Veteran's Day, 2005

I just watched a riveting program on PBS called Independent Lens.  It profiled a family who'd lost a son in the Iraq war.  The father was a military guy, and seemed pretty accepting of the loss, but the mother was NOT.  She was pissed and looking for answers.  

The show reminded me of a conversation I had just yesterday with my youngest son, who's recently 5.  He accompanied me to the grocery store on Veteran's Day and on our way out we were each given a lapel poppy by a very aged Veteran.  My son had a lot of questions when we got in the car about the poppies, the holiday, etc.  I told him it was important to have a holiday to remember and thank the people who've died for our country, and after a pause, I told him that I hoped he'd never ever join the Army.  "Because I could die?" he asked.  I said, yes, mostly that, but also because people need to stop having wars.  Wars are for killing people, and killing people is never okay.  And in a war, it's never just the soldiers who die, its lots and lots of moms and kids, too.  War is bad.  

This Veteran's Day, we've been treated to a 'presidential' speech that yet again, per usual, admonishes us naysayers to just shut up.  Because anyone who would dare question the honest, open and transparent road to Operation Enduring Freedom, has to be gotten the hell out of the town meeting.

We've also been treated to the kind, sympathetic words of Bill O'Reilly, whose appetite for destruction, having been awakened on 9/11, and whetted on New Orleans, is now looking for a new American city to devour.  And what heinous crime brought down the wrath of O'Reilly upon the innocent citizens of San Fran?  The people there just voted, like you can when you live in a democracy, that the military doesn't get to recruit in the public high schools.  Which, if you lived in a fascist state, you wouldn't get to vote on.  Speaking of which, if the good people in Dover, PA, can actually vote God out of their community, could they please turn their attention to several alleged human beings who've been assuming the mantle lately??

Sorry if I'm rambling a bit, it's late, I'm upset by the PBS show, I'm trying to pull strings together ... and it's late.