Alex writes well, well enough to have a career in writing. It is amazing to see his writing skills on his blog improve and develop over time. It's also revealing to see his cynicism about the war in Iraq increase over time during his service there. Thanks to Scout at First Draft, Alex was again brought to my attention.
From Alex:
The Real Deal
Blue Girl directed me to a very interesting story about Rush Limbaugh, who called veterans opposed to the war phony soldiers. Of course, this is the same Rush Limbaugh who threw a fit about the Moveon.org Petraeus ad, calling it "contemptible" and "indecent." Apparently anyone in the military is above criticism as long as they agree with Rush's brave belief that we should be in Iraq "as long as it takes." And I use the term 'we' loosely, as I believe the closest Rush has ever gotten to combat was watching We Were Soldiers with surround sound.
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You make a good point that people who joined the military during the war knew they were going and shouldn't be against it. As I've seen since I joined in 2004, everyone in the military is gung ho to a certain extent, at least in the beginning of their career. I was part of a large group of new guys who got to a unit that just got back from a year long deployment. After our hazing sessions became less and less frequent in the following months, we listened to the stories all of them were telling, of vicious firefights and rescue missions. We all wanted to do our part, we all wanted to get some too. We were going to see what it was like to take a life. Too bad Rush missed his chance to do so, or maybe he'd be singing a different tune. In 1992, ABC newsman Jeff Greenfield posed a question to Rush, asking if he had ever served in the military during the Vietnam War. Here is what Rush had to say:
"I had student deferments in college, and upon taking a physical, was discovered to have a physical- uh, by virtue of what the military says, I didn't even know it existed- a physical deferment and then the lottery system came along, where they chose your lot by birth date, and mine was high. And I did not want to go, just as Governor Clinton didn't."
And with Rush, isn't everything always about the Clintons? And Clinton was never president, was he?
As Rush found after dropping out of his first year of college at Southeast Missouri State University in 1969-1970, he found himself on draft status. Nothing that a claim of an old football injury or a boil on the ass can take care of, though! The medical deferment he was referring to was a pilonidal cyst, which apparently is a clump of severely ingrown hairs. That barred him from enlistment, and I'm sure he was ecstatic. After all, there was a war on.
Alex has posted pictures of "phony soldiers" he knew in Iraq, and stories about the "phony soldiers":
This was taken on a rooftop during a firefight on March 24 in Baqubah. One guy lost a leg up to his knee and another lost a foot in an IED blast that day. Talk about sacrifices! Out of seven Americans on that rooftop, one is going to reenlist! The rest decided to get out to avoid going to Iraq again, despite what Mike from Olympia, Washington said on your show about what real soldiers say, like "they want to be over in Iraq. They understand their sacrifice, and they're willing to sacrifice for their country." All I see is a bunch of phonies!
This is Chevy in Baghdad. Brian Chevalier was going to reenlist but decided against it before he was killed on March 14 during our first mission in Baqubah. His phony life was celebrated in a phony memorial where everyone who knew him cried phony tears. A phony American flag draped over his phony coffin when his body came home. It was presented to his phony mother and phony daughter.
I would be in awe if I ever met a real life soldier, and not a phony one like Bill, Matt or Brian Chevalier. Thank you, Rush Limbaugh, for telling me the difference. I hope your ass is ok.
How do people like Rush sleep nights? How do they look at themselves in the mirror? How can they show their faces in public?
Please go read Alex's post on the "phony soldiers" that Rush wants to stay in Iraq "as long as it takes". If you have time, read a few of his earlier posts.
Oh, these people are just so loathsome. And one of the most tragic aspects of this as that so many of those soldiers who do survive Iraq will find themselves unable to readjust to lives and families back in the US. I look at the pictures of the young men in Baghdad and wonder which ones will be living under a freeway underpass in a cardboard box, bare feet covered in sores, eyes glazed and empty. And you know that Rush and his friends will never support providing veterans with the mental health and vocational services they need.
ReplyDeleteOn a happier note, there's a nice article on the latimes webisite (www.latimes.com) about my home parish, St James Wilshire. Although the Duncanites love to claim that the liberal church is dying, we are a thriving central city parish with a large African and Asian immigrant population. And the leadership of the parish includes lots of gay folk. We struggle with our differences sometimes but our rector keeps us focused on Christ and our call to minister to our neighbors. TEC lives.
At least it gives an excuse to air Limbaugh's own military credentials - excused service in Vietnam because of a cyst on his butt. Of the many Vietnam-era Republican Chicken-Hawk draft-dodger excuses, Limbaugh's is about the most grotesque. Though there is Jack Kemp, disqualified on account of a knee injury, who somehow summoned the stamina to play as an NFL quarterback for eight more years.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.snopes.com/military/limbaugh.asp
Grandmère, thank you for bringing us Alex's own words and perspective. There is altogether too much blather from genuine a******s about "phony" soldiers.
ReplyDelete(Are asterisks allowed here or have I gone beyond the pale in offending grandmotherly gentility?)
Alex provides the authentic voice of our brave kids who risk all (and often lose all) on our behalf. They know the harsh reality of war and its true cost. Whatever illusions they may have had when they signed up are now gone. Still, they fight. We owe them so much and serve them so ill.
Then pompous, hypocritical drug-addled gasbags like Rush spout off to make themselves sound informed and important when they know nothing and care less about the reality faced by our fighting men and women. The mere sound of Limbaugh's voice induces moral revulsion.
Poor Rush. That cyst on the butt must have been terrible. I wonder why he did not know that it existed?
ReplyDeleteOne of the commenters at Army of Dude posted the transcript of Rush's phone call with "Mike", who said that he was a Republican who wanted out of Iraq. Rush told him that he could not possibly be a Republican. In the same vein, Alex, and any other soldier who speaks against the war, cannot possibly be a soldier - only a "phony soldier".
John, I'm going to look for the article in the LA Times.
Lapin, that article that you linked to falls into the category of TMI, especially with regard to our boy Rusty.
ReplyDeleteI didn't read much of it Mimi. I posted it because of the cachet of a Snopes "true" endorsement.
ReplyDeleteps ANY information about Limbaugh's butt is TMI where I'm concerned.
ReplyDeleteMimi, I cry over the young men who are young no longer and whose lives may be filled with the terror of losing comrades in horrific situations. I know I will cry this Sunday when I speak at Bill's funeral, knowing his service - more than 15 years - and his belief in his country as well as his nightmares, flashbacks, and stories.
ReplyDeleteI remember my Dad who served in the South Pacific and how he struggled for the rest of his life with images of bodies, explicitly described so that we would not repeat that horror. And, my uncle who still cringes when he hears airplanes - he lost a leg and was a prisoner of war in Germany.
Then I think about all the other countries at war and how the young men and women are serving the cause - either voluntarily or involuntarily. And, their families.
And, I Pray for peace and an end to the killing.
Everyone, thank you for your comments.
ReplyDeleteWe are so screwed. We will be in this war up until 2008 and well beyond. The Democrats will not do what needs to be done.
Sy Hersh's article on the impending attack on Iran is up on the website of The New Yorker. Read it and weep.
Mimi, wow. thanks for bringing this to our attention. just wow. phony soldiers???
ReplyDeleteThanks for drawing my attention to that powerful post by Alex. I found reading his blog a moving experience.
ReplyDeleteAlex is amazing, and so young. I suppose one can grow up quickly serving in a war zone.
ReplyDeleteOr war can ruin you for life outside the zone - if you survive.
Worse! Rush's condition is readily curable by surgery and a decent rest for healing. So a real gung ho type would just get the surgery, wait a while to see if it worked, and then enlist. Non-gung-ho people would get the surgery anyway, because in the untreated state, a pilonidal cyst hurts like bad hemorrhoids when you sit (not when you c...).
ReplyDeleteThere's more to it than that. The Limbaughs are a prominent legal and political family in Southeast Missouri. I suspect strings were pulled.
NancyP
Nancy, Rush was obviously never gung ho about taking himself to war.
ReplyDeleteBut now it seems easy for him and other chickenhawks to say "as long as it takes" for others to fight the war.