Posted on 01/24/2007 5:02:27 PM PST by Chi-townChief
Sen. Dick Durbin, who voted against going to war in Iraq in 2002 and has remained a steady foe of U.S. military involvement there, played host Tuesday to two wounded servicemen, his personal guests for President Bush's State of the Union Address.
The men -- Marine Staff Sgt. Wade Cobar of Schaumburg, Ill., and Army Staff Sgt. Eric Sundell of Patoka, Ill. -- did not offer criticism of the war, but praised the care they received at military hospitals and the kindness of Americans who sent them care packages to Iraq.
At a news conference in Durbin's Capitol office before Bush's speech, both men said there were no specific issues they wanted the president to focus on in his speech.
"Like my fellow Marine, I don't think I'm qualified to say what he should say or shouldn't say," said Sundell, a 12-year veteran who was shot in August while on patrol in Ramadi, Iraq.
"They have more humility than most politicians here," said Durbin, an Illinois Democrat who is the second-highest ranking senator in the Senate's majority caucus. "We make all kinds of solutions for the president. He doesn't listen to them."
Cobar, who was born in the United States but reared in Guatemala, became an eager student of English when he returned to the U.S. so he could join the Marines. Now wheelchair bound, he was injured delivering supplies along Iraq's Syrian border.
Asked by a reporter what Americans can do to help the war in Iraq, Cobar, now being treated at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland, said they are already doing a good job by sending care packages.
Added Sundell: "They -- civilians -- are going to have their opinions like everybody else, but they care about their troops and they send care packages to make sure soldiers have books to read, foot powder, T-shirts, all the stuff like that."
Durbin's other special guests were Chicago Mayor Richard Daley and his wife, Maggie.
Sen. Barack Obama, a Chicago Democrat, had as his guest Rana Khan, a teacher from Chicago's South Side who works at an all-black school and has recently been named one of two recipients of the Milliken Family Foundation's National Educator Award.
scumbag Dick Turban Durbin
He probably told them he was just kidding when he compared them to Nazis. You know, politicians are always cracking jokes like that. Don't give it another thought.
Ugh.
"They have more humility than most politicians here'...... Certainly more humility, more intelligence, more class and more patriotism than you,Senator Turban.
Must have missed the "solution" by democrats. What could it be?
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