[Ritchie Luna]

Okay.
To antiwar protestors who are protesting to the wrong people.
Stop it.
Do not protest in front of bases or other forts.
If you want your voices heard...protest to the congress.

Soldiers do not need to see protestors.
We are not war mongers who are aching for a fight.
We are normal people called upon by our government to fight for your rights and secure peace.
We have no say in the war. We are just ORDERED to go.
If we had it our way.....we would stay home with our beloved families. But instead we chose to help secure your rights.
Soldiers already have enough on their minds.
They have to worry about leaving their families.
They have to worry about who is gonna look after their families.
The dual deployment families have to worry about who they are gonna leave their kids with.
They have to worry about if they will get back alive to hold their two month old babies and kids and wives or husbands.
Some of them have to work another job just to make ends meet....and with the war going on....that second income is nonexistent. So they have to worry about where to get money to provide for their families.

Then they see protesters heckling them etc etc.
It hurts.


Freaking ingrates !!!!


By the way. I am not going anywhere. I am just sounding off because I know what they are going through. I have a new baby and I would not know what I would do if ordered to go. Well of course I would go....but you know what I mean.

Anyway I am not looking for pity.
This is the sound off forum......I had to get it off my chest.

 

[Darin Chappell]

I agree with everything Ritchie said. A word to the wise might be to not protest to us previous military type people either. Let's just say that the vast majority of us are less than empathetic to all of this after having raised our right hands swearing to preserve, protect, and defend the United States Constitution against ALL enemies, both foreign AND domestic!

 

[Glenn Bartley]

Ritchie,

Shortly after 9/11, I volunteered for duty as a Federal Air Marshal for six months. I started on October 1, 2001. I started flying after only what amounted to a way to short FAM training session (no where near what a permanent guy goes through and I can assure you it was so brief as to make you shiver if you had to do this). I started to fly by the second week of October. I flew either four or five days per week for 6 months. As soon as two weeks after I started flying, I heard stiff criticisms from passengers on the plane, whom did not realize that I was a FAM, about how little the government was doing the right thing to protect them. I wanted really badly to punch a few of them right in the mouth, and maybe even give them an express ticket to the ground, but they were the people whom I was there to protect.

I had never been in the military so was never in a war, but I had made plenty of arrests in my career as a federal agent first in the Border patrol and then for the Customs Service (defunct as of March 1 - the oldest federal agency was done away with without so much as a goodbye). I knew about fear, being beaten badly and otherwise injured while making arrests. Yet that fear was nothing compared to what was in store for me as a FAM. I also knew fear when I worked as a volunteer in the rubble of the World Trade center. Those fears were nothing as to what was to come.

Starting in October 2001, for at least the first three or four weeks, I just about dirtied my pants each time the plane started to roll down the runway. I was really that scared in the belief that my partner and I were on the next plane to be hijacked, and it would be up to us to prevent the next World Trade Center or Pentagon by possibly becoming the next to hit the field in Pennsylvania. I don't remember if it was before leaving on my first flight as a FAM, or during the first week of flights or so that, I sent an email to a friend who had recently retired from Customs. He was a Marine, and will always be a Marine at heart. I expressed my belief, as silly as it may have been, that I was going to be killed while flying as a FAM. He tried to assure me that all would be well, but I was petrified of the prospects before me and told him so. I needed someone to know I was afraid despite the fact I knew: I would fly, and would take the right action if the time ever came. No one was getting past me into that cockpit. Yet, I was more scared than I remember ever having been in my whole life, and I did not want to scare my family so I relied upon this fine friend as a confidant.

Well, this friend of mine, this retired Customs Agent, this Marine, this good man - he sent me some words to think about. Words that when I did thought about them, I realized reflected what my friend was thinking about me because I had volunteered to do the right thing for our country. He truly admired me for having done so. That did not really make things better for me as far as being scared to death went, but it did help me to know that someone out there was in my corner - someone appreciated what I was doing, someone understood why I was doing it.

These are the words that come to my mind when I now think of those who go off to protect freedom, and to fight tyranny. They are the words of one of the greatest of all Americans, one of our founding fathers. I offer them up in way of a dedication to the men and women of the United States Armed Forces who are now in harm's way, they go like this:

THESE are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as FREEDOM should not be highly rated.

Thomas Paine, in the introduction to The American Crisis 1776



God Bless America and keep or service people safe from harm.

Best regards,
Glenn B

 

[Ken Harbart]

The current group of protestors, in my opinion, fall into two groups: 1) decidedly anti-American, or 2) a misguided few who believe the illogoc of the liberal left.

"We support our troops."- Unfortunately, the actions of the protestors contradict this claim. One does not "support" troops by attempting to demoralize them. Also, many left-wingers have gone on record to wish death on our troops (check the forums at www.democraticunderground.com for some of their sickening rhetoric).

Just a few days ago in CA, a 9/11 memorial was vandalized, and a US flag desecrated "in protest" of the impending military action.

Last week, students protesting the war first blocked traffic, then looted a gas station.

Teachers in Maine have been reprimanded for telling elementary school children that their parents were "unethical" due to their military service.

Toni Smith, who plays basketball for Manhattanville College, turns her back on the American flag during the playing of the National Anthem.. Additionally, she has publicly expressed a disdain for the military.

 

[Ken Harbart]

Glenn,
My hat's off to you for having participated in the FAM program. I didn't do it myself, but I understand how trying of an experience it is. FAMs are definitely overworked and underappreciated by both the general public and the FAA itself.

 

[Guest]

Amen to Glenn. I can attest to knowing both Glenn and the man he refers to who forwarded the quote. I, coming from the same stock, was also a Marine and was happy to stand next to Glenn during FAM training.

I remember the anti-war sentiment during Dester Storm. Albeit a rather small uproar compared to now, I remember how it affected me. A young Marine in Saudi Arabia believing in himself and what he was doing. Then hearing the vociferous anti-war protesters who never really seemed to grasp reality. I, too, remember getting Thomas Paine's quote while in Saudi Arabia, the same man sent it to me. If there were more men like him and like Glenn and less like Sean Penn and Martin Sheen, we would not only be a better a nation, it would be a safer world.

"War is an ugly thing but not the ugliest of things; the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feelings which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than hisown personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."

- John Stuart Mill

Alex

 

[Guest]

I'm all for the ability of the individual within the United States to speak their mind in whatever way they determine to be the most useful...

But I really can't see the logic in the targets many protesters seem to feel are appropriate or reasonable. As Ritchie said, the place to protest... IF one feel's it's appropriate to do so, would be before Congress or... more realistically, the individuals involved would simply write to their congressional representatives and express their views. There's really no sense in causing distress to others when there's nothing to be gained by harassing their chosen target.

I'm also not certain when it happened but at some point people stopped reading anything to get their news and turned to Television as their informational source... which was a bit odd but acceptable, there were a number of news casts that were worthwhile... but then people somehow started to get the idea that it matters what some drooling imbecile who does nothing but repeat words on a peice of paper while making faces when they're told to actually thinks...

Take Martain Sheen... the man's a [email protected]#$%&*ing actor... His opinion on anything is really about as hit or miss as cow pie bingo, and his brains seem to be composed of identical material... Heck, Elvira's apparantly a member of PETA, they're actors and musicians and "personalities" and until they can stop ending up in the E.R. for eating crayons, I really don't give a damn WHAT they think...

 

[Guest]

I want to say Amen Ritchie, on what you expressed above i your thread.. it sickens me that people are protesting the very soldiers that uphold there freedoms. i work near an airforce base, and to see protestors in the streets, is damn shameful! it really makes you wonder what this world is coming to... I live down here in the south,,( mississippi) the old south that is,,( my grandfater died last year, and was only 75 when he did so,, but he told me when he was young he remembered 2 people hanging in the town square in a little town about 20 miles north of here) so when i say the old south i mean we are not but a few years removed from the old south. ( the clan is still very active here in mississippi... and it is really a scary thing to know that people like that stil exist, but they do,,) but as ugly as the south can be everyone i have ever met supports our troops. I grew up in fla and was educated in fla,,, and saw many boat people die every day just to realize a chance at freedom that we take for granted everyday,, i just a slap in the face to all of us who value and cherish our freedom... if i was called today to go,,i would go, and be very happy to defend what this country stands for. i have served in the past, and would gladly again if the time comes. OUR TROOPS NEED OUR SUPPORT! THEY DESERVE THAT! After all it is our freedoms that they are fighting for!

 

[Guest]

OUR TROOPS NEED OUR SUPPORT! THEY DESERVE THAT! After all it is our freedoms that they are fighting for!

But one of those freedoms is the right to a certain level of dissent.

They are fighting... in part... to allow protestors the right to protest...

 

[Darin Chappell]

Excellant quotations, everyone! I have a few others I'd like to throw into the mix . . .



"War both needs and generates certain virtues; not the highest, but what may be called the preliminary virtues, as valour, veracity, the spirit of obedience, the habit of discipline. Any of these, and of others like them, when possessed by a nation, and no matter how generated, will give them a military advantage, and make them more likely to stay in the race of nations."

Walter Bagehot (1826–1877), British economist, critic. Physics and Politics, ch. 2, sct. 3 (1872).



"When great nations fear to expand, shrink from expansion, it is because their greatness is coming to an end. Are we, still in the prime of our lusty youth, still at the beginning of our glorious manhood, to sit down among the outworn people, to take our place with the weak and the craven? A thousand times no!"

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919), U.S. Republican (later Progressive) politician, president. speech, Sept. 1899, delivered in Akron, Ohio.



"Some of your countrymen were unable to distinguish between their native dislike for war and the stainless patriotism of those who suffered its scars. But there has been a rethinking [and] now we can say to you, and say as a nation, thank you for your courage."

Ronald Reagan, on privately financed Vietnam Veterans Memorial and statue in Washington DC, Veterans Day address 11 Nov 84



"I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy."

John Adams (1735–1826), U.S. statesman, president. Letter, May 1780, to his wife Abigail Adams. The Adams Family Correspondence, vol. 3, ed. L.H. Butterfield (1973).



"War is a blessing compared with national degradation."

Andrew Jackson (1767–1845), U.S. president. Letter, May 2, 1845, to James K. Polk, Jackson Papers, Library of Congress.

 

[Guest]

Mr Haley.
I agree Americans right to protest:
But does that make it right..?

___________________________________________________


But one of those freedoms is the right to a certain level of dissent.

They are fighting... in part... to allow protestors the right to protest...
___________________________________________________

but i don't agree we have the right to shame, spit on , or protest in front of the very men fighting for that freedom. they are just the messengers, they do what they are told, not what they want,,, one of the worst things that ever happened was Vietnam,,
my father was in it, and took 2 tours,,, one as a cobra helicopter pilot and the other as a medivac helicopter pilot. i asked him once why he took the second tour.. and his reply was not for the war, not because he believed in what they were doing,,, but because he knew he was helping the guys on the ground dying everyday..
and for his counrty,,,
he had no idea what was happing back in the states,, all the disent, all the hatred for the troops. and he told me when he got back home people called him baby killer and treated him and all the other gi's different. they did not deserve that at all!
my father said they picked people that were so badly burned, blown up or shot up, there was nothing left, and to this day my father does not sleep, but maybe 2 hours anight,, but you know what he was proud to serve his country, and still is proud today,,
but he said something the other day that made my blood run cold... he said " I bet this is just how all the people acted when i was in Vietnam..." and you know isn't this just how it all started in vietnam,,? protesters in the streets, ad people holding signs,,?
is it fair to the men who are defending the idea.."LIFE, LIBERTY, AND THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS" I think not.. and is a slap in the face to some that have served..
I served in the reserves,,, and i may end up having to go,,, but you know what i will and will be happy to do so,, i love this country and all it stands for, but i bet the people holding the signs are not in line to go down to the local recruiter and sign up are they,,
A Coward can hold a sign, But a Man Holds a gun to defend his countries Freedom!


how quickly we forget the horror of the past even as recent as 9/11...... how quickly it just glazes over and we go back to our mercedes,,, and big houses,,

 

[Ritchie Luna]

i am all for the freedom to protest....
but protesting to soldiers or in front of soliders does not do anything but demoralize those same soldiers.

 

[Ken Harbart]

It is the Soldier, not the reporter who has given us
freedom of press.

It is the Soldier, not the poet who has given us freedom
of speech.

It is the Soldier, not the campus organizer who gives us
freedom to demonstrate.

It is the Soldier who salutes the flag, who serves beneath
the flag, and whose coffin is draped by the flag, who
allows the protester to burn the flag.

Father Dennis Edward O'Brien

 

[Glenn Bartley]

Ken,

Thanks, especialy for posting the exact quote I had been searching for by Father O'Brien. I had it on my PC but deleted it by mistake I guess. Now I ahve it again, it is quite the truth.

Best regards,
Glenn B

 

[Ken Harbart]

Not a problem Glenn. Hre's a couple more, at least one of which you've probably seen before...

I watched the flag pass by one day.
It fluttered in the breeze
A young soldier saluted it, and then
He stood at ease.
I looked at him in uniform
So young, so tall, so proud
With hair cut square and eyes alert
He'd stand out in any crowd.
I thought how many men like him
Had fallen through the years.
How many died on foreign soil?
How many mothers' tears?
How many Pilots' planes shot down?
How many foxholes were soldiers' graves?
No Freedom is not free
I heard the sound of taps one night,
When everything was still.
I listened to the bugler play
And felt a sudden chill.
I wondered just how many times
That taps had meant "Amen"
When a flag had draped a coffin of a brother or a friend.
I thought of all the children,
Of the mothers and the wives,
Of fathers, sons and husbands
With interrupted lives.
I thought about a graveyard At the bottom of the sea
Of unmarked graves in Arlington.
No Freedom isn't free!!

 

[Ken Harbart]

A Soldier's Christmas

'TWAS THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS
HE LIVED ALL ALONE,
IN A ONE BEDROOM HOUSE
MADE OF PLASTER AND STONE.

I HAD COME DOWN THE CHIMNEY
WITH PRESENTS TO GIVE,
AND TO SEE JUST WHO
IN THIS HOME DID LIVE.

I LOOKED ALL ABOUT,
A STRANGE SIGHT I DID SEE,
NO TINSEL, NO PRESENTS,
NOT EVEN A TREE.

NO STOCKING BY MANTLE,
JUST BOOTS FILLED WITH SAND,
ON THE WALL HUNG PICTURES
OF FAR DISTANT LANDS.

WITH MEDALS AND BADGES,
AWARDS OF ALL KINDS,
A SOBER THOUGHT
CAME THROUGH MY MIND.

FOR THIS HOUSE WAS DIFFERENT,
IT WAS DARK AND DREARY,
I FOUND THE HOME OF A SOLDIER,
ONCE I COULD SEE CLEARLY.

THE SOLDIER LAY SLEEPING,
SILENT, ALONE,
CURLED UP ON THE FLOOR
IN THIS ONE BEDROOM HOME.

THE FACE WAS SO GENTLE,
THE ROOM IN SUCH DISORDER,
NOT HOW I PICTURED
A UNITED STATES SOLDIER.

WAS THIS THE HERO
OF WHOM I'D JUST READ?
CURLED UP ON A PONCHO,
THE FLOOR FOR A BED?

I REALIZED THE FAMILIES
THAT I SAW THIS NIGHT,
OWED THEIR LIVES TO THESE SOLDIERS
WHO WERE WILLING TO FIGHT.

SOON ROUND THE WORLD,
THE CHILDREN WOULD PLAY,
AND GROWNUPS WOULD CELEBRATE
A BRIGHT CHRISTMAS DAY.

THEY ALL ENJOYED FREEDOM
EACH MONTH OF THE YEAR,
BECAUSE OF THE SOLDIERS,
LIKE THE ONE LYING HERE.

I COULDN'T HELP WONDER
HOW MANY LAY ALONE,
ON A COLD CHRISTMAS EVE
IN A LAND FAR FROM HOME.

THE VERY THOUGHT
BROUGHT A TEAR TO MY EYE,
I DROPPED TO MY KNEES
AND STARTED TO CRY.

THE SOLDIER AWAKENED
AND I HEARD A ROUGH VOICE,
"SANTA DON'T CRY,
THIS LIFE IS MY CHOICE;

I FIGHT FOR FREEDOM,
I DON'T ASK FOR MORE,
MY LIFE IS MY GOD,
MY COUNTRY, MY CORPS."

THE SOLDIER ROLLED OVER
AND DRIFTED TO SLEEP,
I COULDN'T CONTROL IT,
I CONTINUED TO WEEP.

I KEPT WATCH FOR HOURS,
SO SILENT AND STILL
AND WE BOTH SHIVERED
FROM THE COLD NIGHT'S CHILL.

I DIDN'T WANT TO LEAVE
ON THAT COLD, DARK, NIGHT,
THIS GUARDIAN OF HONOR
SO WILLING TO FIGHT.

THEN THE SOLDIER ROLLED OVER,
WITH A VOICE SOFT AND PURE,
WHISPERED, "CARRY ON SANTA,
IT'S CHRISTMAS DAY, ALL IS SECURE."

ONE LOOK AT MY WATCH,
AND I KNEW HE WAS RIGHT.
"MERRY CHRISTMAS MY FRIEND,
AND TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT."

 

[Guest]

Thanks for posting the words of Father O'Brien,,, it really drives home the point,,, i never want to see war,,,, but i know sometimes is has to happen,,, i wish all the troops over there right now, my prayers, and a swift return,,,
God bless the troops, and America!

 

[Guest]

I agree Americans right to protest:
But does that make it right..?

Well... in a way, yes...

The act of protestation can't be condemned since it, allong with the vocalization of dissent, are the exact things which made our nation what it is today, what was fought for and men died over for the last two hundred and fifty years, before we even became a nation...

Now, the specific action involved or the specific call to arms might not be something you morally agree with. I usually find myself opposed to the majority of protestors; PETA members, Greenpeace nut-jobs, anti-war protestors who have no idea what the ramifications of their desires would be...

And the specific manner is something you might be morally opposed to as well. Again, I personally see it as pointless and damaging to protest against the individuals who will be going in, risking and dedicating their lives... The proper targets really are congressional representatives and the proper way to go about it if actual change is to be affected is in a far more rational and meaningful manner.

However... The act of protestation unto itself can not be condemned... The ability for anyone, no matter how misguided or stupid they might be, to voice their opinions, to wave their signs and burn their flags and paint their faces and chant silly things while wandering in circles in the snow... Is exactly what all those individuals who have given themselves over to their country were working to preserve.

There is a signifigant difference between patriotism and nationalism that many people fail to distinguish... it seems like a nuance but it is one of vital importance.

Nationalism is the support of one's country no matter what actions are being performed... The germans during WWII were nationalists, it didn't matter WHAT their country did, governmental restrictions, militray actions, internal terrorism... It was Germany! It was right!

Patriotism is what has made America great, it is the support of and pride in one's country. That support and pride is based in the agreement with what the country is doing... the knowledge that, given a popular consensus that an action is wrong, the action will not be taken. Given simple power and avaliable resources, we could very easily place the majority of the world under our domination. A few well aimed neutron bombs to major population centers and we'd rule the world... But this is seen as being morally wrong and, were it to be attempted, the popular opinion about the immorality would cause the plan to cease (before it even began).

"America right or wrong" is the antithesis of everything our nation was founded upon, the mortal enemy of the men who forged our country throughout the years and created what we know today...

"America, we will make it right." is a far more appropriate and meaningful phrase.

In order to do that, the voices of everyone... no matter how misguided or full of nonsense they might be... needs to be heard, even when they choose to express it in profoundly stupid manners.

 

[Glenn Bartley]

Here is a link sure to warm up the hearts of we lovers of the cold blooded. It is about the Navy's decision to fly the First navy Jack:

First Navy Jack Flies Again

The news is a bit dated, at about 10 months old, but it was news to me nonetheless!

Best regards,
Glenn B

 

[Guest]

Being x-military myself....These protesters kind of piss me off.
They will protest and protest, but when they are invaded they are the first to eigther pick up a gun or ask for help from one of us.
Kind of makes you wonder where will they be then,.,.fighting or getting shot in the back

lay down your weapons....... yeah right!!!!!
lay down with your weapons!!!!!