Yesterday was a sad day for Free Republic

May 3, 2011 | Huck

[Huck]

Yesterday should have been a glorious day around here. There should have been fireworks and celebration. There should have been somber remembrances. There should have been patriotic tributes. There should have been shared joy at the news that our guys had finally gotten Bin Laden.

Instead, when I visited the site, what I found was a lot of carping. I found people focused more on the political spin than on the great news. I found people transferring their birther mentality onto this event, talking about Obama faking this news, photoshopping information, etc. It wasn't everybody, but it was a LOT of people. It made me sick.

Yesterday Free Republic seemed like DU. It makes me wonder what the hell is going on. Are Freepers getting younger? I always assume that DU is so pathetically immature because they must be younger. Free Republic has always been a place dominated by great class, and wit, and decency. Not this time. What I saw yesterday was a pathetic embarrassment and totally unworthy of this great forum.

As some of you may know, I was in lower Manhattan on 9-11. I was just across the street from the WTC when the first plane hit. I still remember the beautiful clear blue sky that day. I remember walking in between the towers just a minute or so before 8:46am, on my normal route to work. I remember my co-workers screaming in panic when they watched from an office window as the second plane hit the south tower. I remember women crying and screaming hysterically. I remember not being able to contact my wife to tell her I was OK. I remember people jumping to their deaths. I remember seeing the north tower go down with my own eyes, hearing it with my own ears. I remember fleeing Manhattan. I remember it was a Tuesday.

I remember returning to work the following Monday, riding the ferry passed the site, noxious smoke still billowing from the wreckage. I remember armed troops on the sidewalks. I remember wearing a breathing mask inside my building because the foul odor was seeping in through the ventilation system. I remember thinking we'd really gotten kicked in the teeth. They had killed innocent people, they had traumatized our women and children, and I really wanted revenge. I hung a picture on my wall of the American eagle sharpening his talons.

It has been a long time since that day. It's hard to believe how fast time flies. Then again, if you lost your loved one, I imagine time hasn't gone so fast. I love my wife so much, I can empathize with anyone who has lost the one they love. I can't imagine how that would be, and don't want to know, but I can cry for those people because I know what it is like to find your one true love.

I'm not an Obama fan. I hate socialism. But I am so happy that Bin Laden is killed, and that we have exacted some real revenge. It's about time. The politics don't even play into it for me. I still have the little flag, now tattered, that I flew on my car antenna after 9-11. I want to take it out of storage and put it on my car. I want to see American flags on cars like we saw back then. But it's not going to happen, and partially because the normally patriotic conservatives such as the ones here on Free Republic are instead focused on the politics and the fact that a socialist Democrat was president and will get some of the credit.

I guess you all would have been pissed on D-Day too. FDR was as big a socialist as anyone. I guess VE day and VJ day would have chapped your hides, since Truman was a DEM. I don't mean to paint with a broad brush. I know it wasn't every Freeper acting this way. But when I went on the board, that was the general impression, and it was really disappointing. It should have been a great day here. Instead, I saw a lack of patriotism and a lack of class. Free Republic should be better than this. If conservatives lose their patriotism and class, then what will happen to those virtues? I hope we can get them back soon. In the meantime, thanks for reading.

Respectfully,

Huck

[mojitojoe]

DITTO!

[Fu-fu2]

I agree. Politicians (presidents) come and go. I don’t believe the Navy Seals would sacrifice their honor by supporting a farce for some politician.....

[allmendream]

I am a scientist, trained in Cell and Molecular Biology, currently working in the field of Pharmacokinetics.

Before I went to graduate school I worked for a year as a DNA analyst for a company doing DNA ID work for Virginia to get all convicted felons DNA ID into the federal CODIS database. That was about 10 years ago.

I thought of starting a thread with that info, but figured...

those that want to know will find out, and I posted this on any thread I saw that mentioned DNA testing.

those that don’t want to know just get angry when accurate information conflicts with their complex conspiracy theories.

[dforest]

Wow, I totally agree with your post. Most excellent....uh, except for the photo. LOL

[Bruce Campbells Chin]

This seems to veer close to the whispered opinions of lefties who were upset that the March/April 2003 invasion of Iraq went so well because it would help Bush in his reelection campaign and encourage more military adventurism overseas. In the end, winning would cost more American lives. That was their logic, anyway.

I remember thinking at the time that if you ever find yourself rooting against a U.S. military success, you're on the wrong side of that issue. Is your opinion really any different?

Sorry, but as much as I want this marxist out of the White House myself, I can't root against a U.S. military success, which this unquestionably was.

[Bruce Campbells Chin]

This seems to veer close to the whispered opinions of lefties who were upset that the March/April 2003 invasion of Iraq went so well because it would help Bush in his reelection campaign and encourage more military adventurism overseas. In the end, winning would cost more American lives. That was their logic, anyway.

I remember thinking at the time that if you ever find yourself rooting against a U.S. military success, you're on the wrong side of that issue. Is your opinion really any different?

Sorry, but as much as I want this marxist out of the White House myself, I can't root against a U.S. military success, which this unquestionably was.

[Bruce Campbells Chin]

Thanks very much for posting that. Conservatives are supposed to stand for principle. Now, it seems too many just stand for political expediency, making whatever tortured arguments are necessary to support the political result they desire.

[allmendream]

North Africa.

[Texas Eagle]

It’s an insult to their integrity, that a large minority of FReepers think that so many would go along so easily with a flimsy, easily disprovable scam on the American people.

A "large minority"???

You've done the math? Show us your work.

And, just to add a little fun to the exercise, specify which FReeper you put into each category.

If necessary, start a new thread so this one doesn't get hijacked.

[GreenAccord]

Holy crap, that’s an awesome post. Those who are scanning this thread, please read it.

[Ditto]

Folks may think they’re being ‘tough on Obama’ by being skeptical, but it’s not. It’s an insult to the special operations and intelligence communities who spend many years and many lives fighting your war in the shadows. It’s an insult to their integrity, that a large minority of FReepers think that so many would go along so easily with a flimsy, easily disprovable scam on the American people. It’s basically warmed over Trutherism, if you think about it.

Well said Wolf. Very well said.

[cc2k]

Huck,

On the one hand, I agree with much of your post. I am also very glad that OBL is gone. I am grateful to our intelligence agencies, our special forces, and even to the agency heads and Presidents who accomplished this.

However, Obama's statement, and the timing of the release of this information, was entirely political, and it was all about Obama taking credit for everything. He did take some political risks doing this action rather than using a JDAM or a drone attack and leveling the compound without ever knowing for sure if we got the target, or even who the target really was.

At no time in his statement did Obama say anything to share credit for this. There was no, "the previous administration started this, laid the foundation in intelligence and my administration was able to build on it and complete the mission." Obama's statement was all "I ... me .... I ...." According to the media (AKA the Democrat Party Propaganda Ministry), Bush couldn't get this done, and Obama did it all. That's not the truth, it's not the whole truth. That dishonest presentation divides the country, it doesn't unite.

Just compare Obama's statement to the statement from Bush, for example after Sadam Husein was captured. Bush never claimed full credit for the whole operation. Bush always focused any praise on the troops, and sometimes on the folks within his administration that made it happen, and on our United States as a whole. Bush made it a victory for everyone. Obama claimed OBL's demise as a victory for himself. That difference in focus is a big part of the problem.

On top of that, timing the announcement to preempt Trump's show, "Celebrity Apprentice," on Sunday night looked very petty. Obama and his handlers have had an obsession with derailing Trump in the past couple weeks. They showed this again with their "announcement" of this action.

A true leader and uniter would have done things differently. First, the announcement would have been made at the time that "proof" was released (pictures, DNA results, etc. Possibly to include making the body available for inspection and verification by any who might question the identification). And the announcement would have either been made more immediately (closer to the time of the actual action), and planned as part of the entire action, or later, when all questions could be answered and all proof could be presented. Finally, credit would have been shared with all involved, even those who preceded the current regime whose work contributed to the action. A leader would share credit with the entire team, and the entire country, not try to focus all the credit and praise on himself.

Just my observations.

[MNDude]

from the response here, I’d say that it seems the negative oens are mostly a very vocal minority here.

It seems most of us agree with you.

[JoeSixPack1]

It’s a rarity for me to post anything in the last bunch of years as the increase in the exclusive world of political discourse has reduced FR’s interest in morality (and the betterment of our once celebrated world standing as a nation) to a simple discussion of “who benefits from what”.

So to say you are surprised that we didn’t have a celebration, is only to attune yourself to the lies we need to weed through on a min to min basis.

[Bruce Campbells Chin]

Thank you for your service, and thank you as well for that great post. And unfortunately, the carping by conservatives wasn’t limited just to those who post on FR.

[roses of sharon]

In the FR “early days”, VANITIES were not allowed, sniveling lectures are unseemly....and counterproductive.

[butterdezillion]

Right. That’s the way it has to be for covert operations. It’s the nature of the beast. I’m not saying that they are doing anything out of the normal for this operation. The nature of the beast means that we will not hear first-story accounts from the people who did it.

I don’t believe that this is a faked episode but if it was we would not hear the actual participants calling out the leaders as lying about it, because they are sworn to secrecy. It’s the same reason that Janice Okubo has said nobody in their office could tell anybody - not even law enforcement - if Obama posted a forgery. They’re sworn to secrecy. Just like Obama is hiding behind supposed secrecy requirements for the HDOH, he could hide behind the secrecy requirements for the Seals. I don’t believe that is what he is doing, but I think that people need to realize that this great accountability that we trust to keep the leaders in line IS NOT THERE to the degree we think it is.

There are so many things that we cannot know, cannot see first-hand. This is why it is so critical that we trust the people who CAN see things first-hand and report it to us. Trust makes all the difference in the world. Trust is the difference between the day before the Sept 2008 run on the bank and the day after. Trust is the difference between a banana republic’s law enforcement and a non-banana republic’s. Trust is what makes the rape of a child such a horrendous thing; it is such a gross violation of trust.

Those who say that eligibility is a technicality don’t understand the basic nature of relationship and of society. He who is faithful in a little will be faithful in a lot. If this guy will forge a birth certificate, what else will he lie about? To be CINC means he has access to a lot of secrets that the rest of us can’t know; we have to just trust that he is looking out for our interests. He is driving us across the tightwire and all we can do is trust him. That is a scary, scary thing, when he has been so willing to break laws and lie in such a visible, documentable way.

I hope and pray that everybody is realizing why the Founders required the POTUS to have unimpeachable, undivided loyalty to this country.

[Buddygirl]

Maybe we ought to say to the Obamaists, “We will wait until we verify,” not, “Trust but verify.”

[Responsibility2nd]

“We’ve already had one photoshopped photo of a dead Osama.”

True. And did you see the link in post 250?

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0511/54162.html

So. In less than 48 hours we see conflicts and contradictions to the official White House “story.”

And people ricidule us because we don’t swallow the White House/MSM versions du jour?

(Changing tagline)

[butterdezillion]

Therefore.......

Finish your thought.

Since you can never convince people who want to believe otherwise.......

Finish it.