the proximity of Pecos and Crawford, the reality that Johnny like Chris Sheehan are now dead because of Bush's lies; lies told in Bush's self-service to the plutocracy he and his family have worked hard to build.

Johnny Matta was killed in the same ambush that Jessica Lynch survived. James Moore's story about Johnny is a special tribute and should be read in its entirety.

Mr Moore begins with "his small town American storybook life ended in an early, needless tragedy. To me, Johnny Mata's story is all of their stories. And I have no idea how we can continue to let this happen."

Neither do I.

Almost a hundred people showed up at the home of Domingo and Elvira Mata the first night news came that their son, Johnny, was missing in Iraq a few days after the invasion had been launched. Each night, a priest performed a rosary, and prayers were offered for Johnny’s safe return. The crowds and the candles did not go away until Johnny’s casket, being transported by the army, was met at the Reeves County line by police cruisers. Thousands lined the roadways, silently watching the procession, holding up candles in the 3:30 a.m. desert darkness. When he was buried, half of the 10,000 population of Pecos surrounded the church, or stood in the withering desert heat at the graveyard, waiting for the arrival of Johnny’s funeral cortege.

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No one at Fort Bliss knew about faked documents trying to prove Saddam had attempted to buy uranium from Nigeria. They didn’t know there were no provable connections between Saddam and al Qaeda terrorists. Their commander-in-chief, they were certain, took his duties as solemnly and seriously as everyone at Fort Bliss. If the president said there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, every soldier accepted the statement for fact. As hazy as the politics were, they were irrelevant to everyone shipping out from Biggs Army Air Field at Fort Bliss. A soldier does not debate the politics of a presidential decision. He follows orders.

“We don’t think about no politics in our family,” said Domingo Mata. Johnny Mata’s father is a man whose impressive size reflects an appetite for all of life’s pleasures. He had been hovering nearby, listening to his daughter-in-law answer questions.

“Politics is just when someone tells you they’ll do something so you’ll help them get something they want, and then when they get in there, they forget all about the people who got them in. In our family, we just do what we need to do, what we think is right. That’s all Johnny did. When he went up there, (Iraq,) he just wanted to help all those little children who were hungry, and hurtin’, you know?”

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From Johnny Came Home by James Moore on August 7, 2005

Please do read the entire story:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/theblog/archive/jim-moore/johnny-came-home_5279.html

We know why Johnny and Chris and all the others died.

We know how amazing and honorable their willingness to serve our America is.

And, we know that though they were abused by a few rich folk, the American plutocracy.

They will always be honored and remembered because what they thought they were doing was protecting all of us. It is not their fault that their leaders are liars and war criminals.

We know that Michael Young and Cindy Sheehan and so very many others are absolutely correct in their assessment of the lies, the motives behind those lies, and the fact that we must stop them.

5 million American citizens in the streets of DC on Sept 24th 2005 is a worthy objective - to honor Johnny and Chris and all the others who have died and been brutalized by Bush's illegal war.

We must force Bush and Cheney to resign.

We must be certain that every vote is recorded on paper and counted, in an open and verifiable manner, in 2006 and thereafter.

We must halt corporate control of our government.

We must defend our Constitution, 'from enemies both foreign AND DOMESTIC.'

Currently our principal domestic enemy, when not playing ranch hand, gets to live in our house at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

Let's serve an eviction notice, now, and just tell him to stay in Crawford.


This is not what Johnny Matta or Chris Sheehan or any other soldier in Iraq is dying to protect

by Matthew Donaldson , an independent visual artist from Auckland. “On this, the 60th anniversary of Hiroshima's bombing, my grief for all of those murdered and yet to be murdered by America's weapons - of mass destruction or otherwise - overwhelms me ” said Matt.

Peace.

www.missionnotaccomplished.us - How ever long it takes, the day must come when tens of millions of caring individuals peacefully but persistently defy the dictator, deny the corporatists their cash flow, and halt the evil being done in Iraq and in all the other places the Bu$h neoconster regime is destroying civilization and the environment in the name of "America."

[omega minimo]

1. Thanks for this

:kick:

[understandinglife]

2. "the things he'd had to do in Iraq might jeopardize the salvation of ...

... his soul."

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He is also filled with turbulent emotions related to the insurgents that he killed. "I had no hesitation about pulling the trigger," he said. "But the aftermath is what hurt. Before I joined the military, I valued life very much, so taking it was hard. It's confusing trying to figure it out, you know, because sometimes I feel rage toward them.

"But then it becomes a very religious thing, because I wonder, you know, since I've taken these lives, if I'm going to be accepted into heaven. You know, have I done the right thing?"

Specialist Olander is being treated for depression and post-traumatic stress disorder at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center here. He expects to head back to Waynesburg in a few weeks, where he'll stay for a while in a trailer that sits in a campground "out in the middle of nowhere."

From The Pain Deep Inside by Bob Herbert on August 8, 2005

More at the link:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/08/opinion/08herbert.html

Specialist Olander should have NEVER had these experiences. If he had been served by a President and a government even remotely worthy, he never would have had these experiences.

It is in each of these tragedies that the vast extent of criminality of Bush and the neoconsters is comprehensively detailed.



http://www.newsparkproductions.org

Peace.

www.missionnotaccomplished.us - How ever long it takes, the day must come when tens of millions of caring individuals peacefully but persistently defy the dictator, deny the corporatists their cash flow, and halt the evil being done in Iraq and in all the other places the Bu$h neoconster regime is destroying civilization and the environment in the name of "America."

[AuntPatsy]

3. Kick for the voice of reason to be heard far and wide.

[understandinglife]

4. Apologize for the typo ....

... I'm not sure why I typed "Chris" instead of "Casey" ... sometimes just too overwhelmed by the enormity of the horrors to think clearly.

Thank you, fooj, for catching that one.

Apologies to all.



http://www.newsparkproductions.org/

Peace.

www.missionnotaccomplished.us - How ever long it takes, the day must come when tens of millions of caring individuals peacefully but persistently defy the dictator, deny the corporatists their cash flow, and halt the evil being done in Iraq and in all the other places the Bu$h neoconster regime is destroying civilization and the environment in the name of "America."

[understandinglife]

5. "Whether one supported the invasion is now immaterial."

How can the reason or reasons for conducting a preemptive strike against another country change after the fact?

Even the first President Bush understood this, when he and Brent Skowcroft wrote in a 1998 Time magazine article, “Trying to eliminate Saddam, extending the ground war into an occupation of Iraq, would have violated our guideline about not changing objectives in midstream, engaging in "mission creep," and would have incurred incalculable human and political costs.”

Those incalculable costs are now happening daily. The WMD reason we went to war appears to have been based on incorrect information. A brutal dictator sits awaiting trial, in a country that is barely holding itself together, but we are now going in so many directions – rebuilding, fighting unknown and unseen enemies, conducting gas-bootlegging, providing safeguarding and security in some areas – that the war has become a quagmire.

Whether one supported the invasion is now immaterial. It is time to remember why we started it – for that will also tell us that it should be over. Now.

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From Why Are We in Iraq? by Dal LaMagna on August 8, 2005

Link:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/theblog/archive/dal-lamagna/why-are-we-in-iraq_5301.html

Provides a convenient framework for both Republican and Democratic Members of Congress to place aside their acquiescence at Bush's launching an illegal war of aggression and, now, calling for it to end because the original rationale for Bush's actions is complete.

You were correct Georgie boy -- 'mission accomplished' - now get the troops OUT, NOW.

(p.s. I commented to the author that Casey was in the Army, not Marines)


Peace.

www.missionnotaccmplished.us

[SwimmerFilms]

6. just kickin' it old school

http://homepage.mac.com/godofkarma/swimmerfilms/iMovieTheater74.html