Posted on 05/29/2006 4:46:05 PM PDT by Coop
...
In the meantime, my column had been posted on a well-known right-wing American website, where it attracted 119 comments. Oddly, none of them displayed any hint of disquiet over the behaviour of the Marines under investigation. Rather, their outrage was reserved for John Murtha and yours truly.
One poster's reaction was to "nuke the Middle East" adding "thank you very much Dishonourable Rep. Jack Murtha". He was later to write "if you can't stand behind our troops, stand in front of them".
A few of his co-posters rushed to the website of Murtha's Republican challenger Diana Irey to donate campaign funds.
The fact that this murdering troop has the support of even those 119 posters is worrisome. Surely, nobody should defend the indefensible based on some false notion of patriotism.
Military personnel should act as ambassadors for their country and behave according to international rules of law and the Geneva Conventions that were drawn up as a result of atrocities committed during the Second World War. There should be a difference between real soldiers and ruthless thugs with public opinion the final arbiter.
If the public, as represented by the 119 posters on the Free Republic website, condones such behaviour or seeks to excuse it, then not only is its members giving their country's soldiers a license to kill arbitrarily, they are altering the fundamental psyche of their nation.
To quote a well-known rationalist intellectual Felix Adler "Love of country is like love of women - he loves her best who seeks to bestow on her the highest good."
The "Freepers" - as members of the Free Republic website have come to be known - may also like to contemplate the words of theologian Howard Thurman who said "During times of war, hatred becomes quite respectable, even though it has to masquerade often under the guise of patriotism."
In short, people who glorify soldiers who purposefully assassinate women and small children are as misguided as those who glorify the blowing up of crowded buses, trains and marketplaces.
Does the donning of a uniform render its wearer impervious to justice? The Nuremberg trials indicate not...
If she'd ever peek out of her little bubble, she wouldn't be so ignorant. Then again, she needs her ignorance to survive in that bubble. Oh well. Just step over her. The road to freedom was paved with such fools, and must be patched with them from time to time.
He calls our warrior heroes haters?? I say, "A pox on this so-called theologian, on his house and on his bogus church!" His words are limp and empty - as are yours.
Dear Ms. Heard,
Please provide proof of "soldiers who purposefully assassinate women and small children".
Your story forgot to provide proof of assasination. It only provided evidence of accusations.
Ms Heard: Ignorance can be cured by knowledge. Stupid however is terminal. My condolences on your impending demise.
Y'all don't feed the troll. She has received more attention from the posters on this single thread than she gets from her half-vast readership in the Gulf in a week.
I'm going to have to blog on this tomorrow.
She is collaborating with Murtha to foment riots. They read gulfnews.com in Kabul.
"This is journalist talk for, "THEY'RE GUILTY! LET'S LYNCH 'EM!" "
Guess this jounalist does not believe in innocent until proven guilty. At least, not for those who give her the opportunity to work the job she has.
Ms Heard,
You didn't read very carefully. There are several posters at FR who were just as quick as you and John Murtha to condemn the Marines without benefit of trial.
"My bet is that the terrorist killed innocents just to blame it on the Marines for pr attention."
My thinking on this is, considering a 3 to 5 hour fight, and our troops being fired on, either: the terrorists killed the women and children, the terrorists used the women and children for human shields, or the women and children were the ones doing the firing on our troops.
I simply do not see our troops being fired on from 1 or more sources, and instead going into locations different than where the fire was coming from and killing anyone there.
I bet she already does. ;-)
"It was many years ago, but it was indeed an honor."
Thank you for your sevice.
The LAT did a hit piece on that soldier a couple weeks ago.
I am really starting to get up set with the media :(
I'm glad I missed that. I can't imagine how anyone could do a hit piece on him. I suppose anyone in their little bubble world is a barbarian if they don't hold their pinky just right when drinking Kool Aid.
>>>The outrage on Free Republic has to do with the fact that most of us here have seen this kind of bu!!$h!t smear time after time by the drive-by media, and we know that the likelihood is great that the crime never happened, or at least not as it has been characterized.
Weren't the Israeli's drawn and quartered over a Palestinian sniping their own kind and the death of the child getting blamed on the Israeli military that had been in a fire fight with them at the same time?
If so, then you'd think little Ms. Blame-America-First-And-Guilty-Before-Facts-Are-In would know about this gambit.
Maybe in this writer's fantasyland. I thought the point of the military was to defend us from our enemies. Leave the "ambassadorships" to the pointy headed diplomats who blow smoke up each other's a**es.
Agreed, I was parroting Murtha's position to note that, even IF true, his actions were indefensible.
bump
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