In the small Texas town of Canyon Lake, a sea of Bush ideologues, there is a stong voice of reason: Doug Kirk, the much attacked publisher of the Canyon Lake Weekly. Recently, a letter to the editor from Frances Shannon went too far. Way too far.

“It is people like you who cry anti-war slogans, criticize our commander-in-chief for liberating Iraq and Afghanistan from barbarian rule that I was referring to as wimps,” she wrote. Besides Doug, she also included in the “wimps with no backbone that do not deserve to be called Americans” category, “wives, mothers, and others that complain.”

This rated more than a simple letter to the editor response.

For your information, Frances Shannon, when you were at home baking cookies, I and thousands of other “wimps with no backbone” were crawling around in Vietnam. While some at home were being “patriotic” and proudly waving the American flag with self-righteousness and vociferously supporting that un-mitigated disaster, as is being done today with Iraq, I and thousands of other Americans were getting shot to hell and back, as is happening in Iraq today.

Thirty-five years later, after all the pontificating about “never again” has faded from memory, that same flag of false and misguided patriotism once again “proudly” waves over America. It seems that never again is here again (if it ever went away).

The ease at which those of you who so blindly follow Bush can label fellow citizens as “wimps without backbone that do not deserve to be called Americans,” including those of us who are combat veterans, concerns me in some ways more than my serious concerns for George Bush. Having been decorated for counter-insurgency operations in 1966, having been three times wounded and living a life fighting the effects of Agent Orange, I am not a wimp.

By your statements, one can only conclude that you believe the only patriotic Americans are those that toot the horn for George Bush. I guess it makes no difference to you that the man you support has cut and is cutting funding for the Veterans Administration which to date has forced over 250,000 veterans out of the system due to a lack of funding. At the same time, this same man is creating more veterans and more disabled veterans.

If continuing my open opposition to the Bush cabal makes me a “wimp without backbone,” I guess I’ll be a wimp without backbone for whatever life I have remaining. For I will go to my grave in opposition to any and all who preach perpetual war for profit.

The thing that really stands out is that the vast majority of those who feel free to label their fellow citizens as un-patriotic, un-American, traitors, wimps, etc., especially those of us who actually wore the uniform and went to war, is that they themselves, for whatever reason, never wore this country’s uniform and never went to war. The arrogance of people to call anyone, let alone combat veterans, wimps and un-American is astounding!

My right to criticize was born in the thick of war. Your right to criticize was born in your front rooms from watching 30-second sound bites on Fox “news.” My right is carried by sacrifice, yours by privilege.

A Free Iraq?

As for the statement Iraq is liberated and the Iraqi people are now free, it would be laughable if it were not so very sad. Sure the Iraqi people are now free, free to be a part of the 60% unemployed and free to watch Halliburton import thousands of foreign laborers to “rebuild” Iraq. Free to watch the wholesale privatization of their nation’s resources, infrastructure, economy and everything in between by the same U.S. multinationals importing labor. But the Iraqi people have been liberated.

They are now free to see their fellow citizens subject to arrest, detention, torture, and murder in the same prisons that Saddam used for the very same purposes. But they have been liberated and they are now free. They are now free to watch their country turned into what it never was until the politically driven and ideology based invasion: ground zero for fools and fanatics. But Iraq has been liberated and the Iraqi people are now free.

They are free to wonder, with all the money Halliburton has been paid, when they will have potable water and electricity more than 8 hours a day; they are free to wonder about this and much more. They are free to wonder why Americans pay no attention to their own General Accounting Office reports that clearly state Iraq is worse off than before the invasion. (GAO report, 6/2004: “Iraq is Worse off Than Before the War Began”)

I could go on for a long time enumerating the theft of Iraq, but time and space prevent that. Be that as it may, one last thought on the “liberation” of Iraq: For those willing to use the brain’s memory cells, you will recall that in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, not one time was “liberating Iraq” part of the discussion. From the beginning, it was weapons of mass destruction, mushroom clouds over Manhattan, and the link between Saddam, bin Laden, and al Qaeda, all of which has proven to be false and deliberately so! It was when those “reasons” began to unravel that Bush’s adventure morphed in to a war of “liberation.” This was deliberate deception, just like with Vietnam.

I for one am really tired of Bush and company pissin’ on my boots while trying to convince me it’s raining. The crazy part is how many of you are reaching for umbrellas.

Jack Dalton is a disabled Vietnam veteran suffering from the effects of Agent Orange. He lives in Portland, Oregon.