Hear my words that I might teach you
Take my arms that I might reach you”
But my words, like silent raindrops fell
And echoed in the wells of silence
~ Simon and Garfunkel
By Joe Sinagra | The Save Jersey Blog
Is it not okay to die in one war because it was George Bush’s but okay to die in another because it’s Obama’s war, Save Jerseyans? Why is this not an electoral issue? Have Obamacare, illegal immigration, and gay rights turned everyone’s attention away from the fact there is still a war going on?
When the last U.S. combat troops departed Iraq in December 2011, they left behind a defeated al-Qaeda and an Iraq; two years later, al-Qaeda had seized major cities where hundreds of U.S. troops died. Even as we drawdown in Afghanistan, as was proven with Iraq, any gains made by the United States will be quickly lost under the wrong leadership.
What you don’t hear the media screaming about: during seven years under President George W. Bush, 630 Americans were killed in Afghanistan. Under Obama, over 2,000 troops have been killed, and the 127 killed this year (even as the war was supposedly winding down) are more than any other year but one under President Bush.
At the height of the war in Iraq, the greatest loss of American lives was in 2004, when we suffered 904 American casualties in addition to 575 American troop deaths in Afghanistan under Bush. Under Obama, who supported an ‘Afghan-led reconciliation’, over 2,000 US troops have died, including over 50 Special Operations Forces members.
Regardless of what one’s opinion on the Iraq war may be, does anyone wonder where the hypocrites are now, when Obama has put more boots in more nations than Bush ever did? What happened to all of the anti-war protesters? Was there really an anti-war movement, or was it simply an anti-Bush movement?
Over 100 soldiers have died in the last 122 days alone. Perhaps mainstream media thinks dead soldiers under a Democrat are less dead than under a Republican? Remember when CNN ran daily body counts? Where are the numbers now?
Then-Senator Obama trashed then-President Bush for committing the U.S. to war abroad; President Obama committed the U.S. to 12 more years in Afghanistan and billions of dollars in aid. The sound of crickets in the liberal newsrooms across America is deafening.
December 2013 polls reveal that 63% of the population oppose the war, 56% think it is going badly (with 21% believing it is going very badly), and 60% believing it was not worth fighting; opposition to the war in 2014 is now on a par with Iraq in 2006.
During the Vietnam War, John Kerry testified before the Senate foreign relations committee and infamously asked “[h]ow do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?”
Fast forward forty-three years later and the answers appear to be that you simply stop paying attention to their deaths.
It appears as though American soldiers are not so much dying for their country, but because of it.
Admiration for our military may be deep, but interest in what they are doing is superficial, short-lived and fleeting.
As recently as February 19th, 36-year-old Marine Master Sgt. Aaron C. Torian of Paducah, KY., gave his life during combat operations in Afghanistan.
War has no claim on race, creed, or color. Death, however noble, provides little comfort to the thousands of families who have lost their loved ones in a directionless, goal-less conflict across the globe.
There are 99 New Jersey families who would love to have their boys back home. I’d love to have a media with the guys to ask the right questions of our leaders for them.
