One Veteran's Message To President Bush

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Obviously this is just one veteran's opinion..

Friday, November 11, 2005
A Veteran Speaks to President Bush on Veterans Day


President Bush,

As our nation celebrates the contributions and sacrifices of America's Veterans today, I thought I would take the time to let you know how one Veteran feels about your commitment to our military and your true level of patriotism. After all, the Republican party smears anyone they oppose by questioning their support of the troops and their national loyalty so that's all fair game, right?

You wear the self-provided mantle of a wartime president, love to appear before troops – even if it's a fake piece of theater with pre-screened questions and answers – and use as one of the last available devices in a failed presidency, your zeal for all things military and national security.

But there are many things a Commander-in-Chief must be to truly gain the respect and authority that such a designation merits – and you have shown none of those.

To be sure – and the CBS fiasco notwithstanding – there's not a thinking American who truly believes you served your time honorably in the Air National Guard. While the specific piece of documentation produced by CBS News may have been questionable, what is beyond dispute is the total lack of paperwork or witnesses showing that you ever truly served – period. You leapfrogged over hundreds of other qualified applicants to the National Guard because of your family connections and, despite all your crowing about service to country, dodged your main opportunity to live out that creed.

But is military service necessary to be an effective president and Commander-in-Chief? Not really. President Bill Clinton – you remember him; the person your party savaged for his lack of military service – didn't serve a day in uniform and yet was a capable and thoughtful Command-in-Chief. You never saw Bill Clinton invent intelligence and mislead the country into a disastrous war and you certainly never witnessed Clinton's people ridicule and shame highly-decorated Veterans like John Kerry and Max Cleland as your crew of Chickenhawks has so gleefully done. If Audie Murphy himself were a Democrat today, you and your party would find a way to smear his service as well.

Which brings us to the Iraq war.

This issue is now so far beyond anything that we Veterans can argue about amongst ourselves, whether we be liberal Democrats or conservative Republicans. Because it is no longer a matter of political perspective or belief. Your administration invented intelligence – I believe "fixed" is the word the British used in the Downing Street Memos – and lied to the American people.

It is now an indisputable matter of fact that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction and no immediate way of attaining that capability. That didn't stop you, Vice President Cheney, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and anyone else you could get in front of a camera from lying about that contention which, at the very least, you had evidence to suggest might not be true. But then, we saw how much you listened to Ambassador Joe Wilson when he tried to set you straight, didn't we?

There was also no link between Saddam Hussein and Al-Qaeda and no connection between Iraq and the events of September 11, both of which you misled us about originally and continue to imply, in a despicable attempt to bolster your presidency to a nation that is now collectively seeing the truth.

As a Veteran, I resent this, I resent your administration and I most certainly resent you.

Those of us who have served in the military know the rigors of boot camp, the positive aspects of completing that introduction to true mental and physical discipline and the lifelong feeling of pride in successfully finishing those hard months. Many of us have also held a rifle, fired that weapon at another human, had bullets come at us and know what that truly means.

And no, Mr. President, it's not the toy-soldier, "bring-it-on" thrill that your protected, sheltered experience would lead you to believe. It is terrifying. You're scared to death, shoot at almost anything that moves and pray to whatever deity you worship that you see tomorrow. But you would have no way of knowing that – not even through the stories of the sycophants you are surrounded by, most of whom have never served a day in uniform in their lives.

Because of all of this, I "celebrate" Veterans Day by thinking of 2,057 Americans who, because of you, will never hug their spouses or parents again and will never see their kids grow up. I think of the 100,000 Iraqis you have killed by using the honorable intentions and service of those on active duty in such a dishonest and horrible way. I think of the 15,000 brave men and women who will exist for the rest of their lives minus a limb and those who will forever carry the mental images of war because of your personal agenda —an agenda that had nothing whatsoever to do with national security.

And, because of the budget cuts that your administration has visited on returning Veterans of the Iraq war, many of them cannot get desperately-needed treatment, which is the icing on the cake of your five-year display of bad faith toward those who have served.

It is Veterans Day and, as one of those Veterans, I am sad and I am angry.

So you want to do something to honor Veterans today, Mr. President? Stay in the White House, out of public view and at least have the decency to say nothing.

If you want to really do something noble that would truly honor those who have served, use that time to think about admitting what you have done to Veterans. And then give serious thought to doing the honorable thing – and resigning.

posted by Bob Geiger

the URL isn't working now, I found it on another msg board
 
I guess we just have to take his word that he's a veteran, I have no evidence to call him a liar

he is having problems w/ his isp but this is his blog address

http://bobgeiger.blogspot.com/

here's another entry

I thought that was quite tacky for Bush to make that kind of speech on Veterans Day, it didn't surprise me however

"Bush Even Smears Veterans Day
While most American presidents have chosen to take some time off from politics on Veterans Day, there was President Bush on Friday using that solemn day to push his own partisan agenda and prop up his failed Iraq policy.

Given his own lack of service, his direct culpability for the deaths of over 2,000 military men and women in his Iraq war and the extent to which his administration turns its back on Veterans once they’re home, I had hoped he would just hole up in the White House and say nothing. At the very least, I thought he would make a public appearance, give some scripted comments about the service and sacrifice of America’s vets and then go back to the business of ruining our country.

No such luck.

Instead, Bush chose to appear before a military audience at Tobyhanna Army Depot in Pennsylvania and use the opportunity to bash Democrats and opponents of the Iraq war and to defend his twisted version of what the “war on terror” means.

“While it's perfectly legitimate to criticize my decision or the conduct of the war, it is deeply irresponsible to rewrite the history of how that war began,” said Bush “Some Democrats and anti-war critics are now claiming we manipulated the intelligence and misled the American people about why we went to war.”

“The stakes in the global war on terror are too high, and the national interest is too important, for politicians to throw out false charges. These baseless attacks send the wrong signal to our troops and to an enemy that is questioning America's will,” Bush continued. “As our troops fight a ruthless enemy determined to destroy our way of life, they deserve to know that their elected leaders who voted to send them to war continue to stand behind them. Our troops deserve to know that this support will remain firm when the going gets tough. And our troops deserve to know that whatever our differences in Washington, our will is strong, our nation is united, and we will settle for nothing less than victory.”

Wow. It's almost as if he's implying that if you're against him, you're against the troops as well... There's a shocker. And in the litany of things we owe our troops, there's no mention of them deserving to be told the truth about why they’re in Iraq -- at least that omission is honest. But he did take the time to throw this line in for the trillionth time:

“The war came to our shores on September the 11th, 2001. That morning, we saw the destruction that terrorists intend for our nation,” said the misleader-in-chief.

Meanwhile, he spent little time doing anything that actually paid tribute to Veterans in this disgusting abuse of his national pulpit. But that shouldn’t surprise any of us – he isn’t a Veteran himself and, in the circles he runs, he certainly doesn’t know many.

But I bet if he has his way with an executive order, and we ever begin having a national celebration of “Chickenhawks Day” there won’t be a dry eye in the house when he speaks of his own kind. "
 
sorry MrsSpringsteen I edited my post I guess before you could read it. I just realized that it's probably his writing and he is the vet.
 
:up: to the Honorable Bob Geiger! Apparently there are Veterans out there to do the right thing.
 
whenhiphopdrovethebigcars said:
:up: to the Honorable Bob Geiger! Apparently there are Veterans out there to do the right thing.

And there there is me....:wink:
 
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