Politics, War and Our Troops

At the time that this article is written 4,071 American families have lost a loved one in the war that our nation is in. Many of the kids fighting in this war will eventually face the same politics that our troops in Vietnam faced. As someone writing from a liberal perspective I want it known that my thoughts against the war are not against any of our troops in any single way. They are political thoughts to hopefully bring them all home safe and sound.

As a child I was the son of a WWII Navy veteran that served as a medic attached to the Marines. All of my life I wondered why my father never wanted any of his children to go into the military and follow in his footsteps. It’s an honorable service and for the most part builds a sense of character that one can never appreciate as a civilian. Serving your nation, offering your life in defense of your country and all of the good and bad things it has to offer its people is a greater sacrifice than most people will ever face in a lifetime.

From time to time I can imagine why my father chose to keep his children out of the military. As a medic he had seen the cost of war first hand on many soldiers and marines. Their blood touched his hands first on the battle field and changed his life forever. On Iwo Jima he spoke of the fighting that went on around the clock for days and he finally passed out with exhaustion but found comfort in a large comfortable object and slept for several hours nestled in sleep with his head resting comfortably. That object was a larger than life dead rat but it was the best night of sleep he had in weeks.

In politics today they talk about the war in Iraq as if it is something for somebody else to worry about. Most Americans don’t even think about the war in their day to day lives other than the headlines we read in the papers. Have we become numb to the body count and our children coming home in caskets day after day? Are we ignorant that our kids are still risking their lives every single day in Iraq while we debate politics and personal gripes on healthcare and whom is the best candidate to offer the best solution to Americas future problems?

We as a people need to recognize that our fight for justice over the attacks of 9/11 are over. Our troops need to come home and defend America on the homeland. Our troops need to come back to the land they love and the land they have defended honorably. The mission in Iraq is over. The war is won. That fact is proven by the number of dead of our nations enemy that compares to the sacrifice paid in our own war dead. In some reports the number of Iraqi dead in the war is over one million. Percentages work against any nation willing to attack America ever again. Nut job terrorists hiding behind any nation may not care that in a room of ten terrorists that less than one half of one percent of them will survive. America is not playing around anymore with nut jobs.

Our nation faces an economic crisis that can continue to funnel billions of dollars out of our nations economy to support the efforts in Iraq or it can focus those dollars on the people at home. Bringing our troops home is not accepting defeat in Iraq. Iraq has never in its nations history been stable unless a gun has been held at its peoples heads. America and our military is not about that.

Bringing our troops home is the beginning to the end of the ugly America out to bully the world and the end of the George W. Bush legacy. Now is the time for the olive branch over the sword.

Papamoka

Syndicated:

Bring It ON! and To the Center

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