Thursday, August 25, 2005

Something is Wrong in America

"If we don't believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don't believe in it at all."
-Noam Chomsky, linguistics professor and political activist (1928- )

There's something that George Bush just doesn't understand, that Cindy Sheehan is trying to teach. Cindy Sheehan is trying to teach him, and many others, that you don't stop being a mother when your child dies.

And something is very wrong in America with people who want to insist you should.

Something is very wrong in America when the President can meet with large campaign contributors but not the mother of a fallen soldier right at the end of his driveway.

Something is very wrong in America when the President can leave his vacation to sign an energy bill that he himself admits will do nothing to either lower gasoline prices or reduce our energy independence, but can't meet with the mother of a fallen soldier sitting at the end of his driveway.

Something is very wrong in America when the President can take a five week vacation, while giving a speech that reminds the country no less than eight times that "We are at war", and ignores the tragic and inevitable consequence of that war, even as she is sitting at the end of his driveway.

Something is very wrong in America when the phrase "We are at war", means the death of a child for some people, and "let me hold your coat while you go and fight a war that I started" for other people. And the people who started the war refuse to acknowledge the injustice of that choice, even as it sits at the end of the driveway.

Something is very wrong in America when people think that sacrifice means a magnetic yellow ribbon, when it actually means a combat ribbon. And the cars embossed with those magnetic ribbons drive right by the mother of the fallen soldier who got his combat ribbon posthumously as she sits at the end of the driveway.

Something is very wrong in America when the President who claims moral authority, from a party that touts the moral high grounds at every opportunity, and yet refuses to recognize the absolute and unrelenting moral authority of the mother of a fallen soldier. Even as that mother is sitting at the end of his driveway. Every day. Every night. In the rain. In the cold. In the heat. In the dark.

Something is very wrong in America.

And Cindy Sheehan is working to make it right.

Because you don't stop being a mother when your child dies.

God Bless You, Cindy.

And who is on the front page of the Post-Gazette today just laughing it up like he is doing a great job for our country?

{I don't know the author... please let me know if you know the source!}

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