We Failed

This is my first diary entry here and would note this is being cross posted from DK. I hope we might light a fire in the right places.

This is the worst type of mood diary I have ever written, but it comes with a cost. I am still wiping the tears from my eyes because of a truth I saw tonight in a powerful movie which awoke memories of history that now seems to repeat itself again today. The only reason that history is repeating is because we have failed to act as a generation did 30 to 40 years ago and sacrifice a little. We are not the whole of the failure but we are a big part of it, and sadly I admit my involvement as well. We have written with powerful words our disgust, disdain and lack of support for the way this country is being run, but here we all fairly much think alike so it is a safe enviorment, albeit probably well monitored by those shadowy judges who know what is right for us.

I start this diary out with an apology to a long time diarist on the Daily Kos who I got into an exchange with a while back. I thought his wording wrong but I missed it's meaning as many have with the Wright sermon. I start this diary with an apology to One Pissed Off Liberal.

I am sure many folks here have seen the movie "Of Lions and Lambs", if not you are missing a helluva movie. It might make you wake up as it did me though I confess that age with infirmatry restricts what I do today. (also whom I work for, and proud to work for). A confession I will make to about another well made movie of an opposit genre that I have yet to see the end of because a certain at a certain point there are scenes that take me back through time and when my wife turns on the lights I am crying like a baby and shaking. I have tried to get through this movie four times and given it up as a lost cause. The movie is "We Were Soldiers". My heysay was back then in a little place many school kids can't find on a map today, Vietnam.

Now and then are so seperated today, not just in time, but in the energy and difference of commitment of a generation. Here we have a wide grouping of 3 generations. Helluva lot of power here, and bright to brilliant minds. Yet today we are sedentary animals at best chained to computer keyboards writting letters, diries, comments and making the occasional phone call to our Representatives when we get the mass emails from the ACLU, MoveON or whomever.

I remember disenbarking from a plane loaded with vets at National Airport (don't ever call it Reagan National Airport to me) and only three vets then had the gaul to wear our uniforms while the others wore civey's. Twenty or so demonstrators were waiting calling us baby killers, etc. and I was not n the mood for their shit having just been seperated from the military against my will due to medical reasons. I had my Purple Heart and Bronze Star which were nothing then, and of course serving 14 months as a sniper into my second tour with dreams one day of becoming First Sargent of the Army shot to hell. I worried about my unit and platoon because I was so sure my replacement was going to get them killed and they'd be lost somewhere we never were as Nixon swore to the world. Mostly though I was just plain angry and missed those who depended on me as I did them.

That brings me back to today, and our brave men and women who fighting what I call and endless video Nintendo war game, but with real lives being placed on the line. Should they make it through this mission, hell like in the game they are recycled (aka stop loss). Maybe not so fresh but hell to the suits we elected it's the same thing since for most of them a video game, that's the closest they've gotten to real war. The movie Lions and Lambs opened my eyes (bout time right) to the difference between two eras. The people who suffer because of our literay but actionless refrains are our wives, husbands, sons and daughters, nieces and nephews or the boy or girl next door who was our child's best friend as they grew up. What the hell have we done? One Pissed Off Liberal has the balls to post his intentions to protest, I disagree with his tactics and would suggest there would be a better way. Turn the Rethugs old mantra back on them remember the term "silent majority"? Wanna make a difference? Then take an idea from a person I personally dislike, Louis Farrakon.

Remember the "Million Man March"? Remember how it was conducted? Everything was calm, cool collected and mission focused. Remember the 60's and 70's how people got out and marched, though often with the wrong ideal ( destruction of property, violence etc). Remember they have the guns, and if you want to keep mom and dad middle America on your side I don't recommend confusing their cars, homes or shops with Frankenstein's castle. Imagine the site at the RNC national convention with a hundred years or more McSame ready to except the RNC nomination and all of a sudden a million or so citizens silently stroll down the streets of Minneapolis-Saint Paul with banners saying "Bring Em Home Alive and Whole". Another group banners reading "Impeach Now!". How do you think that  would play on all the news programs, and would the trashy speeches get any air time.....no not really. On top of that, Nancy and Harry might somehow wake up to the fact that there are a lotta pissed off voters, and they might remember who pays their salaries. The table servings might expand.

In my generation eventually those that made sure their voices were heard along with a "silent majority" got their point across, though their means took them many years and cost too many lives (i.e. Kent State). We have failed those so far whom have tried. We have failed also to truly support the troops. I work with the men and women in uniform. They are brave, honest and true and want to see their commrads come home now, safely. I think we can spare a the cost of a ticket to Minnesota. Remember though quiet and orderly. Millwalki is close enough we can get the beer we need. If we cannot, with 81% of the population get the support to pull this one off then we have truly failed those who serve the "so called leadership" we allowed to remain in office. To One Pissed Off Liberal, I'll join you there. But I will only offer you Jack Daniels as that's all I tolerate.


Poll
Would you be willing to help such a rally work?
Yes, with the right organization
No, it's too samn cold up there
Maybe, will I make the front cover of Time and Newsweek?
To damn early in the morning to make that commitment. You on meth?

Votes: 6
Results : Vote Link : Polls

Display:


there have been many protests/rallies (2.00 / 3)

they did no good.  Our fundamental problems will not be solved until we do something about the media. In addition, the kids need to do this and they are not going to be motivated until there is a draft.

I had a similar realization to yours about 6 months ago.  I realized that my sons were going to know people 30 years from now who are still suffering from the effects of war in Iraq.

Where we really failed was in allowing Bush to take office.  After that, there was going to be a war in Iraq no matter what.


For Obama it now becomes: Faith, hope and CHANGE! And the greatest of these is Change!
by TeresaInPa on Sat May 03, 2008 at 03:30:17 AM EST

Re: there have been many protests/rallies (2.00 / 3)

I agree with yu 100%, however even Faux News would have a dilm such as this on and if behaved as the Million Man March was no one could call us the whacko out on the fringe lunitics. Sometimes reality has to give us a lil slap to dully wake us up. Also the GI's deserve it. There is alwaays a chance McSame could win. Maybe it's time we he people set the agenda, not Dick Cheney and David Addington.


by utopia on Sat May 03, 2008 at 03:58:52 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: there have been many protests/rallies (2.00 / 3)

We peacefully demonstrate at our state capitol the third Sunday every month. Sometimes now there is only 20, sometimes 200 but never a word in the paper or in the media. There used to be more and it was more confrontational with the pro-war people showing up, but they don't show up anymore. Without the publicity nobody knows it's going on.

My husband is a disabled American veteran from Vietnam and we are joined by other Vietnam veterans who know the hardships and lifelong challenges many of the Iraq veterans will be facing. Physical and mental wounds- the effects of depleted uranium on them and their future children.

'Protesting' is a very fagile balance- that many 'troops' and veterans do not see is in favor of them and not against them. In the 60's we carried signs 'bring our troops home now'...but we have been forever labled in the negative sense. Then I protested while my husband and brother were IN Vietnam and I was attending funerals regularly for high school friends and family members- most that stood beside me were also family members and veterans and those about to be drafted. We just wanted the killing to stop and our loved ones come home alive.

The Vietnam veterans came back as 'losers' and were shunned and mostly shunned by the government who made promises and never kept and were even shunned by Veterans Service Organizations who turned their backs on them (WWII vets) as 'losers'. We need to continue to bring the Iraq vets home in a way they 'won'...even if we leave tomorrow- they have already accomplished the missions they were asked and keep changing now to some vague unknown. We need to welcome those already home and those returning home soon in a way that doesn't do the diservice that was done to the Vietnam veteran. We need to make them proud and not ashamed of performing their duty to their country (right or wrong on the war in some peoples eyes).

"Yellow ribbons don't bandage wounds, support Veterans funding" (one of my bumper stickers)

People tend to support our 'troops' and then forget about our combat veterans after they are of no use to the military. For the sake of our veterans fight our Congress for MANDATORY funding of the Veterans Administration. As dishonest and untrustworthy as the VBA is- the VHA needs the money to treat our wounded veterans and they are doing their best 'on the cheap', and veterans are falling through the cracks and dying needlessly.


by Justwords on Sat May 03, 2008 at 05:00:46 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: there have been many protests/rallies (2.00 / 2)

I share the same been there done that. I am trying to present a picture here of 1,000,000 people surrounding the Repug Convention saying silently...."we are wise to your lies" I live in DC and see protests all the time but nothing on the scale of the demonstrations in the 60's and 70's. Out of 360 mil with 81% on our side we are fighting a losing cause if we can't find 1 mil protesters for this. My question to you and your hubby is are the military just to be then a branch of Blackwater? We owe em more.


by utopia on Sat May 03, 2008 at 05:42:01 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: there have been many protests/rallies (none / 0)

Yes that will work wonderfully with the electorate.  We should try to very publically waylay the peaceful democratic process of our opponents.

Good thinking.

How politically astute (rolls eyes)


Until recently I was selling drugs, and now I'm selling Obama T-shirts.
by switching sides on Sat May 03, 2008 at 11:37:23 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: We Failed (2.00 / 2)

Kudos' to you Utopia on your first diary at MyDD.
I wasn't as moved by Lions to Lambs as you were, but watched Charlie Wilson's War and saw another side of war that gets little reporting too and cried. Cried for the loss of life, the chidren and why can't people quit killing each other..it's sad.

Rec'd your diary and hope it makes it to the top of the Rec list.


by Justwords on Sat May 03, 2008 at 05:10:24 AM EST

Re: We Failed (none / 0)

I humbly thhank you


by utopia on Sat May 03, 2008 at 05:36:49 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: We Failed (none / 0)

This business of protestors waiting to greet you is bullshit. You know it and I know it. No airport would tolerate that kind of behavior and neither would average citizens. the anti-war movement had no antagonism to the soliders. Their fury was with the executives of the war. In fact, the charge of baby-killer doesn't appear anywear in the national conciousness until after Rambo is released.

In point of fact, the veterans administration conducted surveys on all of the soldiers returning home. And one of the entities listed as being most supportive of returning soldiers was the anti-war movement.

There is a book you need to read written by a Vietnam Veteran - The Spitting Image: Myth, Memory and the Legacy of Vietnam by Jerry Lembke. He is a professor of sociology and thoroughly debunks the protestors harassing soldiers mythology.


by Little Otter on Sat May 03, 2008 at 12:09:40 PM EST

Re: We Failed (none / 0)

I would suggest you talk to some of my brothers who returned from Nam and were greeted like that. If you need to research archieved media films of those protesters....I was there you obviously were not. It may have been a small scattered protest but it and I were there. Some "textbook" expousing a certain view does not mean the author's POV is correct. You mention "regional airport authority" in your response "allowing" such a protest. That was then this is now do not confuse to eras  as one they aren't and regional authorities didn't have the power they have today, if back then they were even called authorities.

Finally I suggest you read Stanley Karnow's Vietnam: A History which won hime the Pulitzer. My memory and those of respected writers are a hell of a lot more accurate then Hillary's ducking sniper fire in Bosnia, you don't duck those bullets except in movies like you cited in your response like Rambo.


by utopia on Sun May 04, 2008 at 10:50:45 AM EST
[ Parent ]

I am proud of the violent protest of the 60's (none / 0)

Call me crazy but I think the mad civil disobedience of the 60's was appropiate and justified. The goverment sent 50,000  Americans to there death and killed Millions of vietnamese. I would sure as hell fight to the death before they sent me to war over B.S war. I think that kind of response is what Samual Adams would be proud of. I am no historian but I dont think they made this democracy so we can be sheep to be dictated to an run over by an out of control bueracracy and elite. If we have to fight and I mean FIGHT then so be it. This passivity does not cause the goverment to fear the people as it should. We should scare them and we must if we are to remain free.


by edtastic on Sat May 03, 2008 at 07:09:49 PM EST

Re: I am proud of the violent protest of the 60's (none / 0)

This is not a "give me liberty or give me death" movement. Protests and waking people up simply requires a peaceful stance reinforced by numbers. To "fight" would just give fuel to the right wing extremist that we were anti-American whatevers. I worked as a psychologist in the Correctional system for many years. One of the most effective ways of getting screaming inmates in a hostile enviorment to calm down, quiet down and listen was to speak in a soft quiet voice. It forced them to focus to hear your message. Much more effective then setting fires, smashing windows and sending everyone running for the saftey of cover creating a situation no one hears your message. Violence doesn't solve violence but just begets a violent exchange.


by utopia on Sun May 04, 2008 at 10:59:11 AM EST
[ Parent ]


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