Will W meet Cindy Sheehan

[mburbank]

"What every family who as ever sent a son or daughter to war has been cost. "

I disagree. Dieing defending your country is one thing. Dieing in a war of agression is something altogether different.

"What will be gained by him going there? "
By whom? Her goal is to make an attempt to bring the war home to him. I think forcing him to look her in the eye and acknowledge real tragedy, real people, real blood spilt OR make him refuse might move more give force to the growing anti war sentiment, it might get us out of Iraq faster and maybe a few more kids, both ours and theirs wouldn't die. I think what she wants is for other mothers not to go through what she's going through. It's a protest, and I think it's working.

If I felt good about feeling morally superior to Bush I'd be awash in happiness all the time. I assure you, I'm not. Don't tell me what's rigt or wrong. My strongly held belief is that this war is wrong and we invaded over lies that maybe, MAYBE W believed, but I don't think Rummy or Chenney or Wolwowitz or any of the others believed for a moment, or even cared about. THAT's wrong. Being unable to account for 9.5 Billion dollars and calling yourself the party of fiscal repsonsability, THAT's wrong. Torture is wrong, rendition is wrong, giving the President to declare someone an enemy combatant and vanish them is wrong, spending billions more on missile defense than on preparing for the next flu pandemic, when one is flat out impossible and the other is a statistical inevitability, that WRONG. And pointless wars that never had to begin with no exit stragtegy are really, really, relly wrong. Those are the wrong things I care about. W. makes Nixon look like a Sunday school picnic.

"Great, then we can get all the living preseidents and congressmen and all other lawmakers to stand there while eveyrone who has a gripe with a policy yel lat them."

No, see, a gripe, that's how I feel about the sullen whitehouse monkey taking more vacation time in a year than most working folks get in a decade. Sure, I'd love to tell him personally that I think his fauz cowboy act is a nauseating farce, but I don't really feel I have that coming to me. Now if on of my kids gets killed in an unjust war that his administration lies about every day, that could possibly rise above the level of a 'gripe'. And unlike her kids trip to Iraq which once he joined the army he had no choice about, W may have signed up to be President, but he doesn't have to go see a woman just 'cause her son got killed and she's waiting in a ditch near his Ranch while he takes five weeks of R and R. That's his choice.

White guys who think affirmative action cost them their jobs don't have dead kids.

Relatives of drug dealers doing prison time might get to watch their kids grow up.

someone who's pet program lost money to the NEA might one day dance at their sons wedding.

Families of all the soldiers who died over seas in a conflict they didn't vote for... I think maybe they can ask. I don't think asking is very big compared to never having grandchildren.

So you see, it's not such a long list. Just people who've suffered the very worst loss imaginable. I would much rather die than see my kids die. I think most parents would feel the same, even if they think dieing in Iraq is noble. I think Cyndi Sheehan is trying to make the raw horror of war come home in a viceral way to as many people as she possibly can, starting with the commander in cheif.

You want to tell me you don't agree with what I think of as right and wrong, you be my guest. But I'm pretty sure I haven't given up just yet.

And yeah. I think it's good that one American Citizen in their suffering has a bully pulpit for a week. She didn't go to Yale, she wasn't born rich, her dad was never president, she's not even Jennifer Anniston and yet through chance and timing she's got the countries ear. If she was selling Amway on her fifteen minutes of fame, I wouldn't think it was so great. But she's not. She's doing what she can to make this war more real to people, hoping against hope it might bring a few more kids home alive than if she did nothing. I think it's better than good. I think it's wonderful.