<p>mootmom: It did occur to me and frankly I don’t care. If I have to be a bit tactless to elicit a response then I’ll do it. I guess I learned something from Cindy - although her motives are less respectable. </p>
<p>carlmom: Why would you have gone to war in the first place? Casey went because he believed in this nation’s efforts. I think he would be truly disappointed with his mother’s actions…just like her soon to be ex-husband is.</p>
<p>Live a little longer, Bern. Invest your heart and soul into loving and raising a child, and then loose that child to a war whose purpose has never been truthfully stated, and whose objective grows more vague with each passing day, and then tell me Cindy Sheehan is “capitalizing” on her child’s death. There’s nothing more perplexing than a person who has lived few years, learned relatively few of life’s lessons, and yet somehow KNOWS EVERYTHING, including the motivations of a grieving mother’s actions.</p>
<p>Carlmom, your post reaffirms my view of most journalists who craft their stories around their own personal belief and then support it based on anecdotal evidence. How can you possibly make the claims that you do based on such a limited sample? If your claims were true, why is it that veterans who have both experienced war, as well as been away from the theater long enough to regain any “lost” perspective, support the war and George Bush by an overwhelming majority? Sure, you will always find examples of soldiers who take the opposite view to create the “proof” and personal interest angle for your story.</p>
<p>Of course I can be critical of Cindy Sheehan for stating views that are ludicrous and anti-American. What surprises me is that those who oppose the war but yet claim to be good patriots don’t also criticize her. Instead we get the weak, "well, I don’t agree with all of her views but, … blah, blah, blah. It would be like a Republican supporting David Duke by saying, “well, I don’t support all of his views, but…” At some time when people say things that are so repugnant, you have to take a stand and just distance yourself completely from the person. Cindy’s anti-American statements have certainly crossed that line.</p>
<p>P.S. Your obviously biased view against Wharton should be directed at the ethics training in journalism schools. Can you imagine if journalists in WW II had behaved like today’s journalists? We would have given up long before we ultimately won.</p>
<p>Actually, Bern, her husband filed before this happened, it was posted this week, not by his choice, and it is not because of her actions.</p>
<p>Many parents have a troubled time and lose their marriages after the death of a child; I can’t imagine a worse pain than that.</p>
<p>If she thinks the war is so unnecessary (we are trying to free the Iraqi people from an oppressive dictator, and free the mideast and ourselves from a possible threat), we should send her over to Iraq herself to see what the effects of Saddam were. She can meet all the people who had limbs cut off as punishments, and the families of those people who were executed by him. Then she can tell those people that this war is unjust and we are “only doing it for oil.” Maybe while she is on that trip, she can take another journey to Israel to tell the people who have been paralyzed or lost loved ones to suicide bombers that they don’t belong there. </p>
<p>Cindy Sheehan is a radical anti-capatalist. bern obviously respects capatalism, as do I. Cindy Sheehan has her own agenda, and that is to protest capatalism. Her son obviously agreed with the war, or he wouldn’t have enlisted. Her family knows Casey, and they ALL seem to think she is extremely radical. I have great respect for her son, I think he gave his life to a very noble cause. Her protesting and making a spectacle of his death is like a slap in the face to what he would have wanted. </p>
<p>My solution, tell her to leave the US if she is so unhappy here. I’m sure she’d have a great time in the mideast.</p>
<p>Dear Funding Father: Where is your evidence that those who have served in Iraq support the war and George Bush by an overwhelming majority? The same sources that have “told” you that Cindy Sheehan is anti-American and have smeared her in deplorable ways? Rush Limbaugh? Sean Hannity? National Review? Free Republic? Like I said before, my heart aches for our country when you can write without irony that Cindy Sheehan is anti-American. You and I live in completety different universes.</p>
<p>Garland: the divorce is filed August 12 in Solano County District Court at 2:47PM…although he signed the actual paperwork August 8th.</p>
<p>Bern700
I am totally disgusted and perplexed by your references to Cindy Sheehan as a “whore.” What exactly does she–personally-- have to gain from all the work she is doing other than to draw attention to a cause that is important to her and many others in this country?<br>
Is she making a lot of money from this venture?<br>
And what will you be doing for this country with your degree from “Penn-Wharton?” Maybe you should look in the mirror.</p>
<p>Since this is a college discussion forum, I would direct Funding Father and Bern’s attention to a newly released article by Immanuel Wallerstein, senior research scholar at Yale, titled “The U.S. has Lost the Iraq War.” And I would also respectfully direct their attention to the latest poll numbers that show Americans’ support for the war hovering at 40 percent. History teaches us that pre-emptive wars never go as planned. History also teaches us that democracy (or anything resembling it) must rise up from within, not be imposed from without. From my vantage as someone who has covered both pre-emptive and defensive wars, I believe Cindy Sheehan has learned those lessons well. Unfortunately, many seem to never learn those lessons.</p>
<p>The divorce papers state they have been separated since June 1. Again, this is tragically common after the death of a child. I don’t think you can really know what led to it; seems ungermaine to the discussion.</p>
<p>One more thing: it is extremely telling to me that some on this board call Sheehan a “radical anti-capitalist.” Gee, guys, I’d been told by my president that we invaded Iraq to let democracy reign. But I am on your side: I agree that the Iraq war was always about capitalism.</p>
<p>A recent column by Pat Buchanan re : Cindy Sheehan
<a href=“http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=8560[/url]”>http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=8560</a></p>
<p>In this country everyone is entitled to a point of view and expressinng a point of view that is contrary to the President or Congress is not only a right, but a responsibility for our democracy to run. Which is more patriotic: urging our enemy to attack us “Bring it on!” or urging our office holders to end an irresponsible, unprovoked attack on Iraq.</p>
<p>I agree that Sheehan has a right to protest anything she wants. Others also have a right to counter her protest. You don’t have to tell me about grieving parents. My parents went through it when my sister died of leukemia. It’s hard, it’s hard for the rest of your life. Parents do not get over loosing a child, ever. She doesn’t get a free pass to press her political views just because she’s a grieving mother however. </p>
<p>My view on pulling out of Iraq – within a year there will be blood in the streets of the US again. I think people forget that we weren’t in Iraq when Trade Center was hit and when 9/11 occurred. There hasn’t been an attack here since we took the offensive. Even in the UK, they were home grown terroist, not imports. That is ‘mission accomplished’. </p>
<p>Don’t want the US to be the policeman for the world? Why not? Imagine the US without police. The thugs would rule and no one would be safe. The world is just a bigger community. When we don’t do it, who will? Drug lords in Central America? Extreme muslim clerics in Europe and the middle east? Soviets in Eastern Europe? China? North Korea? Iran? I like being able to ride the subway in London. I want to be able to tour Israel, Turkey, and the rest of the Middle East. I want to feel safe in the world. The time has long since past where we can close our borders and hunker down from the rest of the world. I don’t want the same searches we have at airports every time I enter a mall, public school, or library. That’s what it will take if we don’t go after the terroist, everywhere. </p>
<p>For the ladies on the board, you seem to be the most vocal about pulling out. That’s been pretty much the theme in every war since the beginning of time. You have a right to speak as well, and I applaud you. Do stop and think about the first casualty of a pull out, Iraqi women’s rights. Education of females will end. Females will become property again.</p>
<p>Bandit–the Shiite majority are the ones most interested in curtailing women’s rights. As has been frequently noted, Iraq, though obviously riddled with human rights violations, had, under Saddam, more widespread women’s rights than most Middle Eastern countries. culturally-bound repression is making a comeback there (See: Iran.)</p>
<p>
devils67: If Bush thinks the war is so necessary, why aren’t his daughters either enlisting or putting themselves on the line physically to support the war?</p>
<p>Also, Bandit, terrorism in the US was unconnected to Iraq in the past (even Bush has said so). You are right that it may not be so in the future, but more war seems to be continually making that more likely, not less.</p>
<p>Not in my recent experience. As I said, we entered into Iraq after they invaded Kuwait. We did not stay, and yet we have muslim terroist attacks on US soil and around the world. Sorry, I’m not buying your hypothesis.</p>
<p>mootmom that has to be the worst point I have ever seen. Do you think you are Michael Moore now? His daughters are free to do whatever they want, just as you are. Not everyone enjoys the military. They had other options open to them, and they chose them, and that is their decision. </p>
<p>Cindy Sheehan is an uneducated fool. Read some of her letters and watch some of her interviews. She contradicts herself, rambles, and makes no coherent sense. She basically hates all capatalist countries like I said before. Here is one quote from her someone posted earlier.</p>
<p>"You get America out of Iraq and Israel out of Palestine and you’ll stop the terrorism.</p>
<p>That lying ■■■■■■■, George Bush, is taking a five-week vacation in time of war. You get that maniac out here to talk with me in person.</p>
<p>The other thing I want him to tell me is ‘just what was the noble cause Casey died for?’ Was it freedom and democracy? Bull***t! He died for oil. He died to make your friends richer. He died to expand American imperialism in the Middle East.</p>
<p>Its okay for Israel to occupy Palestine, but its yeah and its okay for Iraq to occupy I mean, for the United States to occupy Iraq, but its not okay for Syria to be in Lebanon. Theyre a bunch of f***ing hypocrites!</p>
<p>I was raised in a country by a public school system that taught us that America was good, that America was just. America has been killing people, like my sister over here says, since we first stepped on this continent, we have been responsible for death and destruction. I passed on that bull***t to my son and my son enlisted. Im going all over the country telling moms: This country is not worth dying for.</p>
<p>9/11 was their Pearl Harbor to get their neo-con agenda through and, if I would have known that before my son was killed, I would have taken him to Canada. I would never have let him go and try and defend this morally repugnant system we have."</p>
<p>She also blaims George Bush for losing her job (because of unemployment). I’m sorry lady, but America is about hard work, not free handouts. She also said she won’t pay her taxes anymore. Quite a model citizen. Like I said earlier, I’d like to see her to go Iraq and see what it is like.</p>
<p>Bandit: I’ll give you an analysis from the Cato Institute, a generally conservative group:</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.cato.org/dailys/07-22-04-2.html[/url]”>http://www.cato.org/dailys/07-22-04-2.html</a></p>
<p>
</p>
<p>And from President Bush:</p>
<p><a href=“Briefing Room | The White House”>Briefing Room | The White House;
<p>
.</p>
<p>Of course, he then goes on to make claims about the absolute presence of WMD’s…</p>
<p>Anyway, I really don’t think you can make a case for Iraq having been where our terrorism threat had ever been located.</p>