"First Amendment No Big Deal, Students Say"

The University of Connecticut conducted a survey in 2004 of more than "100,000 students, nearly 8,000 teachers and more than 500 administrators at 544 public and private high schools" to gauge their thoughts on the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.

The results? "[W]hen told of the exact text of the First Amendment, more than one in three high school students said it goes 'too far' in the rights it guarantees. Only half of the students said newspapers should be allowed to publish freely without government approval of stories."

Read it and weep.

About Those Dishonorably Discharged . . .

I've been thinking lately about those soldiers who are dishonorably discharged from the service. This train of thought started with the recent killing of the Wal-Mart clerk by a former Marine who had been dishonorably discharged; her death was the first act of a crime-spree that took the man from Texas to Arizona and ended with his arrest after he sought medical treatment from a gunshot wound from someone who didn't wish to be robbed. All I know about the man's military service is that he was discharged for smoking pot, although I assume that he had more infractions than that on his record.

What I'm wondering is whether soldiers dishonorably discharged, especially those who have committed crimes, should be on some kind of oversight, almost like probation. I know very little about how the military deals with soldiers it has to kick out: do they first undergo a criminal penalty, like 30 days in the brig for pot smoking, then get discharged? Are they discharged first, then dealt with by civilian law enforcement? Or are they just discharged, period? Does the procedure differ based on the reason they are being kicked out? I assume it does.

Sociologists could probably tell us if those dishonorably discharged commit crimes at a higher rate than the general population--it would be interesting to know. Part of my thinking runs like this: if the military can't make them behave, do we really want them back as civilians with no oversight?

Tell me if I'm on the right track, or if I'm overreacting to one tragic incident.

How Not to Kill Yourself

A brief step away from the topic of war, in response to the train wreck in California that killed 11 people.

I am opposed to suicide for many reasons, which I will not take the time to discuss here. Let me make that very clear. PEOPLE SHOULD NOT KILL THEMSELVES.

If, however, some people are determined to end their own lives, can't they please manage to do so in a way that doesn't take other people with them? Because this man in California was "despondent," he parked his SUV on the train tracks, setting off a wreck that involved three trains and killed 11 people who were not despondent and had no wish to die. And to top it off, he had second thoughts and jumped out of his SUV at the last minute, so he's still alive!

I realize that people who decide to commit suicide are not thinking rationally, but this kind of behavior drives me nuts. Thinking of killing yourself? Don't run the car with the garage door closed--you'll poison your whole family. Don't stand in front of a semi--the driver does not need to live with the memory of your last moment of life in front of his truck. And don't park on train tracks! This man thinks he was despondent before? Wonder how he feels now that he's responsible for 11 deaths.

I'll end this with a poem from the inimitable Dorothy Parker, written in 1926:

Résumé

Razors pain you;
Rivers are damp;
Acids stain you;
And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren't lawful;
Nooses give;
Gas smells awful;
You might as well live.

A Quote from *Vietnam* Magazine

The editorial in the February 2005 edition of Vietnam (published by Primedia) addresses the issue of military service as a campaign issue; it was written shortly before the election. I quote the final two paragraphs of the editorial, and leave it to my readers, military and civilian, to comment as they see fit.

"On the one hand, the attacks on Bush's record also denigrated those who served honorably in the Reserve or National Guard. On the other hand, the attacks on Kerry's record really seemed to have more to do with his postwar protest activities. Bush as a National Guard pilot did in fact put his life on the line every time he got into the cockpit; and Kerry did in fact volunteer for a second tour inVietnam. Both went in harm's way wearing the uniform."

"And that brings us to those who pontificate on military service, who themselves never have gone into harm's way in uniform and never will--or would. American democracy affords special protection to the opinions of those who don't know what they are talking about. But ultimately, comic relief is the only real value of the opinions on military service of the Rush Limbaughs and Michael Moores of the world." David T. Zabecki, editor

Zell Miller on "Vietnam, Iraq, and the 2004 Election"

I receive a monthly newsletter entitled "Imprimis" (Latin for in the first place), published by Hillsdale College in Michigan. Each volume consists of a speech given by a conservative speaker; this month it was Miller's address on December 9, 2004 in Washington, D.C. As you probably know, Miller, a Democrat, gave the keynote address at the 2004 Republican National Convention, and has written a book entitled, A National Party No More: The Conscience of a Conservative Democrat. You can probably find the text of his speech at www.hillsdale.edu.

What I want to do here is just highlight a few passages from the speech, then pose a question.

"The most significant meaning of the 2004 election is that America has renounced the worst lessons of the post-Vietnam era . . . In the 2004 election, the American people confronted the ghost of Vietnam and considered the threats in today's world . . . American has rejoined the contest for freedom, which is manifested in a new form called the Bush Doctrine. That is why the rejection of a Vietnam-tainted worldview in this election is so monumental. A bad idea must be weeded out before a good one can take root . . . ever since Vietnam, all those other sacred struggles for freedom [here he names Pearl Harbor, Argonne, Auschwitz, Korea, Gettysburg, and others]were overshadowed by the experience of that one struggle. For too many, all else was forgotten."
"Many of us can remember when this view arrived: It was the 1972 election when the Democratic Party of FDR, Harry Truman and JFK was taken over by the anti-war Democratic Party of George McGovern. From that point on, a post-Vietnam mindset dominated the Democratic Party. We never got over it . . . These Democratic radicals opposed our funding of the Contras in Nicaragua. They opposed our support for El Salvador against Marxist guerillas and, generally, our support for freedom fighters anywhere in the world."
"So what did we get from the Vietnam-obsessed theorists in the Iraq War? In essence, they decided to re-fight Vietnam. They recalled that in the 1960s, the way they achieved victory was by pulling down the president from within rather than defeating the enemy aboard . . . In almost every situation where their responsibility to their country conflicted with their desire for political power, they chose political power over the best interest of their country." He then quotes Shakespeare, Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, and Winston Churchill.

I suggest that the civil war in El Salvador is not something he should ask people to look at too closely--the death squads of the ruling government are legendary. That, however, is beside my current point: if the Democratic Party has been going to hell in a handbasket since 1972, why has Miller, who was first elected to office in the late 1950s, remained a "lifelong Democrat?" If you detest everything that a party stands for for over 30 years, why on earth would you remain in that party?

Voting in Iraq

I was discussing the upcoming election in Iraq with someone today, which led to the following thoughts:

• Have you considered how heroic the Iraqi workers are who will be delivering the voting machines and then collecting them after the election? What prime targets for those who don't want the election to go forward! No voting machines, no election; no election, no democracy. (The same applies to the U.S. forces who will undoubtedly be guarding the process, of course.)
• Those who come out to vote will of course be putting their lives on the line, as well.
• I was told, although I haven't confirmed it myself through any news sources, that many voters in Afghanistan dressed up in their best clothes to go to the polls, in honor and recognition of the importance of the event.
• Finally, I can't help but think of the similarities between the dangers faced by Iraqis voting for the first time and African-Americans voting in the U.S. for the first time. What most of us take for granted as the simple act of voting was initially a dangerous thing to do, especially in the South, but brave men and women risked the repercussions in order to claim the freedoms they and others had fought so hard for. And some of them paid dearly for it.

By the way, you DID vote in the last presidential election, didn't you? And the gubernatorial, mayoral, and school board elections, as well?

Good for you!

Are We Winning, or Not?

I picked this up from another blog, http://blog.6thdensity.net/. The author of the response is MacStansbury; he was replying to a post on January 18 about a soldier's report on the war in Iraq.

"we learned a lot from Viet Nam. but the thing that this guy is saying is the same thing I say, and the same thing many other distinguished veterans of Operation Iraqi Freedom say: how come we win every battle handily, every engagement easily, and almost have this thing wrapped up, but if you listen to the news, all you hear is QUAGMIRE!!!"

I would love to hear from someone who knows the truth--someone who has been there, or is there now--DO we win every engagement easily, and DO we "almost have this thing wrapped up?" That doesn't square with what I hear Condoleeza Rice say about how long our troops will need to be in Iraq. Does this gentleman know what he's talking about, or does he have a need to believe his statements?

Another Reason Not to Torture

I am not Catholic, but I was thinking tonight about the Catholic position on murder (spurred in part by Bruce's post on ethics). As I understand it, the great sin of murder is not that you kill someone, but that you cause yourself to become a murderer. The greatest harm, then, is done not to the dead man, but to yourself. The victim has gone on to his reward (we'll assume), while you have committed a hideous sin. (And if any Catholics are reading this and think I'm presenting Catholic doctrine incorrectly, please let me know.)

So, following that line of thinking, could we say that the greatest harm in torture is to the person who does the torturing? It is horrible to be a victim, but torture destroys the body, not the soul. To be a person who willfully inflicts pain on other people, however, corrodes one's own soul, which is a more grievous sin.

I'm just tossing this out there for discussion--what do you think?

Government Matrix Program

I received this link through an email, and I encourage you to check it out. If you are fond of your privacy and wary of the government compiling more information about you to share across the country, then this should be of interest to you.
Note to my conservative readers: don't be alarmed that the message comes from the ACLU; they work for your rights, as well as the rights of people you oppose. Even if you hate them, you owe it to yourself to watch this clip and then click for more information.
http://www.adcritic.com/interactive/view.php?id=5927

Links to Blogs I Read

Thanks to Bruce's help, I can now provide links to other blogs that I read. You'll see his link in the left-hand margin (Galactic-Patrol); others will follow as I get the time. Thanks for the tech help! Check him out--he's always talking rationally about something of interest.

High Number of Amputees

Because of advances in medicine, fewer wounded soldiers are dying than in previous wars. Excellent news. The bad news is that the percentage of amputees from this war is double what is was in World War I and World War II, presumably because those soldiers would have died in previous wars.

We celebrate that they are alive, of course! But I wonder what image most people have when they hear that "One soldier was killed and three were wounded in an attack yesterday." I've asked around a little, and most people seem to automatically think, if they think about it at all, "Oh, wounded--probably shot in the arm, he'll recover" or "took some shrapnel to the leg; they'll pick it out." I do wish that more people would realize just how wounded those "wounded" often are.

Inauguration Festivities

A lot of people are complaining about the cost of Bush's upcoming inauguration (approximately $40M), saying that he should donate that money to tsunami relief; I don't know that this would have even been an issue had the U.S.'s original pledge of $35M not been criticized by the U.N.
His supporters counter that the money comes from private donations and helps drive the economy (catering, hotels, florists, etc.), and Laura Bush justifies it as a "historical event."

Quite frankly, while my heart breaks for the tsunami victims and I have donated to the relief efforts, I don't buy the argument that because of their tragedy, Bush should forgo inaugural celebrations. If we are going to seriously debate whether inaugural gaities are appropriate, I think the only context we should consider relevant is the ongoing war. I know that Franklin Roosevelt kept at least one of his later inaugurals very low-key, believing it inappropriate to hold lavish parties in his honor while the country was at war.

So, what do you think? Soldiers are dying a continent away, just as they were when Nixon took office, although he inherited that war from Johnson. Big parties as a celebration of American democracy and Bush's win, or more subdued events in recognition of sacrifices being made?

Children in War

Yesterday Terry Gross interviewed Peter Singer, a National Security Fellow at the Brookings Institution, about the role of children as combatants in wars. The interview was immensely interesting and disturbing.

A few quick notes: children serve as combatants in around 75% of armed conflicts in the world today. Improvements in weapons have made it possible for children to operate them who have not yet reached adult size or strength. Multiple reasons make the use of children as soldiers appealing: they don't have to be paid; they can be pulled into conflicts that adults may decline to fight (as in non-ideological wars); their minds are more malleable than adults'.

The price to the children is, of course, horrific: they are often used as cannon fodder, the expendable first wave which goes before the more "valuable" adults; they are also used as human mine detectors, clearing paths first, at the cost of their lives; they are frequently given drugs in order to make them more savage and to ensure their loyalty to the group which supplies the addictive drugs; they are branded and forced to take part in killings in their own village so that they will be permanently estranged from their former lives. And of course the cost to their psyches is unmeasurable.

Part of Singer's concern is to call for a wider recognition of, and preparation for, the realities of 21st century warfare. When most of us think of "war," we think of soldiers in uniform fighting for a national cause, which is increasingly an outdated image. Knowing that, Singer wants the U.S. military to better prepare for meeting children in armed conflict. We want, of course, to be good guys, handing out chocolate bars and playing with the kids. But since a bullet fired by a 12-year-old will leave one just as dead as one fired by a 20-year old, it is imperative that we train for actual conditions.

I encourage you to listen to the whole interview here: http://www.npr.org/rundowns/segment.php?wfId=4280681. Singer's new book is entitled Children at War.

Revision: I knew that Singer's name sounded familiar when I listened to the interview, but I couldn't place it. Now I remember that I thought he was nuts when I first came across his work in an ethics class. Be that as it may, the topic and the interview are still worth considering.

"A Real Hero"

My brother forwarded this email to me this morning. It is making the internet rounds without proper credit, so let me say that Snopes verified the story, written by Bob Lonsberry on May 7, 2004. It's the story of a soldier who was awarded the Navy Cross for heroism in Iraq.
I am not into bashing the so-called MSM, nor do I agree with Lonsberry about the public's awareness of American body counts and returning coffins; I do think , however, that you will find the story of Marine Captain Brian Contosh of interest.

Maybe you'd like to hear about something other than idiot Reservists and naked Iraqis.

Maybe you'd like to hear about a real American, somebody who honored the uniform he wears.

Meet Brian Chontosh.Churchville-Chili Central School class of 1991. Proud graduate of the Rochester Institute of Technology. Husband and about-to-be father. First lieutenant (now promoted to Captain) in the United States Marine Corps.

And a genuine hero.
The secretary of the Navy said so yesterday.

At 29 Palms in California Brian Chontosh was presented with the Navy Cross, the second highest award for combat bravery the United States can bestow.

That's a big deal.

But you won't see it on the network news tonight, and all you read in Brian's hometown newspaper was two paragraphs of nothing. Instead, it was more blather about some mental defective MPs who acted like animals.

The odd fact about the American media in this war is that it's not covering the American military. The most plugged-in nation in the world is receiving virtually no true information about what its warriors are doing.

Oh, sure, there's a body count. We know how many Americans have fallen. And we see those same casket pictures day in and day out. And we're almost on a first-name basis with the pukes who abused the Iraqi prisoners. And we know all about improvised explosive devices and how we lost Fallujah and what Arab public-opinion polls say about us and how the world hates us.

We get a non-stop feed of gloom and doom.

But we don't hear about the heroes.

The incredibly brave GIs who honorably do their duty.

The ones our grandparents would have carried on their shoulders down Fifth Avenue.The ones we completely ignore.

Like Brian Chontosh.

It was a year ago on the march into Baghdad.

Brian Chontosh was a platoon leader rolling up Highway 1 in a humvee.

When all hell broke loose.

Ambush city.

The young Marines were being cut to ribbons. Mortars, machine guns, rocket propelled grenades. And the kid out of Churchville was in charge. It was do or die and it was up to him.

So he moved to the side of his column, looking for a way to lead his men to safety. As he tried to poke a hole through the Iraqi line his humvee came under direct enemy machine gun fire.

It was fish in a barrel and the Marines were the fish.

And Brian Chontosh gave the order to attack. He told his driver to floor the humvee directly at the machine gun emplacement that was firing at them. And he had the guy on top with the .50 cal unload on them.

Within moments there were Iraqis slumped across the machine gun and Chontosh was still advancing, ordering his driver now to take the humvee directly into the Iraqi trench that was attacking his Marines. Over into the battlement the humvee went and out the door Brian Chontosh bailed, carrying an M16 and a Beretta and 228 years of Marine Corps pride.

And he ran down the trench.

With its mortars and riflemen, machineguns and grenadiers.

And he killed them all.

He fought with the M16 until it was out of ammo. Then he fought with the Beretta until it was out of ammo. Then he picked up a dead man's AK47 and fought with that until it was out of ammo. Then he picked up another dead man's AK47 and fought with that until it was out of ammo.

At one point he even fired a discarded Iraqi RPG into an enemy cluster, sending attackers flying with its grenade explosion.

When he was done Brian Chontosh had cleared 200 yards of entrenched Iraqis from his platoon's flank. He had killed more than 20 and wounded at least as many more.

But that's probably not how he would tell it.

He would probably merely say that his Marines were in trouble, and he got them out of trouble. Hoo-ah, and drive on.

"By his outstanding display of decisive leadership, unlimited courage in the face of heavy enemy fire, and utmost devotion to duty, 1st Lt. Chontosh reflected great credit upon himself and upheld the highest traditions of the Marine Corps and the United States Naval Service."

That's what the citation says.

And that's what nobody will hear.

That's what doesn't seem to be making the evening news. Accounts of American valor are dismissed by the press as propaganda, yet accounts of American difficulties are heralded as objectivity. It makes you wonder if the role of the media is to inform, or to depress - to report or to deride. To tell the truth, or to feed us lies.

But I guess it doesn't matter.

We're going to turn out all right.

As long as men like Brian Chontosh wear our uniform.

Off for a few days

We have family visiting, so I'll be off-line for a few days. Feel free to chat among yourselves. ;-)

No more phone cards for a while!

I read today that military hospitals in the Washington D.C. area have been so inundated with phone cards for wounded soldiers that they've run out of room to put them! This is good news, of course, that people are responding so generously. But in the spirit of giving wisely, it's time to take a break from phone cards and donate money to organizations that help wounded vets and their families. I'm sure the press will let us know when phone cards are needed again.

Good work, America.