While being approached by a well-meaning fellow employee at work...we'll call him "Jimmy"..., I was berated for volutarily aiding "King Bush" in his "illegal war against Afghan and Iraqi babies." His argument was that a real patriot would stand up against the illegal occupation of the conquered South. Having dealt with those of limited intellect and bumper sticker /slogan philosophy for many years, I attempted to carry out a civil conversation with this person. In short, in his ill-informed mind the sooner that I admit that I am a Republican stooge and a war crimminal, the better.
As I attempted to keep a straight face, he asserted that real patriots would seek to unseat an illegal President, bring out troops home, and end Federal occupation of the South. I thought, "Maybe it is the years of accumulation of THC?"
That was the first mistake: Trying to carry out a coherent discussion involving facts. Wrong answer! In interesting thought processes: no facts, please, just emotion. After all..."I went to Viet Nam!"
Jimmy, as you invited, I'll post on my blog, since you are much too emotional to speak. "Illegal" election (US Constitution and Electoral College-not popular vote-READ IT...especially when you start a neo-Confedrate rant that states that the South is "kept down."), retreat / peace at any price (Read about Lee's tearful determination to Jefferson Davis that Richmond will NEVER fall to GEN McClellan), and the occupied South argument (could seceede state by state if they so wished to do so today, as has been bandied about in the press by Alaska, California, and Vermont) aside, I'll attempt to put forth a bit of coherent language for you.
Okay. Great. You went to Viet Nam. Thanks for yor service, and my heart goes out to you (IF you really went there at all...you still can't tell me which branch of service or unit you deployed with). Military service alone does not make you "right." Look at Hitler. He was a decortated junior NCO wounded in action. Oh, for the Michael Moore fans out there, he wrote a couple of books too.
The two NCO's I will respect as fathers for the rest of my life volunteered to go to Afghanistan with my organization in 2003 after having served in Vietnam years earlier. I love and respect them both. They see things from the perpsective of their generations defining conflict. Their perspective was most welcome, their experience appreciated, and their wisdom most admired. One of these men was severely wounded on an offensive operation, after being already wounded in Viet Nam.
But does military service alone allow one to shut their brains and consciousnesses completely off? As with Hitler, the same standard makes his charachter unassailable simply because "he served?"
That "unassailable service" thing is selectively applied to Viet Nam, and Viet Nam alone, while your generation trashes the actions of your fathers and grandfathers in conflicts before you, and demands that my generation do the same. Confederate service is conveniently lauded only if it is meant as a slap against a President you don't like.
I guess that I am one of the ones you wanted to "bring home." Thanks for nothing. Cutting and running doesn't solve the problem...we CAN win...only if our nation has the will to do it.
The one thing everyone should have learned from Viet Nam is that every third world challenger will try to fight us in our own media, and use our own disaffected citizens to aid them. In short: the American public wants everything both ways. Your own many postings on your own blog points this out, Jimmy.
Admittedly, I have more respect for the hairy hippies than for the ones who hid out in college. They at least took a stand. The easy road, unfortunately, is human nature.
Treason? Why, the last persons tried for treeason got a slap on the wrist, and that was Tokyo Rose and Axis Sally. Jane Fonda and her crowd got a free pass from your own generation and its heroes. How many kids did LBJ kill today? How many died because "Bush lied?" How about how many died because of Ms. Fonda-Turner, and how many maimed because of our own malcontent media throwing the gasoline on the fires of an otherwise defeated enemy?
Fast forward this to 2001-to present. The same freakin' thing.
How can we lose? It's easy. One side is willing to die for their cause, why the other side isn't even willing to fight to survive. Not only are they not willing to fight, they are shouting that they aren't willing to do it from the rooftops, and trying everything in their power to keep others from fighting, too.
Go fight for my king? Were you arguing against Bill Clinton sending us to Bosnia and Kosovo? How about Somalia? How about sundry other places never read about in the newspapers, where we were pimped out to the UN? Were you arguing for adherence to the Constitution when the President failed to carry out his oath as these same animals built power, strength, and resolve by attacking us in ever more deadlier fashion throughout the 1990's?
OH, by the way, those fighting for "our king" are largely from the South. Many of us have carried the Battle Flag with us into action. I personally carried a US and SC flag with me.
I never hear the same comments from the World War II generation, in fact, their comments are always the opposite. They seem to understand that the enemy is using our own media and our own malcontents who have been ruining this country for the past thirty years.
As for learning anything from my Confederate forebears, we learned not to just quit! My own immediate family sent 5 sons to fight as riflemen. After the first died, the rest couldn't be held back. That included the 65 year old father in the citizen's militia. Of those 5, only two returned home, and both of those wounded. The same is true for the rest of my extended family, especially a grandfather who had half of his lower jaw shot away at Franklin TN, and remained with his unit (24th SC IN) until paroled at Goldsboro, N.C. and walked home!
This was borne home into their descendants: a Great-grandfather who lost a leg at sea during the First World War, and a Grandfather in who had to cut himself from his parachute while entangled in a tree somewhere behind Normandy on 6 June 1944, and fought alone in the dark until other troopers from the 507th PIR showed up. He returned to his company in the 507th and was severely wounded while attacking German mechanized infantry in Luxembourg in JAN 1945, losing his entire squad. He Was hidden in a snowbank by civilians until U.S. forces overran the area. He didn't just quit. My point: WE DON'T JUST QUIT WHEN IT GETS TOUGH..WE FINISH THE FIGHT!
Maybe your self-hatred will bear its fullest fruit when your daughters are put in a burqua, your sons given a prayer rug and told to grow a beard, and your throat gets cut by the "oppressed."
Don't think it can happen here? Think again. Look at France and Holland. How many more riots in the past week alone? Then, look south to our open border for good measure to stimulate those neurons and synapses.
I just can't imagine the bitter frame of mind of a generation that thinks: "We lost our war, our children should lose theirs, too." I guess a parent really would give his child a serpent instead of a fish? (Matthew 7:10)
May God preserve our nation, and our freedom.
