Can we ever change each others' minds?

Leonard Pitts, one of my favorite journalists (and 2004 Pulitzer Prize winner for commentary), had a great column today with the headline "Party allegiance, bias are swaying our opinions." He asks some hard questions of people on both the left and the right.
It's worth reading, whatever your politics.
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/living/columnists/leonard_pitts/10490541.htm?1c

Good things in the media about the war

I know that some of you are unhappy with the media, because it seems that they print only bad news about the war or U.S. soldiers. So I've provided two brights spots for you about good deeds:

http://www.dallasnews.com/s/dws/news/texassouthwest/stories/122504dntexsoldiers.50ac0.html

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/iraq/dispatches2/113004ccdriraqkovach.2ca4d.html

Enjoy.

Please send aid

I'm deviating from my usual subjects to remind everyone that the areas devastated by the tsunami need our financial help. We all can do this. The Red Cross and Samaritan's Purse can both be accessed through the web, and Amazon.com is also collecting donations for the Red Cross. We can't even imagine being in that situation, and the footage is heartbreaking. Please be your brother's keeper.

And if you haven't already done so, think about sending some help to our soldiers, as well. A reminder of useful sites:

• http://www.booksforsoldiers.com/
• http://www.soldiersangels.com
• http://www.spiritofamerica.net/.

Also, consider sending phone cards in any amount to Walter Reed Hospital, so that wounded soldiers can call and talk to loved ones. The government does not provide long distance service, so it's up to us to make sure they have a way to call home.

What is the matter with some people?

There are a few blogs that I check in with every couple of days--some right-wing, some left-wing, some apolitical. One in particular is quite strident in its hatred of the mainstream media (MSM), and the responses to its postings carry on in the same vein: "Oh, the MSM hate America; they hate everything we stand for; they want to destroy Bush and destroy this country." They adore their own right-wing media darlings, but detest those "other" media-types. Okay, I figure, it's their opinion, they can think and type what they like.

But today I realized how pathetic and meanspirited their hatred of the "MSM" is, when they declared how "happy" and "gleeful" the MSM is about American deaths from the recent suicide bombing at the base in Mosul. Fourteen plus American soldiers are killed, and they respond by attacking the MSM for "celebrating" that fact.

I want to ask: just who ARE these media people happy over the deaths of their fellow citizens? MSM is not a blob, an entity--it's made up of individual people. I know several of them: a schoolmate from high school who spent many years overseas working for CNN; a local newspaper editor whom I met at a dinner to celebrate George Washington's birthday; a soccer mom journalist whose daughter played on the same team as mine; a columnist whose son I prayed for after a recent health incident.

Were any of these people happy about a security breach that killed our soldiers? Good Lord, no. They live in this country, they work here, they worship here, they're raising their families here, many have family and friends fighting in Iraq, they're Americans and some of them are Republicans who voted for Bush. To assert that the "MSM" is"gleeful" about the deaths because it puts Bush or Rumsfeld in a bad light is disgusting.

To SEAL Curtis!

Open post to my SEAL friend from the flight to DFW: because I am no longer at the university associated with the email address you have been using to write me, that email account has been closed. Unfortunately, they did not give me the date that they were going to close it ahead of time, so I did not have the chance to retrieve my email address book before it was closed, and therefore no longer have your email address.

Needless to say, I am quite unhappy about this; the last time I heard from you, you were headed north; with the most recent bombing at the base in Mosul, I of course worry about you anew. I do know, however, that I sent you this blog address in one of my last emails to you, and so I am hoping that you will come here when you find that the old email address is no longer valid.

You can reach me at an alternate email address through this site; just click on "View complete profile," then click on "email." When I hear from you, I will give you the email address at the university where I'm now working.

Take care, my friend!

Going with the army you have

I read as essay a few days ago about how Ronald Reagan would handle the war in Iraq. (Sorry, I can't remember where I read it.) The author contends that unlike Bush, who says he gave his generals the number of soldiers they asked for, Reagan would have insisted that they take more; I'm not sure if that would be under a "more is always better" philosophy, or if Reagan supposedly would have known more about needed troop strength than his generals.

Do we need more troops in Iraq? Would it make a difference?

"McCain Expresses No Confidence in Rumsfeld"

Excerpts from the Associated Press:

U.S. Sen. John McCain said Monday that he has "no confidence" in Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, citing Rumsfeld's handling of the war in Iraq and the failure to send more troops.
McCain, speaking to The Associated Press in an hourlong interview, said his comments were not a call for Rumsfeld's resignation, explaining that President Bush "can have the team that he wants around him."
"I have strenuously argued for larger troop numbers in Iraq, including the right kind of troops - linguists, special forces, civil affairs, etc.," said McCain, R-Ariz. "There are very strong differences of opinion between myself and Secretary Rumsfeld on that issue."
When asked if Rumsfeld was a liability to the Bush administration, McCain responded: "The president can decide that, not me."

Wow. That's the harshest criticism I've heard yet from McCain in his position as senior member of the Senate Armed Services Committee. It will be interesting to see if this sparks a public dialogue in Washington, or if McCain's comments are swifly swept under the rug.

Read it here: http://start.earthlink.net/article/pol?guid=20041213/41bd21d0_3421_1334520041213-1174299240.

God speed, Adam

My neighbor's brother--husband, father, dachshund owner--will be returning to Iraq next week. He has been home recuperating from combat wounds, but now that he's better, he's going back again.

Our prayers for your safety go with you, Adam.

Operation Homecoming

I have less time for blogging as the semester ends, which is a shame, because there are events happening daily that would be interesting to talk about. However, I do want to alert you to a government project which I am currently studying for an academic project: the National Endowment for the Arts' Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience. The NEA is inviting soldiers who served after 9-11 in Afghanistan, Iraq, or on the homefront to write about what they experienced and submit the writings to the NEA for possible inclusion in a forthcoming anthology. Families of soldiers are welcome to contribute, as well.

For more information, check out http://www.nea.gov/national/homecoming/. I'll be back when semester projects are complete.

More pictures--good grief

I am curious to know where other people stand on the pictures that just seem to keep on coming of alleged mistreatment of prisoners.

A few competing thoughts come to my mind: of course we are not supposed to abuse prisoners--we're bound by the Geneva Convention, and we pride ourselves on taking a higher moral road than our enemies. This kind of behavior is undisciplined, stupid, and wrong.

On the other hand, a friend who was a military pilot during the Viet Nam War told me about the training he had to go through before his tour of duty. Part of that training was the simulation of being a prisoner-of-war, from which he emerged with more physical damage than what many of these prisoner-abuse stories report. And this was from his own side!

We've also heard tales of dogs terrorizing detainees--snarling, lunging, and in one case, biting a man's arm. Okay, that's terrible. But it wasn't too many years ago that similar dogs were being set on African-Americans who were peacefully marching in the South. If dogs were loosed on our own citizens who were not not breaking the law, can we be shocked that they'd be used to scare prisoners?

I guess it is hard for me, as a civilian, to sort out what is really going on. Are we talking about embarassing people, or beating them to a pulp? Making a prisoner uncomfortable, or killing someone who is being detained for questioning? Enforcing sleep deprivation as an interrogation tool, or taking nudie pictures for sport? The reports seem to blur things so that I can't get a handle on whether we're doing terrible things or not.

And I know that American prisoners-of-war have at times been treated heineously, but I don't want to frame a discussion of our behavior around abuses that have happened to us.

What do you all make of this?

Who should sacrifice in time of war?

Below is my transcript of part of Terry Gross' interview with Ted Koppel, in which he discusses why he devoted a Nightline segment to reading the names of those soldiers who have died in Iraq. The entire interview is about 30 minutes. You can hear it for yourself at http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4131015. I am interested in your reactions: should the American public be doing more toward the war effort, or is our job just to carry on with everyday life?

"We did it as a tribute. I deliberately did not want to do it on Memorial Day because then I felt it would just . . . we do things like that on Memorial Day all the time, and they become a part of that day and they get mixed up with the picnics and the start of the summer season and people don’t pay much attention. And I just thought, Lord, when we have this many young men and women who have died, that at least to be aware. I confess to a personal frustration and I felt that when President Clinton sent troops to Kosovo and I have felt that when President Bush sent these troops to Iraq. I’m a World War II baby; I grew up in England during World War II, and I remember, although I was very young at the time, that there was sacrifice involved, not just by the people who were fighting the war, but by the people at home. There was rationing; we had to keep our lights out; there were blackouts; their homes were hit by bombs and people had to spend their nights in underground shelters to avoid the bombing of London. And it just seems to me that these days the approach seems to be, “We can fight a war, and you folks back home don’t have to give up anything. Not only do we not have to raise taxes to support this war, we’re going to give you a tax cut, even as we are at war. There is nothing that any of you has to do, save those of you who have family members or close friends in Iraq. But the rest of you can just go on with your lives as though nothing were happening.” I think that’s a bad way for a country to be at war. I think it needs to be a national commitment, and that involves a certain amount of national sacrifice. And I thought that by showing the faces and reading the names of the young men and women who had died . . . and as I said during the program, not only do I not oppose the war, I happen to believe that we are committed over there, and we need to carry it through to a proper conclusion. I’m not for pulling the troops out. So this was not a political statement on my part, but it was a statement that says, 'Pay attention. You know, there are real young men and women, and some not so young men and women, who are dying.'”