Volunteers for Endless War
By Cindy Sheehan
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The first comment was on the White House lawn on Sunday, March 19 th, the 3rd anniversary of the invasion. By the way, the White House website has entitled this speech as "The President's remarks on the third anniversary of the liberation!!!! (italics and exclamation points added by me) of Iraq." A few sentences in his short remarks were:
Ours is an amazing nation where thousands have volunteered to serve our country. They volunteered to -- many volunteered after 9/11, knowing full well that their time in the military could put them in harm's way.
Notice how many times George says a variation on the word "volunteer:" three times in one sentence. This caught my eye because right-wing warniks who don't want to take any responsibility for supporting George's war of terror and it's accompanying mayhem are always reminding me that Casey "volunteered." And you know what? The warniks got me there! Casey did volunteer. He volunteered in May of 2000, to, first of all, serve his country and, second of all, get the benefits that his recruiter deceived him about. The biggest lie that Casey's recruiter told him was that "even if there is a war, you won't see combat…you scored so high on the ASVAB test, you will only go to war in a support role." The tragic thing about this false promise is that Casey, a Humvee mechanic, was killed in combat five days after he arrived in Baghdad. The truly alarming and upsetting thing about the false promise made to Casey, though, is that recruiters are using that same lie today to potential volunteers while our country is in the middle of an occupation where many of our troops are being deployed for their third and fourth tours of duty.
I believe another aspect of George emphasizing the word "volunteer" so many times in one sentence is that he would love to absolve himself of the mortal sin of sending our troops to die and kill innocent people immorally while still reaping (in his mind) the so-called benefits of being a "war president." George Bush wants to play act at commander in chief, but thinks he can wash the gore of over 2300 brave human beings off of his hands by resting assured that they "volunteered."
more at:
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/9573