Posted on 5/14/2004, 9:05:28 PM by kimmie7
On a bench at the corner of Broadway and U.S. 31-W By-Pass, Harry Pruyne sat next to his homemade sign reading “Stand Up for Fallen Soldiers” as it flapped gently in the breeze Thursday afternoon.
Cars passed while Pruyne, 28, talked about the gruesome reports of violence and torture in Iraq, both by and against Americans.
“There’s too much going on I don’t agree with,” he said. “Something has to be done, and no one’s doing anything. I feel compelled to do this.”
Pruyne’s passion stems from reports about American civilian, Nick Berg, who was captured and beheaded by Iraqi radicals Saturday. Pruyne, who served with the Army’s 101st Airborne Division for three years and spent a while in Bowling Green’s National Guard, heard about the beheading from a co-worker Wednesday.
“I about fell on the floor,” he said. “I haven’t been right since. It’s the only thing on my mind. It’s just wrong.” Pruyne said a seat on the corner of one of Bowling Green’s busiest intersections is appropriate because he can remind many drivers going about their everyday routines about the horrors of war. After finding out about the beheading, Pruyne said he came out to his seat in the middle of the night and cried.
“I sat on this bench and watched everyone driving by,” he said. “I can’t imagine going through everyday life yesterday. I sat here and cried, and decided to come back.”
Pruyne said he thinks U.S. troops should pull out of Iraq, but doesn’t have a solution to the problems surrounding the region.
“I just think people should think about it more,” he said. “But I don’t have a solution. I don’t think there’s one person out there with a solution – if there were, it would be done by now.”
All he can do, Pruyne said, is serve a bitter reminder to people going about their daily lives. “I’ll be out here every day I can be out here,” he said.
Sounds like a future Senator from Mass. I feel for him but it is not time to pull out.
If the coalition forces pull out of Iraq now, before our job there is done, the cowardly murders of Daniel Pearl and Nick Berg will be multiplied by a hundredfold, a thousandfold. Both these young men ventured out into a highly dangerous arena, and were captured and murdered before a video camera, by members of the same vicious brotherhood of thugs. We do not know how many similar incidents have been prevented, by the vigilance and oversight of our military in the area, in pursuit of the foreign "freedom fighters" that have flooded into Iraq in recent months (after they had fled Afghanistan and Pakistan). But as it so happened, a couple slipped through the net, and seized upon opportunity when it was presented.
If we leave now, NONE of the opportunities to slaughter non-Muslim noncombatants will be prevented.
And saddest if all; he is wrong.
He should sober up and get squared away.
"This administration's oil greed" troll.
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