Today we honor the fallen in America’s wars – both the necessary and unnecessary ones. As of today, 2,462 US servicemen and women have been killed in the Iraq War. One of those killed was Lance Cpl. Edward "Augie" Schroeder II. Here is what his father wrote in the Washington Post earlier this year:
"Two painful questions remain for all of us. Are the lives of Americans being killed in Iraq wasted? Are they dying in vain? President Bush says those who criticize staying the course are not honoring the dead. That is twisted logic: honor the fallen by killing another 2,000 troops in a broken policy?
I choose to honor our fallen hero by remembering who he was in life, not how he died. A picture of a smiling Augie in Iraq, sunglasses turned upside down, shows his essence — a joyous kid who could use any prop to make others feel the same way.
Though it hurts, I believe that his death — and that of the other Americans who have died in Iraq — was a waste. They were wasted in a belief that democracy would grow simply by removing a dictator — a careless misunderstanding of what democracy requires. They were wasted by not sending enough troops to do the job needed in the resulting occupation — a careless disregard for professional military counsel.
But their deaths will not be in vain if Americans stop hiding behind flag-draped hero masks and stop whispering their opposition to this war. Until then, the lives of other sons, daughters, husbands, wives, fathers and mothers may be wasted as well.
This is very painful to acknowledge, and I have to live with it. So does President Bush."
And the ever-eloquent Bob Herbert asks us to Consider the Living in today’s New York Times op/ed piece:
"Leadership does not get more pathetic than this. Once there was F.D.R. and Churchill. Now there’s Bush and Blair.
Reacting to the allegations about the murder of civilians, the commandant of the Marine Corps, Gen. Michael Hagee, went to Iraq last week to warn his troops about the danger of becoming "indifferent to the loss of a human life."
Somehow that message needs to be conveyed to the top leaders of this country, and to the public at large. There is no better day than Memorial Day to reflect on it. As we remember the dead, we should consider the living, and stop sending people by the thousands to pointless, unnecessary deaths."
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Write something how the money should go into education instead of the MIK so they don’t have to see this stuff anymore… write something about Cromwells razing of the monasteries and how Brits were caught for centuries in the ensuing intellectual darkness. And how this system has been unknowingly replicated in the US.