Posted on 05/05/2004 7:00:09 PM PDT by Lando Lincoln
The media is having a field day with the pictures of the Iraqi prisoners in what they call ''humiliating'' positions and ''torture.'' All of the anti-war liberals are pointing their fingers with disgust and glee, justifying their long-held position that the United States military has been evil all along, and their chants are in collective unison with the outrage being echoed throughout the so-called Arab world.
Now while I don¹t condone the actions of the soldiers reportedly involved, I understand why they're taking the opportunity to let it all out.
Our young men and women left the safety of their homes to venture into a war zone to free people they didn¹t know. Some put their careers on hold, some left loved ones behind for an undetermined amount of time, and after the liberation was completed, they witnessed a recurring event when we go in to save people from themselves and we become the targets.
Ask some of the World War II veterans about the response of the people they liberated. I'll bet there isn't much of a similarity. While some Europeans were throwing kisses and flowers to our servicemen, the terrorists who've infiltrated Iraq are shooting off rocket-propelled grenades at our men and women today.
Personally, I'd feel a little angry at the prisoners who shortly before capture, would've had their way with my body if they captured or killed my buddies or me.
Somehow I don't recall the outrage from our liberals and the Arabs when some of our dead soldiers were dragged through streets packed with jubilant onlookers. Remember the networks debating whether they should show the Palestinians dancing in the streets shortly after the collapse of the Twin Towers?
Where was the collective outrage from ''60 Minutes'' and the rest of the media when American citizens, who went to Iraq ultimately to make the lives of the citizens there better, were shot at point blank range, and their bodies were burned and left hanging for all to admire on an overpass?
I remember the media being quite reluctant to show the mutilated, charred bodies of Americans and for a variety of reasons. They said they didn't want to gross out our viewing audience, but some seemingly didn't want to embarrass a culture that thought the spectacle one worthy of the traditional "taking to the streets."
Our men and women who went to Iraq to liberate the people from an evil dictator, have been met with open arms. But they've also been met with booby traps left in every convenient hiding place imaginable. They've been met with mortar fire, sniper fire, and suicide bombers.
Where is the American liberal outrage when terrorists, who are flooding into Iraq, blow up minivans with Iraqi children going to school and Iraqi men who've joined the newly formed police force to keep the peace?
Of course, when our military men and women who are stuck in that backwards part of the world trying to aid people who shoot back, vent their frustration in an illegal fashion, that's what prompts outrage?
Maybe one day former Army Private Jessica Lynch will regain the repressed memory of what happened to her during her capture. It can't have been pretty seeing how her mind has elected to deny her access to the recollection.
Our military personnel are only human. They rightly expected to walk into Iraq as liberators and be treated accordingly. Instead, they have to sleep with one eye open and look at every approaching civilian as a possible martyr-in-waiting looking to kill and maim as many of them as possible. So in response and gratitude for their ''service'' (a word that has taken on a humble new meaning), the liberals and their media are attempting to paint them as crazed sadists and showing empathy to the very people who refuse to speak out against those with whom we are fighting.
I've said many times that the Arabs need to shout in one voice denouncing the terrorist actions, but they still live by that perverted code about not speaking ill of a fellow Arab. We are expected to be civil and compassionate while our opponents can repeatedly spit on the very Geneva Convention our media now wants to know if our soldiers have read yet and understand.
President Bush, Colin Powell, and the media can express all the outrage they want but until our service people kidnap Iraqis and threaten to burn them alive unless they get a ticket home, I think we should all keep this in perspective.
There are always a few people who lose it. I don¹t think any of our beloved liberals can even come close to imaging the daily horror our soldiers are experiencing every day in the life-threatening performance of duties they couldn't have imagined a year ago. Do we know what those Iraqi prisoners might have said or done to provoke their humiliating experience? Or as usual, do the liberals look down with pity on these enemy combatants as they do American minorities?
Also, remember one important distinction: we may have humiliated some of them; they seek to mutilate us. Not only those in the theater of battle, but if they could they would kill each and every one of us who refused to pick up a Koran.
Before we get all riled up with Democrats demanding hearings to find out how this could have happened, take a minute first to think about what it would be like to get up and not be sure if your car would blow up when you went to get coffee. Take a minute to think if once you got to the donut shop, someone parked next to you would get out of his car and pump a hundred rounds into your car and you. Take a minute to think if someone might shoot a grenade into your office while you were checking your e-mail. Take a minute to think if you had to think twice about venturing out for lunch without an armed personnel carrier as an escort. Take a minute to think if you would have second thoughts about opening a package that just got dropped off by Federal Express. Take a minute to think if this is the day you won't make it back home alive.
Thoughts similar to this have got to be going through the minds of the soldiers who are in Iraq to help those who just can't seem to get their own houses in order.
And if a few of our people crack, they'll be punished accordingly. For the rest who are doing a job these liberals would never volunteer to do, cut them some slack.
~~o~~
Bob Parks is a versatile Bostonian and former Californian writer and activist who is now working in Central Massachusetts as manager of Steven Adam's campaign for Congress. Website: www.stevenadam.com
Until recently (and at the moment in Iraq alone) Arabs were not free to mouth off. Those who did so freuently showed up in a massgrave somewhere ~ and that's any Arab country!
I really liked Bush' approach to the interviews with the Arab media today ~ he said he was going to be going after the dictators on a continuing basis. Folks with close personal contacts in the region know very well that all but the syncophants would like to see their local dictators removed, and sooner rather than later.
Imagine what it must be like for folks in Egypt to see Arabs in Iraq free to mouth off.
Then, to have the President of the United States actually speak to them about his concern for the comfort of his enemies in prison ~ thereby "witnessing" to several fundamental Christian principles that do make the West different than the Middle East.
That just had to send the Ayatollahs and the Mullahs spinning.
No doubt those monsters were beating her constantly with truncheons.
Bingo!! The activities pictured are just too kinky. Must be the "Don't ask, Don't tell" crowd. And the Washington Post says they have another 1,000 photos. What kind of kooky "torturers" want to document their kinky business with 1,000 photos?
American women in a dominant position over Arab males, forcing them into homosexual poses.... Bin Laden has all the motivating and recruiting tools he will ever need in those pictures. Wake up.
Smells like a set-up to me.
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