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Kevin Tillman on Pat Tillman from TruthDig.com |
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After Pat’s Birthday
It is Pat’s birthday on November 6, and elections are the day after. It gets me thinking about a conversation I had with Pat before we joined the military. He spoke about the risks with signing the papers. How once we committed, we were at the mercy of the American leadership and the American people. How we could be thrown in a direction not of our volition. How fighting as a soldier would leave us without a voice… until we got out.
Much has happened since we handed over our voice:
Somehow we were sent to invade a nation because it was a direct threat to the American people, or to the world, or harbored terrorists, or was involved in the September 11 attacks, or received weapons-grade uranium from Niger, or had mobile weapons labs, or WMD, or had a need to be liberated, or we needed to establish a democracy, or stop an insurgency, or stop a civil war we created that can’t be called a civil war even though it is. Something like that.
Somehow our elected leaders were subverting international law and humanity by setting up secret prisons around the world, secretly kidnapping people, secretly holding them indefinitely, secretly not charging them with anything, secretly torturing them. Somehow that overt policy of torture became the fault of a few “bad apples” in the military.
Somehow back at home, support for the soldiers meant having a five-year-old kindergartener scribble a picture with crayons and send it overseas, or slapping stickers on cars, or lobbying Congress for an extra pad in a helmet. It’s interesting that a soldier on his third or fourth tour should care about a drawing from a five-year-old; or a faded sticker on a car as his friends die around him; or an extra pad in a helmet, as if it will protect him when an IED throws his vehicle 50 feet into the air as his body comes apart and his skin melts to the seat.
Somehow the more soldiers that die, the more legitimate the illegal invasion becomes.
Somehow American leadership, whose only credit is lying to its people and illegally invading a nation, has been allowed to steal the courage, virtue and honor of its soldiers on the ground.
Somehow those afraid to fight an illegal invasion decades ago are allowed to send soldiers to die for an illegal invasion they started.
Somehow faking character, virtue and strength is tolerated.
Somehow profiting from tragedy and horror is tolerated.
Somehow the death of tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of people is tolerated.
Somehow subversion of the Bill of Rights and The Constitution is tolerated.
Somehow suspension of Habeas Corpus is supposed to keep this country safe.
Somehow torture is tolerated.
Somehow lying is tolerated.
Somehow reason is being discarded for faith, dogma, and nonsense.
Somehow American leadership managed to create a more dangerous world.
Somehow a narrative is more important than reality.
Somehow America has become a country that projects everything that it is not and condemns everything that it is.
Somehow the most reasonable, trusted and respected country in the world has become one of the most irrational, belligerent, feared, and distrusted countries in the world.
Somehow being politically informed, diligent, and skeptical has been replaced by apathy through active ignorance.
Somehow the same incompetent, narcissistic, virtueless, vacuous, malicious criminals are still in charge of this country.
Somehow this is tolerated.
Somehow nobody is accountable for this.
In a democracy, the policy of the leaders is the policy of the people. So don’t be shocked when our grandkids bury much of this generation as traitors to the nation, to the world and to humanity. Most likely, they will come to know that “somehow” was nurtured by fear, insecurity and indifference, leaving the country vulnerable to unchecked, unchallenged parasites.
Luckily this country is still a democracy. People still have a voice. People still can take action. It can start after Pat’s birthday.
Brother and Friend of Pat Tillman,
Kevin Tillman
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/200601019_after_pats_birthday/
Poor Kevin Tillman he doesn’t see that once you start invading countries illegally there is no turning back. All deaths are “necessary”. All invasions become “legitimate”. Just as Germany learned in WWII: once the world turns against you because of the criminal actions of your leaders the populace must fall in-line and do what the leaders say or else they risk being attacked. Only “liberals” would dare to stand against leaders who illegally invade other countries for profit. And we all hate those “liberal pacifists” who are ruining everything for the corporations making money in Iraq. The government and corporations make sure we hate those un-American liberal pacifists! Kevin Tillman is just a weak pacifist – denounce him!
“Naturally the common people don’t want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for it,” Joseph Goebbels.
Or, as one comment to Kevin Tillman’s post on “TruthDig.com” put it:
(OIF = Operation Iraqi Freedom)
I agree with part of what you’re saying such as, “faking virtue…profiting from death and tragedy…” but that’s about it, but that’s directed at the Cindy Shehans of the world, not OIF supporters.
Before I write about anything else we have to clear up a few things.
1. International law is based on treatise…not humanity. It takes two parties to enter into a contract…thus law or obligation. After the fist Gulf war, Saddam entered into a contract with the UN…he sued for peace and got it. Part of that was Saddam would:
a. Give up all WMD’s (which were found)
b. Give up delivery systems (which were launched at coalition forces at the beginning of OIF)
c. Abide by other stipulations.
Saddam did none of those things, therefore violated the terms of surrender. Once the terms of surrender were violated, and invasion was justified per international law, to force capitulation of the original terms of surrender.
2. The Bill of Rights only applies to American citizens per the 14th Amendment of the Constitution. So holding a foreign terrorist for 500 years is not a violation of his Constitutional rights because foreign terrorists aren’t citizens of the United States.
US Citizens that operate with foreign agents have a less degree of protection due to their interaction of a foreign nexus. This is authorized by Executive Order 12333. Executive orders are directions by the President and confirmed by Congress, sort of a backwards approach to legislation. This particular one was created by Reagan; Clinton found fit to allow it to survive his administration.
3. Lying is generally not tolerated, especially by the military. Anti-war proponents constantly lie. The two points above indicate either you don’t understand macro politics, or you do, and are intentionally misleading people (IE Lying). Major lies by the anti-war crowd are:
a. WMD’s were not found: Not true. Mustard, and Saran depots have been found (do a Google search).
b. WMD facilities were found that could be spun up and produce more chemical weapons quickly. The CIA report that ‘blasts’ the Bush administration actually said, “the parts to make chemical weapons were there…” Look at it like this, if I have my M-16 field stripped, is it a weapon. No. The barrel by and of itself is not a gun. The lower receiver by and of it itself is not a weapon. The ammunition by and of itself is not a weapon. When all components are combined it therefore becomes a weapon…the same thing as the chemical factories that were found throughout Iraq are. By and of themselves were not chemical weapons, but combined, you have them.
c. General George Sada (Iraqi Air Force General in his book ‘Saddams Secrets’ tells that more WMD’s were sent to Syria.
d. Iraq did not harbor terrorists:
i. Abu Abbas was the mastermind of the Achille Laoro…he was found in Iraq where he was afforded a safe harbor. http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/04/15/sprj.irq.abb as.arrested/
ii. The world’s largest terrorist training camp was destroyed by 3rd Special Forces Group near the Iranian border. The operation was called ‘VIKING HAMMER’. (You can read about it in ‘Hunting Down Saddam’ page 30, by Robin Moore.
iii. Currently we’re fighting al-Quadea in Iraq…I shouldn’t have to say anything more about this point.
4. Democracy: We don’t live in a Democracy; we have what’s called a ‘Republic’. A republic is when we elect representatives to represent us. Democracy would imply we vote for everything; we just don’t do that.
I’m sorry for the loss of your brother and for all other Americans and coalition forces members that have died in this war against terrorism. But you’re misguided, and don’t fully appreciate the context of this war.
Iraq and Afghanistan are the same war, you may not be able to see behind your blind faith of politics, but it is.
* The quickest way to end this war is to simply let people fight it as a war. As a soldier who has been in Iraq, and will be going back, we don’t need arm chair quarterbacking. We need for the American people to have faith in us, and let us do our jobs.
The best thing you can do to help us is simply stop lying, stop politicking, and shut up.
The conservative answer to everything is to “just kill it”*. Killing things makes problems go away. Once the people who are still alive all have the same view point about everything, peace will be achieve. Simple. So, write the laws in a way that give us the “right” to go kill anyone we choose and we won’t have to call the killings “murder”. It’s justice. We wrote the laws for the Native Americans, they broke our laws and we killed them. Simple. We wrote the laws for Iraq, they break them, we kill them. Simple. Soon anyone whose opinion does not support the greater good of the corporatocracy will be killed, legally of course. Simple.
The plain and simple truth is that we go to war and we are in Iraq/Afghanistan for only one reason: commerce. If you find that noble, fine, but don’t try to dress it up with: WMDs, freedom, democracy, terrorists, end-times, God’s will, law-and-order, or whatever the latest fashion is today, to convince the rest of us that it’s a noble cause. Some of us just don’t think that corporate profits are a noble cause. Going to war to make a buck is nothing new or shocking. This isn’t something the Bush administration dreamed-up. It’s the reason Rome used to go to war. It’s the reason the Greeks went to war. It’s the reason the US has always gone to war. Read Major General Butler’s comments about all the “Wars” he fought-in which include the Spanish-American War and WWI.
In Major General Butler’s day Corporate America selected him to lead a coup against President Franklin Roosevelt because Roosevelt wouldn’t let the corporations have absolute power over the American people. Butler blew the whistle on the corporations. You’d think it’d be a big scandal, but since politicians are greased by corporate dollars it was swept under the rug. Most of us today don’t know about it because after Roosevelt died the corporations grew into monsters that control all fascists of our lives including what’s printed in out history books. It is no wonder that we cannot see our true mission in Iraq; we are all taught from birth that corporations are “good”. What’s good for them is good for us. The masses are kept so busy “politicking” about who is better: Republicans or Democrats that they cannot see that their democracy (Republic) has been hijacked by the super rich who own the corporations.
Corporations de-humanize all decisions so that guilt can be removed from all decisions that concern profits. Thus, a corporation is mandated by law to first and foremost make a profit. “Should we sacrifice lives to get oil in Iraq?” No brain-er, profits come first! So the only real question is: “is it cost effective?” Well, it won’t hurt profits to have soldiers die, so yes it’s cost effective! Next: “how do we get the government to work for us corporations? According to the constitution government is to work for the people, how do we corporations get around that?” Easy, use the 14th Amendment to get the courts to rule that corporations are “people”! Thus the government has to work for us the corporations because we are “the people”. The President, Congress and the courts can rule in our favor, at all times, guilt-free because legally we the corporations are “the people”. Brilliant!
When I read comments from people like “Tom” above, I know that they have been so thoroughly indoctrinated by the corporatocracy that they can regurgitate the corporate message on queue and try to make the rest of us feel like idiots for not being on-board with the de-humanizing plan. Bravo “Tom” you choose “treatise…not humanity”. You choose laws written by those who have found a way to serve money (mammon) over all other considerations, including God, country and human beings. Well done Tom, you have bought fully into corporate think. You can even justify torture because “it doesn’t break any laws”, bravo, Tom.
Don’t be like Tom, be true to the real people of America not the corporations of America. Know what you stand for and why you stand for it, not because some talk-show host tells you what to think and some college professor explained to you how corporate law works. Break down the corporate stranglehold, smash the laws that give them more rights than us: choose humanity not corporate treatise!
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