Monday, September 10, 2007

Fallen heroes?

I often wonder what soldiers returning from Iraq must think of us, particularly when I see a thing like news of 7 more GIs killed in Iraq buried in the back pages of our newspapers.

The president doesn't attend funerals and Donald Rumsfeld had to be forced to sign official letters of condolence with his own hand. I suppose they tell themselves they are busy, important people with many important things to do, when everyone knows they lack the courage to face the consequences of their own decisions.

I know that it helps the president's P.R. if everybody pretends not to see the bodies and the wounded as they are flown back to the US under cover of darkness and under a media blackout, but should we all participate in this P.R. effort?

Should we make it easy for those who lead to take the lives of our young?

Should soldier's families see a nation ignore their sacrifice the way we ignored Cindy Sheehan when she travelled to Crawford?

Are we guilty of recoiling in shame from their sacrifice? Is that why we hide them, bury their loss on our back pages, and fail to honor their sacrifice publicly?

Are we shielding ourselves from funeral fatigue?

If the war is worth it then the sacrifice is something to be proud of, is it not?

Shouldn't we treat returning soldiers cadavers better than the homeless among us? Shouldn't we at least see them, notice them, acknowledge them?

Haven't they become like inconvenient truths to us?

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Foot Quotes

"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge"

Charles Darwin