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Warriors and wusses
The Los Angeles Times ^ | January 24, 2006 | Joel Stein, Los Angeles Times

Posted on 01/24/2006 9:38:49 AM PST by seanmerc

Warriors and wusses

I DON'T SUPPORT our troops. This is a particularly difficult opinion to have, especially if you are the kind of person who likes to put bumper stickers on his car. Supporting the troops is a position that even Calvin is unwilling to urinate on.

I'm sure I'd like the troops. They seem gutsy, young and up for anything. If you're wandering into a recruiter's office and signing up for eight years of unknown danger, I want to hang with you in Vegas.

And I've got no problem with other people — the ones who were for the Iraq war — supporting the troops. If you think invading Iraq was a good idea, then by all means, support away. Load up on those patriotic magnets and bracelets and other trinkets the Chinese are making money off of.

But I'm not for the war. And being against the war and saying you support the troops is one of the wussiest positions the pacifists have ever taken — and they're wussy by definition. It's as if the one lesson they took away from Vietnam wasn't to avoid foreign conflicts with no pressing national interest but to remember to throw a parade afterward.

Blindly lending support to our soldiers, I fear, will keep them overseas longer by giving soft acquiescence to the hawks who sent them there — and who might one day want to send them somewhere else. Trust me, a guy who thought 50.7% was a mandate isn't going to pick up on the subtleties of a parade for just service in an unjust war. He's going to be looking for funnel cake.

Besides, those little yellow ribbons aren't really for the troops. They need body armor, shorter stays and a USO show by the cast of "Laguna Beach."

(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Editorial; Foreign Affairs; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections; US: California; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: joelstein; ohnonotagain
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Read the whole article--it is absolutely unbelievable! The libs are now showing their true colors. At least they're finally being somewhat honest.
1 posted on 01/24/2006 9:38:49 AM PST by seanmerc
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To: seanmerc

Good. Hope he convicnces the Democrat Leadership that this is a winning tactic for them. Time to demand the Democrats come out of the closet like this writer did.


2 posted on 01/24/2006 9:40:40 AM PST by MNJohnnie (Is there a satire god who created Al Gore for the sole purpose of making us laugh?)
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To: seanmerc

Ahhh, perfect. An unvarnished, PERFECT example of the left in this country - a man who has, by his own admission, never served his country in any respect (even jury duty, as he proudly proclaims), casting a baleful glare at the armed forces that are, to him, nothing more than an "imperialist tool" of the United States. The more people that read it, the better. Just get a mop for all the vomit.


3 posted on 01/24/2006 9:44:32 AM PST by domenad (In all things, in all ways, at all times, let honor guide me.)
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To: seanmerc

One again, another liberal whackjob who thinks 9/11 was a made for TV movie. It didn't really happen, so why are we off killing terrorists(oops, freedom fighters) in Iraq and Afghanistan?

Are these people honest-to-God serious? What would these people fight for? How about OBL coming up the Potomac river on gunboats? Would they lob some mortar shells at OBL from GW's backyard at Mount Vernon? Or would they try to reason with the man? Try a more compassionate way to fight terrorism? Honestly, I think they'd chose the latter.

Surely, there must be something these people would fight for? What then?


4 posted on 01/24/2006 9:49:52 AM PST by RexBeach ("There is no substitute for victory." -Douglas MacArthur)
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To: seanmerc
I'm sure I'd like the troops. They seem gutsy, young and up for anything.

Not to mention butch as all git out.

5 posted on 01/24/2006 9:52:15 AM PST by Billthedrill
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To: seanmerc

Joel Klein is not a typical liberal. He wrote a column (last week I think?) in which he told how he made Maureen Dowd mad and now she won't accept any wine from him in a restaurant LOL! It was a funny piece.

He's being honest, which is rare on their side. And it's refreshing to read.


6 posted on 01/24/2006 9:54:14 AM PST by saveliberty (Proud to be Head Snowflake, Bushbot and a new member of Sam's Club)
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To: seanmerc
I have no problem with this guy? He's flat-out honest about his feelings. He's basically describing what we've said all along -- that liberals who oppose the war based on Michael Moorish fantasies can not hide behind the "I oppose the war but suupport the troops" veil.

This guy has every right to oppose the war, just like he can stand in traffic and blame Bush or Rove or Halliburton if a car hits him. It doen't make him right, but then again, that's why they're call 'opinions'. Still, he's honestly conveying his opinions, unlike the wusses who can not reconcile the gulf between what the say and what they really feel.

7 posted on 01/24/2006 9:58:31 AM PST by cchandler
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To: seanmerc

This guy ain't fit to shine a soldier's boots.


8 posted on 01/24/2006 9:59:20 AM PST by Lexington Green (FOX doctored the news to satisfy a Saudi stockholder.)
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To: seanmerc

I have to agree that he is one of the few liberals simply stating what should be obvious: you cannot support the troops if you cannot support their mission.

People who claim to support the troops but denounce the war are cowards at worst or confused at best.


9 posted on 01/24/2006 9:59:29 AM PST by Gingersnap
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To: seanmerc

Is he the wussy? Reading crap like this only makes me prouder for serving. He wouldn't have any idea what service was all about. Wussy.

"But it's really not that easy to say because anyone remotely affiliated with the military could easily beat me up, and I'm listed in the phone book."

What's funny is that if he thought for a second that anyone WOULD come and beat him up, he wouldn't have said it. Liberals, generally, are the worst kind of cowards.

10 posted on 01/24/2006 10:03:23 AM PST by jjm2111
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To: saveliberty

His column on Dowd was funny. She must be one humourless prig.


11 posted on 01/24/2006 10:06:49 AM PST by jjm2111
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To: seanmerc
"I know this is all easy to say for a guy who grew up with money, did well in school and hasn't so much as served on jury duty for his country. But it's really not that easy to say because anyone remotely affiliated with the military could easily beat me up, and I'm listed in the phone book."

..I'm a wuss..

12 posted on 01/24/2006 10:08:10 AM PST by Donald Rumsfeld Fan ("fake but accurate": NY Times)
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To: jjm2111

Yes she must be.


13 posted on 01/24/2006 10:08:34 AM PST by saveliberty (Proud to be Head Snowflake, Bushbot and a new member of Sam's Club)
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To: seanmerc
Not directed at seanmerc.... I understand the guilt. We know we're sending recruits to do our dirty work, and we want to seem grateful.

I understand the guilt. We know we're sending recruits volunteersto do our dirty work, and we want to seem grateful.

We *are* grateful, dirtbag.

And you should be, too.

14 posted on 01/24/2006 10:09:54 AM PST by George Smiley (This tagline deliberately targeted journalists.)
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To: seanmerc
No close STRIKE tag. Bad me.

Not directed at seanmerc.... I understand the guilt. We know we're sending recruits to do our dirty work, and we want to seem grateful.

I understand the guilt. We know we're sending recruits volunteersto do our dirty work, and we want to seem grateful.

We *are* grateful, dirtbag.

And you should be, too.

By the way, calling him a wuss is an insult to wusses everywhere.

15 posted on 01/24/2006 10:11:09 AM PST by George Smiley (This tagline deliberately targeted journalists.)
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To: seanmerc

I just finished reading the piece on Drudge's web site and had to come over here to express how outraged I am. I have absolutely had it with leftists and their pollyannish view of the world. What they fail to understand is human nature, and one undeniable truth about human nature is that bullies will be bullies until someone gives it right back to them twice as hard. I learned that little lesson in grade school, but these overprotected, facile wimps think Osama bin Laden and company will just give up their murderous ways if only we would try to understand them and be sensitive to their needs. What a load of crap!


16 posted on 01/24/2006 10:18:25 AM PST by piperpilot
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To: RexBeach
Surely, there must be something these people would fight for? What then?

The right to kill unborn babies perhaps?

17 posted on 01/24/2006 10:18:44 AM PST by WVNan
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To: RexBeach
What would these people fight for?

We already know.

Violent "resistance" at WTO meetings & Republican conventions; armed attacks on Republican campaign offices; ELF/ALF "actions"; destruction of GM seed test plots; relentless use of the judicial system to obtain 'legislation' they couldn't get legislatively enacted...the list goes on & on.

OTOH, very little of that is "for"; almost all of it is "against".

Their motto is, "Birkenstocks & tofu for all, paid for by none!"

18 posted on 01/24/2006 10:19:07 AM PST by ApplegateRanch (Mad-Mo! Allah bin Satan commands ye: Bow to him 5 times/day: Head down, @ss-up, and fart at Heaven!)
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To: RexBeach

"One again, another liberal whackjob who thinks 9/11 was a made for TV movie. It didn't really happen, so why are we off killing terrorists(oops, freedom fighters) in Iraq and Afghanistan?"

As George Carlin once said;
"If crime fighters fight crime, and firefighters fight fire, what do freedom fighters fight?"

The left is entirely correct labeling terrorists as freedom fighters.


19 posted on 01/24/2006 10:23:30 AM PST by Renderofveils ("A is for all the tea they taxed, M is for the minutemen they shellaxed...")
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To: RexBeach
I went to a writers workshop a few months ago and couldn't believe how many of them were screaming, raving liberal lunatics.

I am working on a book involving a war between the United States and an alliance between China and Mexico and you should have heard the screams this brought when I presented some of my sample chapters.

20 posted on 01/24/2006 10:28:01 AM PST by Stonewall Jackson ("I see storms on the horizon")
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